Chapter 109 Is This Batman? (Part 1)_1

Watching as Shiller was rushed into the emergency room, Batman heard rapid footsteps behind him in the corridor. Oliver and Clark hurried over, with Zatanna trailing them. Clark, his face filled with urgency, was the first to reach Batman. "How is he?" he asked, "Is the Professor alright?"

"I don't know yet." Batman shook his head again. Clark drew a deep breath, stepped forward, and lightly tapped Batman's shoulder. "Can you tell me what's going on?" he asked, "Why did Professor Shearer suddenly..."

Before Batman could respond, Clark spoke up, "Listen, Bruce, I know I acted rashly before. I understand that this matter might be complex, and you aren't the killer. But since you were there, you should've protected Shearer. After all, he's an ordinary person, and it's our duty to do so."

Clark relaxed his shoulders and lowered his head. "This mess shouldn't involve a university professor," he said, "It could put him in grave danger."

"Things are complicated, but there's no time to explain everything from the start." Batman turned his head, eyeing Zatanna. Zatanna took off her top hat and sighed deeply. "Alright, all of this is my fault. When Schiller and Constantine come back, I'll apologize to them. But my hurry wasn't without reason, it's all heading in the worst direction, isn't it?"

Zatanna seemed extremely exhausted or to be more precise, she was in the worst state among them. Although Batman had experienced all sorts of hardships in Hell, he was in soul status which means he doesn't need to eat, drink, or rest. But in the real world, such options didn't apply to Zatanna.

Zatanna had set up several portals, nearly exhausting all her energy. She had been moving back and forth among the human world, the spirit realm, and Hell. Now, she barely had any magic left to cast.

"We can discuss the apologies later. What we need to know now is what happened to Schiller. Then, we have to deal with the chaos in Gotham," Batman declared, glancing out the window.

At that moment, an eerie calm spread over Gotham City. During Batman's absence, when he ventured into Hell, Gotham's citizens didn't remain idle. Especially those former supercriminals with special abilities - after Batman's departure, they became the saviors of Gotham City.

When the virus first started spreading, it did cause a significant panic. But after the initial chaos subsided, many people began to realize something unusual. The first to notice the discrepancies was Jason.

Recalling the time he delivered food to the mob and got scratched by someone, catching a high fever. It was Professor Shearer who saved him. Replaying this sequence of events in his mind, Jason instinctively identified something suspicious.

Normally, the person who scratched him would have given him the virus. But that would imply that this man got infected because someone else had scratched him, causing him to go mad.

If that was the case, it would mean that a fight happened during the mob's rescue mission after the house collapsed on Street of the Broken Fish Basket. If a fight did break out during their rescue mission, it would be chaos, the kind of chaos Jason would have heard about.

If a fight broke out and someone had gone mad due to a scratch, Jason would surely have heard about it. Hence, the man who scratched him hadn't been scratched by someone else before.

So, if that's true, he must be the origin of the virus. Finding out what happened should start with him. But then, Jason remembered another detail.

After Jason was scratched, he felt an intense pain. He had sustained injuries before in street fights. He knew the level of pain a scratch wound should cause, but back then, the pain from his wound was beyond his imagination.

Tire found his injury and hastily took him back to the building of the ongoing renovation project. Upon entering the building, Jason felt the pain from the wound lessen, which allowed him to lie on the bed and fall asleep.

Moreover, another more significant clue was that Jason's wound was deep, and his fever lasted for a long time. Shearer's aid wasn't immediate, yet, during this time, Jason didn't go mad. Based on his later investigations, he found out that most people would become insane within one to two hours after being scratched.

What made him different from the other infected?

Thinking carefully, the most significant difference between the indoors and outdoors was that indoors, you wouldn't get rained on. Also, the significant difference between him and the other patients is that his recovery place was a room inside the building of the ongoing project.

How did the building of the renovation project differ from other buildings? Grabbing onto this question, Jason caught a vital clue. Indeed, there were many dissimilarities between the internal parts of the project building and other buildings. But the most critical one must be the water supply.

All of the buildings under redevelopment were equipped with new water purifiers. They hadn't directly consumed naturally recycled water for a long time. After Jason had a fever, Tire constantly gave him water to drink, which greatly alleviated his symptoms.

With this in mind, Jason started his investigation and found out that all people who had lived in the project building had a prolonged fever after infection. Only those who didn't receive any medical treatment in this period would turn mad, and their symptoms were much less severe than those of people elsewhere.

