The next morning, when Elliot woke up from the old wooden bed, sore all over, he realized that in this era, no one had advocated for hard mattresses yet. Most of the beds in luxurious mansions were soft and comfortable, ones could sink right into them; the enveloping feel made them feel significantly more secure.
Elliot had always grown up in such a comfortable and luxurious environment; it had never crossed his mind that he would one day stoop to sleeping on a plank bed. So, when he got up the following day, he felt like his entire body was falling apart.
But a more serious problem than the discomfort from the bed was his lack of money for food. Elliot couldn't possibly have the same moral standards as Bruce; he wouldn't mind burglary and murder, but considering the martial morals of Gotham, committing burglaries without firearms was akin to seeking death.
Elliot decided he needed to acquire a gun. He was extremely against doing so as he felt this wasn't the life of Batman, but he had no other choice. Unable to don the Bat suit or use the Bat Equipment, wasn't a gun the best option?
Just then, the only phone in the house rang. After answering it, Elliot heard a slightly familiar female voice.
"Hello, Bruce, I called your house, and your butler gave me this number. Are you free?"
"Pamela?" Elliot questioned, furrowing his brow.
"Yes, it's me. I called to tell you that I need your help. The crop cultivation topic we discussed earlier should be making some progress by now."
Elliot was about to impatiently tell her that he didn't have the time, when he heard Pamela on the other end saying, "The funds from Victor have arrived. I bought some new improved seeds, but a lot of it is left over. I think we can discuss how to split it. We also need to buy some new equipment."
Elliot raised an eyebrow, his tone changing as he said, "Okay, wait for me for a bit; I'll come over immediately."
After leaving the house, Elliot directly hotwired a car and drove to Gotham University, a skill he acquired while on the run. However, he was still not very skilled, so it took him a bit more time than expected.
When he arrived at the lab, Pamela frowned and said in a rather displeased tone, "Your 'a bit' means more than an hour?"
"The traffic was bad." Elliot evaluated the equipment in the botany laboratory. As Pamela followed his gaze, she stood in the center of the room with her arms crossed, saying jocularly, "So, you are so interested in the equipment that you've invested in?"
Pamela moved to the side of the lab table, sliding her hand along its surface, "The new lab you built is indeed much better than the original one, but it's a shame that I'm the only one left to do research here. My original botany professor has been sent to Arkham Asylum, where he will continue his research on plant toxins."
"I'm not really interested in his research direction; I prefer living plants... Okay, no more beating around the bush, let me fetch the results of the last round of research. You can take a look at and advise what needs to be improved for the next round of research."
After saying this, Pamela left the room. Elliot wanted to stop her but she walked away too quickly for him to animate a response.
After a while, Pamela returned, cradling a cylindrical glass chamber filled with a light green liquid and a plump cabbage floating inside.
Pamela placed the glass chamber on the table, retrieved a large stack of research data from the drawer next to her, and started to recite. Elliot no longer put on his impatient demeanor and instead listened quietly, pretending to be very focused.
However, the truth was Elliot had no desire to help Pamela solve any problems. All he really wanted was to gain Pamela's trust. Elliot needed a useful figure he could employ to help him overcome the various predicaments he was facing; a female university bookworm seemed to be a good choice.
Originally, Elliot's appearance was nothing remarkable, but his wealthy family background helped attract a significant amount of attention from the opposite sex. The wealth of the Elliot family was certainly enough to entice many women, even those who were far superior to Pamela.
Now, equipped with the face of Bruce Wayne, wouldn't he simply enchant these university women?
In this aspect, Elliot certainly had credibility. After all, he was a rich man's son and had met all kinds of women in the social scene.
Although Pamela's clothing wasn't luxurious, her gestures exuded an air of the upper class, making it clear that she was a middle-class woman, reared to marry well into a wealthy family.
Discussing funding? Elliot sneered silently. Who would discuss with Bruce Wayne petty university subject funds?
It was nothing more than an excuse to lead the conversation towards the subject of money, to exhibit her humble beginnings and passion for learning, affirming that the solo meeting with Bruce Wayne in an unmanned lab was for purely scientific research purposes.
Manipulating these innocent female university students, deriving aesthetic and physical pleasure from them, and then cruelly discarding them was a prerequisite course for these truly wealthy and licentious men. Elliot was indeed well versed in this regard.
