Inside the office at Zeus Securities.
Arnold was a balding, fat old man in his sixties. Short and stocky, he wore a suit and glasses and held a scarred puppet with a cigar in its mouth.
He was sitting in his chair, the Scarface puppet on his hand acting every inch the mob boss.
"Oh, Harley Quinn. What brings you here?"
The Scarface puppet bobbed a few times as a low, raspy voice came from Arnold's belly, making it seem as though the puppet were speaking.
"Ventriloquist, how did you recruit so many men?"
Harley looked at the burly Black men beside the Ventriloquist, all wearing suits with guns tucked into their waistbands, and plastered a fawning smile on her face.
"Could you teach me?"
"You want to learn?" The Scarface puppet on Arnold's hand lifted his head.
"Of course."
"Why should I help you? Just strip naked and take a stroll around the East End. Plenty of men will follow you then."
A vein bulged on Harley's forehead.
This damn idiot was as stupid as ever!
She gritted her teeth and forced a smile. "Once I've recruited some men, we can pull off something big together, make a name for ourselves across the United States, and reshape Gotham City in our image!"
The Scarface puppet shook his head. "Harley Quinn, Arnold and I want to rise above everyone else. We have no interest in any of that."
His tone shifted.
"Besides... if you want me to teach you how to recruit men, you'll have to show Arnold a good time first. Once he's satisfied, I'll tell you!"
Harley frowned, staring at the Ventriloquist in undisguised disgust.
"Then we have nothing more to discuss. Mr. Riddler, let's go."
She grabbed Lynn and turned to leave, but he stopped her.
"Leave? They're the ones who should leave. This is our turf."
"Your turf?" The Scarface puppet snickered. "Harley Quinn, where did you find this lunatic? Take him to Arkham Asylum and get his head checked!"
The moment he finished speaking, Lynn pulled his Gatling Gun and rocket launcher from the System Inventory.
The dark muzzles pointed at the Ventriloquist and his lackeys, and the heavy smell of gunpowder filled the air.
"Gentlemen, this place belongs to our Bat Gang. Who agrees, and who objects?"
The Black gunmen swallowed at the sight of his heavy weapons. Then they exchanged looks and, with practiced ease, lined up against the wall.
In the United States, these were basic survival skills.
BOOM!!
The rocket slammed into one of the Black men, blowing him into scattered chunks.
"I didn't fucking tell you to stand against the wall! This place belongs to our Bat Gang. Who agrees, and who objects?"
"I agree."
"Me too..."
"..."
Seeing his lackey blown to pieces, the Scarface puppet hurriedly tried to placate him.
"Neither of us means you any harm. Could you point that Gatling Gun and rocket launcher somewhere else?"
He felt like crying. Where had this guy pulled those heavy weapons from?
"Sorry. You might not mean any harm, but I do."
Lynn's lips spread into an arrogant grin.
"Hand over your guns and everything in your pockets. Otherwise, if my finger happens to slip, you'll end up scattered all over the place."
The Scarface puppet: "..."
"All right, you can leave."
Lynn sat beside the desk with his legs crossed, the Gatling Gun's dark barrels aimed at the gunmen, who had been stripped down to their underwear.
The gunmen looked at one another, bitter expressions on their faces.
If you're letting us leave, could you at least give us our clothes back?
Seeing their miserable expressions, Lynn frowned and immediately pulled the trigger.
RAT-A-TAT-TAT!!
Bullets poured into one of the burly Black men, riddling him with holes.
The remaining gunmen forgot all about their dignity and rushed out of the office without looking back, terrified that they would be shot full of holes too.
"And you." Lynn looked toward the Ventriloquist, who was crouching in a corner, trembling.
[Side quest: Break the Ventriloquist] [Quest description: The Ventriloquist has verbally abused your NPC teammate. Break him. Messing with a mental patient with a split personality is an essential part of every Gotham player's experience~] [Quest rewards: Random skill ×1, Harley's affection +10]
Lynn raised an eyebrow, then kicked Arnold the Ventriloquist in the backside, sending him sprawling.
