Days as a Spiritual Mentor in American Comics

During Bruce's narration, Shiller recalled the plot of the Pale Knight comic.

It's actually quite simple. The Joker of this universe wasn't born a madman. Initially, he was just an ordinary person, a small-town boy who came to the big city with dreams of work, but ended up telling jokes in a bar to make a living due to a lack of skills.

Later, he developed a mental illness and became the crazed Joker. Perhaps because he wasn't an antisocial personality, but a real mental patient plagued by mental illness, he seemed insane. However, due to his poor mental state, he never committed any major crimes.

This was the main reason why the people of Gotham later forgave him so easily. He was a true mental patient who, trapped by poverty and without treatment, fell into madness.

In this universe, Batman's old housekeeper Alfred is dying, and as a result, Batman is also suffering mentally. One day, he caught the Joker and gave him a good beating, a bit too hard, and it was caught on camera.

Half-dead, the Joker asked Batman if he was willing to gamble, and Batman, on the verge of losing his sanity, agreed. Then the Joker pulled out some medicine, and Batman stuffed all of it into the Joker's mouth.

The Joker fell into a coma, and the video of Batman beating up the Joker was released, leading to a lot of criticism against him.

When the Joker woke up, he became the Pale Knight, using a series of frame-ups and false accusations to send Batman to prison.

Initially, it wasn't really a frame-up because the Pale Knight indeed discovered a 3 billion US dollar natural disaster fund that was being used to clean up Batman's messes. He saw it as one of the pieces of evidence of Batman's harm to Gotham, because if the money had been used to improve the livelihood of the people, Gotham wouldn't have become such a mess.

Later, the Pale Knight found out that the money came from Wayne Enterprises and also learned Batman's real identity. He understood it was just shifting funds from one hand to the other, Batman using his own money to clean up his own messes.

And although most of that money ended up in the hands of the rich, the remaining bit did improve the lives of the poor to some extent. This wasn't Batman's problem.

However, by then, the Pale Knight had already gained much renown by defaming Batman and aligning with the poor. The counterterrorism squad had also been established, and with Batman behind bars, he had no way out.

When he was still the Joker, during a bank robbery, he met a bank employee named Maria. He took Maria home and made her fall deeply in love with him.

But after the Joker was cured and turned into the Pale Knight, Maria felt that the Pale Knight had hidden away her lover and opposed him at every turn.

The Pale Knight was ruthless too. He got hold of the Mad Hatter's hat, brainwashed Clayface, then ground the brainwashed Clayface into powder and made the criminals drink it, thereby controlling all criminals.

Maria found out about this, uncovered the truth, and took control of Clayface herself. She also got hold of an ancient weapon left by Thomas, a freezing cannon, and prepared for a final showdown with the Pale Knight.

It was at this moment that Bruce came.

Resolving the fundamental issue of distribution indeed seems a bit advanced – humanity hasn't completely figured it out over the years, and Bruce couldn't either in such a short time. But defeating a super villain was still easy for him.

Although he didn't know the plot, he quickly realized what kind of idea Maria was playing with.

Upon returning to his own world, the Pale Knight's mental condition deteriorated again, and though Bruce couldn't immediately reproduce the medication, he had become adept at dealing with illnesses, knowing how to suppress schizophrenia and depression. Utilizing various therapies, he helped stabilize the Pale Knight's mental state.

Then, Bruce gave the Pale Knight a performance lesson.

Simply put, Bruce had the Pale Knight feign an episode, successfully deceiving Maria by exploiting the information gap, leading her to believe she had the upper hand and to act rashly.

Because the real Harley loved the normal Pale Knight, and Maria loved the Joker, but the Pale Knight and the Joker shared the same body—making them the ultimate love rivals.

Thinking she had secured victory, Maria didn't rush to activate her freeze cannon, but instead went to kidnap Harley and arrived at the chemical plant in district X15, planning to execute Harley with the toxic gas there.

Bruce, in turn, released Batman to rescue Harley, with the Pale Knight arriving a step later.

At the critical moment, Batman took a bullet for Harley, but Harley was also knocked out by the toxic gas and both were taken to the intensive care unit.

Batman's physical condition was indeed not bad; the bullet was not far from his heart, but he managed to pull through. Harley was less fortunate. Under Bruce's arrangement, she was supposed to suffer only minor injuries. However, she hated Maria to the bone and, in an attempt to push Maria into the toxic chemical vat, was hit directly by the toxic gas and is now lying in the intensive care unit.

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

Actually, it wasn't that they were willing to do so. Now the freeze cannon capable of encasing Gotham in ice was in the hands of the Pale Knight, and Harley was lying in the intensive care unit of Wayne Hospital. They held the most important leverage over each other, with no choice but to reluctantly agree.

