Luther struggled as he was escorted out, his expression furious, but a glint of shrewdness flashed in his eyes, and the center of the expensive watch on his wrist pulsed with a red light.
Taiwan Novel Network → 𝗍 𝗐 𝗄 𝖺 𝗇 . 𝖼 𝗈 𝗆
The first step of Luther's plan had begun.
Next, it would depend on whether Batman could figure it out.
Outside the main control room.
Wonder Woman and Firestorm cleared the way, while Shimizu and Batman, clad in battle armor, advanced towards the interior of the spaceship alongside Lightwave.
Compared to the sturdy exterior, the interior of the ship was not as strong.
According to Shimizu's observation, the interior of the spaceship might actually be a giant computer.
Because it looked too much like one.
It had a controller, a processor, and storage, at most with a little space for Brainiac to conduct experiments, store models, and install weapons.
The structure might not be the Von Neumann architecture of Earthlings, but some of the underlying principles would certainly remain the same.
Suddenly, Shimizu and Batman's armor received an unknown signal.
"This is…"
Shimizu frowned as he looked at the string of garbled code on the secondary screen inside his armor.
A pile of gibberish that would likely require the correct decryption method to extract useful information.
Then the decryption method should be…
"Call up the latest decryption database from within LexCorp."
The gibberish was quickly deciphered.
It was an audio recording, along with a map showing only a few simple routes, and a few simple instructions.
The audio was a recording of a conversation between Luther and Brainiac.
The map showed the route by which the bottle containing Metropolis was transported into the exhibition room, as well as a route leading to other locations.
It was there that Luther was exposed to the ray gun, allowing him to return to his normal size and communicate with Brainiac.
The former never thought he could persuade the latter with words.
All he did was to probe and obtain useful information, so that those who served as the main force could have a deeper understanding of the enemy and a more accurate direction of the mission's goals, and also to distract the enemy and try to leave more ways to turn defeat into victory.
To be able to devise such a simple, bold, interlocking, and highly feasible plan in such a short period of time after being captured on the spaceship, Luther's intelligence and courage could not help but make Shimizu marvel.
If it were him, would he have been able to come up with such a brilliant plan?
There was no time to think more, because they had already fought their way to the door of the main control room.
"Old Grey said something was wrong. Logically speaking, the strength of these alien robots that surpass interstellar civilization shouldn't be this weak. Although the artificial intelligence in your armor is very strong, it shouldn't be this easy," Jefferson suddenly said, as he hurled a fireball at the door.
"There's nothing wrong. According to the information we've obtained so far, Brainiac needs a huge amount of computing resources. Even Luther's daughter is being used as a human CPU. The remaining computing power within this spaceship is probably not much," Shimizu explained, while stepping aside to give the output position to Diana, whose single-target destructive power had the highest limit.
The battle cry of the Amazonian war goddess rang out, and the Godkiller sword with subatomic cutting ability instantly broke through the door of the main control room.
"Knowledge is power, and power is also knowledge. The individual entities on your planet possess considerable power. Perhaps I should collect your entire planet and gather data."
Brainiac sat comfortably on a steel chair, looking somewhat haggard.
His brain, like Alex Luther's, was connected to many tubes leading to the cultivation tank in the center of the main control room.
The number of these data transmission lines was several times greater than that of Luther's daughter.
"You look weak. Perhaps we should talk. The way higher civilizations conduct themselves shouldn't be as crude as yours. They should obtain the highest benefits with the least cost," Batman said, stopping Firestorm and Wonder Woman from rushing forward, while his eyes constantly scanned the situation inside the main control room.
The unknown entity in the cultivation tank, Superman being bound to the equipment and having his power extracted, Alex sitting in another high-tech chair, using her nosebleeds as a CPU…
All of these entered Batman's eyes.
Brainiac's purpose was to use Superman's energy and a vast amount of calculation to nurture the unknown entity in that cultivation tank.
He must have already paid a huge price for this, even consuming most of the computing power of his own brain, and would certainly be worried that the battle here would cause damage to it.
"Perhaps you're right. In a situation where the other party might cause losses to oneself, negotiation is indeed a more intelligent approach than violent conflict."
Brainiac sat still in the high-tech chair, and the few pimple-like pink lights on his head flickered as he looked at Batman.
"After scanning, your overall level of intelligence should be comparable to that hairless human who spoke to me earlier. Please tell me the content of your negotiation."
Clearly, Brainiac recognized the intelligence of Batman and Luther, believing that they were not primitive humans, but rather intelligent beings who were qualified to discuss matters with him, so he agreed to talk to them.
Batman said, "I need to know your purpose first, before we can negotiate."
"I know why you're saying that, but I can tell you."
Brainiac said stiffly.
Most of the computing power in his brain had already been consumed, and talking to Batman at this time required squeezing out the remaining computing power in his brain.
"If we use your planet's stellar year as a cycle, tens of thousands of years ago, I was born on a planet called Krypton. In this long period of time, my intelligence has continued to evolve, and I have mastered all the mysteries of time, space, matter, laws, etc. in the universe that I can observe.
But now, I feel empty, because no matter where I go, everything I discover and the knowledge they represent are things that I have long mastered and researched.
I already understand everything in the universe, so I need to create something new."
"New knowledge?" Shimizu asked doubtfully.
"No, I don't know."
Brainiac sat rigidly in place, glanced at Shimizu, and after deciding that his intelligence rating was lower than Batman's, looked back at Batman.
