Hawks from the Land of Light are calling me a dove and an undercover agent in the chat group.

"After this battle, the great President Luther's approval rating immediately surged by another three percentage points."

"President Luther said that he urged people not to look at him alone, that he is not a dictator, and that he accepts any challenge if others are willing to run for the next election."

"He especially called on Superman and Ultraman to run for office, saying that only a strong enough opponent can prove that he has the support of the people. A true strongman is never afraid of any enemy. Lex Luthor is even more outstanding than Ultraman Kasa and Superman."

"Finally, President Luther said, 'Even Batman's little brother can't do it? He can do what Batman can do, and he can do what Batman can't do. That's the value of being the most intelligent person.'"

Greatness needs no further explanation!

Chapter 428 Luther's masterpiece, the breathy Batman

Well, they managed to casually mention Batman while reporting on the perfect results achieved in governing Gotham?

This Luthor is truly unbeatable. I guess he knows Batman's intelligence is no less than his own, so he deliberately targets fame and status to show off his superiority. Doing this day after day, no wonder Batman's lucky bag sales can only be ranked at the same table as Constantine's.

Moreover, this should also be seen as revenge for scheming against Batman before he left D. Although Luthor himself enjoyed that scheming, his mentality is typical: I can think of doing this, but you can't scheme against me like this.

Bruce was speechless. No matter how bald Luther's head was or how shiny it looked, his heart was just as small as that.

"How about it? Big change, right?"

"If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I probably wouldn't have believed this was Gotham."

Clark's voice came from the side. He had already memorized Bruce's heartbeat and had noticed it when Bruce arrived in Gotham and returned here. However, he had been busy with disaster relief and rescue and had only just found a peaceful rest time to leap over in an instant.

Bruce sighed and turned to look at Clark.

After reading the D manga in Subaru's world, he once again deeply understood how important Clark was to him and to this entire world.

Although his own side is not Earth 0, the center of the multiverse, in his eyes, his close friend Clark is definitely no less than Clark in any other universe.

In the world of ninjas and Warhammer, he sometimes missed the greatest support humanity had in this D universe.

Well, that doesn't stop him from continuing to work on plans to prevent Clark from becoming an enemy's backer.

"You did a great job, exceeding my expectations." Bruce remained expressionless, assessing Clark's current strength the moment they reunited, subconsciously preparing a countermeasure, and showering him with praise.

Not

However, this praise was indeed sincere.

“I have never been able to govern Gotham so well, with not a single criminal in sight… You have chosen a different path from mine, but it has been far more effective. It seems that this trip was absolutely the right one, Clark. I am very grateful for that.”

Bruce was willing to admit that if he were still in the local area, he would have stubbornly rejected Clark and Luther's approach.

Because of his special feelings for Gotham, so special that he would only be more willing to believe in Batman's idea of ​​using fear to govern the darkness of Gotham until he saw the outcome.

Fortunately, it was precisely because of his own stubbornness that Bruce went to the ninja world to avoid seeing it and to see how Gotham would become under the rule of others when he returned.

According to his initial plan, Gotham might become better with Clark and Luther working together, but it was impossible for it to become this good.

However, it turns out that the chemical reaction produced by combining the two is quite wonderful.

Clark asked somewhat cautiously, "You're not angry?"

“You should say it’s regret and resentment,” Bruce whispered.

He was clearly the one who most wanted to change Gotham, yet his contributions to Gotham were overshadowed by others, and he couldn't participate in the process himself. It's impossible for him not to have regrets.

But isn't this a good thing?

Gotham doesn't need Batman anymore, which isn't a bad thing. Bruce won't feel empty because he has a forward-looking vision. Even if Gotham no longer needs Batman, the Earth and humanity still need him.

That's enough.

In contrast, it was Clark's words that made Bruce show a look of disapproval: "You're treating me like a Gotham psychopath, Clark."

"...Cough." Clark was speechless.

Although he felt this was true, Bruce seemed to be in much better spirits after this trip, and it seemed he could finally get rid of the mental unhealthy state that was typical of Gotham people.

