Chapter 50: Is It Not Also a Kind of Cow?

Harvey Dent didn't die; in fact, even Rachel Dawes was fine.

Ma Ma Zhaodi watched the news report, smiling with great joy; he could almost be completely certain of his judgment because the system's prompts never err.

He casually filled a cornucopia with grapes, corn, small pumpkins, and cherry tomatoes; today was Thanksgiving, another holiday representing another job, and the cornucopia in his hand was precisely the item this part-time job required him to deliver.

"Even the usage count of the protective amulet necklace shown in the system panel hasn't decreased; Harvey Dent is truly impressive, ten seconds must be very ample time for him."

Thinking of this, his smile faded again because the latter half of the news seemed very strange.

Why was Harvey's wife hospitalized? He couldn't figure this out at all; if her admission on the day of the explosion was because she needed examination, then today, under no circumstances should she still be staying in the hospital, right?

Could there be some change he didn't know about?

He carefully recalled memories concerning Harvey's wife, but in reality, he could only recall the Harvey Dent girlfriend kidnapped by the Joker in the Dark Knight trilogy; clearly, these two had nothing whatsoever to do with each other.

"I'd better go to the hospital to check, and retrieve the cross necklace along the way."

—

"Do you think his account is at all plausible? This isn't the first time I've heard it—"

"Harvey Dent shot the Roman's nephew twice in the head? I don't believe it, I won't believe it, and neither should you."

Harvey, who had just entered the room, knew nothing of the conversation that had occurred between Gordon and Batman; he was merely slightly dazed while tearing off his mask.

At the same time, feeling like two people was truly strange, yet he seemed quite accustomed to it, even feeling a bit reluctant to let go, as if he had been born as two people all along.

"So, no murder charges against the Irish mob—I intend to let them go directly; we'll leak some news to the streets, say we reached an agreement with them, and then see how the Roman reacts."

"We can still charge them; they admitted to intent to murder, bombed your house, and sent Rachel to the hospital."

Hearing Gordon mention Rachel, Harvey's mood grew somber.

He had tricked Rachel into wearing the cross necklace from the package and led her to dodge the main blast radius, but even though no external injuries were found on her body, she still fell into a coma and has not awakened to this day.

Gordon's words indeed touched his heart, because Rachel's condition remains unclear even now, but if they proceed this way, there will be no gain.

"They can post bail within an hour, bribe the judge, and we'll still have nothing."

Batman watched the two argue, silent; at such a moment, he did not wish to make a decision for them.

"Charge them, Harvey, for God's sake, or I'll go to the district attorney's office and find someone willing to prosecute them." Gordon's words at this moment were each filled with anger; Harvey's wife had been hospitalized, yet now they were to release those bastards innocent for the sake of solving the case, which made him unable to suppress his burning rage; he had always despised such lawless thugs who brazenly provoked the judiciary and walked free.

If Gordon did not possess such integrity, the Gotham Police Department might still be one of the mob's protective umbrellas to this day.

Harvey was wrong; the time it took for the Irish mob members to be bailed out of prison was even less than an hour.

Gordon truly missed dinner; Harvey stayed at the hospital watching over Rachel through the night, while Batman took a Thanksgiving feast into the sewers—only to find Solomon there eating another meal, which reminded him again of the friend Grandi had mentioned.

"Grandi? Who brought you your meal?"

However, the big man did not answer him, merely eating on his own.

Batman glanced around; besides the sewage on the ground, it seemed everything else had been eaten into Grandi's stomach; Solomon's friend had left no trace whatsoever to investigate—encountering an incident and instinctively wanting to investigate was Batman's natural reaction.

On the other side, Harvey also returned to the hospital.

Rachel still lay on the hospital bed, showing not the slightest sign of awakening, so he took her hand, warming her cool palm with his body heat, and sat by the bedside silently praying to God, hoping his wife would awaken soon.

At this moment, Harvey seemed to have returned to the role of a husband, a feeling somewhat strange to him; for a long time, he had always needed to make a choice between Gotham and his family, and he had always chosen Gotham; longer and longer overtime, more and more crimes, more and more dangers came pouring in, but he had endured them all.

But his return home came later and later, the cases he encountered grew bigger and bigger, and Rachel's pressure grew greater and greater—she wholeheartedly stayed in this city with Harvey, supporting every decision he made, yet her husband spent less and less time with her.

This city stole her husband, she often thought.

Harvey thought of things the two had said long ago, about wanting a child, to add a small life to the family, but to this day, that idea remained merely an idea; even until today, he only remembered he still had the identity of a husband.

I owe my wife an apology, he thought, feeling even more guilty; holding her hand like this, he leaned over her bedside and fell into a deep sleep.

Moments later, a nurse wearing a mask pushed the door open, glanced briefly at the patient in the room, then walked straight to Rachel's bedside.

His steps were very light, not waking Harvey; he reached out and lightly touched the cross necklace around Rachel's neck, and it vanished.

He turned his head again to look around the room, confirmed no one had noticed him, then quickly left the room.

"Hey, hey, John, look at this monitor, why did it suddenly stop working?"

In the monitoring room, the security guard eating a hamburger turned his head, saw that the monitor screen pointed to by his colleague was indeed speckled with white dots like snow, and couldn't help but scratch his head.

"It really is; damn it, I'll go check—huh, the picture is normal again?"

The two stared at each other, finally unable to figure it out, so they simply gave up thinking about it.

"Who cares, anyway, it's working now."

"Let me see: one computer set cost four thousand, equipping it with a phone cost five hundred, the nurse uniform cost twenty, Intermediate Stealth Mastery cost four thousand, custom bombs cost five hundred."

Ma Ma Zhaodi muttered these asset points spent over the past few days and sighed.

More than nine thousand deducted in money, and many things to worry about; trying to be a good person is truly exhausting and laborious.

I don't know how Harvey Dent managed to persevere.

(End of this chapter)