But the explanation continued.
“I don't know if I can create new knowledge with this, which represents breaking the upper limit of the universe, so my plan is to create another me, one that is more perfect, more eternal, and possesses the potential of surpassing level twelve intelligence, that is her, my Brainiac Queen.
I need more powerful computing power, not just simple computing power, simple data operations. My spaceship itself is the most perfect computer, enough to carry most of the work, but that only belongs to mechanical operations. What I need is wisdom, not computing ability. My level twelve intelligence is enough to carry most of it, but it's still not enough. I also invested every city from every planet that had reached the interstellar civilization level that I had collected before, absorbing the advantages of their wisdom and genes as nourishment.
But this is far from enough, and even now it is almost impossible to produce results.
So I need creatures with wisdom reaching level ten to help me share the burden, or civilizations with a high enough civilization level and degree of evolution.”
“Is that why you chose Superman? To let him be devoured by your creation?”
Batman said in a deep voice.
Brainiac replied.
“Yes, the Kryptonian civilization is an extremely glorious civilization. Their Life Codex is integrated into his body. He alone represents the entire Kryptonian civilization. Moreover, in the idealistic realm unique to intelligent life, he has the potential to surpass every life form I have ever seen. This can make the Brainiac Queen more perfect, perfect enough to become the answer to everything in the universe.”
“What about this girl?”
“A little short, but she will become part of the ultimate answer to the universe.”
“I see… So, your Queen is an existence you created. She should be your daughter, but you think it's another you. So who exactly are you? Your daughter is you, are you your own daughter?”
The sudden ethical and philosophical question caused Brainiac to stall for a moment. Alex, on the other side, even let out a scream.
This kind of meaningless, grandstanding ethical and philosophical question itself has no answer. Brainiac has seen countless civilizations and societies, so he naturally knows this truth and will not fall into a dead loop because of it.
However, his remaining brainpower was still squeezed out by this bug-like question in an instant, even though he quickly reacted and interrupted it, he was still caught.
Batman threw a batarang from his side, accurately hitting the data pipes on Alex's head.
The batarang, coated with a thin layer of promethium metal, was enough to cut through almost all materials in this universe.
Shimizu directly pushed Wonder Woman to Superman's position, and then fully activated the Speed Force Dagger, rushing towards Brainiac's position.
Wonder Woman's Godkiller sword has subatomic cutting ability, which is no worse than promethium metal. The rescue of Superman is naturally most suitable for her.
And Shimizu, with the assistance of the Speed Force and promethium metal, is close to full in defense and evasion. He may not be able to win against those with super strength, but within a limited time, his ability to save his life and withstand pressure is the strongest except for Superman.
“I regret your choices.”
Brainiac still sat in place without moving, but countless swimming metal tentacles instantly ejected from the high-tech chair under him, and the tips condensed into spikes, attacking Shimizu.
Editable liquid metal that is even deeper than nano metal.
Shimizu controlled the White Knight to dodge, and Lightwave behind him shone red in his eyes, emitting heat rays, shooting towards the position of the Brainiac Queen.
Attack the enemy, must save!
Brainiac waved his hand lightly.
The green light suddenly lit up around the cultivation tank in the center of the main control room used to cultivate the Brainiac Queen, transferring all incoming attacks.
Deflection field!
“Boom!”
A powerful explosion sounded.
A fireball thrown by Firestorm with all his strength produced a tiny nuclear explosion, bursting at the edge of the deflection field, making the structure of the entire main control room somewhat unstable.
Due to the special nature of his ability, Firestorm can use a method called the Firestorm Matrix by Professor Stein to limit the range and radiation of the nuclear explosion, and routinely perform small-scale, high-power micro-nuclear explosions.
Batman used the anti-Superman armor to block in front of Alex, who had just been rescued, and handed his cloak to the latter to block the aftermath.
The weak Superman was also protected by Wonder Woman in front of him - even if he was weak, his current state was not caused by Kryptonite, so his physical strength was much better than ordinary people like Alex.
He even had the strength to climb up and float in the air again, condensing heat rays, trying to fight back.
Brainiac was still calm, looking at the Queen's cultivation tank, which was swaying in the micro-nuclear explosion, and stretched out a finger, slightly circling, and countless liquid metal flew out from behind, surging like a flood.
A part surrounded the Brainiac Queen to protect her, a part turned into spikes and tentacles to attack the enemy, and another part autonomously condensed into energy cannons, firing lasers.
The battle entered a fever pitch.
Although Brainiac is very strong, but here is inside his own spaceship, the spaceship itself has almost no weapons that can be used to attack the outside, and most of his own computing power is used to continue to maintain the creation of the Brainiac Queen, unable to exert all his strength, so Shimizu and others can still fight with him back and forth.
Even if there are some incomprehensible weird technologies, as long as they are not hit by special attacks such as shrinking rays, they can still withstand it with the fighting power of a few of them.
At the same time, the bottle containing Metropolis was opened by Ray Palmer.
The prepared Lex Luthor was carrying a manned rocket at the bottom of the city, flying out of the mouth of the bottle.
Palmer pointed the magnification gun at Luthor, restoring him.
“We have to go support Superman and them next.”
Palmer helped Luthor on the ground up and said.
Luthor shook his head and said:
“No, our strength is not important. Batman chose to separate you and Flash from the main battlefield because he values the role that your respective abilities can play. If I guessed correctly, Flash should have run through every corner of this spaceship.”
