"You only need to..."
"Get lost, I'm running. Stop! Don't say anything about two hundred million dollars. I'm afraid I won't be able to resist the temptation. No matter how much money there is, you still need to stay alive..."
"That's right. You need to stay alive. Lawton, if you work with Cheshire Cat, there's still a chance of survival."
Deathshot halted mid-step. His expression darkened as he stared at the Ventriloquist, who was sauntering out from the corner. That old bastard had been cowering like a turtle the whole time, but now he...
"Oh, I'm very sorry, Mr. Lawton. I didn't want to, but Bat-Baby insisted that I do this!"
The Ventriloquist apologized with his mouth, but the muzzle of the Thompson submachine gun in his hands remained trained firmly on Deathshot. A ghostly glint flashed across his round, pudgy face and spectacles.
"Don't force me to act, Lawton."
A deeper, gloomier, hoarser voice emerged from the Bat-Baby doll in his hands.
Deathshot's heart sank to the bottom. "Arnold, you..."
"—If you don't attack him, I'll attack you."
Chen Tao couldn't help silently applauding the Ventriloquist's assistance.
Good! You really know how to be a battlefield enforcer.
"Fuck!"
Deathshot cursed loudly. The Ventriloquist was right. With Cheshire Cat taking the lead, they could definitely hold out for more than a minute. But if he started a firefight with the Ventriloquist now, with wolves ahead and tigers behind, he would undoubtedly die an even uglier death.
He picked up the rocket launcher discarded on the ground.
"One minute!" he grumbled. "Just one minute!"
Then he raised the rocket launcher and fired at Bane.
Boom!
"Get out of the way!"
Cheshire Cat, who had been dodging left and right, was nearly blasted into the sky by the shot. She hopped and rolled aside, panting heavily. Her voice was no longer cool and detached.
"Bastard, you dog! You almost blew me up!"
Countdown: 50 seconds.
Boom!
Brilliant flames and thick smoke engulfed Bane, but Deathshot knew very well that weapons of this level could only knock him back. They couldn't actually harm him.
He fired repeatedly, then covered three steps in two and rolled behind the wreckage of a car.
Countdown: 40 seconds.
Bane leaped out of the smoke. Cheshire Cat tried to keep distracting him, but Bane ignored her completely. Instead, he turned his gaze toward Deathshot, then shot toward him like lightning. Each of his charges was practically teleportation.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
With four gunshots, the four lamps that had illuminated the scene burst almost simultaneously. Bane's steps faltered slightly, but the silver-white moonlight still guided his path forward.
Boom!
The spot where Deathshot had just disappeared was blown apart by Bane's kick. Construction debris sprayed into the sky like vegetation caught up by a lawn mower.
Deathshot, hiding elsewhere, had no time to celebrate before he saw several steel bars and huge stones hurtling accurately toward him.
"Ah!"
Deathshot screamed. He barely dodged the steel bars that would have been fatal, but a huge stone still slammed into his shoulder.
Damn it, Bane hadn't been fooled by him at all!
Bane was the greatest escape artist after Batman and Mister Miracle. Playing tricks and illusions in front of him was like showing off an ax before Lu Ban.
Not only had the ploy failed to buy him time, it had allowed Bane to turn the tables and injure him by surprise.
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
Even with his shoulder injured, Deathshot still fired three shells in rapid succession. This linked firing method maximized the explosive force and should at least have been enough to stop—
Then Deathshot watched helplessly as Bane caught the three rocket-launcher shells he had just fired with his bare hands, one after another, and threw them back in movements resembling a Greek demigod hurling javelins.
The round warheads were reflected in his pupils.
"Fuck you."
Countdown: 30 seconds.
Rumble—!
Broken stones fell like raindrops. Deathshot vomited a mouthful of blood, his back burning with pain. He thanked his excellent armor for keeping him from dying on the spot.
