amaotonovel Chapter 3747 The Perilous Situation of Dark City (Part 2)
Chapter 3747 The Perilous Situation of Dark City (Part 2)
Chapter 3747 The Perilous Situation of Dark City (Part 10)
Schiller found more information about the experiment in the archives and learned that 15 years ago, around the time Batman was defeated by the Angel of Death, a riot broke out at Arkham Asylum, and countless madmen and criminals escaped. The most famous of them was Batman's nemesis, the Joker.
Although the experimental data doesn't detail exactly how the Joker was captured, it's known that the Angels of Death didn't take long to apprehend these criminals. Almost all the supervillains had their genes extracted 15 years ago, with the Joker being among the first.
According to the "Batman-Joker Law," since Batman can't defeat the Angel of Death, it's inevitable that his Joker won't be very strong, and it's understandable that he would be captured by the Angel of Death. After capturing them, the Angel of Death didn't lock them up with Batman. Instead, he modified the original Arkham Asylum and placed these supervillain test subjects in the laboratory beneath Arkham Asylum.
To find the Joker, Schiller had to go back to the original Arkham Asylum. Although the leaders of both factions in the city were now dead, their henchmen were still diligently patrolling, making it no easy task to traverse half the city.
His first problem to solve was visibility, which is why he brought out Pride and Greed. His previous severe injuries had indeed allowed him to spot Ms. Shiva immediately, proving the effectiveness of this tactic. However, because the pain from his injuries was too intense for daily activities, he needed to find a compromise that allowed him to move freely while still providing visual assistance.
Schiller found information about the solution in the jar in the room where Ms. Shiva had been in among many documents. Rather than a culture dish of genes, the solution in the jar was more like artificial blood, used to give Batman a blood transfusion.
Different blood has different effects, granting Batman different abilities. However, according to the experimental logs, Batman is not suited to this blood transfusion. Most of the solutions injected into his body cause him pain, making it difficult for him to use his abilities effectively. Therefore, the experiment has not been successful so far.
But Schiller didn't want any special abilities; what he needed was stable, controllable pain that wouldn't interfere with his daily activities, and the injection solution was his best option.
However, the type of solution used for injection is also important. If it causes any mutations, that would be bad; something like the Joker's, which affects mental function, is definitely out of the question. Finally, Schiller targeted Bane's solution.
Bane's special abilities actually come from a steroid poison called "GL11," and his blood likely contains this substance, which makes him exceptionally strong and incredibly powerful. However, the downside is that he must be injected with it every 12 hours; otherwise, he will not only lose these powers but also become extremely weak.
According to the experimental records, Batman experienced significant pain after being injected with the drug, but unlike Bane, he did not develop an exceptionally strong physique; his strength only increased slightly, and he also needed to be injected with the drug every 12 hours. He constantly felt nerve pain during the duration of the drug's effects, which provided negligible improvement to Batman, and the side effects were significant, thus the experiment was considered a failure.
But this was quite good for Schiller. Further increases in strength were just icing on the cake; the real enhancement was the ability to stabilize and sustain nerve pain for 12 hours. As for taking a dose every 12 hours, that wasn't a problem. Each injection was less than 10 milliliters, and the bottle of medicine would last him forever.
Schiller bypassed the patrol and returned to the room, where he found several syringes on the lab bench that Ms. Shiva had been facing. He first used a beaker to collect some liquid from the solution container that represented Bain, and then filled about 10 syringes.
Undoubtedly, this was somewhat dangerous, because he wasn't Batman, and his constitution was different; the reaction to the injection might not be the same. But walking in the city in the dark was obviously more dangerous, so Schiller almost didn't hesitate to inject the solution from the first syringe into his vein.
About three seconds later, the solution began to take effect. The first sensation was a strange pain; Schiller could clearly feel the pain from his joints rubbing together, his internal organs colliding, and his muscles moving. It wasn't extremely intense, but because the pain was so widespread, it was almost unbearable.
Schiller realized that this solution was likely suppressing the brain's release of certain dopamine receptors for pain, somewhat similar to the pain experienced by addicts during withdrawal. The description sounded like some kind of escapist hallucination, but it was actually real pain.
The human body naturally experiences pain during activity, but a certain substance secreted by the brain makes people immune to this pain. Drugs disrupt this secretion mechanism, reducing the amount of this substance produced. Therefore, people trying to quit drugs experience pain from their internal organs every minute. This pain is excruciating, making addiction extremely difficult to overcome.
