In the lavishly furnished mansion, an irate middle-aged man in a suit, with graying hair, was bellowing into the phone.
"A damn mob boss dares to threaten me on television?! If we let him be this arrogant, where is the dignity of federal law, what on earth is the Federal Bureau of Investigation for?! Rush in and catch him, is that so difficult?!"
"Did you get it wrong? I'm a legislator, not an agent! My job is to ensure the government runs smoothly, not to catch criminals! Where were you when the federal government was dealing with a crisis?"
Breathing deeply, the man stood akimbo, forcing his hand downward in midair, before saying: "Enough, Amanda, I don't want to hear any more of this pointless drivel. If the Federal Bureau of Investigation isn't afraid of losing face by dereliction of duty, then I'll join them in the game! If I can't drag him out of his house, then I'll make him understand, neither he nor this rotten city will have it easy!"
In his fury, the man hung up but turned to feel a vague black shadow flashing through the shadow of the curtain behind him.
After an immediate twitch, he looked back suspiciously, extending his neck towards that direction, and called out with a tough exterior yet weak inside, "Who's there?! Show yourself, or I'll call my bodyguards!"
A black figure stepped out of the shadows. Batman looked at the man's face and said, "I'm here to remind you not to mess with Gotham. It's in your best interest."
"Batman?!" The man called out Batman's name in surprise. Of course he had heard of the Dark Knight of Gotham, but it was not a revered title.
Anybody living in a standard city would find it hard to understand why an environment requires a man in a tight suit to maintain justice. So they typically don't understand Batman, dismissing him as nothing more than a clown seeking attention.
"You're Cobblepot's hired killer, huh?" The man snorted in disdain, raising his chin and arrogantly saying: "He truly believes that a few boasts on TV and I'd grow scared of him?! Dare to kill a legislator of the federal government, and he'll live the rest of his life as a fugitive!"
Clearly, regardless of who he faced, Batman wasn't the best at explaining. He doesn't believe he needs to either. He just said: "Taking on Gotham and its people has no benefits for you, it could even have dire consequences. You might want to think carefully about your decisions, don't leave yourself without an exit."
With that, Batman turned to leave. Being a smart man, he sometimes underestimates the stupidity of fools, thinking his hint was explicit enough.
Since Cobblepot is nothing more than a public mob boss, what harm could a few boasts on a local Gotham show do? He should continue attending meetings and giving condemnations. As long as he doesn't step foot in Gotham, how can he be led to the guillotine?
But not everyone has the extreme rationality and self-control of Batman. It all comes down to "Why should I"
Legislators are elite individuals accustomed to looking down on everyone from above. They've always been the ones pointing fingers and handing out condemnations. Even if political opponents strike back, it's just a war of words. When have they ever faced death threats?
Even if there are those reckless enough, in most American states, death threats are punishable by law. The Federal Bureau of Investigation would have them under arrest within days.
Meanwhile, Oswald Cobblepot is just a mob boss of a region within a city. He hasn't even been elected mayor of Gotham yet. He dares to openly threaten a legislator and the Federal Bureau of Investigation does nothing. How could the targeted legislator swallow this indignity?
Of course, he doesn't have the guts to tread into Gotham. He's not foolish. If the Federal Bureau of Investigation dares not enter, wouldn't going in be equivalent to serving himself up on a platter?
But after all, he is a state legislator, from a political family, backed by a substantial interest group. They dare not invade Gotham, but they can still sanction Gotham from the outside.
Firstly, they'd provide subsidies to the Coast Guard, focusing on the crackdown against smuggling ships bound for Gotham. Then they'd issue new environmental legislation drafts. All products from food, medicines, textiles, and other industries produced within the range of ocean pollution, will not be transported to other cities until they've passed inspections.
Next come the standard sanction measures like adjusting tax rates, embargoing bulk products, and detaining imported products at customs.
Indeed, such diverse mitigation measures were being used for the first time inside a federation city.
But did this affect Cobblepot? A bit, but not much.
Again, Cobblepot is just a mob boss. The most valuable business under him is just the Iceberg Restaurant. Even if he closes the restaurant due to lack of ingredients, it's just a matter of earning a little less money.
It's not Cobblepot who's worried, it's Wayne.
To be fair, though Gotham has a terrible public safety situation, it is geographically well situated. After generations of infrastructure development, it is one of the most significant heavy industrial cities on the East Coast.
Sanction methods like this against other countries are acceptable, but one can't cut off their own sea transportation routes, preventing the transportation of industrial materials. Isn't that equivalent to severing your own arm? How retarded would someone have to be to do that???
Recently, Bruce Wayne had been reevaluating the bottom line of these politicians' intelligence, but now he was facing an awkward situation.
The series of sanctions by the legislator and his supporters were not targeted at Cobblepot. In fact, they were aimed at pressurizing Wayne.