Bruce shook his head: "Forget it, I won't talk to you about this. It's one thing to deal with the criminal cleanup, but what's with the ice and smoke? How come Luther is involved in this, and so well at that?"

“Luther only wants to rule the elite.” Clark looked around and muttered to himself, as if trying to avoid Luther’s possible eavesdropping. “He thinks that if people smoke meth and cigarettes, it will reduce the probability of becoming a successful elite. If the people under his rule are all meth-smoking [mentally challenged], then he would rather not be president.”

"Mentally challenged" was Luther's original wording. Although it was just a paraphrase, Clark still found it difficult to say those words because he didn't want to swear.

However, whatever Luther's original intentions were, Clark was at least very supportive of what he did.

Bruce immediately guessed how drastic Luther's approach would be: "He completely banned and destroyed all ice, and then promoted smoking less?"

“Yes.” Clark nodded.

"Then I think you must have played a very crucial role in this."

Bruce immediately connected many of the events of the previous day, his eyes filled with suspicion as he looked at Clark. His expression and gaze clearly conveyed, "I didn't expect someone with thick eyebrows and big eyes like you to have learned to play dumb."

Clark scratched the back of his head, chuckling like a fool, a little shy and embarrassed.

He wasn't really pretending to be stupid; when Luther pushed for a complete ban on ice, all the relevant factions risked their lives to stop him.

Although Clark supported Luther at the time, those people destroyed their evidence immediately, losing many ledgers and a lot of money in the process. Therefore, without evidence of a crime, they could not be arrested or executed.

In that situation, Clark could only protect Luther while also protecting the latter when Luther sent Deathstroke to assassinate those faction leaders.

After all, although Superman is no longer rigid and can kill, he still needs to have principles and bottom lines that are far higher than those of others. As the strongest man on Earth, Superman must always ensure that he eliminates all possibilities and temptations for turning evil.

However, despite the protection, Luthor gave Deathstroke many secret weapons, including Kryptonite, which was something that couldn't be helped.

As we all know, Superman is weak to Kryptonite. After being ambushed by a Kryptonite weapon, he was temporarily rendered powerless and unable to stop Deathstroke from killing. Isn't that a perfectly normal thing?

Clark didn't need to go into the details; Bruce had already figured it all out.

He watched Clark become more flexible and started using his super brain, and couldn't help but chuckle, but he didn't object or give any advice.

After reading so many of Subaru Natsuki's D-manga, he understood that Clark was truly reliable in most situations, even in the Dark Multiverse, where he mostly upheld an undistorted and unambiguous justice until his death.

Besides, even if Clark has turned to the dark side now, he still has Ultraman to call on others. The pinnacle is no longer the only one, which means that he can finally lower his extremely high expectations for Clark a bit.

The two strolled through the streets. Bruce reveled in the present-day Gotham while gathering intelligence to see if there were any hidden dangers in the city. If so, he would find them as soon as possible.

While doing this, Bruce could also multitask like Guilliman: "These days..."

What about other places besides Gotham?

"Everything is fine, just like the Destroyer said. We have indeed entered the Great Supernatural Era, with supervillains emerging everywhere. Although we have benefited from the Destroyer's past and intercepted the birth of many supervillains that could have been avoided, unfamiliar supervillains without any information have appeared in other places."

As for these supervillains, those who can reform are allowed to do so, while those who are as stubborn as the Joker are all sentenced to death.

Bruce remained expressionless; this was expected. Based on the D manga from Subaru's world up to Death Metal, and the related content found by the yellow weasel, in their D worldview, the threat of danger is omnipresent.

Crisis Force brings crisis, which manifests as the birth of a large number of super villains. When enough super villains are born, they will feed back into Crisis Force, causing it to unleash a massive cosmic crisis or even a crisis at the multiverse level.

It's impossible to eradicate the Crisis Force before defeating Barbatos and Perpetua; at best, it can only be reduced and delayed.

Even if they could defeat Barbatos and Perpetua, it's hard to say whether they could deal with the Crisis Force. After all, among the remnants of the D series that the Yellow Skins dug up from the subspace, there was no indication that the Crisis Force had ever been eliminated by anyone.

