American comic book: After mastering resurrection, I became incredibly popular.

“It was a trap from the start,” the criminal added.

Only then did Jason realize something was wrong. He tried to stand up, but his knees wouldn't give way.

The criminal walked down from the edge of the pool and slowly approached Jason.

"You've been ruined by your own arrogance again, Jason Todd. Once again you've broken away from Batman to act alone, once again you've underestimated your opponent's intelligence. This reckless nature of yours has never changed since you were Robin, and that's why you died back then."

"Shut up!" Jason growled.

“Look at you, how pathetic.” The criminal squatted down and used the barrel of his gun to lift Jason’s chin. “What place do you hold in Batman’s heart? If he cared about you even a little bit, he wouldn’t have let you come to a place like this alone. But don’t worry, he won’t be here to collect your body this time, because we’re not planning to kill you.”

The Laughing Man added, "Yes, we won't kill you, because I'm going to turn you into... into our Robin, into a Joker just like us. We want to see what Batman's face looks like when you have the same smile on your face as them."

The criminal pulled a syringe from his pocket; the liquid inside glowed a sickly green in the dim light. He held the syringe up to Jason's eyes and waved it.

"This tube of formula is the legacy the clown left us. Like us, he wanted to know what he could leave behind for the world after he was defeated. This tube is the answer."

The man held Jason's arm down, and the criminal aimed the syringe needle at Jason's carotid artery.

Jason's struggle left a shallow line of blood on his neck from the needle. Countless images flashed through his mind: the night Bruce led him out of that alley, Bruce fighting for custody, witnessing Superman fly in the Justice League, being beaten by the Joker…

Life's revolving lantern has appeared once again.

Is he about to die a second time, a clown-like death even more pathetic than the first?

But just then, a piercing metallic clang exploded in his ears.

That was the sound of the iron gate being smashed open!

The needle didn't even have time to pierce his vein.

The criminal's hand, holding the syringe, froze in mid-air. He looked up towards the entrance of the swimming pool, a smile just beginning to spread across his face as he was about to greet them, "Ah, Batman, you're finally here, and with your new Robin! Look at Jason, he's not here at all..."

But before he could finish speaking, the Batmobile crashed into the pool, its body scraping over the edge of the dry pool, hurtling straight toward the criminal with no sign of slowing down.

The criminal's smile was still on his face when his body was slammed head-on into the Batmobile's guardrail.

The enormous impact sent him flying, his back slamming into a wall ten meters away.

When he fell to the ground, his limbs were so deformed that he couldn't move them. The smile on his face froze at the last moment, so absurd that even he himself couldn't have imagined it.

That's so violent!

Laughing Man stood there, glancing at the criminal's corpse, then looking up at the Batmobile that was still growling. For the first time, a look beyond madness appeared on his face, which was covered in paint.

“Criminal! Criminal, no, how did you die!... You can’t be Batman.” He screamed hysterically, then turned and ran, limping away at the end of the locker room corridor, his footsteps fading into the distance.

Jason's vision was already blurring; he could only see a tall, black silhouette jump out of the driver's seat and walk towards him with a whoosh. When the man stopped, his boots were only twenty centimeters from Jason's face.

ten centimeters.

Five centimeters.

"Damn it! You... 'How did you find me?' Take your new Robin and get the hell away from me!"

"Don't swear in front of children!"

As the somewhat unfamiliar voice faded, Jason heard the sound of a cloak being lifted and lowered. Then, an unfamiliar child's face suddenly appeared, with a helmet on its head and bright, piercing eyes.

That face looked a bit like someone I knew.

Jason frowned, his last vestige of consciousness still lingering.

“...Talia?”

Chapter 141 Gotham People Can Fly

Damian Wayne took off his helmet and tucked it under his arm. He squatted down in front of Jason and scrutinized the blood-covered man with eyes that were exactly the same as Talia's.

“I am not my mother. Let me introduce myself. My name is Damian Wayne, and I am the biological son of Bruce Wayne and Talia Elgul.”

Jason stared at him, desperately processing the information with the last vestiges of his sanity.

Bruce and Talia's son?

Bruce and Talia actually have a son?

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Jason's voice was so hoarse it was almost inaudible.

"Believe it or not." Damian stood up, dusted off his knees, and called out to Wang Baixi behind him, "Wang Baixi! This guy can't get up, come and lend a hand!"

"coming!"

Wang Baixi jumped out of the mangled driver's seat of the Batmobile, walked to Jason's other side, and together with Damian, each grabbed one arm and dragged Jason up from the ground. Jason's body was heavier than it looked, and he slumped down with a heavy thud. It took Wang Baixi a lot of effort to keep him steady.

"You just drove the Batmobile in here so openly?" Jason asked weakly as he was being dragged toward the car.

Wang Baixi scoffed: "Otherwise what? Do you expect me to knock and wait for you to open the door?"

“Bruce won’t allow me to do that, damn it, why did I bring him up again?” Jason suddenly laughed, but then gasped in pain halfway through his laugh.

