Chapter 2098: Knight's Terrifying Night (Forty)_1

Jason sat on the sofa eating a sandwich.

He felt hungry, and that strange parasitic lifeform called the Symbiont in his head said to him, "Body repair is already 80% complete. I'm not sure if you need me to enhance your imperfect body structure and muscle strength..."

"Can it be enhanced even more?"

"Theoretically it can be, but after the enhancement, you will go through a period of adaptation. After the adaptation period, you still need regular exercise and to maintain your physical health…."

"You're as chatty as Dick. Just do your work."

Jason turned his head to see Shiller coming up from the basement, carrying a thick stack of files. He sat down on the couch opposite Jason and put the stack of documents on the table.

"Help me out, Jason."

Jason frowned at the large pile of stuff that seemed to be written in English, but he couldn't understand a thing.

From the vague images visible on the surface, it looked like some kind of medical and biological analysis reports. Jason even saw the cross-section of the organ he had personally cut off.

"What is this?"

"Medical, biological and chemical analysis reports."

"Yes, I know, I mean, what is being analyzed?"

"An analyzable substance."

Jason took a bite of his sandwich and looked at Shiller with some confusion. The terrifying atmosphere was gone, he now looked just like any ordinary doctor.

Shiller stopped his hand movements, looked up at Jason and said, "Do you know about the Joker virus?"

"I've heard of it," Jason swallowed the food in his mouth and continued, "But I don't think the Joker is a patient. He didn't get infected with some disease and then became crazy."

"A very accurate understanding, Jason. However, his madness can be contagious, usually through death." Shiller glanced down at the documents and said, "I told you before, I didn't come here just to treat you."

Jason stopped chewing and looked at Shiller. He also glanced at the documents in Shiller's hands and said, "You want to study the Joker virus. Is that the deal you made with Batman? Did he commission you to do this?"

"No, he allowed me to study the Joker and the Joker virus, and I will do my best to heal you."

With a soft sigh, Shiller looked into Jason's eyes and said, "You wouldn't want to know how much Batman spent to hire me. If you knew me earlier, you would know that my charge is high."

"It's just money, right? He has plenty of money." Jason retorted with a smirk.

"Not this time, Jason."

Jason's gaze immediately fell on Shiller's face, as if hoping for an accurate answer, but Shiller shook his head, handed the sorted documents back to Jason and said, "Go, give these to Batman."

Jason had just finished eating a sandwich. He stood up, took the documents from Shiller, and Shiller stood up as well, took out the communicator Batman left for him and said, "I'll call him, then he'll send you his location. If you have anything, ask him directly."

Jason pursed his lips and rubbed his nose a bit, showing some discomfort. He muttered softly, "I'm not interested in knowing."

"But you'd better show that his expenditure is worth it. Trust me, Jason, the cost is greater than you think."

Soon, Robin and Nightwing took Jason away from the island in a helicopter.

After Jason left, Shiller returned to the basement, took out a notebook from the file cabinet. All the words in it were not printed; they were handwritten. The professionalism was not as strong as the other documents, and there was more speculation.

This was the most important objective for Shiller's departure.

Before, there was a Batman-Joker theorem, which stated: Batman's gaze creates Joker; Joker is produced from Batman's options.

But later, through practical verification, it was found that Batman's gaze is a necessary condition, but not a sufficient condition for the birth of Joker. The conditions for the birth of Joker are very complex.

Under normal circumstances, Batman's gaze is just one of the factors contributing to the birth of the Joker.

Just like frying a dish, Batman's gaze is like a tomato. It can be used to fry eggs, stew meat, but it can hardly be a dish on its own.

So the question is, how did Shiller become the Joker?

Of course, the process Shiller knew before was, when he met the Batman of his universe for the first time, he was chosen, and then he became the Joker.

But as mentioned before, Batman's choice alone is not enough. Even if it can be, the required destiny and entanglement are not something that can be achieved at first sight.

Moreover, at that time, Bruce had just made his debut, and wasn't the very Batman yet. According to the Batman-Joker aggregation theorem, his gaze wasn't potent enough to transform Arrogant into the Joker.

Before knowing the truth about his origin, Shiller could only guess that it might be because the Batman of his universe was special, coupled with the fact that he was a special transmigrator. The combination of the two led to this catastrophe.

But after discovering the astonishing fleece plan of his original body, Shiller found that things might not be that simple.

His transformation into the Joker might not have been an accident.

So, if we consider Bruce's gaze as a tomato, what is the ingredient that mixes with the tomato to make a dish?

Of course, Shiller admits that his mental state can't exactly be called healthy, but Gotham is never short of madmen. If he was a local like them, why was it him?

