American comics: What kind of evil intentions could Batman have?

Chapter 596 The Laughing Bat Flees for Its Life

Chapter 596 The Laughing Bat Flees for Its Life

"Ugh!"

The laughing bat could no longer laugh.

He had initially speculated that the Emperor Joker was incapable of taking action in the current reality, which didn't make sense.

If he could reach across the surging, turbulent hypertime stream and directly interfere with the present from its upstream, then why would he have gone to all that trouble to bargain with the Black Death Emperor and to manipulate the three clowns as his agents in the present world?

Just like if you clearly have the ability to knock someone down with one punch, a normal person wouldn't prepare a domino effect just to launch a small pebble, right?

Unless it means...

The Bat of Laughter sighed. Now there were two possibilities.

In the best-case scenario, although the Emperor Joker used some unknown means to break through the barrier of the time flow, he was still limited and his ability to take action in reality was limited.

He still has the ability to fight back on his own.

An even worse possibility is that the entire series of events, from beginning to end, was orchestrated by the Emperor Joker!

From the triumphant return of the three clowns in Batman Dragon's universe, to Batman Laugh observing the Emperor Joker making a deal with the Black Death, all the way to Batman Dragon leaving his own universe in an attempt to find a way to fight the Black Death, everything was under the Emperor Joker's manipulation.

The reason why the Laughing Bat dared to so arrogantly leave the protection of Barbatos's giant bat wings was based on the most basic logical deduction: [The Emperor Joker needs to cooperate with the Black Death Emperor] → [Without the Black Death Emperor's help, the Emperor Joker cannot take action in reality].

But if this reality that he previously believed in is overturned, it means that he is now completely trapped.

"But...but all of this was part of my plan!"

In an instant, the powerful force that altered reality began to work on the Batman Who Laughs's brain. Blood gushed from the Batman Who Laughs's mouth and nose. He let out a monstrous laugh, and then his body disintegrated in a loud explosion.

The red cake, interspersed with white bones, crumbled, and a torrent of bright red juice rained down.

Even after quickly discarding Jason Todd's physical body from a certain dark multiverse, the Batman Who Laughs still remembered to keep the head intact, and then threw this head, which clearly resembled Jason the Red Hood, towards Chen Tao.

He knew that even though he was now fleeing to escape the Emperor Joker's attack, Batman who remained here would still be attacked by the three monsters he had brought with him.

In particular, he has secretly enhanced the Omac Blue Beetle and the Earth Gaia Terra, which will surely give Batman Dragon a surprise at the crucial moment. His back-and-forth with the other party about the Queen Hecate was to cover up this.

In his final moments, he still threw Red Hood Jason's head at him to break his spirit and will. No matter which universe, if the Second Robin Red Hood had ever died, that death would be an eternal pain for every Bruce, no less than that for their parents.

Even though he knew that Batman Dragon had reconciled with Jason from his universe, any Batman would be furious upon seeing this...

Chen Tao caught Jason's head as it was thrown at him, then patted it between his legs like a basketball: "What the heck, Jason again? No crowbar, bad review. This hellish joke's been told to death, can't you come up with anything a little more creative?"

Then he grabbed Jason's head, which was still wide awake in death, and pushed his chin open and closed a couple of times with his hand, speaking in a shrill, childlike voice: "Today is the best day of my life!"

He laughed wildly, feeling that he himself was the one whose spirit had been shaken.

Chen Tao nudged his chin twice more: "I forgive you, Mom!"

(Note: Jason was initially beaten with a crowbar and then blown up because the Joker tricked him into coming here using Jason's biological mother. Jason's mother betrayed him and cooperated with the Joker, but in the end, Jason forgave his mother's betrayal, which is very touching.)

Chen Tao shrugged twice more: "Save me, Bat..."

"Enough!" The Batman Who Laughs's will quickly distanced itself from the body he had abandoned, not only because Batman Dragon was disgusting him, but more importantly because the Emperor Joker's reality-distorting power was ever-present.

