Chapter 2032

Someone moved Barbara's computer, and someone also moved the Bingshan Lounge's computer. Could this be a coincidence?

Batman hadn't heard that there were such brilliant hackers as Oracle in Cat Getan City. If one were to say it was the culprit Scarecrow, it wouldn't make sense. Even if he had such powerful technical personnel under his command, his ordinary military vehicles couldn't achieve the maneuverability of the Batmobile.

Batman re-sorted the timeline in his mind.

8:02 tonight, individual victims appeared, Scarecrow released the fear toxin Cat Getan destruction plan.

9:10, the Bat-Signal lit up, Batman began to formally confront Scarecrow. He first solved the street conflicts caused by fear toxin, while simultaneously having Barbara track Scarecrow's trail within Cat Getan City.

10:00, Batman was scratched on the arm during a street confrontation, saw the Joker's phantom in the mirror for the first time, and simultaneously Barbara discovered clues about the military vehicle.

10:20, Batman caught up to the military vehicle and subdued the two people inside. After obtaining the next clue, the military vehicle was brought back to the Batcave.

10:40, Batman rescued Poison Ivy in Scarecrow's safe house and, at Peter's request, sent Poison Ivy and the toxin seized from the driver back to the Batcave.

11:00, unknown toxic gas anesthetized everyone in the city, FBI plane appeared.

Clearly, 11:00 was a watershed. Before this, everything was still within Batman's expectations, but after the unknown toxic gas spread, things began to gradually exceed his control.

11:10, Barbara called, Batman learned Peter was kidnapped.

11:30, Batman discovered clues left by Scarecrow, followed the clues to the ACE chemical plant, but was ambushed, and after waking up, saw Nightwing who had come to support him.

11:40, began tracking Scarecrow again, chased Scarecrow all the way and discovered his four safe houses.

12:00, confronted the Arkham Knight on the rooftop, Cat Getan encountered missile bombardment.

This was another watershed. Batman discovered that he had already begun to lose control during this segment.

At 11 o'clock sharp, a type of unknown toxic gas spread in Cat Getan, causing almost everyone in the city to be anesthetized. At this time, shouldn't he be investigating the source of the toxic gas? Rushing to the weather control center at the first opportunity was the best choice.

But Batman didn't do that. He acted as if he were crazy, chasing Scarecrow.

No, he wasn't chasing Scarecrow, Batman suddenly thought. When the Arkham Knight appeared on the rooftop to block him, that inexplicable restlessness disappeared.

That urgency was directed at the Arkham Knight.

But why would it be like this? Now the clues were too few. Batman could only begin to recall again.

12:10, Batman woke up from the Batcave again. He remembered that when he was beating the Arkham Knight, the influence of the fear toxin and Joker virus broke out, causing the Arkham Knight to run away, while he himself returned to the Batcave.

12:20, finished chatting with Peter, learned that Penguin might be the culprit behind the military bombing of Cat Getan, Batman set off for the Bingshan Lounge.

12:30, arrived at the Bingshan Lounge, but didn't find any suspicious traces here. Penguin was insolent, Batman broke his legs, and just when he was about to take him away, information came from Nightwing's side, Batman left to go to the vault.

12:40, arrived at the vault, discovered signs of the vault door being violently broken into, investigated, and suspected that Harley Quinn had taken Gordon's group and kidnapped Barbara.

12:50, Penguin appeared on the screen, declaring that he was the one who killed Jason Todd.

1:00, the Joker's phantom appeared, saying that he had imprisoned and tortured Jason Todd, an explosion occurred in the street next door, Peter was chased and killed by the Arkham Knight.

This again had an obvious problem. The biggest problem Batman was facing at this time was the disappearance of Gordon and Barbara. What did Penguin have to do with this? Why was he chasing him relentlessly?

Oh, it was because Penguin was colluding with the military, and the military bombed Cat Getan. But since they had already bombed it, no one was hurt, and evidence could be found at any time. Why did he have to go to the Bingshan Lounge instead of immediately heading to the vault to rescue Gordon and then search for Barbara?

Batman felt that since 11 o'clock, his way of acting had become very strange, chasing one thing then another, but he hadn't caught anyone. Gordon and Barbara were missing, Peter was kidnapped, ran out, and was chased, Robin's communication channel had been silent for a long time, and he hadn't caught Penguin, Scarecrow, or Harley Quinn.

He investigated one thing halfway then went to investigate another, but didn't investigate any of them thoroughly. He didn't know who released the mysterious anesthetic, didn't know how to crack the fear toxin, didn't know who kidnapped Gordon and Barbara, and didn't know what the Arkham Knight wanted to do.

He had been busy for half the night, not only without obtaining any actual results but also being ignorant of everything.

Was it really the Joker virus and fear toxin that made him lose his reason?

No, that wasn't right. Batman became alert.

His judgment having problems was clearly not a forced error. Throughout this half of the night, he hadn't encountered any life-or-death dilemmas, nor had any judgment been made under extremely dangerous circumstances.

