Chapter 747: Theater Murder (Part 1)

The Joker pulled at the collar of his coat and turned around twice to show Batman his new suit. Aside from the bomb, this was indeed a new suit, completely different from the one he wore on stage last time.

But when he finished turning, he found that the scene he expected did not appear at all.

When Batman saw the Joker carrying explosives, he would usually step back immediately, make tactical defensive movements, and then shout: "Joker! Stop your evil plan!"

At this time, Bruce looked up at him, and when the Joker's eyes met his, they both froze for two seconds.

The Joker looked down at himself, then looked up at Bruce, and then looked down at himself again, as if he suspected that he had some hallucinations.

He let go of his clothes, wiped his nose with his arm, sniffed hard and said: "No, no, you are not Bruce, you are Batman... You are Batman now, I smell the smell of pain..."

The Joker wrinkled his facial features together, got close to Bruce, and sniffed hard. He said: "Yes... yes... the smell of fear from bats, a bloody smell, a stench, I can smell it two kilometers away, in the whole Gotham, no one else has this smell..."

Suddenly, the Joker jumped back and shouted at Bruce at the top of his voice: "Batman! How can you do this?! Why don't you wear your battle suit? Why are you staying at the door of the hospital! Instead of the roof of the building?!"

He ripped off his coat again and shouted at Bruce: "Look at me! I got a lot of explosives! Enough to blow up half of Gotham!"

The Joker waved his arms with saliva flying, describing the mushroom cloud after the explosion to Bruce.

He swallowed his saliva, limped to Bruce's side, put the bomb in his eyes, and said, "Do you think this is a prop? No! Smell the gunpowder on it, this is a freshly produced, the most delicious big bomb!!"

However, Bruce seemed to be completely immersed in his own thoughts. He was like this when he just came out of the hospital. This is a very typical state of catatonia caused by trauma re-experience.

Patients with stress trauma syndrome will show a very obvious state of sluggishness when they experience or associate with a scene similar to the traumatic experience. Re-experience and catatonia are typical manifestations of trauma syndrome.

Bruce, who had just walked out of the hospital, recalled that when he was about to return to the empty Wayne Manor again, he felt very resistant because it reminded him of the day when his parents died.

The weather in Gotham is very similar every day, gloomy during the day and rainy at night. Although the Waynes died on the spot, their bodies were still sent to the hospital for autopsy. When the young Bruce left the hospital, he just sat blankly at the door of the hospital.

Because as long as he thought about it, when he returned to Wayne Manor and faced those familiar scenes, there would be two people missing from the scene, that is, his parents.

The death of relatives is an inevitable and necessary process of life, but even if some relatives have been gone for a long time, their hospitalization, rescue, doctor's announcement of death, issuance of death certificate and other processes will still be clearly imprinted in people's minds, and so is Bruce.

This state of stress needs time to ease, but the Joker has no idea what happened. He suspects that he has met a fake Batman.

He took off his coat, shook it hard, and squeezed it into a ball, and said to Bruce: "Look! Bomb! Read after me, bomb-bomb-!"

"Don't you recognize it? Have you forgotten? The three workers who died in the chemical plant before, and the owner of the car repair shop who was killed by me before, don't you remember?"

Looking at Bruce who had no reaction at all, the Joker was shocked.

He took a deep breath, stood there, put his hands on his hips, and suddenly he seemed to remember something, jumped excitedly and said: "Oh, I know, it must be the problem of clothes, wait for me!"

After that, the Joker "whoosh" disappeared into an alley next to the hospital. Not long after, the sound of a truck sounded, and when the Joker ran over again, he had changed into another suit.

"Batman, look, this is the suit I often wore before, you should recognize it now, right? It's me, the Joker! The greatest comedy performer in the world, Jack!!"

The Joker sniffed hard, swallowed his saliva, then pulled the corner of his clothes, handed it to Bruce and said: "Look, there is blood on it... Whose blood is it? I can't remember it."

Then, the Joker squatted down, put his face next to Bruce, looked at him with an expectant look and said: "Do you remember?"

Bruce moved his head slightly and glanced at him, but then turned his head back.

The Joker pursed his lips, then opened his lips, showing his teeth, looking a little hideous.

He bent down, half-crouched on the spot, stomped his feet hard, and ran away again. After a while, he changed into the work clothes that truck drivers usually wear.

"Now, you should recognize me, right? This is what I wore when we first met! Look at me!"

The Joker turned around, waved, and took off his coat and waved it in front of Bruce, but Bruce didn't respond.

Finding that this method didn't work, the Joker started to use some force. He grabbed Bruce's arm and tried to pull him away, but Bruce's limbs were a little stiff and his reaction was very slow. The Joker was so tired that he started to breathe heavily, but he didn't move Bruce ten meters away.

But he didn't give up at all and insisted on dragging Bruce to the side of the hospital building.

Bruce was trapped by some of the horrible scenes in his imagination, but it didn't mean that he didn't have an instinctive reaction. He stood up and walked over with the Joker's power, but as soon as he reached the side of the hospital, his breathing rate began to increase again, and then he found a step to sit down.

The Joker was so tired that he bent over and held his knees to breathe heavily. His messy hair blocked his vision in front of him, making him unable to see the surrounding environment clearly.