The three of them squeezed into the Batmobile's cockpit. Originally designed for a single seat, the vehicle became incredibly cramped after cramming in two adults and a teenager. Damian, squeezed between Wang Baixi and Jason, kept shifting his body, trying to find a slightly more respectable sitting position.

"Don't move!" Damian squeezed even closer, prompting Wang Baixi to yell at him while starting the engine.

Damian immediately retorted: "Let me drive!"

"You can't even reach the accelerator!"

"Are you insulting me?"

"That's true!"

After the Batmobile reversed out of the swimming pool and turned onto the main road, the argument inside immediately changed its subject.

“We have to turn back,” Damian suddenly slapped the dashboard. “That clown who ran away is still in the swimming pool. We can still catch up with him!”

“Didn’t you see those people trapped in the pool by the poison gas?” Wang Baixi gripped the steering wheel, not slowing down at all. “They’re not dead yet. If we don’t contact the emergency medical team and the chemical defense troops immediately, none of them will survive.”

Damian glared at him: "As long as we catch the Joker, there won't be another victim! Don't you even understand that?"

"You've become a champion of justice?" Wang Baixi said, both amused and exasperated. "Damian, the lives of the living are more important than catching a clown!"

“My father’s priority was always catching bad guys first!” Damian retorted. “That’s what Batman always did!”

Wang Baixi laughed out loud: "So his approach is necessarily correct?"

"Of course!"

"He won't allow you to kill anyone!"

“We didn’t kill anyone, that clown was just asleep!” Damian said.

"You're hopeless."

Jason leaned back in his seat, closed his eyes, and listened to them argue for a full minute before suddenly speaking.

"Can you two please be quiet for a second?"

The car fell silent. Damian and Wang Baixi turned to look at him at the same time, Damian's eyes filled with incomprehension at this strange man.

"The toxic gas has already started spreading outwards from the bottom of the pool. I was in there for so long that the filtration system of my mask was already overloaded."

"The ventilation ducts around the swimming pool connect directly to the underground pipe network of the old town. If the toxic gas spreads out along the ducts, the entire old town will be affected."

"Therefore, the most urgent task is to leave here first, and then shut off all the pipe valves in the old town."

Wang Baixi and Damian exchanged a glance.

"Alright then, let's do it this way!" Wang Baixi finally decided.

……

Twenty minutes later, above the city square in the city center, the airship filled with clown gas slowly drifted past the rooftops.

A giant LED screen hanging below the airship plays a loop of pre-recorded videos of the Joker, who laughs maniacally and invites all of Gotham to share his "ultimate humor."

Batman rides the Batmobile through narrow alleys between buildings, while the head-up display in his helmet synchronizes with the airship's flight parameters.

The airship was too high for the grappling hook to reach. There were also no tall enough buildings nearby to serve as a launch platform.

He envisioned three options.

The first option was to let the airship continue to ascend. Once it reached a certain altitude, the air pressure would decrease, causing the gasbags to rupture automatically. The poisonous gas would then dilute at high altitudes, leaving the ground unaffected. However, Tim, based on the scan data, told him that the airship's gasbags had been maliciously slashed several times by the Jokers, and that it would rupture immediately upon further ascent.

At that time, a small portion of the poison gas will be released at high altitude, and then the entire airship will crash back to the ground.

The second option is to apply external thrust to the airship, allowing it to accelerate towards the Atlantic Ocean.

It didn't matter how much toxic gas leaked over the sea. But after calculating the wind direction and speed, they concluded that the margin for error was too low; if the wind direction changed by even a few degrees, the toxic gas would be blown back into the port area.

The third option is to release inhibitors to neutralize the key components of the poison gas through chemical reactions.

However, the formula for clown gas has been readjusted, and no existing inhibitor can effectively neutralize it in a short time.

"Damn it..."

"Are you at your wit's end, Batman?!"

Just then, Wang Baixi's voice cut into Batman's communication channel.

“Wang?” Batman frowned, wondering how he knew what he was thinking.

Wang Baixi resolved Batman's doubts first, "I checked the Batcomputer's work logs and know what you're doing. In any case, you missed a solution."

"You said."

“You can fly up there and drag that damn airship to a safe location on the ground.”

"This plan lacks feasibility; I don't have the equipment to support such a long flight," Batman stated objectively. "If we send an airplane to handle it, it would be too conspicuous and easily spotted by the Joker's gang."

"It's okay if you don't have one, because I've arranged for a professional to take care of you."

Before Batman could even ask who the professional was, a silver-gray sedan pulled up from the east side of the plaza, making a clean drift and stopping right in front of him. The window rolled down, and Zatanna Zatara glanced at Batman from the driver's seat.

"Get in the car, Bruce. I'll take you up."

"Za? Are you going to use magic again?"

"Yes. It's a short-duration flight spell, which should last about ten minutes. Ten minutes is enough for you to deal with that broken airship, and the rest is up to you."

Batman dismounted his Batmobile and strode to Zatanna's car. Zatanna placed her right hand on his shoulder armor and uttered in a clear, short voice, "Fly!"