When people are panicked, their minds often go blank, they won't consider the reasons, they will hold a retaliatory or gambling mentality and pick one at random, and then sit and watch the development of the situation with a desperate mentality. Only in this situation can the errors be called forced errors.

And Batman felt that every one of his choices had been carefully considered.

Now he looked back and thought, the reason he had dragged it out for several hours without discovering the problem was precisely because of this. He felt that every one of his choices had a reason.

And the Joker virus and fear toxin that only existed in his mind clearly didn't have the ability to create a cause in reality. If they were strong enough to control Batman's body to do bad things, then why play this hallucination game?

In other words, the problem wasn't himself. There was indeed someone who created problems where there were none, coming up with a whole bunch of side quests, completely disrupting the entire plan to confront Scarecrow.

And every problem he created successfully guided Batman onto a side road unrelated to the main plot. The rewards seemed to be placed at the end of the side road, but before Batman could walk there, another side road appeared.

So Batman began a repetitive, futile effort, discovering one accident, learning of a clue, following the clue, discovering another accident, finding another clue.

This was equivalent to Batman taking a max-level character to repeatedly clear the beginner tutorial. You couldn't say he wasn't given rewards, but compared to Batman's level, the rewards were practically non-existent.

At the same time, the hostages or hero companions waiting at each level had also gone missing for various reasons because Batman was trapped in the beginner tutorial.

Then thinking about it from the reverse, there must be a final boss who deliberately set such a trap, because if Batman killed his way through the levels, he would be the one who suffered the most serious damage.

Who would this boss be?

Batman first ruled out Scarecrow and Penguin. Based on Batman's understanding of them, these two people only had three tricks—poisoning, bribery, and celebrating halfway through.

Joker? No, Joker wasn't this style. In this series of inducements, Batman didn't feel mental pain, nor did he face any interrogation of human nature.

This was an extremely special style. He didn't want to make anyone suffer, nor did he have a clear interest orientation, and it didn't even contain any emotion, containing only a slightly playful coldness, an academic coldness.

He didn't hate any chess piece, didn't want to gain any benefits from winning the game. Which step to take or simply throwing the chess piece away wasn't out of rational judgment, but more like it was out of interest.

A thought suddenly emerged in Batman's mind—"Experiment?... An experiment?"

And his next thought was that Cat Getan was about to have another tricky super-criminal, even trickier than the Joker after his death.

Batman didn't make this judgment out of thin air.

First, the timing of each seductive clue appeared exactly when Batman wanted to take the next step but hadn't yet acted.

Then why hadn't he acted? Because an accident occurred. For example, the first accident where everyone in the city was anesthetized successfully interrupted Batman's action to pursue Scarecrow.

Then a clue appeared. The FBI came. The timing of their appearance was so perfect that Batman would definitely suspect them, so Batman went to deal with the FBI.

Batman was about to attack the FBI plane when Barbara called, telling Batman that Gordon was trapped and Peter was kidnapped. Batman had to interrupt the investigation of the FBI line again.

And just when Batman wanted to support Gordon and simultaneously investigate Peter's kidnapping, the clue left by Scarecrow appeared again. He chased Scarecrow to the ACE chemical plant and was ambushed.

Clearly, this was another accident, completely interrupting Batman's multi-step plan to investigate the FBI, rescue Gordon, and Peter. Then came new clues...

After that, it was a complete cycle: accident, clue, another accident...

And in the process of reviewing, Batman keenly discovered that the role of the accident wasn't just to interrupt his investigation, but also to skillfully manipulate his emotions.

"Very good, Peter." A deeper, even gentle voice rang in Peter's ear.

Peter shuddered. He had met this personality in the Tower once before. He knew he was called "Manipulation."

In that one second, Peter Parker knew for the first time that his spider-sense could be so loud.

They almost didn't have a direct conversation, because Peter Parker actually couldn't hear what he was saying at all. The deafening sound of the spider-sense completely drowned out the voice.

And the moment his voice rang out, Peter shuddered again. The buzzing in his ears rang out, and after that, he couldn't hear the words at all.

Then Peter heard the other party sigh helplessly. The voice subsided, seemingly communicating with other Schillers. After a while, the voice of the Schiller doctor he was most familiar with rang out.

"Peter, don't worry, your plan is proceeding very smoothly, right? All of us have given you extremely high evaluations."

"However, we want to know if you adopted the guidance method of emotional manipulation in this plan, and we want to hear your specific thinking. Do you have time to talk to us now?"

"Uh, I'd be happy to talk, but I'm a bit busy right now."

"What are you busy with?"

The perspective of the bystander switched from Batman to Peter, and Peter was currently dragging a man and throwing him onto a truck.

Looking closely, the unconscious man being dragged was none other than Robin, and in the shadows inside the truck were Barbara and Gordon, who were also unconscious.

"Busy sending them to where they should go."