So, as Pamela read the data, Elliot stealthily moved closer to her, leaning against the lab table with their hands almost touching each other. Pamela continued to read data that Elliot didn't understand for a whole ten minutes while he kept up the appearance of paying sincere attention.
After Pamela finished, Elliot remained silent for more than a dozen seconds only then speaking like he just awakened, "I'm sorry for zoning out, I was too engrossed."
After speaking, he lightly touched his brow and said, "I was so captivated by your voice, I might have missed some of the key points. Could you summarize it for me?"
Pamela helplessly spread her hands, raising her voice: "In short, I've replaced all replaceable control conditions, but these plants still go crazy. Do you know why?"
"Go crazy?" Elliot finally focused on what Pamela was saying. He leaned forward to look at the glass container on the table. But the cabbage inside looked like just ordinary vegetables, at most a little more robust than others.
Elliot shook his head. Even though there was a precedent of plants going crazy in Gotham, this cabbage seemed ordinary. Pamela's words sound like a fabricated lie merely seeking attention.
"How did it go crazy?" Elliot patiently continued the topic. He knew that at the beginning, he couldn't show too much aggression but had to give the other side a sense of security and control to prevent panic and escape.
Pamela tilted her head, looking at Elliot, "Do you want to see? But let me warn you, they have gone crazy… Forget it, you are not those helpless undergraduates, you can handle a cabbage."
Then Pamela used a device to drain the liquid from the glass container and opened its lid.
The cabbage quietly lay in the center, Elliot curiously leaned over.
Then there was a bang, a green shadow flashed, a long cabbage leaf slamming straight into Elliott's nose, sending him reeling back onto another workbench.
Elliot was dizzy and hadn't realized what had just hit him. Another swishing sound, a huge round shadow hit him straight in the forehead. Elliot's head slammed into the table's surface, and then he slid down the edge.
Pamela quickly moved to the edge of the room and yelled at Elliot, "What are you doing?! Fight back!"
Elliot stumbled up and saw a cabbage using its outermost leaves to prop itself up. Its front two leaves were rolled into a fist, jumping with force, and ramming itself into Elliot's chest.
The well-developed cabbage leaves were thicker and heavier, this impact was almost equivalent to being hit by a full-speed basketball. Caught off guard, Elliot was knocked down again.
Never satisfied, the cabbage jumped off Elliot's chest, punched him in the ear, and immediately, Elliot lost some hearing in his right ear.
As he struggled to rise, the cabbage lost interest due to his apparent weakness and quickly ran towards the other door of the laboratory, while Pamela only screeched from behind the curtains.
"Stop screaming!" Elliot's voice was warped as he clutched his nose, standing up, enraged. He had been beaten by a cabbage?!
So, what's more terrifying than a fighting cabbage?
The answer is two tons of fighting cabbages.
The leap of the cabbage broke another door, and Elliott's face turned from anger to shock as a flood of fist-swinging cabbages poured out.
Gotham University held a Physics lecture that day. Victor was the lecturer, and many people were sitting in the auditorium, as the bespectacled Victor demonstrated the structural model of dense ice to them.
"By interfering with the structure of molecular arrangements when water condenses, we can obtain such a magical new material. Although it is ice, it far exceeds…"
While he was speaking, Victor dragged out a long note, slowly widening his eyes as he stared at the window across the stage. He took off his glasses, rubbed his eyes, seeming to disbelief what he had seen.
The sound of cracking wood came from the grande entrance. Victor quickly pulled out a Freeze Gun from below the lectern.
"Bang!" The door was broken open, and Elliot stumbled in. As Victor was about to shoot, "Boom," over two tons of fighting cabbage flooded the entire auditorium.
Victor's Freeze Gun was immediately smacked out of his hand by a cabbage that landed in front of him. Following that, a punch flew his glasses, "Ouch!" and his face took a punch.
Within seconds, the lecture hall turned into a boxing ring, where all teachers and students were punching bags, and the cabbage starred as the boxer.
Pamela was peeking in from behind the curtain that the cabbage had jumped through, watching this crazy boxing match. After a while, she crossed herself and whispered:
"I'm really sorry, but rather than having bad luck myself, I chose to help Professor Shearer bring bad luck onto others. Amen."