Finding that Batman's state was completely different from what he imagined, the Joker suddenly paused, his facial muscles gradually relaxed, revealing a mocking smile.

He took a lighter from his pocket and turned it in his hand, with the other hand in his trouser pocket, and staggered towards Bruce who was sitting on the steps.

He sat down next to Bruce, opened the lid of the lighter, and said: "Do you know? Batman, humans are born with a fear of pain, which can break many disguises..."

As he said, he lit the flame of the lighter and put his finger on the flame. After a while, he took a breath and shook his hand, then smiled and looked at Batman and said: "Actually, I have always wanted to know whether you will feel pain, Batman, let's try it?"

As he said, he put the lighter under Bruce's fingertips, but Bruce still did not respond. With a "click", the lighter was closed. The Joker pursed his lips and showed a boring expression and said:

"It seems that our Mr. Bat has finally gone crazy. Ha, I knew that you have never been interested in bombs and flames. Well, then please tell me, what are you more interested in?"

The Joker and Bruce sat side by side on the steps of a small square on the side of the hospital.

The Joker looked up at the people coming and going at the hospital gate. He said, "Do you know? People like to spend a lot of time in the hospital. They would rather spend a lot of money to treat their physical illnesses than ask themselves why their hearts are so ugly."

"I know that one day you will be sad, Batman. You regard yourself as a god, but people in the world do not love gods, they only love themselves."

"Do you love them, Batman?" The Joker said, holding the lighter in his hand, "Or do you save them just because you hope you are a savior and have the ability to save anyone?"

"Okay, little bat, you wait here. I'll go see who made you suffer from such lovesickness." The Joker grinned and showed a terrible smile and said, "I will let him know the consequences of doing so."

As he said, he stood up, lifted the hem of his clothes in a chic manner, put the lighter in his pocket, whistled, and left with a brisk pace.

Half an hour later, in the office on the roof of the Iceberg Restaurant, Cobblepot took two steps back, pointed at the Joker and said, "Don't come over here! Keep your bombs away, you lunatic!!!"

"Shh..." The Joker put a finger close to his lips and made a gesture of silence. He said to Cobblepot, "Don't make a sound, you idiot. I heard Batman crying. Did you hear it?"

Cobblepot's face was darker than the bottom of a pot. He looked at the bombs on the Joker and felt a little weak in the knees. He also knew something about explosives. The things on the Joker, added together, might be enough to blow up the entire East District.

He swallowed and said, "Jack, go find Batman, don't go crazy here. I don't have time to play those childish games with you. I want to make money."

The Joker's right cheek twitched, looking very fierce. He stared at Cobblepot with cold eyes and said, "You ruined Batman's reputation and made him feel sad. Now he is crazy and has a mental illness that will never get better. You have to pay the price for this!"

Cobblepot heard that the Joker's tone was trembling, and some words would be repeated over and over. Obviously, his mental state was not very good.

Cobblepot and the Joker are completely different people. He is not crazy at all. He opened a restaurant business just to make money.

Seeing the Joker take out a lighter from his pocket, he stretched out his hand and said, "No! Don't do this! Jack, I didn't want to publish that report. Someone found me and asked me to do this!"

"Who? Who asked you to do this?"

"... Schiller." Cobblepot spit out a name.

The Joker closed his suit coat, buttoned it up, adjusted his tie, and walked out aggressively.

Ten minutes later, Schiller pinned him to the roof of a building.

Schiller let go, and the clown got up from the ground, shouting, "What are you doing?! You're in the way, you broke my toy!!!"

"That's not the reason why you ran into Gotham University with so many explosives."

Looking at the Joker's crazy eyes, Schiller smiled and said, "Aren't you curious?"

The Joker stared at him silently, and Schiller continued, "Don't you want to know why Batman helps others?"

"Is he doing good deeds to help others because he is kind, or because he wants to be a savior and hope to become the perfect god of Gotham?"

"Now, he can no longer be a perfect god. There must be someone in this city who believes in that report. No matter how he clarifies it, it will become a permanent stain."

"The name Batman may be forever associated with infamy. He is no longer a figure like the Son of God Jesus. No one will expect him to save anyone, and now he is suffering for this. Why do you think this is?"

Schiller saw that the Joker's eyes gradually lit up, and he excitedly accelerated his breathing frequency, making a sound of breathing in his throat, and he swallowed He drooled and said, "Yes, that's right, because... he can't be a perfect god!"

"He should know this. No matter how he tries to make amends, there will always be people who don't believe him, and there will always be people who abuse him, and there will be many people! This will become a hole in the car window. No matter how hard the wiper works, this hole will not disappear!"

The Joker began to tremble with excitement. He said, "He has to leave his favorite dream, the fantasy that he has become a god, omniscient and omnipotent, and can save anyone, and return to the cold and pale reality, just like me, just like everyone in Gotham!!"

"He can only be Bruce Wayne, whom he hates the most! He has to go back to Bruce's life and can't escape reality anymore! Hahahahahahahahaha!!!!"

The Joker laughed and laughed until tears came out of his eyes. He wiped the corners of his eyes and said:

"God loves the world... God loves the world... He should wake up. God never loves the world. God only loves the perfect self!"

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