Chapter 2194: Battle of the Two Cities! (Part 72)

The Joker chanted the prayer.

The next second, he discovered that this thing was actually connected to Bruce in front of him.

The Joker instantly stopped believing in God again, and now he even wanted to grab God by the throat and ask him, "Are you blind?!"

Beyond all the misfortunes the Joker had encountered, he derived another completely different kind of despair today—this unidentified object in front of him was actually a f***ing angel.

"Then do you want to know what this is all about?" Bruce asked quite triumphantly.

The Joker stared at him gloomily. At least he now discovered that Bruce had completely utilized his curiosity—about the Court of Owls, about Superman, about mysterious powers, and especially about the ins and outs of all this.

If one only viewed the Joker as a synonym for chaos, then it would be a bit of a flattening of his madness.

He was actually a quite inquisitive, even fanatical explorer. He had long indulged in various strange thoughts. If he found an opportunity to verify or practice them, he would never let it go. He even didn't advocate getting something for nothing in this regard, but was more willing to obtain more satisfaction through the process of paying for knowledge through equivalent exchange.

Or rather, the process was the most important. The anticipation of a certain answer when paying time, energy, or other costs could bring a sense of security. This was the reason why most excellent scholars were more focused than ordinary people.

Bruce asking this was equivalent to telling the Joker: Yes, there is a certain answer that you definitely don't know. If you pay the price to explore it, you will definitely gain something.

Who could refuse this?

Let alone the Joker, Batman couldn't either. This was even his favorite thing to do. So-called reasoning was the same as this.

The Joker rubbed his hands excitedly. He didn't feel sad for a moment because the comedy master had a black-history ugly photo taken by the audience. He immediately came to the scene—it was still the Joker!

Bruce sat on the ground with his legs crossed, looked at the picture he had drawn earlier, and said: "I think you already know that this lake is the source of darkness, the creator of all misfortunes related to Gotham. We usually call it the Source of Darkness."

"There lives a giant dragon in the Source of Darkness, named Barbatos. His appetite is very big, and he wants to swallow all universes with darkness in one breath."

Peter immediately said with some shock: "My God, then what should we do? Who will stop him?"

"We don't need to stop him. The giant dragon in the lake intends to use this water to erode every universe. Even if we block the flood back this time and the water returns to the lake, the giant dragon can stir up another flood at any time. So-called 'blocking is not as good as dredging,' that is exactly it."

Clark touched his chin and said: "Makes sense, so you intend to drain the water in the lake before the flood happens."

"In fact, the flood has already happened, just on a smaller scale, but sooner or later a big disaster will come. What we have to do is to constantly drain the water, constantly delay the date of the disaster, until everyone is ready."

Peter's gaze was fixed on the river channel Bruce had drawn earlier. He said: "So how is this done?"

"You have to ask yourself."

"Me?"

Peter remembered that mysterious black sun. Peter had just understood that all the dark energy was handed to them by the black sun. That is to say, the so-called river channel was actually the black sun.

Then how did Bruce know?

Peter secretly glanced at Bruce, thinking, could he also be a believer of the black sun?

This made sense. Perhaps it was the black sun that didn't want the dark flood to drown the universe, and it instructed one believer to find another believer to complete this great feat.

The Joker, however, squinted at the picture Bruce drew. He had just received power from Peter and didn't see anything, but he believed that in the mysterious Source of Darkness, there must be a power unknown to the dark giant dragon at this time, constantly digging the river channel and letting the dark energy flow out continuously.

The Joker's guess was not half wrong.

Barbatos had been a bit puzzled recently.

He had encountered the same thing as Chthon before. He woke up, and half of the brick wall in his house was missing.

Of course, it wasn't that exaggerated. If one had to use an analogy, it was like a piece of firewood missing from a whole stack of firewood used for winter.

However, because the firewood stack was piled up in a relatively regular posture, the owner knew best how he had placed the firewood, so although it was just a piece of firewood missing, Barbatos also keenly discovered it.

He searched back and forth in the Source of Darkness for a long time but couldn't find the missing piece of firewood. He thought it might have been bestowed upon some believer by him earlier and he forgot, so he simply didn't look for it anymore.

A day passed and another piece of firewood was missing...

A day passed and it was missing again...

A day passed and...

Barbatos hadn't done anything these past few days, just squatted in his own home to see where this damn firewood thief came from. As a result, he didn't squat on anyone, so he didn't look for it again.

Of course, it wasn't that he was generous. Barbatos was now the Source of Darkness for the entire universe, which meant he was the thing that produced oil, not some middleman.

