Chapter 1630: No Time to Die (29)

Facts have proven that the classic fable of "The Boy Who Cried Wolf," having been passed down for so many years and remaining evergreen, naturally possesses its own unique wisdom.

Throughout the many years of his struggle against the Joker, Batman has become all too familiar with the Joker's behavioral patterns and his methods for setting up conspiracies.

Many DC comic fans find it hard to understand: given how omnipotent Batman is, why does he only discover the Joker is up to something at the very last moment when the Joker presents him with a moral dilemma? Shouldn't he be discovering it the moment the hostages are taken?

Firstly, Batman is like an emperor in a feudal monarchy, with a harem of three thousand beauties; Cat Getan has countless villains taking turns causing trouble, and he cannot favor the Joker alone.

When the Joker is secretly plotting, other villains have already brought their own brutal criminal scenes to the table, and Batman must prioritize stopping the most dangerous ones.

Secondly, before the Joker decides to prepare a grand feast, he must inevitably create some appetizers to distract Batman, or play a double game.

Regardless of which set Batman chooses to investigate, the Joker can turn the other set into the main course to serve to Batman later. On the surface, it seems Batman is chasing the Joker's tail and failing to stop the conspiracy in advance, but in reality, he may have already resolved a dozen other conspiracies while in pursuit.

Batman has experienced this too many times, so naturally, he assumes the Joker has once again concocted a dilemma to mess with his head.

Batman analyzes that this time, the Joker's conspiracy seems to target Spider-Man. After all, the Joker injected the "Source of Darkness" serum—condensed from Cat Getan's rain—into Spider-Man shortly after his debut, hoping to see him turn evil and then turn against Batman.

But in truth, that was only the Joker's temporary plan; the trap he had been laying all along targeted the Robins who frequently appeared in Cat Getan.

Even in this matter, Batman couldn't conceive of any other possibilities. After all, what reason or motive would the members of the Bat-family have to acquire a large bomb to destroy Cat Getan?

What would be the point? And how could they undergo such a sudden personality shift in such a short time? No matter who thinks about it, the probability of such a thing is extremely low, bordering on non-existent.

This brings us to Batman's preconceived notions about the universe where Schiller resides—or perhaps it's not just a preconceived notion. With so many universes and so many Gothams, how different can they be? Even if the Gothams of different universes differ, how much could they really vary?

Since they are all the same, the "little birds" were essentially just on a trip. Having returned from a Cat Getan with better sunshine, they should be more cheerful and lively, not suddenly thinking about destroying the world.

Impossible, absolutely impossible!

But coincidences in this world rarely follow logic. The Robins had indeed gone mad, and they had gone mad in a way that perfectly coincided with the Joker's behavioral patterns. Batman could naturally pin this black pot on the Joker, and because the Joker had never imagined he might one day face such a false accusation, he hadn't left himself any room to clear his name. He couldn't wash himself clean even if he jumped into the Yellow River.

He is like the boy in the "Wolf" story; he has cried wolf too many times. Not only does Batman no longer believe him, but not a single villain in Cat Getan believes him either, as this isn't the first time the Joker has pitted them against each other or used them as pawns.

The Riddler, Penguin, Clayface, Hugo Strange, and Black Mask mostly just sneered or ignored him when they heard his cries. Corrupt officials, gangs, wealthy businessmen, and police officers simply turned him away or refused to see him.

In the end, the only one who truly believed this cry of "wolf" was Spider-Man.

"What? Mr. Joker, you say some villain got a giant nuke and wants to blow up this city? Why didn't you tell me sooner?!"

Spider-Man grabbed Joker's sleeve, looking anxious. Joker's eyes darted around; he immediately turned to respond to Spider-Man: "Listen, you call yourself Spider-Man, right? I must tell you, Batman is human too; he isn't omniscient or omnipotent. So if he tells you everything is fine, it might not necessarily be true..."

"Of course, I don't think he's a god who knows everything. He definitely has things he hasn't anticipated."

Joker was actually taken aback; this was the first time he'd met a Robin who didn't worship Batman like a god.

"So, tell me quickly what's going on. We can join forces to take precautions early, to prevent some supervillain from actually blowing up the city!"

Listening to Spider-Man's tone, Joker pondered for a moment. He looked at Spider-Man and said, "You seem to have a lot of experience with this?"

Spider-Man opened his mouth, then closed it. Finally, he said helplessly, "You might not believe me, but for the past few years, I've been running around saving the world. I don't know how many times the city I live in has been blown up."

"Then I suppose we have something in common." Joker immediately acted like a guiding philosopher, though he didn't describe himself as a good person, but rather said quite sincerely, "In the past, I was indeed a criminal. I went to the police station to turn myself in and confessed all my crimes. You heard it, right?"

Spider-Man nodded, affirming this. Joker then took a step further: "You must find it very strange why I confessed but then broke out of prison? But I must say, if it were for my own sake, there would be no benefit in this at all."

"Although I am a mental patient and will eventually be sent to a mental hospital, the act of breaking out of the interrogation room will definitely cause the nurses to increase my dosage. That's certainly no good thing for me."