After hearing the story, Shiller couldn't help but clap for Bruce and say, "You seem to have mastered the hostage and kidnapper game."

Bruce also smiled and said, "It looks like you're speaking from experience."

"Oh, not at all," Shiller replied politely, but still said, "Too bad, things that people here love are too abstract, and this tactic isn't so effective."

"Yes, I also considered whether or not to kidnap a Robin or something, but after thinking it over, I figured threatening Batman with Gotham was the most effective, otherwise, I wouldn't have bothered to lure Maria away and seize the opportunity to take control of the cannon."

"How many Robins are there in this universe?"

"Seems like two, but one has gone missing," Bruce recalled and said, "And Dick has joined the GTO; Batman is pretty much on his own now."

At that moment, the voice from the car radio broadcast the news, "… The Mayor will give a detailed explanation this afternoon regarding the chemical pollution incident in district X15. The Neipier Government will certainly provide an explanation to the public…"

"Is the chemical pollution in that area severe?" Shiller asked casually.

"Yes, Maria wanted to slaughter the police and tampered with the pipes. Luckily, I was one step ahead and didn't let her succeed," Bruce said, his words seemingly contradictory. Shiller knew there was more to come, so he didn't reply, and sure enough, Bruce continued.

"The pipe interface had been replaced by me in advance, only emitting harmless, colored vapor. But this is something only I know about, neither the pale knight nor Batman are aware of it."

"What about Harley?"

"She was really unlucky and opened the valve of the actual harmful gas." Bruce was a bit depressed, saying, "Actually, there was no need for her to play the hero. At that time, I had already taken control of the cannon and was rushing back with a sniper rifle. If she hadn't meddled, Maria would've been long dead."

"Maria isn't dead?"

"No choice, Batman took a bullet, and the pale knight who arrived was busy saving Harley. I couldn't expose myself by going after her, so I let her escape. But she's severely injured and can't make waves now."

"It's for the best," Shiller said.

"So, was the chemical plant pollution a trap you set up for that group of elite?"

"Exactly," Bruce said with a cunning smile, "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 century, and the price of the surrounding land will disastrously drop to rock bottom."

"Are you going to buy that land?"

"Yes, and no one will compete with me for it because those people aren't fools either. They clearly know that a chemical pollution disaster is very hard to solve. Even if they snatch the land, the astronomical sum needed to remedy the pollution means they won't lift a finger, no matter how cheap it gets."

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

"Of course, but the testers value their lives too. At most, they'll select a few representative areas for testing; they can't do a comprehensive survey. So there's a lot of margin for error in those tests."

"Have you done it already?"

"Almost there," Bruce nodded and said.

"Let me guess, you recruited Arkham's criminals?" Shiller guessed. "Who did you have do it? Scarecrow?"

"Bingo," Bruce said, snapping his fingers.

"How are you controlling them? Using the Mad Hatter's hats?"

"I admit that breaking apart Clayface and feeding him to the others was creative, but it really wasn't very safe. I used a more secure method."

"What is it?"

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

"Vampire?"

Bruce nodded and said, "I met a vampire in Battleworld, he bit me, and taught me the Initial Embrace method. A vampire's progeny cannot rebel against their sire."

"Killer Croc can become a vampire too?" Shiller said with some surprise.

"Not just him, even Clayface can."

"Then you can't be active during the day?"

"It's not about being unable to be active during the day, but not being able to be exposed to sunlight." Bruce raised his hand and pointed upwards, saying, "And Gotham's clouds happen to filter the sunlight."

Shiller was speechless. You're still exploiting a bug.

But just as Bruce had said, the nature of Gotham's clouds was truly miraculous. Despite the skies seeming relatively bright, there was no heat at all. Shiller felt it wasn't entirely without sunlight, just that the ultraviolet rays were too weak to inflict fatal harm on a vampire.

Since it wasn't fatal, Bruce wasn't worried at all. After all, he was still an Angel, possessing a strong Self-Healing Power. He really did exploit that bug.

To be fair, this method seemed indeed much more reliable than whatever brainwashing hats the Mad Hatter had, especially from what other Shillers had experienced in the Vampire Universe; vampires had strong control over their progeny.

"You better not let Arrogant see your wound," Shiller kindly reminded him. "If he knew you turned yourself into a vampire just to control the criminals, he might be furious."

"Well, he turned himself into a snake to lure the Magic Goddess, didn't he? At least a vampire is somewhat related to a bat. What does Arrogant have to do with snakes?"

Shiller actually found his reasoning quite sound.

"Can you turn into a bat?"

"No, that's something only very high-level vampires can do. I don't know any vampire magic either, aside from being able to control my progeny, there aren't any other benefits."

"A losing deal," Shiller said.

"Not really a loss," Bruce smiled and said, "At least I can drive Arrogant up the wall."