Godhood Unlocked: I Chose Sci-Magic Dual Cultivation

But what he truly hadn't expected was this.

Harleen Quinzel, the female student he had originally invited to conduct criminal psychology research, had discovered his greatest secret.

She had discovered Thomas's Joker personality.

The Joker personality was very interested in her, but Thomas only wanted to kill her. Neither of them could persuade the other.

In the end, Thomas proposed a game, because he knew Joker liked games.

He would infect Harleen with the Joker virus, and then they would observe the results together.

In the previous human experiments, every test subject had ultimately broken down and committed suicide because they could not endure Joker's madness.

Thomas had survived only by relying on his powerful will and resilient mind.

So he believed Harleen would also be tortured to death by Joker's madness.

Sure enough, Joker found the game interesting and agreed.

But the result was beyond his expectations. A new personality had indeed been born within Harleen, but she was not Joker.

She was a brand-new personality, though somewhat unhinged.

But compared to the real Joker, she was practically harmless.

Thomas was ecstatic. He believed he had found the cure—Harleen was that cure!

At that point, the Joker personality instead began to hate Harleen. He wanted to kill her.

But Thomas stopped him.

Joker was right. Harleen's mind was one of a kind, enough to resist even the Joker virus.

A secret capable of killing the Joker personality was hidden within her brain, but it was not yet time. Not yet.

Harleen had not truly merged with her new personality. Only when Harleen and her new personality had completely become one would it be time for Thomas to perform cranial research on her.

The experiment log ended there.

By then, Dane had gained a general understanding of Thomas.

He was a supercriminal infected by the Joker virus, possessing a split personality.

No wonder he knew about Superman, and even knew to order Poison Ivy to control him.

The Joker personality had told Thomas about Superman's abilities, while Thomas had used his familiarity with Bruce to steal the plans he had arranged against Superman.

Joker and Thomas were both highly intelligent criminals. One was deranged, his thoughts wildly unconstrained; the other was calm and skilled at laying plans step by step.

If they worked together, toying with Batman and Gotham's criminals would be no challenge at all.

"Bruce, you didn't lose unfairly this time."

"Two old friends joined forces against you. With insufficient intelligence, how much could you possibly have done?"

"But this alone isn't enough. I need to lend a hand."

At that moment, Dane suddenly revealed a meaningful smile.

Hello, Harley Quinn

"Hey! I know you're in here. Why are you ignoring me?"

Dane had been deep in thought when Harleen's words suddenly interrupted him.

He flew before the poor woman, considering how to deal with her.

"You came in, didn't you?"

The moment Dane's soul crossed into the isolation room, Harleen sensed it immediately.

Her ability startled Dane, and he could not help circling her once.

Harleen seemed to sense his gaze as well. She suddenly drew into herself, her demeanor turning timid and withdrawn.

She curled herself into a ball and hid in the corner, muttering under her breath.

Dane leaned closer to listen.

"Stay away from me, stay away from me! Get lost! Get the hell away!"

It looked as though her normal personality was beginning to gain the upper hand.

That made Dane even more curious about her inner world.

He cast a spell, and his spiritual body drilled directly into Harleen Quinzel's mind.

Harleen's inner world was bleak, like an old film covered by another layer of dim filter.

It was lifeless, without the slightest trace of light, even somewhat eerie.

Dane recognized the place. It was Arkham Asylum.

But this Arkham was set during the time Jason had slaughtered everyone there.

In the corridor, inside the rooms, beside the passageways—corpses shot dead with a single bullet lay everywhere.

Blood flowed from the bodies, pooling into little rivers across the floor.

The red streams were so clear they reflected people's images.

Dane stepped onto one of those "rivers." He left no footprints as he passed, but he heard a voice coming from a room.

"Your life is as worthless as your name, Joker. Why don't you just die already?"

Dane stopped. The voice sounded familiar, but he did not quite dare to be certain.

So he quickened his pace and saw who the voice belonged to.

It really was him.

Dane fell silent. In the room where he had killed Joker back then, another "Dane" stood there.

No, he was not exactly "standing" there.

Strictly speaking, he was floating in midair, looking down at the "Joker" tied to a chair.

And the "Joker" was not really Joker. It was Harleen—or rather, Harley Quinn.