Spider-Man nodded in agreement again. What Joker said was indeed the truth, at least from Spider-Man's perspective, there were no flaws. After all, he hadn't spent years playing cat-and-mouse with the Joker like Batman had, so he didn't know his tricks very well.

In Spider-Man's view, if Joker didn't want to go to prison, there was no need for him to turn himself in and confess. Since he had confessed and then broken out, wouldn't his confession be in vain?

"My escape has hidden reasons. There are some things only I can stop, and Batman is just taking a wait-and-see attitude, showing no reaction to the imminent crisis. Buddy, I'm really not smearing him."

Joker deliberately adjusted his tone, making his word choice and inflection sound more youthful, fully demonstrating his ability to tell people what they want to hear.

Sure enough, Spider-Man was intrigued. He adopted a posture of attentive listening, and Joker didn't keep him in suspense: "Just like I said, there's a group of people who want to restore gang rule here. They got a giant bomb—a massive hydrogen bomb. It looks like it was produced in the former Soviet Union. It's highly likely a test version developed before the Tsar Bomba. The yield is second only to the Tsar Bomba that was tested—what's even more terrifying is that this might not be the original Soviet version; they might have modified it!!!"

When Joker reached the end, he was practically screaming. He seemed to have had a sudden episode, his handcuffed hands clenching into fists, pounding the table with a high-pitched, sharp voice.

"Batman! Your little birds didn't just buy a giant bomb from the Soviets; they actually modified it themselves! I really want to crack open their skulls and see what's inside! They modified it! With drills and screwdrivers!!!!"

Suddenly, Joker grabbed the bars, staring fixedly at Batman, baring his teeth and gums, and said: "They intend to rebuild gang order in Cat Getan, letting that bunch of people with zero artistic taste, no philosophical inspiration, and full of copper-stink occupy our home. Batman, how can you be so indifferent?!"

Batman stood outside the interrogation room bars, looking at the Joker's madness with the same cold, stern expression as always. Only after Joker finished speaking did Batman open his mouth.

"Joker, I know you want to alienate me from the Robins. This isn't the first time you've done this. But after you discovered that even after injecting Spider-Man with the 'Source of Darkness' serum, he didn't become worse, you set your sights on the other members of the Bat-family."

"But I must say, the lie you've concocted this time is very poor." Batman shook his head, then began to analyze.

"Previously, I noticed that the gangs of Cat Getan, which had long been scattered, were showing signs of regrouping. At the same time, my Robins began staying out all night; everyone seemed very busy."

"According to standard logic, I would most likely connect these two things. But in reality, this is all a conspiracy you've orchestrated to alienate me from the Bat-family."

"Your Joker gang members haven't caused trouble for a long time. They are the ones stirring up the gangs behind the scenes, creating the illusion of a gang resurgence, and then using various conspiracies to keep the Robins busy, distancing them from me and reducing communication within the Bat-family."

"For some reason, I didn't investigate the clues of the gang unrest in time. But if I'm not mistaken, if I follow this thread, I will definitely find the Robins' tracks, because this was all carefully arranged by you, with the goal of making me feel that the members of the Bat-family have betrayed me and become my enemies."

"But Joker, you are too impatient." Batman narrowed his eyes slightly and said: "You saw that I had a new Robin, so you couldn't wait to apply this plan to him."

"You first created the 'Source of Darkness' serum and injected it into Spider-Man, hoping to see him go mad and turn against me, so that I would feel isolated and helpless."

"But seeing that the serum had no effect, you started from Spider-Man's psychological level, wanting to make him feel that I am his enemy by showing him some of Cat Getan's darkness, thereby alienating us."

"Originally, I failed to connect the sudden gang unrest with the Robins' long absences, but the conspiracy you showed me against Spider-Man reminded me: the targets you are attacking aren't just the new Robin. You had already laid traps for the other Robins long before Spider-Man appeared in my field of vision."

Batman took a step forward, looking into Joker's eyes: "But you can't fool me, Joker."

"You appearing at the police station is nothing more than wanting me to feel that even a dangerous criminal like the Joker has to turn himself in to seek help because of the Robins' crazy actions, implying the Bat-family members must have become evil to the extreme."

"You are putting on this panicked, pleading act just to show that you are standing with me, and that the Robins are our common enemy."

"But you are wrong, Joker." Batman lightly flicked his cape and turned around. In the empty, dark police station corridor, only his deep, stern voice remained.

"Even if you have long been weaving conspiracies, laying traps, and guiding every step, I will never believe my children are my enemies. The darkness of this city is forged by you. Batman will not misidentify his enemies, nor will he ever turn against the Robins."

"Give up your conspiracy to alienate the Bat-family, Joker. You will not succeed."

Joker watched Batman leave, completely dumbfounded.

The Joker hadn't persuaded him that he should grasp the main contradiction when disaster was imminent, but the reply he always got was "Don't worry, I'm very fast, it won't take much time."

Actually, it didn't take much time, but if it went on like this, Cat Getan's civilization construction would really be thriving.

By then, even if the Cat Getan Friendly Neighborhood Award was awarded to Spider-Man, the Joker who followed Spider-Man to brush his face would also have to go on stage to receive the award.

What's more terrifying is that the person presenting the award would have to be Bruce Wayne.