From now on, I, Ian, stand above Batman!

Gotham.

Ian completed his self-aggregation.

His face was painted with makeup symbolizing the Joker, but it was no longer simple white powder, red lips, and green hair. The patterns of that face paint had grown stranger and more intricate, as if they contained countless hidden symbols, while his green hair drifted faintly like living vines.

Most striking of all were his eyes—his left burned with dark-golden, divine flame, while his right flickered with a mad, chaotic, ghostly green light.

When it came to sculpting a look for himself, Ian had always been a professional—practically a master.

Pose.

And playing mysterious was no different.

"I, the Ultimate Joker, was naturally born in a very reasonable and perfectly DC-style way because of Batman's atrocities and the radiation in this sewage pool."

After all, Ian had made plenty of aliases for himself.

He knew the routine.

He raised a hand, looked over this newly born body of his, now carrying a little more weight in terms of status, then turned those mismatched pupils toward Batman, who was kneeling by the pool, struggling in pain.

"Good evening, Bruce." Ian deliberately spoke in a deep, brooding voice, a mixture of symphony and scraping metal, carrying divine echoes while hiding mad whispers. "Looks like—you need some help. Yes, you're sick, and I'm a licensed doctor."

"Trust me, there's no disease in this world I can't cure. That license cost two hundred and eighty thousand dollars. You can even look me up on the [Professional Physician] website."

Ian spoke to Batman with complete seriousness.

Rain began to fall again, washing the stains from the ground of the Sewage Treatment Plant while also trying to cool the strange energy residue lingering in the air and the thick, inescapable aftertaste of madness.

"You—" Batman knelt at the edge of