"Aren't you Cobblepot, the one hiding in Gotham? Let us negotiate directly with Wayne. We trade one person for one delivery, you kill off the most outrageous head bird, and we all continue to make money. What's wrong with that?"
Batman sees it as wrong.
Not to mention that Batman would never surrender a villain from Gotham to anyone else, even if he wanted to make a statement by arresting Cobblepot or finding ways to silence him, Bruce Wayne couldn't do it.
Because Lode's action has essentially tied Wayne Enterprises and Cobblepot on the same line, pushing them to one side. If Wayne Enterprises handed over Cobblepot, it would mean they had surrendered. But Bruce Wayne couldn't surrender, or else wouldn't everyone start imposing sanctions on Wayne Enterprises?
The default rule in business is that everyone is a wolf with sharp teeth, eager to tear flesh from each other. If anyone's sheep's wool is exposed, they would be consumed to nothing quickly.
So for the sake of Wayne Enterprises' reputation, Bruce Wayne couldn't take action against Cobblepot.
From Batman's perspective, he could use Penguin Man's illegal activities, as stated on TV, to get him into Arkham Asylum.
However, if Penguin Man disappeared now, people wouldn't feel a sense of justice being upheld; instead they would suspect that Wayne Enterprises was to blame behind the scenes, and that Wayne Enterprises and the State Council had come to some kind of agreement to silence Cobblepot.
The situation has already stirred up a lot of attention and has become a hot topic on the East Coast recently. If Cobblepot showed any signs of succumbing, Wayne Enterprises could jump into the Yellow River and still not be clean.
Batman has only ever considered traps set by Joker himself, never thought he would be drawn into a situation by these foolish politicians with their surprisingly low levels of intelligence. It's true what they say about fools getting the upper hand sometimes.
The scariest part is that these sanctions, originally intended for a deal with Wayne Enterprises, have sparked a very strong public outcry in Gotham. The Gothamites, already driven crazy by the rain, are now pouring gasoline onto the fire.
People were already lenient towards the Federal Government, figuring no one would dare come to a decaying city like Gotham; even if they didn't lend a hand, everyone would make do. But now with these sanctions, people have come to realize that their lives, which were already at rock bottom, could still get worse!
The most severe consequence of the ban on raw materials is factory shutdowns. Although no layoffs have occurred yet, no work means no pay.
The newly revised draft of the environmental law has forced food suppliers to change their routes, fearing that the 'Gotham pollution' tag would affect their sales, preferring to give up this market rather than transport goods here, resulting in an inevitable rise in prices.
With wages declining and prices rising, it would be a surprise if people didn't revolt.
Those Gothamites who were used to relying on factory wages for living and could barely make ends meet are now also struggling to survive. If they can't make a living, why not turn to crime?
With no work available, they can't just sit at home and starve. A brilliant idea appears in the Gothamites' perplexed minds "Isn't there a war going on in Midtown? Just a few days ago, they were recruiting fighters. It's better to become a hireling than to starve!"
So, many of the laborers living in cheap apartments in Lower Gotham joined the Midtown war with the impassioned cry, "Great Chu rises, Chen Sheng is king!".
As is well-known, the war potential of a certain area is limited, including strategic depth, reserves of war supplies, range of personnel movement, etc., only allowing a certain number of troops to fight there.
That's why in many large-scale city battles, the attacking side seems to be using a strategy of fuel addition, leaving many internet commentators questioning why the attackers don't just send in 100,000 troops all at once, one foot per person could crush the defensive line. The reality is, there simply isn't enough tactical space to accommodate that many people. The excess people would simply be meat in a grinder.
With the continuous influx of residents from the Lower City into the war, the manpower in each family's and interest group's territory has suddenly increased, and the materials they need have also risen exponentially. But the territory they own and the goods they can grab from it simply can't supply the current workforce.
What choice do they have then? Of course, it's to keep expanding outward to occupy bigger territories, to rob more things, and then to feed more people.
But due to different city structures and job roles, the Lower City is the main densely populated area, mostly residential land. Even though everyone is poor, if you try to steal my house, there's going to be a lot of resistance. It's a disheartening effort.
But the Upper City is different. It's filled with wide parks, high-end restaurants and hotels, luxury jewelry stores with a large amount of circulating money, and even some old banks.
Of course, the Upper City is also home to these interest groups. But their locations are much deeper inside, within the inner Upper City.
The rich elites don't think of themselves as being in the same class as the so-called middle-class poor live on the edge of Upper City. If the middle-class neighborhoods are robbed, so what?
As long as I have money, I can hire people to surround my home. It doesn't matter what happens outside; as long as I get more money to build my defense system, why wouldn't I rob?
So, without any deliberate guidance, the Pandora's box was opened by the unrestrained greed of Gotham's shadowy figures. Chaos swept through Gotham like a plague in the blink of an eye.