"Oh, of course, darling, but I heard this guy say that the people of Gotham are about to forget about this old friend of mine? That's terrible, I hate that, so I want to help them remember," the Joker said with a grin.
Black Mask's suit and underwear had long been stripped off, leaving only a pair of briefs.
The clothes were twisted into a rope and lowered, pulling Harley Quinn and the little mouse up.
Two days later.
Gotham City Harbor.
Dusty and worn, Batman finally returned to his loyal Gotham.
Having received advance notice, the butler Alfred and Wayne Enterprises CEO Lucius Fox hurriedly escorted Bruce Wayne into the limousine.
"Master Wayne, your hand…"
In the back seat, Lucius looked at Bruce Wayne's prosthetic limb, his expression filled with emotion.
He couldn't imagine what terrible things Batman had experienced in other worlds to cause him to lose an arm.
In all these years, except for the time Bane broke his back, Batman had never suffered such a serious injury.
"It's okay, Lucius. This prosthetic is made by Wayne Industries from 2077, you know? In that future world, an old me, just like you and Alfred now, served as logistical support for the young new Batmen."
Bruce Wayne reached out and quickly made a few gestures, also demonstrating the prosthetic's functions of discharging electricity, extending, retracting, and attaching, indicating that the hand was very useful.
"Master Wayne, regarding the function of this arm, I think we can also make a glove to wear on your hand, without the need for a prosthetic."
The butler Alfred glanced at the rearview mirror on the car's roof and spoke.
"Well, I understand what you mean, Alfred, but my hand has already been severed, and the original parts can't be found. We don't have limb regeneration technology for the time being, so there's no way to repair it," Bruce Wayne said, spreading his hands.
"It doesn't matter, we don't have it, but Vought does."
Alfred held the steering wheel with his left hand and took out a few newspapers from the drawer with his right hand, throwing them to the back.
He had long prepared these paper and electronic media publications that could allow Batman to quickly understand what had happened during his absence.
"Today is November 14th. Look at the newspapers from two days ago. Vought Corporation's new technology can help disabled people achieve limb regeneration. It went directly from the laboratory to commercialization as soon as it appeared."
Batman curiously took the newspaper and began to browse.
"Did our group get a spot?"
"Of course, and quite a few. In order to ask Mr. Vought to occasionally disguise as you to placate those on the board of directors, we had to conduct in-depth cooperation with Vought Corporation, and incidentally peddled the technology of electronic beam etching nano-robots."
Alfred replied.
"First the Arc Reactor, then this regeneration serum. I didn't expect Vought to have been hiding so many good things."
Bruce Wayne looked at the familiar, but slightly changed, Gotham City district, stroking his chin as he spoke, his eyes flashing with a strange light, obviously plotting something bad.
"Master Wayne, Mr. Vought told us to be sure to convey a message if you were found."
Lucius interjected.
"If he finds out that you're secretly stealing his technology again, he will not hesitate to beat you into a pig's head, then strip off the Batsuit, leaving you without even your underwear, and hang you under the American flag in front of Gotham City Hall for all the people of Gotham to admire your sexy body."
Batman: … …
"Then I should be fine if I don't steal it myself, right?"
"You're still like this after all, but I really don't recommend you do that, because of the failsafe insurance, your credit within the Justice League has declined. Lucius, Dick, and Tim had to go one by one to apologize on your behalf.
And I believe that Mr. Vought must be very eager to find a reason to hang you up now. Believe me, most of the League would not object."
"Okay, I won't do it unless it's necessary. By the way, where are Dick and Tim?"
"They were planning to come, but a murder case suddenly occurred, and they went to investigate it immediately."
Bruce was about to ask further, but suddenly noticed a flicker on the huge advertising screen hanging in the center of the street, quickly switching from black and white static to a room painted with red, green, and ridiculous smiley faces.
His only normal hand clenched into a fist.
This familiar feeling… Could it be!
"Hello, Gotham!"
The Joker, wearing a purple suit, returned to the sight of the people of Gotham through the television screen once again.
"In the two years I've been gone, did you miss me? Don't tell me you've already forgotten about me, I'd be very sad. But it doesn't matter, to deepen everyone's memory of me, I've placed another hundred bombs in Gotham—just kidding! Only one! But…"
The camera shifted from the gesticulating Joker to the other side.
A tall man wearing a Batsuit and a Robin wearing a red tights were tied to the wall.
And at their feet was a bomb with a countdown timer.
"Are you very scared? Even Batman and his little bird have been captured by me. Obviously, my old buddy's level and vigilance have dropped a bit because I'm not around, but it doesn't matter, isn't there another hero in Gotham?
Hello, War Machine, we haven't fought yet, I'm looking forward to your arrival. If you can't find this place within an hour, then I'll take off their masks first, and then detonate this bomb…"
"Beep—"
The television screen was turned off with the remote control.
Qing Shui shook his head, tossed the remote control onto the table, and looked at the puppet still undergoing Mr. Freeze's testing on the other side.
A human puppet whose appearance looked ninety percent similar to Qing Shui's appearance.
"The plastic surgery was quite successful. Even after receiving radiation enhancement from the yellow sun, there were no changes."
Mr. Freeze looked at the human puppet transformed from the Kryptonian warrior Namor and nodded in satisfaction.
After Nam was personally killed by Shimizu, his body was kept frozen in an ice coffin with coolant. After Scorpion developed a puppet technique that could inherit the abilities of the puppet before it was alive, Shimizu personally modified it into a human puppet, and incidentally changed its face to be similar to his own, using it as a kind of external avatar.