She wore the twin ponytails Dane remembered, streaked red and blue. Her expression was crazed, but she could not conceal the terror in her eyes as she looked at the "Dane" in the air.

Dane watched the impostor expressionlessly.

He wore the same red skintight combat suit as Dane, but his cape was red as well, even dripping with blood.

The hood of his cape covered his head, hiding his face completely in shadow.

Only his eyes seemed to glow with an eerie light as they stared at the "Joker" before him.

The scene, the composition—aside from the hellish filter, the darker character designs, and the absence of Batman and Red Hood—was almost identical to that night's events.

Dane instantly understood the connection.

Faced with the threat of the Joker personality, Harleen Quinzel had spawned a new personality, Harley Quinn, to fight against it.

But Harley was not as powerful as Joker, so she chose a mad way to oppose him—she actively peered into Joker's memories.

Among the countless insane memories of Joker's life, there was one man he had seen only once.

But that one time, the man had ruthlessly, coldly, and without the slightest mercy killed him.

Joker hated him, but there was nothing he could do against him.

Harley thought she had found a way to defeat Joker, so she released the man from Joker's memories.

She had guessed right. The instant that man emerged, he killed Joker.

But she had also been wrong. Letting that man out was the beginning of every nightmare.

"One fish slipped through the net."

Harley Quinn was a personality born from Joker's mental infection, so she naturally carried some of Joker's mad traits.

Though those traits were not strong, they were enough for "Dane" to identify her as "Joker" and kill her.

And so Joker's ordeal that night began repeating itself upon her.

She played the role of Joker, killed again and again by the "Dane" descending from the sky.

By now, Harley could no longer remember how many times she had been "killed."

The deaths were not real, but the memories of pain were real enough to make death seem preferable to life.

Through those repetitions, Harley had carved a fear of "Dane" deep into herself, until his image had become the current Blood-Clad Man.

Cruel and cold.

The Blood-Clad Man "Dane" looked down at Harley.

"Why are you so unwilling to die obediently, Joker? How much more of my time are you going to waste?"

"Are you in such a hurry, darling? Being too impatient isn't a good thing. Girls won't like it."

"I admire your sharp tongue and stubborn spirit, but I'm tired of this game."

"So could you please hurry up and die?"

With that, blood-red lightning lit up around the "Blood-Clad Man." The lightning formed into a spear in his hand.

"Honestly, darling, you should have more variety in the way you kill people. This is far too monotonous."

Harley forced a smile. Only by finding amusement amid the suffering could she endure the torment of dying again and again.

Just as she prepared to accept another "death," an unexpected voice suddenly entered the scene.

"Then what do you think of this move?"

The instant the words fell, the Blood-Clad Man's body stiffened. He lowered his head.

A bloody hand had "grown" out of the front of his chest. Someone had pierced through him from behind!

The Blood-Clad Man turned his head with difficulty, trying to see who had killed him.

But blazing white lightning suddenly flashed around the bloody fist. Electricity and scorching heat spread up and down through the wound, quickly covering his entire body.

A few seconds later, the Blood-Clad Man had been burned into a charred skeleton.

Dane, standing behind him, waved a hand and flung the impostor's remains against the wall, smashing them into ash.

"Looks like you have some misunderstandings about me, Harlequin."

It referred to the comic character in traditional theater who wore colorful diamond-patterned clothes.

It was also another English term for "clown."

In fact, before Gotham's supercriminal Joker gave the word "Joker" its special meaning,

Joker more often referred to the wild card in a deck of playing cards, rather than a circus clown.

It was Joker who had brought his fear of clowns to Gotham and branded Gotham with his mark.

Harley Quinn was merely another victim of that mark.

Dane could tell that the Harlene Quinzel who had awakened outside had only returned temporarily.

As the Blood-Clad Man's slaughtering punishment continued, the real Harlene Quinzel and Harley Quinn had long since merged deeply together. The process was irreversible.

More importantly, they did not want to reverse it.

Harley Quinn was being reborn.

A New Game

"You—you!"

Harley Quinn suddenly screamed, but it was not out of terror.

On the contrary, it was excitement.

She knew. She knew this Dane was different from the one just now.

Not merely because this Dane wore a white hood, but because of something far more fundamental.

Dane descended before her, his feet landing on the bloodstained ground.