But this pain was just right for Schiller. It wasn't the kind of sharp, intense pain that would make someone faint at the slightest touch, but rather a long, persistent, and moderate pain that was just enough to open his hallucinatory visions without affecting his normal activities.
As for the increase in strength, Schiller didn't feel much of a difference. In his current state, his strength was already considerable, and he didn't need to increase it further. Schiller suspected there might be an improvement in endurance, but he couldn't verify it yet.
With the medicine in the inside pocket of his coat, Schiller, now possessing hallucinatory vision, easily bypassed all the patrols and returned to the ground.
But the ground has completely changed now.
Schiller had barely stepped outside when he heard an explosion. He was all too familiar with the sound of modern firearms exploding. He looked in the direction of the explosion and, sure enough, saw flames and thick smoke, as well as the charred corpses of many cult members.
This was clearly not the work of the League of Assassins; Schiller suspected it might be the resistance previously led by Tone. They were numerous and had been lying in the shadows. So what made them suddenly appear and use firearms that had never been seen before?
Just as Schiller was thinking this, he heard a sharp whistling sound overhead. He instinctively ducked into the church building and then saw an unidentified fighter jet roar past, dropping several packages into the city.
"There's even an airdrop?" Schiller recalled the arrogant words from before, the mastermind pursuing a false sense of fairness. Batman and Robin didn't use firearms, so the enemies in the city wouldn't either. But now that Schiller had a gun, the enemies could naturally use firearms too.
But the weapon they used wasn't some small pistol. Judging from the explosion just now, these airdropped supplies should contain military bombs, and there's also a high possibility that there are other standard military weapons, or even automatic weapons.
The nearest airdrop was about 800 meters away from Schiller as the crow flies, but the city's routes were complex, and going around it would take about 1.5 kilometers. Compared to the potential military bombs and automatic weapons, this distance wasn't far, but Schiller had no intention of going there.
This is clearly another tactic used by the mastermind to wear him down. If nothing unexpected happens, there will be at least a dozen side missions along the short 1.5-kilometer route to find the airdrop, the kind where you won't get the rewards if you don't complete them, so he won't waste his time on them.
The bombs and automatic weapons were indeed powerful, but they were actually useless for him to achieve his mission objectives because he never intended to fight his way through. He used illusionary vision to avoid patrols; if it were a head-on confrontation, wouldn't it make no difference whether he could be seen or not?
Schiller had misjudged the city's weather again; it wasn't without day-night cycles. The previous state of dark, foggy lighting had even been daytime, but now, Gotham had entered night.
“Good news indeed,” Schiller thought. In the short distance of about a hundred meters he had just walked, he had brushed past two patrol teams. He could evade them using his hallucinatory vision, but the other side was completely blind in these extremely poor visibility conditions. Unless another guy with nanotech gear appeared, they were no threat at all.
Schiller first climbed a building to get his bearings. The records in the archives didn't specify the exact address of Arkham Asylum, and even if they did, after 15 years of turmoil, place names and road signs were long gone, so finding the asylum was up to him.
Before that, Schiller went to the nearby city hall, the place where he killed the Angel of Death, Batman, and Toni. Returning to the balcony, he glanced inside: the Angel of Death's body was still there, but Batman's head and Toni's body were gone.
Schiller only glanced at it and didn't investigate further. He searched the city hall and eventually found a map of Gotham in an archive-like place. Although it was 15 years old, he could still roughly make out that Arkham Asylum was north of the cathedral, which was relatively far away, about a three-hour walk, and possibly even longer if he had to avoid patrols.
Schiller didn't stop and headed in that direction as fast as he could, because he had a feeling that if Broken Bat really wasn't dead, he might also go looking for the Joker.
As night fell, Gotham became as black as ink, devoid of moonlight or artificial light; both indoors and outdoors, it was utterly pitch black. Standing in the city felt almost like being blind. Furthermore, due to the fog, the torches carried by the cult members cast very little light, illuminating only a small patch of ground in front of them.
Without night vision goggles, people here are practically blind, but Schiller seemed to have X-ray vision. He could see others, but they couldn't see him, so he arrived at the designated location an hour earlier than expected.
Arkham Asylum, an already ancient building, became even more dilapidated after years of neglect, seemingly on the verge of collapse. In the pitch-black night, the windows appeared like openings through which something unspeakable peered into the real world.
Schiller stood before the gates of Arkham Asylum, hearing rustling sounds coming from inside. He turned to look at the marks on the stone bricks of the gate and realized he was too late.