And Shiller doesn't share common traits with the Joker; he has no acting experience, hasn't performed any comedy, isn't from a circus background, hasn't fallen into a chemical vat.

If we look at his past life experiences from a common person's perspective, besides the hardships in his childhood, it could hardly be considered a deadly joke, if anything it was deadly to others.

More importantly, Shiller believes his views completely differ from the Joker's. The Joker has a tendency to take revenge on society, whereas Shiller has always been trying to fit into ordinary society.

So, if the experiences and concepts are different, another factor that could have turned Shiller into the Joker can only be physical.

Combined with the fact that his original body was involved in the explosion in Gotham, it's hard for Shiller not to wonder, was this also part of the original plan?

When he speculated about this, Shiller suddenly thought of something else - Lex Luthor.

Lex Luthor once told Shiller about the scene when he met his original self.

At that time, Lex's father Lionel asked psychology expert Shiller to treat his son's illness. Of course, it was not a real treatment, but only to declare through Shiller's mouth that his son was ill.

Perhaps Shiller felt empathy for the young Lex. Upon realizing Lionel had excessively medicated him, Shiller knocked Lionel unconscious with a vase.

And then the important part came, Shiller injected Lex with a strongly alcohol-smelling concoction. At the time, Shiller guessed that it might be the Dionysus Factor.

But now, upon digging up the conversation between the original Shiller and Lex, he discovered a crucial point.

That was, the original Shiller had emphasized to Lex that the concoction would induce wild emotions, which could counteract the numbness caused by Lex's overuse of sedatives.

Shiller had some understanding of the Dionysus Factor, as underneath Gotham Cathedral was a whole pool of Dionysium, which was basically all Dionysus Factor.

The Dionysus Factor was actually a plot device created by DC writers to justify Joker's self-healing power. At the time Shiller found it peculiar, the original comics emphasized mainly the healing power of the Dionysus Factor.

So, could it be possible that the concoction held by the original Shiller wasn't the Dionysus Factor, or at least not entirely?

Suppose the Dionysus Factor predominantly originates from Gotham's Dionysium pool, and the original Shiller's route was to go to Metropolis first, then to Gotham. So, how would he have Gotham's specialty while in Metropolis?

Additionally, there's a detail. Lex told Shiller "there's just a few left" when Shiller took out the injection.

And according to Lex's observation at the time, the remaining liquid in the injection was indeed very little, probably less than a milliliter. It didn't look like it was originally this amount but more like what was left after usage.

So where was this mysterious injection used before?

The biggest question is, what was the mysterious injection in the original Shiller's hand? Was it used and where was it used?

Combining the fact that Arrogant turned into the Joker as soon as he attracted Batman's attention, Shiller could only make a wild guess: the injection in the original Shiller's hand was not the Dionysus Factor, but the Joker virus, and he used it on himself.

This would also explain why Lex later turned into the Joker after receiving Batman's attention. The combination of the Joker virus and Batman's gaze is the recipe for turning someone into the Joker.

This hypothesis sounds completely insane, and to verify the possibility of this, one needs to first understand what the Joker virus is.

The simplest method is, of course, to draw a tube of blood from Jack. Shiller believes that as long as the price is right, Jack wouldn't mind. However, this involves a problem of rigorous experimentation.

Firstly, as Bruce is no longer Batman, it is doubtful whether Jack, as the Joker, can now be considered a pure Joker.

Since the Batman-Joker relationship in this universe isn't normal, the concentration of the Joker virus in Jack's body can't be used as standard experimental data.

Similarly, Shiller's blood, having been chosen by Bruce, might also not meet the standard since Bruce gave up on becoming Batman.

But if one wants to extract blood from a standard Joker from another universe, to be blunt, the greatest resistance isn't the Joker, but Batman.

Batman and the Joker are inseparably entwined. Trying to separate them under normal circumstances is not only difficult and thankless, but also likely to result in one becoming the other.

Shiller doesn't want to become the Joker again after painstakingly separating the two.

So, certain conjectures have been lingering in Shiller's mind, without a chance to be realized, until the Batman from the Arkham Knight Universe sought him out.

At the time, Shiller quickly went over the experiences of the Batman from the Arkham Knight Universe in his mind and realized this was just what he needed.

The Joker of this universe was dead, the only one remaining was Batman, who also happened to be infected with the Joker virus. Dealing with one Batman was much simpler than dealing with a Batman-Joker combination.

So, not only did Shiller agree to Peter's request for an internship, he also told Peter this was actually a test - and Peter lived up to expectations.

Plan for Subject One, lure for Subject Two, shift blame for Subject Three, interfere for Subject Four. A smooth sequence of actions resulted in Batman seeking Shiller's help.