As Bruce spoke, Schiller recalled the plot of the Pale Rider comic.
It was actually quite simple. The Joker of this universe had not been Born Madmen. At first, he had only been an ordinary person—a small-town boy who came to the big city full of hopes and dreams to find work, only to end up telling jokes in bars because he had no particular skills.
Later, he developed a mental illness and became the mad Joker. But perhaps because he was not antisocial by nature, but a genuine psychiatric patient who had always suffered from mental illness, he seemed crazy without ever pulling off any major crimes due to his unstable condition.
That was also the main reason Gotham's citizens had found it so easy to forgive him later. He was a genuine mental health patient, driven into madness by poverty and the lack of treatment.
Alfred, the old butler of this universe's Batman, had been dying, and Batman had been tortured by it mentally. One day, when he caught the Joker, he gave him a brutal beating and hit a little too hard. Someone recorded it.
The half-beaten-to-death Joker asked Batman whether he was willing to make a bet. Batman, who was already close to losing his mind, agreed. Then the Joker took out some medicine, and Batman shoved every last pill into the Joker's mouth.
The Joker fell into a coma, while the video of Batman beating him senseless was released, drawing fierce criticism.
When the Joker woke up, he became the Pale Rider. Through a series of frame-ups, schemes, and false accusations, he sent Batman to prison.
At first, it had not exactly been a frame-up, because the Pale Rider really had discovered a three-billion-dollar natural disaster fund used to clean up Batman's messes. He considered