Chapter Summaries

Nygma and Otis investigated a filthy bay where bodies had been dumped, but their search was interrupted by a gigantic humanoid bat emerging from a sewer outlet. They escaped in Nygma’s car, leaving the creature’s identity and its destination in Gotham unknown.

• Nygma examined the unusually filthy shoreline while Otis sent his rats to scout the area.
• The rats returned in panic, and Bastian warned Otis that something huge was inside the sewer.
• A gigantic humanoid bat lunged at Otis, but Nygma struck it with an electrified cane.
• The bat flew toward Gotham City and vanished among the buildings.
• Nygma and Otis fled to their car, where they discussed the creature and Gotham’s extensive sewers.

Li Jie pressed Cobblepot about the stolen money and tested whether he had the ambition to challenge Falcone for leadership. After improving his firearm skills, Li Jie discussed the dismemberment case with Nygma and learned that Chief Bob’s prospects for becoming commissioner had weakened.

• Li Jie got Cobblepot to admit he had the twelve million dollars and asked whether he was willing to replace Falcone; Cobblepot nodded but Li Jie said he had no plan yet.
• Li Jie leveled up his firearm skill after practicing at the precinct’s shooting range.
• Li Jie found Nygma studying a range of subjects and suggested investigating surgical drugs and asking Otis about the body-dumping sites in the dismemberment case.
• Li Jie encountered Chief Bob watching Friends and learned that Loeb might be forced out while Captain Nathaniel Barnes had the strongest support to replace him.
• Li Jie reminded Bob that he had introduced the littering fine after spotting Bob’s cigarette butt on the lobby floor.

Li Jie learned that Black Mask was preparing a major attack and discovered he planned to assault Blackgate Penitentiary. As Black Mask's forces set out, Li Jie decided to investigate the prison with Wilson.

• Li Jie received a tip that Black Mask was gathering men and warned his office to secure the precinct in case it was targeted.
• Black Mask rallied his surviving men and announced a plan to storm Blackgate Penitentiary, free prisoners, and seize weapons.
• Black Mask's armed convoy headed toward Blackgate while mercenary squads moved toward a charity gala and the Commercial District.
• Li Jie informed Gordon of the threats, and Gordon chose to take officers to protect the Commercial District.
• Li Jie asked Wilson to accompany him to Blackgate Penitentiary to investigate the attack.

Li Jie and Wilson watched Black Mask’s assault on Blackgate Penitentiary, where a strange attacker used electricity to disable the prison’s defenses. Black Mask’s men stormed inside, and Li Jie and Wilson fled after their shot failed to stop the attacker.

• Li Jie and Wilson saw Black Mask’s convoy cross the lowered drawbridge and attack Blackgate Penitentiary’s entrance.
• Black Mask’s men blew open the prison gate, but SWAT officers on the walls cut down their advance with machine-gun fire.
• A heavily equipped stranger unleashed powerful electrical arcs through the rain, incapacitating the officers and guards on the walls.
• Li Jie fired at the stranger, but the bullet slowed and bounced off his helmet as the stranger struck again.
• Black Mask’s men surged through the gate and entered the prison, while Li Jie and Wilson escaped in the Cherokee.

Li Jie and Wilson found Batman battling Firefly at the burning Gotham Royal Banquet Hotel, where Black Mask’s mercenaries were abducting officials. Li Jie helped Batman defeat Firefly and distract the mercenaries, and Batman knocked out the gunmen as Li Jie moved to rescue the hostages.

• Li Jie spotted the fire at Civic Plaza and persuaded Wilson to drive toward it, where they saw Batman fighting Firefly outside the burning hotel.
• Li Jie discovered Black Mask’s mercenaries forcing Gotham officials into a van and helped Batman by shooting Firefly’s fuel tank twice.
• Batman knocked Firefly unconscious, extinguished the flames on his arm, and Li Jie shot out the van’s front left tire.
• Li Jie approached the mercenaries as Batman signaled from the shadows, then shouted “Allahu akbar” to draw their attention.
• Batman dropped from above and knocked the three mercenaries unconscious while Li Jie watched.