Stealing a part of Barbatos to the bright universe was equivalent to accelerating his plan to invade the bright universe. After all, the main body of his plan was to secretly erode the bright universe with dark power and then settle it in one fell swoop. Even if it was stolen to the dark universe, it would eventually return to the Source of Darkness, which was meaningless.

So, besides being a bit puzzled by the unannounced taking, Barbatos didn't think about chasing it at all. If they liked to move it, let them move it. No matter how far they moved it, it was still a part of him anyway.

As for the three unlucky things in the sky, Barbatos didn't list them as suspects at all. The home of this group of outer gods was not in this world at all. Dark energy couldn't leave the Source Wall, so naturally, it couldn't go to other worlds. Stealing it was useless.

Moreover, the style of these three didn't look like they needed energy. Taking a step back, the sun had been hanging in the sky, and it was impossible to steal the little heat from your fireplace because of heat decay. The scale was not on the same level at all.

Bruce explained this to the other three.

"So this thing is corrosive and can't be used directly?" Peter said with some confusion: "Then the drained water can only be poured away, that's too wasteful, right?"

"Of course not poured away." Bruce supported his cheek with one hand and said: "Although it can't be used directly, it can be used for investment. Have you heard of money laundering?"

All three looked up at him. Bruce pointed to the ground and said: "This is equivalent to black money earned from illegal business. It cannot legally exist in any financial system in the world, and using it directly will face the danger of being arrested."

"But the usual way to deal with it is to take this black money to invest in legal industries. The continuous output of legal industries is equivalent to laundering the black money. This is also the safest method so far."

"If it's money, it's fine, but I don't understand, can energy also be used for investment? Invest in what?" Peter asked again.

Bruce showed a mysterious smile.

In a dilapidated wooden hut on the coast, a sloppy man in a trench coat leaned on the sofa, muttering to himself, and the wine bottle in his hand slid from the sofa to the ground.

With a "whoosh," he saw a rune light up in front of him, scaring him into scrambling up in a panic.

"Who? Who's there?! Come out! I see you!"

He saw another version of himself walk in from the doorway.

Constantine looked blankly at this younger version of himself, who didn't even look like him. He rubbed his eyes hard and sucked in some saliva.

"You're not dreaming, nor are you high or drunk. I am another version of yourself from another universe, just here to find you."

Constantine slumped back onto the sofa and said: "People say you see another version of yourself before you die. It seems I'm dying?"

"If you don't listen to my advice, you will die soon." The young Constantine walked to his plane, sat on the sofa, and looked at himself and said: "Soon you will encounter some trouble and need to borrow debt again to solve it. Then you will find that both Heaven and Hell have closed their doors to you, and only one door is open for you."

"Behind the door is a black sun. He is incomparably generous and kind, lending you vast energy you have never possessed or even dared to imagine. Then you will die in this accident, and your soul will come to the mysterious fog."

"Is the fog of Heaven very big?"

"You don't belong to Heaven, nor do you belong to Hell." Constantine sighed and said: "You belong to the person you owe the most. Both body and soul will belong to him."

The young Constantine seemed to realize something. He turned his head and looked out the window. On the coastline where the sun was dazzling and the heat waves in the air were clearly visible, a man in a long black trench coat was walking towards this side.

Constantine's Adam's apple moved.

The black figure soon walked onto the porch. He knocked on the door and walked in. He just glanced at the young Constantine and then fixed his gaze on the Constantine slumped on the sofa.

"How are you? John Constantine, All Souls College, Oxford University sends its regards. Have you heard about the case that happened in Wales recently?"

Constantine coughed heavily several times, barely supporting his body with his elbows to sit up from the sofa, sighed, and said: "It seems I'm more popular than I thought. What's going on with you two? Tell me."

"I am shallow in learning." Soship lowered his eyes and said: "But the school usually teaches us that angels and devils will use all methods to shake you, and the most common method is to become someone you care about."

"Not bad at all, Doctor." Constantine lit a cigarette. The next second, the fire on the cigarette tip turned into a ball of flame and flew towards the young Constantine.

The young Constantine dodged quickly. He anxiously wanted to open his mouth, but the next second, an extremely painful expression appeared on his face. He clutched his heart and knelt down trembling.

Soship took the cigarette Constantine handed over and said: "In common contracts, devils always set terms to prevent their believers from saying their names. If believers try to do so, they will be severely punished."

"Sneaky guy," Constantine commented.

The young Constantine pursed his lips and stood up, clenching his fists tightly. He stared at Soship's profile for a long time, and before his figure disappeared from the magic flame, he said: "Thanks for the reminder."

"You're welcome." ===== CHAPTER 2195 =====