Moreover, they don't even know what level Papetua is at; they only know that he is the creator god of the entire D worldview and now harbors absolute malice towards the D world.

Fortunately, the opponent seems to be sealed in the Origin Wall. As long as the Origin Wall does not break, there will never be a need to confront this supreme creator god, who is clearly no match for even the Dr. Manhattan who appeared in "The Last Bell".

How did the Origin Wall break?

do not know either.

Death Metal has only just begun, and it's unclear what will happen next. Whether the Origin Wall malfunctioned during the Barbatos event or in some subsequent major event is completely unknown.

If external forces intervene to pressure and force the D manga department in Subaru's world to update quickly, it might cause the plot to become cheap and irrelevant to the original story, losing its reference value. Therefore, that approach is not feasible.

"There's nothing we can do about it. We can only do our best. If a supervillain appears, we either have to physically eliminate him or eliminate him by his identity."

"No matter how perfect our systems and policies are, a perfect ending might be possible in other worlds, but in our case, at least for now, it is absolutely impossible. A supervillain is bound to be born."

Bruce felt an urge to sigh. Ever since he finished watching the entire series from the beginning to "Death Metal," he really wanted to complain. How could this damn D world be so dark? One big event after another, one after another, the evil Papetua and Crisis Force!

The key issue is that things like the Old Gods have always turned a blind eye to various crises, even though if the major event succeeds, the Old Gods and many other isolated forces and beings will either die or become slaves.

How can you possibly develop a proper worldview while surrounded by these insects?

Clark, who was unaware of the existence of the Crisis Force—and who would have chosen optimism even if he had known—showed disapproval at Bruce's discouraging words.

However, his super brain chose to go offline the moment Bruce returned, leaving only the final strategy: put Batman first and trust Batman.

So since Bruce said so, let's just accept that as the case and avoid this controversial topic for now.

Bruce continued rambling, "Of course, even if supervillains appear, the intensity can be reduced. As long as they are all within a manageable range, that's good enough."

"Right, speaking of which, what's the status of Luther's artificial Ultraman and artificial Superman? With those two things he's working on, it's easy for them to become supervillains or the start of a major event."

“That’s reassuring,” Clark chuckled. “Although he did start out doing this, he stopped later.”

Bruce was half-surprised: "Someone like him wouldn't do this?"

Clark corrected his wording: "Well, to be precise, according to Luther himself, it's not that we're not going to do it, it's that we're doing it slowly, taking it step by step, doing it in a planned way, preparing for the future, not rushing into it."

"No need to ask, something must have happened."

"As expected, it had to be you, Bruce."

Clark raised his two scissor hands like a mischievous child and pinched them together playfully. "On the one hand, both Tiga and Dyna have aired, one is Masaki Keigo and the other is Strategist Quan Teng. After watching those two parts all night, Luther went back and dismantled the two man-made products in his secret base, reducing them from 70% to 30% completion."

“That makes sense,” Bruce nodded.

Masaki Keigo is a genius no less than any human. Even he couldn't control Ultraman. So, although Luther thinks he's stronger than Masaki Keigo, he'll be more cautious in assessing the difficulty. It's normal for him to choose to delay the manufacturing process.

As for Strategist Quan Teng, the fact that his artificial Dyna was parasitized by Sophia would definitely make Luther even more wary. He would choose to add layers of safety devices before completing the artificial Ultraman and artificial Dyna to ensure that control would not fall into the enemy's hands.

in.

Once you start paying attention to this, it never ends. One day you might think it's okay, but the next day you might think it's not enough. It's definitely not safe, and you have to think of another way to strengthen your control.

Bruce understands this better than anyone else. Smart people like him and Luther can never be at ease. Once suspicion is aroused, it will never end.

"And what about the second factor?"

"It's an invasion of a cosmic starfish."

"Staro?"

"Hey, how did you know?"

Of course I read it from the manga, but I'm not going to tell you anything. This kind of information about manga is something I have to keep to myself!

Starro, a cosmic starfish, is a gigantic, starfish-shaped alien life form that roams the universe, controlling other races through fission parasitic spores. It also possesses a Cthulhu-type passive mental attack and is the first enemy of Earth-0's Justice League.