He tried to crawl up and run, only to discover in despair that a huge stone had pinned down his hind leg. He looked at Bane, who was standing there at his leisure, and despair filled his eyes.
Ha-ha, the world's greatest master of firearms was actually going to be blown up by his own shells. Wasn't that the funniest dark joke of the century?
Cheshire Cat tried to run, but without Deathshot holding Bane back, Bane quickly caught her.
With one punch, Deathshot watched helplessly as Cheshire Cat rolled across the ground like a soccer ball, plowing a path through the debris before finally smashing through a pile of construction waste and lying there motionless.
Countdown: 20 seconds.
Deathshot let out a grim laugh, then vomited another mouthful of blood.
His internal organs were probably damaged, right? But it no longer mattered. He stared indifferently at Bane as he walked toward him step by step.
He remembered his entire life. Scene after scene passed before his eyes like the flickering images of a zoetrope.
Damn it, he'd actually been beaten badly enough to see the running lantern of his life. Deathshot wanted to laugh.
His impoverished youth. His dream of becoming a painter. The twelve bullets that pierced the bodies of his parents and younger sister. His shattered life. His military career. Becoming a mercenary. And—
His daughter.
"Zoey..."
Countdown: 10 seconds.
So.
This was the end.
This was the end of Floyd Lawton's life.
Bright moon... you were dim and yet radiant.
The world breathed, groaning after the Heat Wave and explosions.
There was no military force here...
Except me.
There was no authority here...
Except me.
There was no hope here...
Except me.
There was no Batman here, no one else.
There was only Bane.
Countdown: 3 seconds.
Bane reached a hand toward Deathshot—the fatal caress that would end everything—
2 seconds.
His rough palm brushed against Deathshot's throat.
1 second.
"Die."
0 seconds.
"Ba—ne—"
The roar seemed to come from somewhere far away, yet also right beside his ear.
Heaven and earth trembled. The white night shuddered!
Bane's hand froze. He turned sharply and, at the very top of the mound of garbage, met the gaze of that godlike, ultimate nightmare, his entire body trembling.
Buzz!!!
It was as if an invisible bomb had exploded in the air. An icy, terrifying chill swept across Bane's huge and frightening body, making every hair stand on end.
What kind of gaze was that?!
Bottomless darkness howled hysterically in his eyes. His surging presence arrived like a tsunami. The air he exhaled was like the fiercest northern wind, carrying a bone-piercing chill, like the glaciers of the Arctic Ocean that had remained frozen for ten thousand years!
He simply stood there, yet he was like the sky collapsing upon the earth with overwhelming force!
[Take one more step, and you will die!]
His body told him so.
Bane knew Batman never killed.
He was a good man, a superhero. Superheroes all had that ironclad rule against killing, didn't they?
But...
He felt that even his genes were roaring angrily at him in warning:
[Take one more step, and you will die!!!]
Bane knew that even if Batman wanted to kill him, he wouldn't be able to. He had complete confidence in his own body.
But... what difference did knowing that make?!
The fact was that every drop of his blood, every muscle, and even every strand of hair was roaring at him:
[Move forward, and you die!!!]
Bane didn't know how Batman had done it.
He didn't know how Batman had sent this biological-hormone-like death threat into his body. It was impossible. It wasn't scientific. But Batman had done it, and therefore it somehow seemed perfectly reasonable.
The true master of Gotham City roared and snarled before him, proclaiming his sovereignty. That bat spread its wings and cast down a shadow, illuminating this moment, this instant, this place, announcing the arrival of Gotham's son!
And so Bane abandoned Deathshot. With several leaps, he vanished behind the heaps of garbage and automobile wreckage.
In the far eastern sky, the first light of dawn happened to tear through the skirt of night like a sword at that very moment, revealing that nightmare-like figure. He stood upon the rosy dawn, sweeping away the darkness in every direction beneath the heavens.
The red sun rose in the east, and its path shone brilliantly.
The vast, endless night had finally come to an end.
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