Li Jie returned from rescuing Gotham’s dignitaries and learned that Black Mask and the Roman were expanding their territories while the city’s violence escalated. He recruited Nygma to help with a case, then persuaded Cobblepot to provide him with a powerful 14.5-millimeter sniper cannon on credit.

• Li Jie revealed his police badge to the rescued dignitaries, then shot a mercenary who arrived to collect them and returned to the precinct.
• Nygma told Li Jie that a Gotham officer had died and another had been wounded during a mercenary attack, and that Black Mask had recruited nearly three hundred felons and seized territory in the West District.
• Li Jie heard that Joseph Rigg, an Iraq War veteran, had been arrested for setting fires, while Nygma described building a Taser-like cane and studying the Mad Hatter’s equipment.
• Li Jie assigned Anna and Otis to help Nygma with the Dismemberment Case.
• Li Jie asked Cobblepot for a more powerful firearm, and Cobblepot offered him a 14.5-millimeter sniper cannon for at least fifty thousand dollars.
• Li Jie insisted that Cobblepot put the cannon on his existing credit tab, and Cobblepot reluctantly agreed.

Carmine Falcone tried to unite Gotham’s crime families against Black Mask, but Salvador Maroni rejected the proposal and sought another advantage. Maroni visited Arkham Asylum, where Doctor Hugo Strange showed him a powerful experimental creation called Number One.

• Carmine Falcone offered Salvador Maroni and Rupert Thorne a share of Black Mask’s territory in exchange for a joint defense alliance.
• Salvador Maroni and Rupert Thorne questioned Falcone’s proposal, and the negotiations ended without an agreement.
• Maroni decided he needed a superhuman weapon and ordered his driver to take him to Arkham Asylum.
• Doctor Hugo Strange showed Maroni Number One, a strong, obedient creation whose pain response had been suppressed.
• Maroni agreed to fund Strange’s work, while Number One’s eyes seemed to follow him as he left.

As Black Mask’s gang violence spread across Gotham, a gunman encountered a pig-headed killer disposing of bodies in a sewer alley. Bruce Wayne returned from patrol with injuries and asked Alfred about the wiretap on Li Jie.

• Li Jie and Wilson discussed Black Mask’s takeover of gang territory and the disruption it caused in Gotham.
• A skull-masked gunman dragged a corpse into an alley and found a pig-headed man dumping dismembered bodies into a sewer.
• The pig-headed man killed the gunman after he fired a shot and wounded his hand.
• Alfred treated Bruce Wayne’s broken arm and told him he had arranged a false story about the injury for the media.
• Bruce asked Alfred whether monitoring Li Jie had produced useful information, and Alfred advised against it because Li Jie swore so often.

Nygma used Otis’s rats to track the source of chemically treated human remains found near a Gotham sewer outlet, while Li Jie visited Harper at the clinic and later heard George Harkness report being robbed and stripped. The chapter ended with Li Jie suggesting that Harkness had survived a glimpse of Gotham’s true depths.

• Nygma examined dismembered remains and a murdered Black Mask henchman at the sewer outlet, then sent Anna away so Otis could have rats memorize the remains’ scent.
• Otis gathered hundreds of rats and sent them into Gotham’s sewer system to trace the odor to its source.
• Li Jie visited the Gotham Charity Clinic with gifts for Harper and discovered her administering injections to a line of gangsters.
• Li Jie took Harper upstairs to Karen when gang members brought in a badly wounded companion, then left the clinic.
• At the police station, George Harkness told Li Jie that someone had knocked him out and left him stripped after he tried to return a woman’s dropped wallet.
• Li Jie sympathized with Harkness and said he was lucky to have seen Gotham’s true depths and survived.

Li Jie and Nygma pursued a suspect connected to the Dismemberment Case while Gordon described the police force’s state of alert over Black Mask. Meanwhile, Cobblepot gathered Gotham crime figures and proposed an alliance against Black Mask, leaving them to raise a cautious toast to the city’s stability.

• Gordon told Li Jie that Barnes had ordered officers to cancel leave after an anonymous warning about Black Mask, and Li Jie declined Gordon’s offer to join the arrest operation.
• Li Jie, Wilson, and Bastian approached the processing plant while Nygma and Otis stayed behind to watch the van.
• Cobblepot met with Rick Torino, Sobieski, and Paul in his hospital room and criticized Falcone’s handling of their losses and troubles.
• Cobblepot proposed pooling resources into an alliance against Black Mask, and the three visitors raised their glasses to Gotham’s stability.

