True Identity

The pungent smell of disinfectant filled Qin Wei's nose. He opened his eyes, and the blurry grid of the hospital room's ceiling gradually sharpened as his vision focused.

He slowly turned his head, looking past the IV stand until his gaze settled on Oswald's face in the next bed.

Fuck! How was this bastard still alive? Someone had kicked his head into a wall, and he survived! If I'd known he wasn't dead, why the hell would I have fought that guy?

Qin Wei could have cried.

"You're awake?!"

A familiar, deep male voice came from the doorway. He carefully turned his head and saw Gordon approaching with a small bunch of baby's breath.

Gordon had lost a great deal of weight since their last meeting. His face was sallow, dark circles ringed his eyes, and his cheeks had hollowed beneath his cheekbones. Helping Harvey gather evidence had clearly been exhausting work.

"Why bring flowers? Fruit would've been much more useful. I'm so hungry I'm dizzy."

"Could the dizziness possibly be from your concussion?"

Gordon placed the flowers in the vase on the bedside table.

"Impossible. Absolutely impossible! My stomach feels so empty I could reach through it and touch my spine." Qin Wei wasn't putting on a brave face anymore. His dizziness really was caused by low blood sugar.

"Then I'll go buy you something to eat, or have someone bring you a meal?" Gordon took out his phone and sent a text.

"Forget it. Business comes first." Qin Wei's gaze shifted to the black bat utility belt in Gordon's hand.

He and Gordon weren't close enough for a visit like this. The man had probably come because of the fake Batman.

"I checked this belt. It appears to be custom-made, with no manufacturer listed. The only fingerprints left on it belong to you and the officers handling the case." Since they had broached the subject, Gordon got straight to the point.

"The belt has plenty of functions. It delivers electric shocks, fires a grappling hook, and holds several throwing blades, smoke bombs, and flashbangs."

"You don't need to explain its functions. Just get to the point."

"It doesn't give us a lead, so I wanted to ask you. How much do you know about its owner, that bat criminal?"

"At first, I thought he was Bruce Wayne. Now I realize I know nothing about him," Qin Wei said honestly.

"Why would you suspect Bruce?"

"That has nothing to do with the case. If you keep asking, you'll hear answers crazy enough to get me committed to Arkham Asylum."

Gordon nodded and recounted something that had happened many years ago.

Twenty years earlier, he had personally put Bruce Wayne into an ambulance. Before long, the hospital had sent word of the boy's death. His death certificate and autopsy results had arrived on Gordon's desk shortly afterward.

"Wow! So young Master Wayne really did die?" Qin Wei raised his eyebrows.

He didn't believe that answer. The fake Batman from last night might not have been Bruce, but he had to be connected to him somehow. Otherwise, why would a set of bat gear suddenly appear in a world without Batman?

Honestly, he no longer wanted to bother with the fake Batman. Whether the man existed or not made little difference to him right now.

But on one hand, this was Gordon's request. On the other, the Node Event a month from now was crucial. It would involve three factions, and an all-out clash was inevitable.

If the fake Batman intervened at that point, he might throw Qin Wei's entire plan into disarray.

After weighing it over, he decided to help Gordon one more time. If this investigation led nowhere, he would just have to let it go.

"Find someone. If he's in Gotham, then Bruce Wayne is definitely still alive," Qin Wei said after a moment's thought.

"Who is this person?"

"Alfred Pennyworth."

Alfred, affectionately known as Alfred-the great Butler Knight.

With his knowledge of Batman's story, Qin Wei had possessed more information from the outset. According to the original story, Alfred would become Bruce's guardian after the Waynes died. But if Bruce really had died, Alfred most likely wouldn't have stayed in Gotham.

His presence could therefore serve as indirect proof of whether Bruce was alive.

Gordon took out a battered notebook and wrote down the name.

"Thanks for your help. If the investigation makes any progress, you'll be the first to know. Oh, and before I came, Bullock and Harvey asked me to pass along their regards. They both hope you recover soon."

"Thanks to them, I'm ready to get out of bed right now!"

Gordon had barely finished speaking when Qin Wei pulled the needle out of his hand and sat up.

His actions stunned Gordon.

"Are you crazy? Do you know how badly you're hurt?"

"Of course. Nobody knows my body better than I do. But you know what? We're running out of time. That fake Batman threw my whole plan off track. I need to move faster!"

Gordon had been among the first to reach the scene last night. Nobody knew better than he did how severely Qin Wei had been injured.

Both fists had been battered bloody. He had a puncture wound through his palm, multiple fractures in his hand bones, a cracked elbow, and an inch-long gash in his back. The wound gaped like the maw of a man-eating flower, exposing bloody flesh.

With injuries like those, Gordon would have spent at least two weeks in bed.

Under Gordon's horrified gaze, Qin Wei deftly stripped off his hospital gown and changed into his tattered suit beside the wardrobe. "Commissioner Gordon, give me a hand, will you? My hands are wrapped in gauze. I can't find the sleeves..."

Who the hell was this guy?

After helping Qin Wei get dressed, Gordon felt a flicker of relief amid his alarm. At least this man was still on the side of justice for now.

Qin Wei had barely left when Selina arrived.

After receiving Gordon's text saying Qin Wei was awake, she had made a special trip to Chinatown to pick up some dumplings. But the language barrier had left her stumbling over her words and gesturing at the proprietress for ages.

That small delay was enough for her to miss Qin Wei.

"Damn it! Couldn't he have waited a little?"

Riding a motorcycle in this weather was unbearably stuffy. Since she had been rushing, she was now drenched in sweat.

Tucking her helmet under one arm, Selina ran a hand through her wet hair.

Her gaze flicked toward the unconscious Oswald in the next bed.

"Lucky you!"

She tossed the food onto the bedside table and left the room with an angry pout.

"You're back?"

Under the dim light of an oil lamp, Dr. Hugo raised his head and carefully placed the reagent he had just prepared in a test-tube rack.

Slow, heavy footsteps from deep within the sewer were his only answer.

"What a shame. Even with all that equipment, you couldn't kill him. Was its performance inferior to the original, or was it because you're a mindless puppet who can only move when his master pulls the strings?"

No one answered.

A pitch-black figure slowly emerged from the darkness. The mysterious man in the bat mask stopped before Dr. Hugo and stood motionless.

"I suppose it's only natural. Reason and thought are the most powerful weapons God bestowed upon humanity. I was too impatient. I shouldn't have expected so much of you."

Dr. Hugo stepped forward, rose onto his toes, and removed the mysterious man's mask.

His eyes were vacant, his face deathly pale. Sweat-soaked black hair hung over his forehead like tangled, fraying straw. It was a face devoid of life.

Yet strangely, apart from being a little thinner, he looked exactly like Qin Wei.

"I thought that since I'd already succeeded once, I could replicate that success simply by continuing down the same path. But now it seems this is yet another tasteless joke the god of fate has played on me."

Dr. Hugo pressed a button in his hand. The mysterious man shed his bat suit and climbed naked into the cultivation tank beside him, which was filled with orange-yellow liquid.

"My research funds are running out, and the deadline he gave me is almost here. I can hardly deliver a defective product like you!"

Crouching down, Dr. Hugo traced the scratches on the bat armor as a sinister plan gradually took shape in his mind.