Testing

"If I were you, I'd take a careful look at the situation before doing anything reckless." The man in black spoke, his voice so low it hardly sounded human, clearly altered by a voice changer.

Jay stopped himself from instinctively lunging forward and decided to hear what this guy had to say first. The man in black watched his reaction coldly and said flatly, "A wise decision."

"Who are you?" Jay asked. "Are you the ones who've been looking for me?"

Instead of answering, the other man explained on his own, "Now, as you can see, all I need is a slight movement of my knife to take this woman's life. I've slit countless throats in my career, and I believe I won't miss this time either. I know you're fast, but you should know that my belt contains a sensor-triggered quantum field barrier. If you try to throw a punch at me, it will activate. Perhaps one punch would be enough to destroy the barrier, but it would buy me enough time to kill this woman."

"Let her go," Jay gritted out. "You want me, don't you?"

"Sorry, but that can't be done. Her involvement is a very important part of this." His voice remained utterly flat, like synthesized electronic speech. "Of course, you are not without options. I know you possess Heat Vision with powerful penetration. That would be the only thing capable of hitting me before I kill the hostage. But you should also know that you have only one shot, and it must be fatal."

Jay was startled by the bizarre condition. He began to wonder if he was dealing with a lunatic. Because if he understood correctly, the other man seemed to be urging him to kill him.

"Now, the question is," the man in black said coldly, "do you have the guts to do it?"

His voice was still icy and gloomy, without the slightest emotional fluctuation, but an intense killing intent had unmistakably been released. Jay had no doubt this madman might really act, and Helena would die because of him. Damn it, he had only just started to feel the faintest bit of affection for her.

Jay saw a trace of expectation in Helena's eyes as she looked at him. Perhaps she believed Jay could handle this situation, but truthfully, he had little confidence himself. Jay took a deep breath and said, "There's no need for this. You want me. Don't drag an unrelated person into this."

"Ten seconds." The man in black remained unmoved. As he spoke, he applied slightly more force with his hand. The blade, reflecting the basement's white light, had already faintly cut through the skin of Helena's neck. "That is the last time you have to hesitate."

The man was not lying. Jay scanned his entire body and saw that there really was some kind of high-tech device on his belt that he could not understand, faintly emitting particles invisible to ordinary eyes. Perhaps it truly could activate a barrier capable of blocking one of his attacks. Maybe he could use Heat Vision to burn out the device, but the man had cunningly positioned himself behind Helena, leaving Jay with only one certain target: his head.

Jay began considering the one option the other man had presented. It did not seem like such a bad choice. He could fire Heat Vision straight through the man's head, stopping his brain before his nerves could even transmit a signal. Helena had said that every one of these assassins had blood on their hands. One less person like that might not be good for the world, but it certainly should not be bad.

The man in black's countdown had reached five seconds.

It seemed like a very easy trade. There was nothing left to hesitate over. Huntress was a current government agent and had once been a superhero. More importantly, he knew Helena was a good person. Trading the life of some assassin who had appeared out of nowhere for hers was clearly no loss, especially when this bizarre situation had been deliberately created by this madman.

Jay had already begun thinking that way. Killing intent flashed in his eyes along with the red glow of Heat Vision. It was a pretty simple question. What was there left to hesitate about?

Yet he could not help hesitating for another two seconds.

Could this really be treated as a transaction? If, in this instant, he defined what he was doing in his heart as "trading a worse life for a better one," did that mean he had the right to decide whose life had more value?

He did not even know who this guy was.

He suddenly felt that he at least needed to know what kind of person he was about to kill. No matter how terrible the other man was, he felt he should at least remember his face.

Jay tried to see through the black mask, only to find that he could not. The other man had definitely mixed lead into the mask, preventing Jay from seeing his features. So he tried looking through his body instead, and the result truly shocked him.

Though he was no surgeon, he was still certain that the X-ray image of this man in black had nothing to do with the word "normal." His entire skeleton was riddled with signs of damage, as though it had been patched together over and over. There were too many fractures to count, cracks covered the joints throughout his body, and the wear on his knees in particular made Jay wonder how his legs could still move normally. When he saw evidence that the man's spine had once been broken, he nearly cried out in shock.

His body had been damaged to this extent, yet he still had such skill. Was this guy made of iron?

It abruptly reminded Jay of someone. A new possibility born from that thought flashed through his mind like lightning. He suddenly realized—was this entire chain of events too much of a coincidence? Helena had just rushed to the football field to warn him, and this assassin in black had arrived right afterward. Besides, with Huntress's skills, even if the man had caught her, she should not have been unable to resist even once.

And thinking about it now, both the assassin and Helena seemed less like they were acting naturally and more like they were constantly throwing problems at Jay, observing how he responded, reacted, and resolved them. Perhaps from the very beginning, all of this had been nothing more than a test.

The man in black's countdown had reached one second. Helena still looked at him expectantly.

Jay took a deep breath, unable to keep himself from feeling nervous. He was still young and had not even left school yet. This was the first time he had encountered anything like this. His judgment concerned Helena's life. It was a burden unlike anything he had ever faced.

What if I'm wrong?

The countdown ended, and he still did not act.

The man in black stared into his eyes. "Time's up. Is this your answer?"

Jay returned that blade-sharp gaze and felt an inexplicable pressure. But he did not back down. "No. I won't kill you, but I'm willing to make a deal with you."

"Let's hear it."

"If you dare touch her, I guarantee you'll regret it. I won't kill you, but I'll make you pay the price you deserve," Jay said. "But if you let her go now, I guarantee you can leave this parking garage unharmed. I won't lay a finger on you."

After saying that, he stood motionless where he was, staring straight into the man in black's fierce eyes. He did his best to hide his lack of confidence and tried to project more certainty. The man in black also stood perfectly still, silently maintaining their eye contact. With every passing second, Jay felt more of himself being laid bare beneath that piercing gaze.

After a long moment, Helena suddenly spoke. "I think that counts as passing, right?"

The man in black put away his dagger and commented, "Almost as naive as him."

Helena rubbed the neck the blade had just rested against and smiled brightly. "But isn't that exactly what you wanted?"

Jay took a deep breath. He knew he had guessed correctly.

The man in black tore off his black mask, revealing another mask beneath it—still entirely black, with white lenses, a pair of pointed ears, and below it, a hard-lined, stubbled chin.

He was Batman.