Li Jie and Wilson found and killed the pig-headed serial killer Lazlo Valentin in an abandoned meat-processing plant. In the Batcave, Bruce Wayne received cryogenic grenades and prepared to return to patrol despite his injuries.

• Li Jie and Wilson searched the abandoned processing plant and discovered a peeled human face and a storeroom filled with preserved body parts.
• Bastian hid in Li Jie's tactical vest as a nursery rhyme and the sound of a wheeled cart announced the killer's approach.
• The pig-headed Lazlo Valentin entered the storeroom, and Wilson and Li Jie shot him dead.
• Li Jie received a system message confirming that he had ended Lazlo Valentin's fate and gained three skill points.
• Alfred gave Bruce Wayne cryogenic grenade samples and reported the Wayne company's profits from its cryogenic life-support service.
• Bruce Wayne told Alfred to ready the Batmobile, insisting that he would patrol Gotham despite his injuries.

Li Jie, Wilson, and Nygma tested Nygma’s frightening image projection before Roman Sionis rallied his followers to attack Wayne Tower the next night. As Falcone prepared to attend Wayne Enterprises’ gala, a hooded figure slipped away from Sionis’s gathering.

• Nygma used a projection of the Jersey Devil to scare Wilson, then showed him how the illusion worked.
• Roman Sionis urged his army to destroy Wayne Tower and announced that Electrocutioner and mercenary companies would join the assault the following night.
• A hooded figure cheered with Sionis’s followers, then quietly left the church and escaped across the rooftops.
• Falcone told Victor he planned to attend Wayne Enterprises’ technology press conference and charity gala, where he could meet Mayor O'Brien and incoming police chief Mr. Barnes.

Li Jie gained a discriminatory trial skill and strengthened his body, then learned Black Mask planned to attack Wayne Tower and prepared to support the police. The chapter left him heading toward a dangerous operation while his department’s million-dollar fund had run dry.

• Li Jie spent two skill points to gain the male-inactive Even-Fist trial skill and raise his Little Man skill to level two, which required strenuous advancement tasks.
• Jim Gordon called Li Jie early in the morning with a tip that Black Mask and more than four hundred gang members planned to attack Wayne Tower.
• At the station, Li Jie experienced a vivid hallucination of gunfire destroying the lobby, then warned Edward Nygma about Black Mask’s plan.
• Bob asked Li Jie whether their department should support Gordon’s response, and Li Jie agreed to go while criticizing Gordon’s likely casualties and Bob’s evasiveness.
• Bob revealed that the department had spent its million-dollar fund, and Li Jie promised to find a solution if he returned alive.

As Gotham prepared for Black Mask’s attack on Wayne Tower, Li Jie tried to keep his officers out of the operation while Carmine Falcone and Bruce Wayne made their own preparations. Bruce left to face the danger both as Wayne and as Batman.

• Li Jie announced Central Headquarters’ operation and let officers use car trouble as an excuse to stay away, then sent Alan to help with their leave slips.
• Carmine Falcone prepared to go to Wayne Tower, distrustful of his allies and fearful that Black Mask’s chaos was beyond his control.
• Bruce Wayne decided to attend Wayne Enterprises’ technology presentation and personally confront the threat despite Alfred’s warnings.
• Alfred confirmed the Batmobile’s upgrades, including a freeze projector, while Bruce put on his Batsuit and prepared to leave.

Li Jie and Wilson prepared for the Wayne Tower reception as Gotham’s powerful guests gathered under heavy police presence. With Carmine Falcone and Bruce Wayne arriving, Li Jie readied his team for the violence he expected to erupt.

• Li Jie met James Gordon at Diamond Plaza and gave him body armor, shotguns, a rifle, and ammunition.
• Carmine Falcone arrived with a large convoy of armed bodyguards and Victor Zsasz.
• Mayor O'Brien, city officials, philanthropists, and other prominent guests gathered for the reception.
• Bruce Wayne arrived in an Aston Martin and joined Mayor O'Brien and Falcone at the entrance.
• Li Jie told Wilson to check their gear as the cast assembled and the show was about to begin.