He wasn't finished. As Arnold fell, Lynn snatched the Scarface puppet from his hand.
"Scarface! Give Scarface back to me!"
With his puppet snatched away, the Ventriloquist reacted as though his parents had died and lunged forward.
But against Lynn's strength stat of over a hundred, he had no chance of getting Scarface back. Like the helpless husbands in certain Japanese movies, he could only watch as Lynn toyed with his Scarface puppet.
Lynn turned to Harley Quinn beside him and asked, "Harley, you said this guy's split personality is connected to his puppets. If I strip him naked and put several different puppets on him at once, will that break him?"
Harley Quinn was busy counting the wallets they had taken from the gunmen, her pretty face brimming with excitement.
Hearing Lynn's question, she answered, "I'm not sure either, but you could give it a try."
With that answer, Lynn tore the puppet in his hands to pieces right in front of the Ventriloquist.
"Oh, no! Mr. Scarface! My Scarface!!"
Arnold let out an anguished scream and threw himself onto the fragments on the floor, as though he had lost something precious.
He sobbed, "Boo-hoo... Mr. Scarface, Mr. Scarface, don't die! How am I supposed to live without you...?"
Lynn hauled Arnold the Ventriloquist up and gave him two hard slaps, leaving both his cheeks red and swollen.
Those two slaps instantly made the bawling mental patient much more alert.
Seeing his reaction, Lynn thought, The Personality-Correcting Slap really does work best.
He picked up a ragged sock nearby and held it out to Arnold. "Try a new puppet. New puppets work much better than old ones."
Arnold looked at the ragged sock in Lynn's hand, his face full of timidity.
"What about the old ones?"
"Out with the old... pah! They haven't paid me for an ad, and you're trying to trick me into advertising for them?!"
Lynn glared at Arnold. He hadn't expected this mental patient to be so crafty. He had nearly ended up advertising some secondhand marketplace app.
"If you don't want it, you won't even get a ragged sock."
Under Lynn's blatant threat, Arnold wore the humiliated expression of someone forced to eat shit and shakily accepted the ragged sock from his hand.
The very next second, another voice emerged from Arnold's belly.
"Hello, Arnold. I'm Mr. Sock."
However.
The instant that voice emerged, Lynn snatched the ragged sock from Arnold's hand again.
"No! Mr. Sock! Give Mr. Sock back to me!" Arnold lunged at him again.
"Man!"
Under the Boss's elbow strike, a mere mental patient had no strength to resist.
Lynn's elbow sent him crashing to the floor, a sharp pain shooting through his chest.
But the Ventriloquist didn't hesitate. He simply got up and rushed toward Lynn.
It was as though that ragged sock held every last hope he had in life.
Then-
In Lynn's hands, every last one of those hopes... was torn to shreds.
"No! Sock, my Sock... boo-hoo! Scarface left me. Are you going to leave me too?"
The Ventriloquist threw himself onto the shredded sock, his face filled with grief and tears.
Before he could keep crying, Lynn stripped Arnold's clothes off.
"Ah! No! My clothes!" Arnold let out a piercing scream.
But that still failed to stop Lynn. In the end, all four of his limbs were covered with white, ragged socks.
Because of his extremely severe split personality disorder, Arnold the Ventriloquist had a tendency to create other personalities.
Both the earlier Scarface puppet and the ragged sock were evil personalities the Ventriloquist had created to protect his timid primary personality.
And in just a few seconds, Lynn had ruthlessly destroyed two of the Ventriloquist's personalities.
Without his precious puppets, the Ventriloquist would experience withdrawal, much like someone trying to quit jerking off: one day without it, and he would itch all over.
Normally, the Ventriloquist would seek out another object and slip it over his hand to replace his puppet and protect his timid primary personality.
But now Lynn had given him four identical ragged socks. Would those personalities start fighting inside the Ventriloquist?
If they did fight, what would happen to the Ventriloquist when he lost control of all four limbs?