Realizing that the drinking water and rainwater might be problematic, Jason immediately wanted to find Batman. However, when he arrived at Wayne Manor, he only found Zatanna, who had just regained consciousness.

Aisha and Dick were trapped in the school. All schools in Gotham had become quite accustomed to these situations, sealing off the campus as soon as the chaos erupted. The damage was minor, but the students couldn't leave.

Therefore, Jason went to Gotham University and located his friend Little Sly. Little Sly wasn't very familiar with chemistry, and he led Jason to Victor. At that time, Victor was using his Freeze Gun to deal with the infected inside Gotham University.

After tirelessly working for several days, Victor realized that simply freezing each infected person was not a solution. The root of the virus had to be found to end this chaos.

Inspired by the leads provided by Jason and Little Sly, he took out a batch of freeze weapons from his cryogenic lab and gave them to Jason. He trusted this young man approved by Shiller, hoping that Jason could deliver the weapons to those who could utilize them to the fullest.

Simultaneously, Victor led his students to collect water samples from various sources in Gotham for testing in the lab, hoping to find if there were substances that could drive people mad.

As soon as Jason and Little Sly got the freeze guns, they didn't make a big fuss about it. Instead, they reached out to local Gotham kids like Tire and Red Card Truck, listening to their ideas.

Eventually, the weapons were handed over to Cobblepot. Under the direction of Alberto, the most elite members of the Falcone family, leading the finest of the Twelve Families, began patrolling Gotham with the freeze weapons.

Although a comprehensive solution was needed, they had to stop the chaos on the streets first. These mobsters, trained with great effort by the Twelve Families, had impeccable gun skills.

Equipped with these handy and efficient freeze weapons, they started to patrol different areas. The moment they found anyone infected, they would instantly freeze them,

That's when the widespread network of truck drivers in Gotham, thanks to Joker Jack, came into play.

Jack had been driving trucks all day. Upon waking up, he found Gotham full of lunatics. Excited, he thought this was a good opportunity to chat with Batman. Unfortunately, his beloved Batman was not in Gotham, which left Jack sorely disappointed.

Having no one to share in the fun, Jack was let down. He had bought two bottles of liquor, intending to have a wild night with Batman. Without Batman around, he had to drink alone.

Fully drunk, Jack stumbled home. On the way, he was scratched by a deranged drunk, leaving two wounds on his shin.

The madness virus infected Jack dramatically, and left just as dramatically.

Even though Jack wasn't infected, he was still annoyed. Not because of a mishap, but Batman wasn't near when he got hurt.

Jack was displeased, but he didn't go crazy. He didn't feel like venting his anger on a bunch of lunatics. Instead, he contacted his network of truck drivers. The frozen patients were then all transported to the cold storage warehouses which are normally used for cargo.

Once again, Batman was in Joker's debt.

By the time Batman returned to Gotham, most of the chaos in the city had already been taken care of.

The infected patients were frozen and stored in the cold storage, waiting to be thawed once the antidote was found.

Everyone else was warned by the mob to stay indoors, and so the streets were all cleaned up except for the omnipresent broccoli.

Just as Batman was about to reveal his plan, hurried footsteps echoed from the end of the corridor. Jason, the one running towards him, was wearing a raincoat and carrying an umbrella. Batman glanced at the familiar umbrella in his hand and then at Jason.

After catching his breath, Jason asked Batman, "How's Professor Shearer? I heard he's unconscious."

"Yes, the doctors are doing their best," Batman nodded. He thought Jason would be anxious and would ask for the whole story. To his surprise, Jason took a deep breath and said,

"The initial test results of rain water and drinking water from the Gotham University Cryogenic Lab are out. Professor Victor called me to say that the situation is a bit complicated."

"I never studied chemistry, so if I went to listen, it would be like hearing gibberish. I heard from Mr. Alfred that you were back, so I came here. You should hurry over and hear out Professor Victor's conclusions," said Jason.

Batman bent down and looked into Jason's eyes. Jason seemed to know what was coming and said, "I know, Professor Shearer's condition is not good, but, right now, it's more important to deal with the trouble in Gotham."

"My being worried here isn't going to help the doctors. But if we manage to deal with the lunatics and broccoli, at least we can provide Professor Shearer a better environment to recover when he wakes up."

Batman's hand on Jason's shoulder faltered. Jason looked at Batman and said, "Both of us know what would happen if the newly recovered Professor Shearer saw broccoli at first glance out the window."

Batman stood up straight immediately, looked at Clark, and said, "Come with me. We need to solve this problem right now."