Starting from scratch, Batman crushed my dream of getting rich

Chapter 221 An organization with eight hundred cunning schemers

Although Gotham was a four-way winner last night, it's clear that everyone will eventually face their own next day.

The things that need to be done still need to be done; winning once doesn't guarantee winning next time.

At this moment, the Mad Hatter was selecting an audience for his stage as usual, while Ma Zhaodi observed his play from the side. It was the plot of Alice in Wonderland, but there seemed to be some differences—the stage setting was less like a play and more like an artificial amusement park, a recreation of the fairy tale world in Alice in Wonderland.

A giant rabbit hole, a bubbling shrinking potion, Colonel Caterpillar, a grinning Cheshire Cat, the Queen of Hearts shouting "Cut off her head!", and a house with chimneys shaped like two rabbit ears.
He even built a small pool on the stage, as a pool of tears from a fairy tale.

"Alice, come play with me!"

He pulled up one of the blonde girls on stage and they crawled down the rabbit hole into this artificial fairytale world. He started dancing, and the girl, with a blank stare, replied like a puppet, "Okay, Jervis Teach."

"No, you should call me Taichi!"

“Okay, Teach.”

So the blonde girl danced with the Mad Hatter.

However, even with his height-increasing shoes, the Mad Hatter and Alice were not the same height, and Alice, whom he controlled, did not possess the thinking abilities of a normal person. After jumping a few steps, the Mad Hatter was stomped on twice, and even lifted up by Alice's hand once.

"Stop! Stop!"

Furious shouts echoed across the theater stage. The Mad Hatter was furious at the imperfect dance. He angrily pulled his hand from the girl's and drew his gun from under his tuxedo.

"This isn't a perfect day! You're a fake too, die!"

bang!

The bullet left the barrel, and the girl fell down, a flower of blood blooming on her chest. After she fell to the ground, her golden wig fell to the ground, revealing her dark red hair.

Beneath his black robe, Ma Zhaodi's hand instinctively rested on the pistol at his waist. At that moment, he finally understood why all the girls on stage had uniformly long blonde hair; and why, despite not wearing hats, they were under the Mad Hatter's mental control.

Wigs are also a type of "hat".

No! No, no, no!

After knocking the girl down, the Mad Hatter cried out as he put her wig back on her head: "No, no, my Alice is blonde, not red! I should have stapled it back on like I always have! No, no, I can't do this to Alice! Someone, someone! Thor!"

Ma Zhaodi walked over and mechanically replied, "Boss."

"Throw her out! I never want to see her again! Throw her anywhere—and you over there, come and clean the stage!"

"Yes."

Ma Zhaodi picked up the girl from the ground and walked towards the exit of the theater. He had already prepared some fruit candies in his hand. Since the Mad Hatter said he could throw her anywhere, he now had a legitimate reason to take her to a secluded area.

"We'll call Batman or Catwoman tonight to take her out."

When Ma Zhaodi returned to the theater, the bloodstains on the stage had been cleaned up. The Mad Hatter went back up and jumped out from the row of blonde Alices standing blankly on the stage, took her hand again, and wanted to continue dancing.

“Hey, Teach.”

A voice suddenly interrupted the Mad Hatter's ball activities, and the Penguin walked in through the theater's front door. "Don't bother with your business yet. The Joker said Mr. Freeze has discovered something—the latest movements of the Riddler's forces—and he needs someone to go on a mission with Man-Bat."

"Does he really have to hire my new subordinate?"

“We don’t have many men left, Teach, whether you accept it or not—this is the Joker’s order.”

Jervis released the girl with a dark expression. He ran down to the stage, picked up his broken cup with the words "Drink Me" written on it, something mentioned in fairy tales.

"What are you looking at me for?" He pulled a tea bag labeled "Soothing Tea" from his pocket, threw it into the broken cup, poured in hot water, and asked the Penguin, "Why don't you just take him away? Do you think I can say 'no' to the Joker?"

Ma Zhaodi's nose twitched; he smelled the aroma from the tea bag, though to be precise, it wasn't tea at all.

His pockets were filled with all sorts of smells: belladonna, psilocybin, lysergic acid diethylamide. They were all psychoactive drugs, hallucinogens, stimulants, and the like—a veritable slew of technology and ruthless tactics. It was unclear whether the Mad Hatter had become obsessed with these things after overdosing, or whether he simply wanted to use them to enhance his fighting abilities. In any case, this guy was insane beyond belief.

The Penguin replied, “You know, Teach, the Joker needs him, which means he needs to control him—you have to hand over his controller.”

"Fine, fine, take everything I have." The Mad Hatter sneered, "But remember, I'm the one maintaining our army now. If you anger me, none of us will be happy."

He tossed a remote control with buttons to the penguin: "You know how to use this thing, so stop bothering me."

"It's been a pleasure working with you, Tych."

The Penguin pressed the button, and Mazhaodi obediently followed him out of the theater. Before leaving, he gave the Mad Hatter a buff to ensure that no one else would die.

After the Penguin left the theater, he took Ma Zhaodi directly into the car.

"Drive, let's go see the Joker."

"Yes, sir."

Once the driver started the car, it sped off towards another grand theater in Falcone on the Upper West Side, where the Joker was now located—the Mad Hatter chose theaters to fulfill his fantasies, while the Joker chose theaters simply because he enjoyed jokes and performances.

But Ma Zhaodi couldn't help but think to himself, "Why do you supervillains all like to meet in the theater?"

Just as the Penguin's car was halfway there, it suddenly turned around. Ma Zhaodi raised an eyebrow and watched as the car drove into the underground parking lot of a building, going from floor to floor until it finally stopped at the bottom.

"Alright, Thor." The Penguin waved his hand. "Get off with me."

Ma Zhaodi walked out of the car in a daze, and several burly men in suits came out of the parking lot and firmly restrained his body.

"Were you not being followed?"

"No, signal jamming is not a problem."

"very good."

Penguin reached out and pressed the control release button on the remote: "Mr. Thor, our deal isn't finished yet. Now that you've survived, we can talk about the rest of the matter privately."

(End of this chapter)