Days as a Spiritual Mentor in American Comics

Chapter 5914: Chapter 4935: No Batman Here (22)

After the former Rodrix Manor was turned into the base of the Young Avengers, they carried out a series of renovations. Although the decorative style and overall structure hadn’t changed, they added many modern facilities and refitted it to look more like a combat headquarters.

First, a large operations table was placed in the center of the hall, in front of the staircase. Although they used a carved solid-wood design to keep it consistent with the decor, the Gotham City sand table on top was a carefully made high‑tech product, with a precise physical model as well as holographic projection.

The sofa area next to the fireplace was left untouched; they sometimes rest there and eat snacks. Most of the less important tactical meetings are also discussed there.

On the other side, the partition wall between the hall and the dining room was torn down, letting sunlight enter the hall more easily and making the estate look a bit less like a Vampire Castle. The dining room’s color palette was slightly adjusted, changing from solid wood with dark green decorations to a more youthful and lively deep orange.

Then, two windows were opened in the wall leading to the back door, which also made the entire hall more open and better lit. On the walls on both sides, the oil paintings left by the Viscount were taken down; the left side was replaced with a map, and the right with a bulletin board. They also cleared out the maid’s room that had originally been used as a storage room and installed a device there to enhance the Brainiac signal reception.

Right now, the atmosphere in the estate could definitely be called serious. Several members were gathered around the operations table, staring at the Gotham Map. The faces of those who had previously been unconscious were still a bit pale.

The Robins from the Prime Universe felt a little dazed as they carefully took in their surroundings. You rarely see such an old‑fashioned building in Gotham. Wayne Manor could count as one, but under Alfred’s care it exudes a classical elegance, rather than this estate’s pure, gloomy gothic vibe.

Red hood couldn’t help whispering, "Are they planning to role‑play vampires in here?"

"I’m afraid someone else is going to be playing the vampire." Nightwing said, "I remember this place used to be Professor Shearer’s house..."

But they still all stood in front of the operations table, just about to say something, when the Arkham Knight, radiating cold air, walked in—unlike most Robins, he was clad head to toe in silver Armor that gleamed with a hard, icy light; he was Silent and stern, and looked extremely unapproachable—"What’s going on?"

"He looks like he snatched Batman’s cape." Red Robin muttered.

"And it looks like he snatched it while Batman was still alive." Nightwing also said quietly.

"Not quite; don’t forget who his Batman is." Red hood cut in.

At the thought of that Batman, the Robins all felt a chill run down their backs. To be fair, a lot of disasters that should have happened in the Prime Universe didn’t happen because of Multiverse interference, so their clashes with Deathstroke were actually pretty rare—nowhere near the level of "getting beat up every single day."

But fate clearly wasn’t going to let them off that easy. Because they’re always taking Battleworld instances, and Arkham Batman is a Battleworld addict, they kept running into each other. They were really hunted down and beaten by Arkham Batman; they couldn’t beat him one‑on‑one, and they couldn’t beat him one‑versus‑many either.

The key thing is, Arkham Batman is not the kind of Batman who stops once he realizes you can’t fight back; he’ll keep chasing you. Even in non‑PVP instances, if you get too close to him, you might get beaten up together with the Monsters. He’s flipping pans in Battleworld every day, and one of his main dishes is Robin.

As a result, now most Robins, as soon as they see a Batman in Metal Armor—even if it’s actually not Arkham Batman and just has a similar Armor style—turn into skittish birds spooked by a bowstring.

By comparison, the Arkham Knight kept a much lower profile; he wasn’t very interested in the game. But the charm of stacking boxes is that when your opponent’s power level rises, your own strength rating naturally goes up too. No Robin could help being curious how he had opposed Arkham Batman back in the day.

On this point, the Arkham Knight rarely offers an Explanation, and not just because he doesn’t talk much. He can hardly say that his so‑called opposition was just picking one night when a certain Batman was a bit distracted to have a fight with him. The total physical damage he caused in that fight wasn’t even one ten‑thousandth of the Psyshock he inflicted on Batman when his own identity was exposed, and then the two of them each got hit with a mental crit from Shiller.

"I really wonder which bastard let that Monster out." Ted sighed. "It can’t be like in the movies, where a real man never looks back at an explosion and never checks if the Monster’s actually dead, and that’s how it miraculously escapes, right?"

"Shiller isn’t that much of a noob." Harley said. "This Monster might have been capable of resurrection from the start. It’s just hard to imagine Shiller using something as brute‑force as smashing it to bits to solve the problem, instead of conducting a careful investigation to find a way to banish it."

"That really doesn’t sound like the Professor’s style." Tim said, bracing his hands on the edge of the operations table. "But if it were the agent, that would make sense; he doesn’t have the patience for investigation."

