Chapter 2880: When Night Falls (IX)

Dick turned his head away tremblingly. He gritted his teeth and argued, "This was just a means of self-preservation. If I hadn't appeared at all during the day, it would have been too obvious..."

"Yes, I understand. Then what about the afternoon tea?"

Dick couldn't answer. Batman still looked at him and said, "You could have chosen not to eat. That wouldn't have seemed very abrupt, because there was another person who didn't touch anything."

"That doctor..." Dick gritted his teeth.

"What should you call him?"

"Dr. Shiler." Dick met Batman's gaze for the first time in his life, and then said, "Without him, my plan would have proceeded very smoothly..."

Batman just looked at him without speaking.

In the end, it was Dick who couldn't accept such a confrontation. He took a deep breath, didn't loosen his hand grabbing Batman's arm, just looked away and said, "I have to admit that my sanity was affected to some extent. This isn't an excuse to escape, but it is indeed the case."

"After my fangs were pulled out, I felt a bit dizzy. I originally thought it was the aftereffect of the pain, but it seems it wasn't like that. I felt some connections were broken. I'm not sure what that was."

"You can't use providing clues as a way to change the subject, Dick. Many times, I am a detective, but more often, I am a father."

Dick didn't seem to expect Batman to say such things. He glanced at Batman, but quickly moved his eyes away and said, "Do you want to accuse me of lying to you?"

"Shouldn't this be accused?"

Very good, a perfect kill. Although Batman didn't know where Shiler got his understanding of Dick, at least based on his understanding of Dick, a sober Dick had normal justice values. He couldn't say words of denial one hundred percent.

"So you just mind that I lied to you?"

Something was wrong. Batman suddenly reacted. Dick chose to avoid the topic on this issue instead of clarifying the public interest first... It was too wrong.

"I told you not to have any guilt," Shiler's slightly frivolous tone came from the earpiece. "You aren't the only one who wants to manipulate something."

Batman suddenly felt anger rising in his heart, but Shiler's reminder was like a basin of cold water extinguishing his anger. "If this is all Dick's disguise, then you really can't blame him for taking some special means."

"Answer my question first."

"Which question?"

"What's different?"

"I... lied to you," Dick chose to admit.

Batman shook his head and said, "No, it's clearly that you don't respect me enough."

"You found me before you went to Blüdhaven and told me what you were thinking, then you proposed a plan for the future, asked for my opinion, and finally chose to leave."

"And what did you do today? Standing in the sunlight triumphantly, eating food that vampires shouldn't touch, thinking even more triumphantly in your heart that fortunately you were prepared, mocking me for testing the traitor with this method..."

Batman's hand was still on Dick's neck. He said, "If you had maintained the most basic respect for me, the situation wouldn't have become what it is now."

Batman couldn't say that the words he repeated next didn't come from his true heart.

"You chose to provoke me in this way, but you were surprised that I would want to kill you. Is it that you still fantasize that you have the capital to be pardoned? No, you don't, Mr. Grayson. I said, you have already reached the last level."

"You must be very unconvinced why the punishment evolved from 'turning around and leaving' to what it is today, but this is all your fault."

"You chose to be my enemy, but couldn't see your own position, still thinking you were my son, feeling that I would treat you with the tolerance I treat children. Too naive."

"Since you chose to betray me, but didn't make a move at the fastest speed, even leaving time for me to prepare various tests, blindly indulging in the happiness of keeping me in the dark. Too stupid."

"Even if I made a move on you, you still felt that you could make me feel pain because of your special position in my heart, instead of choosing to use the power you newly acquired to kill me with one blow. Too cowardly."

"Dick, the biggest difference is that the you who went to Blüdhaven made me feel proud, while the you now only makes me feel disappointed."

"So I will need you to prove your loyalty to me, because this is the only way you can take back your status. Powerful but free, weak but loyal, you can only choose the latter."

Dick looked at him with wide eyes and said, "You said as long as I think it's not worth it, you could..."

"You didn't pay a greater price for your stupidity. Otherwise, the best situation now would be being soaked in some solution in the Batcave, becoming the raw material for my research on the vampire virus antidote."

"You are threatening me again?!"

"You don't seem so scared anymore, because you think you have a chance of winning? Or is it that you finally understand that you can't manipulate me?"

The moment red light appeared in Dick's eyes again, Batman gripped his neck tightly. The cross necklace Dick wore around his neck was pressed into his palm until it cut the skin on the side of Dick's neck.

Flames burned again. Dick let out a scream. His defense against holy artifacts seemed to exist only on the surface of the skin. Once it came into contact with the inside, he would also be injured.

Shiler's judgment was correct. This holy artifact from England was exceptionally easy to use. Perhaps the neck was also the lifeblood of a vampire. The damage from Batman's move was even greater than the one Shiler gave Dick behind his back. Dick's entire neck was burned.

