Chapter 3242

During the process of Bruce's recounting, Shiler recalled the plot of the *White Knight* comics.

To put it simply, the Joker in this universe was not a born lunatic; he started out as an ordinary person, a small-town boy who came to the big city full of aspirations to work, but because he had no real skills, he could only make a living telling jokes in bars.

Later, he developed a mental illness and became the insane Joker, but perhaps because he was not a sociopath but a genuine psychiatric patient, he was constantly plagued by his mental illness; thus, although he seemed crazy, he never committed any major crimes due to his poor mental state.

This was also the main reason why the citizens of Cat Getan were so ready to forgive him later; he was a true mental patient who, trapped by poverty and lacking treatment, had spiraled into madness.

The elderly butler, Alfred, of the Batman in this universe was dying, and he was suffering great mental torment because of it; one day, when he caught the Joker, he gave him a sound beating, hitting him a bit too hard, and it was filmed by someone.

The half-beaten Joker asked Batman if he was willing to take a gamble, and Batman, who was already losing his grip on his sanity, agreed; then the Joker produced medicine, and Batman shoved all of it into the Joker's mouth.

The Joker fell into a coma, and the video of Batman beating the Joker was released, causing him to suffer much criticism.

After waking up, the Joker became the White Knight; he used a series of frame-ups and false accusations to send Batman to prison.

In fact, it wasn't exactly a frame-up at first, because the White Knight had indeed discovered a 3 billion dollar natural disaster fund used to clean up Batman's messes, and he believed this was one of the proofs of Batman's harm to Cat Getan, because if this money had been used to improve people's livelihoods, Cat Getan wouldn't have rotted to this extent.

Later, the White Knight discovered that this money came from the Wei En Group and learned Batman's true identity, only then realizing it was just the left hand passing to the right—Batman was spending his own money to clean up his own messes.

And although most of this money ended up in the hands of the rich, the scraps that remained could still slightly improve the lives of the poor; this was not Batman's fault.

However, by then, the White Knight had already gained much fame by disparaging Batman and standing on the same side as the poor, and the Counter-Terrorism Squad had already been established; Batman was locked in prison, and he had no way back.

When he was still the Joker, he met a bank clerk named Maria during a bank robbery; he brought Maria home and made Maria fall deeply in love with him.

But after the Joker was cured and became the White Knight, Maria felt that the White Knight had hidden her lover, and she opposed him at every turn.

The White Knight was also a ruthless man; he obtained the Mad Hatter's hat, brainwashed Clayface, and then ground the brainwashed Clayface into powder for the criminals to drink, thereby controlling all the criminals.

Maria found out about this, investigated the truth, and took control of Clayface herself; she also obtained an ancient weapon left behind by Thomas, a freeze cannon, and prepared for a final showdown with the White Knight.

Bruce arrived right at this moment.

Solving the fundamental problem of distribution was indeed a bit beyond the scope of the curriculum—humanity hadn't fully figured it out after all these years, and Bruce couldn't do it in a short time either, but taking down a supervillain was easy for him.

Although he didn't know the plot, he could tell what Maria was planning with a slight glance.

Upon returning to this world, the White Knight's mental state became poor again; although Bruce had no way to immediately reproduce the medication, he had become a doctor through long-term illness and knew how to suppress schizophrenia and depression, using various therapies to help the White Knight stabilize his mental state.

Then, Bruce gave the White Knight an acting lesson.

Simply put, Bruce had the White Knight perform a relapse, successfully deceiving Maria and using the information gap to make Maria mistakenly believe she had the victory in hand, causing her to act rashly.

Because the real Harley loved the normal White Knight, while Maria loved the Joker, but the White Knight and the Joker shared the same body; they were rivals among rivals.

Thinking she had already secured the win, Maria didn't rush to activate her freeze cannon, but instead went to kidnap Harley and came to the chemical plant in District X15, wanting to execute Harley using the toxic gas there.

Bruce then took the opportunity to release Batman, letting him go to save Harley, while the White Knight arrived one step later than him.

At the critical moment, Batman took a bullet for Harley, but Harley was also knocked unconscious by the toxic gas, and both of them ended up in the intensive care unit.

Batman's physical fitness was indeed excellent; the bullet wasn't far from his heart, but he still pulled through. Harley was unluckier; originally, under Bruce's arrangement, she would have suffered only minor injuries at most, but she hated Maria to the bone, and in order to push Maria into the toxic chemical pool, she was sprayed directly by the toxic gas and was still lying in the intensive care unit.

It was under these circumstances that Batman and the White Knight reached a reconciliation.

In fact, it wasn't that they were willing to reconcile; now the freeze cannon capable of freezing Cat Getan was in the hands of the White Knight, while Harley was lying in the intensive care unit of Wei En Hospital, each holding the other's most important leverage, so they had no choice but to swallow their pride and accept it.

After listening, Shiler couldn't help but applaud Bruce and said, "You've really mastered the whole hostage and kidnapper routine."