The Batman Who Laughs just doesn't understand. The Emperor Joker is standing there, a huge Batman Dragon with a smile practically reaching his ears, can't he see him?

Attack him! Why don't you attack him?

But no matter how loudly the Batman Who Laughs curses, it cannot change the fact that the Emperor Joker has now completely turned his attention to him.

Even after he was forced to self-destruct the body of Jason that he controlled in order to delay the Emperor Joker's attack on him, the Batman Who Laughs, hiding in his own universe, could still sense that the attacks initiated by the Emperor Joker had not stopped.

That immense, reality-distorting force easily pierced through the barriers of the dark multiverse and attacked the Batman Who Laughs directly.

The laughing bat suddenly leaped from his seat and rushed into the depths of his bat cave.

There was a coffin there, constructed primarily of dark metal with N-metal and amber gold as secondary materials. It was an experimental version; he had originally intended to create a device capable of capturing an unprecedentedly powerful version of Bruce…

Yes, that's right, it's Anti-Monitor Batman. If Batman Dragon ultimately fails, it will transform into that monster. And this thing is prepared for Anti-Monitor Batman.

However, due to the immaturity of the technology and Batman's Dragon's eventual escape to become the Anti-Monitor Bat, this thing was never actually put to use.

(Note: It was revealed during Death Metal that the Batman Who Laughs' ultimate target was the Manhattan Batman, through which he became the Quantum Batman, and eventually absorbed the Crisis Force to become the Dark Knight!)

But now this vessel he had prepared beforehand has become his best hiding place to temporarily defend against the Emperor Joker's attacks.

The Batman Who Laughs believes that the Emperor Joker's attack was not without cost, and that he only needs a little time to devise a counterattack.

He, the Batman Who Laughs, is no ordinary, delicate Bruce; he possesses power and trump cards.

Just as he said, everything was going according to the Batman Who Laughs's plan!

With a thud, the Laughing Bat stumbled and fell face-first into the mud.

He discovered that the steps on the ground had turned into soft mud, causing one of his feet to sink into it.

The Laughing Bat felt a pair of eyes staring at him from behind, like a hungry wolf licking its paws.

It's the Emperor's Clown.

Has the Emperor Joker's power spread this far? No... not yet, not completely. This reality-distorting power is so far away, it's weakened too much, and there hasn't been enough time. It can't even do anything to the Bat Who Laughs, and it can't even distort ordinary metal, but it can still soften concrete steps.

The Laughing Bat got up from the ground expressionlessly, then spat out the softened cement in his mouth and crawled down on all fours. He found the coffin that was there, jumped in, and closed the lid.

With a thud, the lid slammed shut, and instantly, the pricking sensation vanished without a trace.

The Batman Who Laughs knows he has succeeded; he has successfully blocked the Emperor Joker's power, and now it is time for his counterattack.

He chuckled softly inside the coffin.

Everything was going according to the Batman Who Laughs' plan! In the end, the Batman Who Laughs won.

He spat out another mouthful of cement stuck between his teeth.

……

……

……

In the shadows somewhere in the multiverse.

A member of the Third Legion remained silent for a moment.

"Gentlemen, there's a problem. It seems we've targeted the wrong Emperor Joker."

The members of the Third Legion were in an uproar. Many members looked at each other, trying to confirm whether the incident had occurred at the time of the other's return.

"No, absolutely not. When I came back, on the timeline, the Emperor Joker's first choice upon seeing Batman Dragon was to attack him, not the Batman Who Laughs."

"Me too, the Emperor Joker and Batman Dragon are locked in a fierce battle. No one here has yet experienced a situation where they didn't immediately choose each other as rivals."

"You returned at the very beginning of the Multiverse War, when it would have been perfectly normal for the Emperor Joker and Batman Dragon to fight. I'm asking what we should do now!"

"In my opinion, the Batman Who Laughs didn't play a significant role in the entire multiverse fusion. We might as well just watch him die, thus weakening Barbatos by eliminating one of his minions..."