Li Jie and the GCPD faced Black Mask’s convoy as it attacked the square, and Li Jie joined the firefight with a heavy sniper rifle. Vicki Vale arrived to report on the battle and ran toward Gordon’s line through the gunfire unharmed.

• Li Jie and Wilson watched the GCPD prepare to confront Black Mask’s approaching convoy, while Gordon ordered officers to take cover.
• The convoy ignored Gordon’s warning, fired an RPG at the police line, and launched a fierce exchange of gunfire.
• Li Jie killed a machine gunner with his Cheetah M3, and a Central Headquarters sniper shot a thug aiming an RPG at him.
• Li Jie encountered Vicki Vale, who insisted on reporting the battle, and urged her to film the wounded officers.
• Vicki ran toward Gordon’s defensive line as gang members fired at her, but every bullet missed.

Li Jie and the defenders fought Black Mask’s forces as a squad infiltrated Wayne Tower through underground passages and the tower suddenly lost power. The battle continued in darkness, ending with an armed mercenary crashing through an upper-floor window and dangling upside down from a cord.

• Li Jie destroyed the lead SUV of Black Mask’s eastern detachment with a sniper shot, while Anna shot a gunman and Wilson drove the van to cover.
• Otis told Li Jie that a squad had entered Wayne Tower through underground passages and that he could no longer sense Bastian.
• Gordon reported that Black Mask’s forces were flanking the defenders from the west, where Falcone’s bodyguards fought back and suffered casualties.
• Li Jie prepared to enter Wayne Tower, but its lights went out and communications with the building became static-filled.
• Gunshots and screams came from the tower before a mercenary burst through a window and was left hanging upside down from a cord.

Batman emerged from Wayne Tower and used the Batmobile to disrupt the Black Mask gang’s attack, but two enormous giants appeared and threatened the battlefield. Li Jie and his allies prepared for the new attackers as the chapter ended.

• Batman leaped from Wayne Tower into the Batmobile as Li Jie and Wilson watched from their Patrol Van.
• The Batmobile charged through the Black Mask gang’s forces, releasing tear gas and firing out the remaining lights to plunge the plaza into darkness.
• Li Jie gave his teammates gas masks and prepared them to mop up the disoriented gang members.
• A box truck flew toward the Batmobile, which narrowly dodged the impact as the truck smashed apart among nearby gang members.
• Two towering, heavily muscled giants emerged, and Li Jie asked whether anyone had brought beans.

Li Jie used an anti-materiel rifle to wound one giant while Batman’s Batmobile was struck down, leaving Batman injured. Li Jie killed the charging giant with two more shots, then collapsed in the Patrol Van.

• Gordon ordered the officers and gang members to fire on the two giants, but their bullets barely hurt them.
• Li Jie took the Cheetah rifle as the giants attacked the Batmobile and demolished the plaza.
• Flares lit the battlefield, allowing Li Jie to shoot a washbasin-sized hole through one giant’s chest.
• The second giant struck the Batmobile with a streetlight, wrecking it and forcing an injured Batman from the cockpit.
• Li Jie saw a suspicious masked thug get flung into a building, then shot the wounded giant twice and killed it.
• Anna and Otis helped Li Jie back into the Patrol Van, where he collapsed and told Wish he was done for.

Batman and Li Jie helped defeat the Black Mask gang’s attackers, and the police began clearing the battlefield. Li Jie found Otis grieving over Bastian, who had died from his wounds, and promised him a funeral with honors.

• Batman escaped Giant’s attack, froze Electrocutioner, and killed Giant with bat-bombs.
• Li Jie and the police advanced as the Black Mask gang members surrendered or fled, while Anna and Wilson reacted to the gruesome battlefield.
• Gordon praised Li Jie’s weapon use but warned him to avoid trouble with the incoming Chief Barnes.
• Li Jie searched for Otis and found him mourning Bastian, who had died after being burned and wounded.
• Li Jie wrapped Bastian’s body in his jacket and promised Otis he would arrange a medal and a funeral with honors.