Bruce also laughed and said, "It seems you speak from experience."

"Not at all." Shiler was polite, but still said, "It's a pity that the things the people on your side love are too abstract; this trick isn't that easy to use."

"Yeah, actually I was wondering at the time whether to go kidnap a Robin or something, but after thinking it over, threatening Batman with Cat Getan was the most effective; otherwise, I wouldn't have had to go to such great lengths to lure Maria away and take control of the cannon."

"How many Robins are there in this universe?"

"Seems like two, but one went missing." After recalling, Bruce said, "And Dick has also joined the GTO; Batman is pretty much a lone wolf now."

Just then, the sound of a news broadcast came from the car radio, "... The Mayor will provide a detailed explanation regarding the chemical pollution incident in District X15 this afternoon; the Napier administration will certainly provide an account to the public..."

"Is the chemical pollution there very severe?" Shiler asked as if casually.

"Yes, Maria wanted to slaughter the police and tampered with the pipes, but fortunately I was one step ahead and didn't let her succeed." What Bruce said seemed contradictory, but Shiler knew he had more to say, so he didn't reply, and sure enough, Bruce continued.

"I had the pipe interfaces replaced in advance; what was discharged was only harmless, dyed steam, but only I know about this; neither the White Knight nor Batman knows."

"What about Harley?"

"She was truly unlucky; she kicked open the valve for the real toxic gas." Bruce was also a bit depressed and said, "Actually, she didn't need to play the hero; I had already controlled the cannon at that time and was rushing back with a sniper rifle. If she hadn't meddled, Maria would have been dead long ago."

"Maria isn't dead yet?"

"No choice; Batman took a bullet, and the White Knight who arrived was busy saving Harley, so I couldn't reveal myself to pursue her, and let her get away, but she was also severely injured and won't be able to stir up any trouble."

"Best if that's the case." Shiler said.

"So the chemical plant pollution was a setup you made for that group of elites?" Shiler asked.

"That's right." Bruce smiled slyly and said, "Chemical pollution isn't a disaster like an explosion destroying a building or a fire; this kind of pollution can last for decades or even a hundred years, and the price of the surrounding land will catastrophically drop to freezing point."

"You're going to acquire this land?"

"Yes, and no one will compete with me, because that bunch of people aren't stupid either; they clearly know that chemical pollution disasters are very difficult to solve, and even if they grabbed the land, the capital required to invest in pollution control is an astronomical figure, so no matter how cheap the land is, they won't make a move."

"Won't they send people to test it?"

"Of course, but the testing personnel also value their lives; at most, they will select a few points in representative areas to test, and it's impossible to conduct a carpet-style survey, so the testing data is highly manipulated."

"You've already prepared it?"

"Just about." Bruce nodded and said.

"Let me guess, you recruited the criminals from Arkham?" Shiler guessed, "Who did you get to do it? Scarecrow?"

"Bingo." Bruce snapped his fingers and said.

"How did you control them? Using the Mad Hatter's hat?"

"I admit that the trick of smashing Clayface and feeding him to others is very creative, but it's really not very secure; I used a safer method."

"What is it?"

Bruce pulled down his collar, and Shiler saw a very obvious bite wound on the side of his neck.

"Vampire?"

Bruce nodded and said, "I met a vampire in the Battleworld; I let him bite me and he taught me the method of the Embrace. A vampire's progeny cannot resist their sire."

"Killer Croc can also become a vampire?" Shiler said with some surprise.

"More than that, even Clayface can."

"Then wouldn't you be unable to come out and operate during the day?"

"It's not that I can't operate during the day, but that I can't be exposed to sunlight." Bruce reached out and pointed upward, saying, "And Cat Getan's dark clouds happen to filter out the sunlight."

Shiler was speechless; you're really exploiting a bug here.

But just as Bruce said, the nature of Cat Getan's dark clouds was very magical; don't look at the sky as being relatively bright, it just had no temperature at all. Shiler felt this wasn't completely without sunlight, just that the ultraviolet rays were too weak to cause fatal damage to vampires.

Since it wasn't fatal, Bruce wasn't afraid at all; after all, he was still an angel and possessed strong self-healing abilities. He really did manage to exploit this bug.

To be fair, this method was indeed much more reliable than any brainwashing hat from the Mad Hatter; after all, judging from the other Shiler's experiences in the Vampire Universe, a vampire's control over their progeny is indeed very strong.

"You'd better not let Pride see your wound." Shiler kindly reminded him, "If he knew you turned yourself into a vampire just to control criminals, he'd probably be furious to death."

"He turned himself into a snake to lure the Goddess of Magic, didn't he? Vampires at least have some connection to bats; what connection does Pride have to snakes?"

Shiler actually felt that what he said made a lot of sense.

"Then can you turn into a bat?"

"No, that requires a very high-level vampire; I don't know any vampire magic either, and besides being able to control my progeny, there are no other benefits."

"A losing business." Shiler said.

"Not really a loss." Bruce smiled and said, "At least I can make Pride furious to death."