Unfortunately, Nam was just an ordinary Kryptonian. Although he had the genes of a warrior, he was far inferior to Superman, who possessed the excellent genes of all Kryptonians, or Zod, who was the pinnacle of Kryptonian warriors.
Therefore, even when the Fault Insurance incident broke out, Shimizu didn't take him out, because at that time, this thing hadn't been exposed to sunlight for long enough, and its combat power was slightly insufficient. In addition, Fault Insurance had Kryptonite weapons, which were the natural enemy of Kryptonians, so Shimizu didn't take him out.
But that's okay too.
Nam's strength was weak enough, and the strength of his body was also more conducive to Shimizu's modification and processing.
"Speaking of which, aren't you going to deal with the Joker's matter? I didn't expect that madman would actually return to Gotham."
"No need. The real Bruce Wayne has returned to Gotham. The Joker hasn't realized that the Batman he caught is just Nightwing. Obviously, he's not the Joker we know, because he lacks a little understanding of our Batman here.
Relying on this single piece of information discrepancy is enough to provide Bruce Wayne with enough room to maneuver."
Shimizu glanced at the message Alfred sent on his phone and said.
This is a game between two mental patients, Batman and the Joker.
He doesn't need to interfere.
"Okay, what if Batman asks for help?"
"Then we can let Lightwa give them a surprise."
Shimizu patted Lightwa's shoulder.
Lightwa is a puppet made from Nam. The name means the combination of the English word "light" and the first two letters of Shimizu's English surname, "wa".
Because this thing's ability depends on absorbing sunlight.
Batman and the Joker probably don't know about Lightwa's existence yet.
To deal with this kind of person who has persecution paranoia or whose brain is crazy and whose actions are unpredictable, you must have a trump card in your hand.
And it must be a trump card that people can't guess.
All your abilities, connections, and resources can be investigated as long as they want to. They can deduce the trump cards you might have based on the information they have investigated.
Shimizu is able to continuously obtain new methods from the incarnations of other worlds, which is why he can always surprise these people.
"Brain-load chip working normally, signal connection normal, Ark sub-heart function normal... What about your superpower that uses your own bio-energy to drive the device?"
Victor looked at the test results on the scanner and asked Shimizu.
The latter stretched out a finger at Lightwa.
Lightwa slowly raised his hand and made a few slightly awkward movements.
Kryptonians are Kryptonians after all. Even after death, after being processed by himself and retaining the ability to absorb sunlight and gain strength, after only a few months of sunshine, the performance strength of the body has already exceeded most of the puppets Shimizu has created.
Only White Knight, because of the Speed Force Dagger and Promethium metal, can surpass Lightwa in speed and defense.
And in terms of conventional strength, speed, etc., even if the current White Knight is loaded with several Ark reactors, it is only comparable to the current Lightwa who has been in the sun for a few months.
Of course, even so, Lightwa's speed is comparable to a supersonic missile, and its defense is almost beyond all extraordinary metals. Even if a Promethium metal dagger is used for cutting, it can only break through a layer of skin and cause superficial wounds.
But unfortunately, Lightwa's speed of absorbing sunlight and becoming stronger has slowed down a lot. The reason why he could absorb so quickly before was because he had never been exposed to the sunlight of a yellow star in the first half of his life, and he could quickly absorb it like a thirsty sponge when it came into contact with water.
If you want to continue to improve later, it will be relatively slow, and you can't be like Superman, using the power of idealism to achieve the power to destroy a universe against the sky.
Just thinking about it, the sun is just a tiny star in the vast universe. How can it have such power just by absorbing the energy emitted by the sun?
But even if Lightwa can only constantly exert the lower limit of his strength, it can still play a huge role for Shimizu.
"What's wrong? Is it because the muscle strength is too high?"
Victor looked at Lightwa's stiff movements and said to Shimizu.
"Almost, but there's no problem."
Two more chakra threads popped out and connected to Lightwa.
Now, as long as Lightwa is within the range of Shimizu's chakra thread contact, he can fully exert his strength.
Perhaps in the future, he will have to put more effort into the Divine Machine Technique of the A Person World, and integrate Materialization, Object Manipulation, Sealing Technique, and Puppet Technique to be able to exert a higher limit on puppets like Lightwa.
After Victor and Shimizu circled around Lightwa for another round of monitoring, another half hour passed, and the phone in Shimizu's pocket suddenly rang.
The caller was Captain Cold.
"Snart, what's the matter?"
"Wo... Boss, just now, old man Stein said that he used the instruments in the department to monitor some abnormal, some messy signals, saying that there may be something like an alien invasion like two years ago."
Shimizu: ...
I almost forgot that although Captain Cold is a high-IQ criminal who understands human nature, he has not actually received higher education.
He is a master of deception, able to use tactics to trick the Flash team, which has a group of PhDs, but it is somewhat difficult to ask him to be a scientist and engineer and explain some technologically advanced things.
"Put Professor Stein on the phone."
"Mr. Wot, I suggest you immediately summon the members of the Justice League. I just monitored abnormal gravitational waves located outside the solar system, and more than once. The gravitational wave signals are extremely regular. This is very likely caused by the distortion of the space-time wormhole. I believe that aliens are heading towards us!"
Shimizu's expression gradually became serious.
"How long is it expected to take to reach Earth?"
"According to the trajectory, the other party is likely to be carrying out accurate transmission through space calibration. It is expected to arrive in the solar system in three minutes and land on Earth in four minutes!"