He struggled painfully, but Shiler said in the earpiece, "Although I think you should teach him a lesson, disfigurement wouldn't be good. Take him to the Batcave."

Batman didn't let go, so the cross was still pressed against the wound. He dragged Dick to the Batcave like that and threw him into the prison.

"You don't have to feel angry," Shiler advised. "According to my observation, the vampire virus seems to partially distort people's minds. Even if I pulled out two of his teeth, it only made his hostility less obvious, but in fact, he has become much more vicious."

"How to eradicate this?" Batman wasn't asking Shiler, but asking himself. Since the disappearance incident, he had already started investigating matters related to vampires, but currently, he still had no clue.

"You can't solve all of this," Dick's weak voice came. He mocked, "You still want to hold another afternoon tea..."

"He lacks too much respect for you," Shiler said. "Although there is the influence of the virus, it might also be that your usual majesty isn't enough. If it were me, I wouldn't have let him develop into what he is today..."

"Because I'm not a madman, I won't let my children live in fear at all times."

"Obviously you can't indulge him anymore."

"You said you could let me manipulate him, but you failed."

"Still far from it," Shiler's tone remained unhurried. He said, "Look, hasn't his true face been tested out?"

Batman's hand paused. Shiler continued, "He will play the role of your son, with the purpose of making you soft-hearted. You can also play the role of his father, but under the influence of the virus, he shouldn't be soft-hearted."

"Then why did he fall into your trap?"

"This is exactly the key to your victory over him. His love for you is engraved in his instinct, so it always presents habitual actions, which is why I could set a trap with the necklace and pull out his fangs."

"What you need to do is the same as me, use the love that the virus can't influence, first engrave fear on him, to truly tame him."

"I can't do that," Batman finally gave his answer. He said, "Fear is the deepest scar in a person's heart. After everything is over, he will suffer for it for a lifetime."

"What about sufficient love to compensate?"

"No," Batman said. "It can never compensate for each other. This is a pathological relationship that only you madmen like."

"What a pity," Shiler sighed. "So you intend to give up?"

"No, just no longer need your guidance," Batman's tone was terrifyingly calm. He said, "Actually, I know better than you how to manipulate Dick. I wanted to borrow your hand before, just to escape."

"Are you sure you won't go too far?"

"I am much more cautious than you imagine." Batman seemed to have returned to that Batman, his tone calm, always beating around the bush, answering every question, but not answering it.

"Then, I await the good news."

Shiler hung up the phone, knowing his goal had been achieved. He never intended to interfere in the relationship between this father and son. He just wanted Batman to realize that the greatest danger of the vampire virus was its ability to distort people's minds.

But this wasn't to make Batman feel painful or embarrassed, but precisely to stimulate his greatest potential, and even make him temporarily put down a part of his moral constraints.

It wouldn't be wrong to say Batman is a human supremacist, but his definition of human isn't that extreme. Those with superpowers are human, those who die and come back to life are human, and even those with different bloodlines can be human.

In Batman's view, the encoding of the flesh isn't that important, so there might be a situation where there are humans among vampires. As long as they sincerely repent and identify as human, Batman might treat them as human.

This situation is most likely to appear in the Bat-family. If his children sincerely repent, although Batman will lock them up for fear of them hurting people, he won't feel they are monsters in his heart, and naturally won't truly judge them, and then use those means to deal with criminals to deal with them.

But mental betrayal is something Batman cannot accept, and especially for his children, directly distorting moral concepts is a kind of degeneration that Batman cannot tolerate the most. Using evil means to deceive and refusing to repent is committing a major taboo.

Batman doesn't have much love, almost all of it given to his children. If someone wants to use this to deal with him, they will inevitably receive Batman's thunderous means.

As long as Batman can get over the hurdle in his heart and take out means aimed at criminals, then this pile of little birds in the Bat-family really isn't enough to look at.

It's just that it's useless for others to go and tell him; he has to discover it himself. Love for children is too easy to confuse him. Shiler's operation on Dick was just to let Batman see reality.

Facts proved that Shiler's plan had no problems. That night, Dick reappeared at the dinner table.

Logically speaking, Dick's attention should be on the murderer who pulled out his two teeth, but the fact was, during the entire dinner time, all of Dick's attention was firmly attracted to Batman, constantly stroking the cross around his neck.

Although he didn't know the specific process, obviously, Batman succeeded. Dick's little manipulation means were still too far behind compared to his.

"What did you do?" After dinner, Shiler asked, looking at Dick's happy back.

"I offered a condition he couldn't refuse."

"I'd like to hear the details."

"He can enter the laboratory when performing surgery."

"Just like that?" Shiler looked at Batman.

"And I will tell everyone that the necklace is the most important holy relic, now exclusively his."

"You have no qualifications to say I'm a pervert," Shiler picked up the wine glass and evaluated it like this. ===== CHAPTER 2881 =====