"Idiot, you're obviously back too early. When we last modified history, we also thought the Batman Who Laughs was useless, but actually he..."

"Now that I've checked, I'm the newest one back, so I'll tell you. The Bat of Laugh's role is to guide Barbatos..."

"So it doesn't matter if he dies?"

"Of course not, I think..."

But just as they were arguing and unable to make a decision, a blue portal suddenly opened beside the members of the Third Legion.

This sudden turn of events immediately silenced all the arguing members of the Third Army.

"It was Brainiac's ability that opened the hyperspace portal..." someone whispered.

"This means we're back to the present moment again," a member of the Third Legion concluded. "His intelligence is the most up-to-date; we'll let him make the decisions."

With a loud boom, before they could finish speaking, a cloaked member of the Third Legion burst out of the blue portal. His first question was, "Is the Batman Who Laughs dead now?"

No, not yet.

Someone said.

"Excellent! We absolutely cannot let the Bat of Laughter die!" the newest member of the Third Legion shouted a warning.

"Damn it, the Bat of Laughter's brain actually contains information on how to summon the Fifth Dimension Mischief-Maker, along with a whole bunch of other important but misleading and harmful information..."

His voice was hurried, sounding agitated and still in shock.

"After killing him, the Emperor Joker took over everything. Using this information, he achieved a great victory in the Multiverse Fusion. This is the most devastating ending we have ever seen. Everyone was utterly defeated by the Emperor Joker..."

The new Third Legion member said, "He combined the powers of the Mischief and the Bat Mite, then ambushed and killed Parallax Morhal, then stole a portion of Barbatos's authority, and what followed was nothing short of a massacre."

"Then let's kill the Bat Who Laughs before the Emperor Joker does," said a member of the Third Legion.

"No, the Batman Who Laughs anticipated this!" the new Third Legion member hurriedly stopped him. "If he dies, he'll just give all the intelligence to the Emperor Joker!"

"Wait, what did you say? He left behind a contingency plan, containing all the intelligence..."

"I wasn't wrong to give it to the Emperor's Clown."

"I don't quite understand. Doesn't the Batman Who Laughs hate the Emperor Joker the most? They just can't stand each other."

"That's why the Emperor Joker and the Batman Who Laughs are both madmen. Their relationship can't be simply categorized as hostility or friendship. In short, the Batman Who Laughs has to live, and live well. I've tried several times, and the safest place to keep that information is in his head."

The newest member of the 3rd Legion said, "Stop the Emperor Joker now, as quickly as possible!"

"After many attempts, we have found that this is the only way to stop the Emperor Joker from getting stronger. We must weaken every player participating in the war equally, as this is in our best interest."

……

……

……

"Ahhhhh!"

On Chen Tao's side, the Horrifying Lantern was also screaming loudly.

Hecate rushed into the body of the Horrifying Lantern. Her first reaction was to leave this body that was completely incompatible with him. She was the goddess of magic, the goddess of witches, although only the "goddess of witches" of a single universe. She was a flawed projection of Hecate, the goddess of magic who caused the "Hour of the Witches" in the main universe, in the dark multiverse. Their relationship was similar to that of the mortal Möbius and the anti-monitor who was truly upstream in the timeline.

However, unlike the mortal Möbius and the Anti-Monitor, the Hecate within Queen Hecate is far weaker than the goddess of magic in the main universe. The mortal Möbius, besides being a reflection of the Anti-Monitor, also incorporates a portion of the essence of the New 52 era Anti-Monitor Möbius, which is why he is so powerful.

Empress Hecate's projection represents the true level of a normal projection, much like the Superman Supreme who was killed by the Omac Blue Beetle.

They are not weak, but they are far from being that terrifying—although this "not that terrifying" is only relative.

But Surtur is stronger.

Among the many Dark Multiverses, Surtur's controlled Lanterns are among the most powerful.

Therefore, Queen Hecate is now at a complete disadvantage.

(End of this chapter)