"Let’s think about what we should do." Pamela said, resting her chin on her hand. "I lean toward going to the place where this Monster first appeared and investigating; there should still be some clues that haven’t been discovered. And didn’t Shiller say there was a treasure chest there?"

"Yeah." Charles nodded. "But we still don’t have a key..."

"I do." The Arkham Knight said. "A Silver Key dropped during a previous raid; Brainiac said it’s used to open chests."

"Then this is easy." Harley snapped her fingers and said, "We organize an investigation squad, go to that Black Water Tail Alley or whatever, see if there are any missed clues, and open the chest while we’re at it."

"But investigation alone isn’t enough." Tim said, "We have to limit that Monster’s movements, otherwise it’ll contaminate more and more other monsters, and the next wave of assaults will be impossible to fight."

Once they got onto this topic, the mood grew heavier. They’d already discovered that this Monster made of black sludge could turn other monsters into a living-dead state, then send them out to contaminate even more monsters.

Every Monster that had been contaminated carried the Outer God’s Psyshock attribute. You really couldn’t even look at them, let alone shoot them like before with guns. If they actually let it spread like this, then in the next wave of assaults they could only close their eyes and wait to die.

"We’ll go." Nightwing said.

"You guys don’t have Superpower." Ted slapped the table and said, "Let me go instead."

"Go my ass." Harley frowned impatiently and said, "This is a combat squad, not a suicide squad. Do you have any way to restrict it? You just charge in?"

Tim coughed, reminding Harley not to be so sharp-tongued—after all, they were teammates now. He let out a light sigh and said, "Harley’s words are crude, but her logic isn’t. Combat is always results-oriented, not about who’s more vicious or reckless. We have to first work out a practical, viable battle plan, then decide who should go based on the plan, instead of turning this into some courage contest where whoever’s more impulsive wins. That kind of team culture only leads to more pointless sacrifices."

Prime Universe Robin looked at him in some surprise. There was nothing wrong with what he’d said; it was just that it sounded a bit too much like Batman. Batman often talked to them like that.

"I feel like the cape’s on him." Nightwing nudged Red Robin with his elbow. "What do you think?"

"Need to keep watching." Red Robin tilted his head and said.

"Maybe holographic projections would help." Ted thought for a moment and said, "Blue Beetle is a technological construct; it itself isn’t affected by Outer Gods, and it has independent Wisdom. It might be able to project something to trap the Monster..."

"It’s not that simple. The matter your holographic projections convert doesn’t have Magic Attributes, so it can’t block spiritual pollution. We can’t trap an Outer God with just a few walls. If it were that easy, we’d be laughing."

"Then we first use walls to block its line of sight, and then I use Magical Plant to bind it." Pamela thought for a moment and said, "The power of All Things Green should have some purifying effect."

"We can’t assume it won’t fight back." Lilith said, "Outer Gods aren’t all mindless. Even if it can’t figure out what Blue Beetle and holographic projections are, at the very least it knows someone’s attacking it, and it will definitely counterattack."

"Makes sense." Dick nodded and said, "Most Outer Gods are blind and idiotic, with little reaction to outside changes, but this is a Game World made by Brainiac, so he definitely mixed his own design for the Monster into it. He wouldn’t design something that just stands there dumbly. This Monster must have basic routines, like retaliating when hit, or running when it encounters abnormal situations."

"We don’t have many chances; we can’t act rashly." Dick said. "Once the initial containment plan fails and the Monster gets wary, it’ll be even harder to pin it down."

Cassandra let out a soft sigh. Lilith glanced at her, then said, "Maybe we can use the method for putting out Forest fires."

"Spell it out." Dick said.

"This Monster is a regional boss; it’s unlikely to personally join the assault. What we’re really worried about is it wandering around nearby and contaminating the monsters that are supposed to participate in the assault. In that case, we can just kill all the monsters near its area of activity and carve out a blank isolation belt. That way, no monsters will get contaminated."

"But this Monster moves." Nightwing said, "We can’t chase it all the way and kill every Monster along its path, clearing the entire region. Even if it stayed put, carving out an isolation belt would be very difficult."

"Its movement speed isn’t fast; this could still work." Pamela thought for a bit and said, "If Polaris and I alternate strikes, it might be doable. It’s just that the Strength consumption would be too high—we’d probably need a long rest after the fight."

"This can only be a backup plan." Tim said, "I’m thinking: can we snipe it from ultra-long range? As long as we blast it apart, it’ll have to go find another place to respawn, and that way it shouldn’t have time to contaminate too many monsters."

That actually sounded like a good idea; everyone agreed. Don’t forget, the Prime Universe Robins had handled heavy weapons before, and they immediately realized that their main problem right now was lack of firepower.

There are no civilians in the Game World; the only things wandering around are monsters, so why talk about any so-called "martial virtue"? Firepower saturation is the best solution. All fear comes from insufficient firepower—if they could build nukes here, would they still be afraid of some Outer God?