For anyone, this would be an incredibly shocking event - you're training with Captain America, attempting to get used to recently obtained powers and looking towards a promising future. Then, in a blink of an eye, you find yourself back in your apartment in San Francisco, starting over.
This is different from time-travelling, where you leave a familiar environment for a new one. The familiarity of everything makes this fresh start feel more like a nightmare that you've created.
How was Bruce supposed to handle this?
Even if he's not very clever, he's certain that everything he just experienced was not a dream. Any mentally sound adult wouldn't confuse reality with dreams.
Bruce is not insane. His only peculiarity lies in his somewhat obsessive vengeance regarding his parents' death. He never lost himself in day-to-day suspicion and caution like other Batmen, who are pure lunatics.
Therefore, his sanity is sufficient for him to discern that he has been reborn, not in a cliched nightmare from a horror film, but had truly gained power before being reset back to his weaker period.
Who could possibly accept all this?
Think about it. You've always felt that you are incapable of many things, but compared to others, it seems normal. Who could save a city beyond redemption with just a few years of effort? Just take it slow, right?
But then suddenly, you find yourself in a game where other versions of you from different universes are incredibly strong. Sure, other Batmen cannot save Gotham either, but how could Bruce not envy their strong abilities from other universes?
It is evident that this is not something that can be honed through experience. Bruce is the least talented among all the Batmen. Even if he grinds for decades, it would be in vain.
It definitely leads to a kind of despair. If such a powerful Batman can't save Gotham, what's the point of his own diligence?
He might as well give up, it's all a dead end anyway. Why should he bother?
In fact, the only thing that keeps Bruce going is the obsession over the unexplained death of his parents.
But then, unexpectedly, he enters a new world where he can gain powerful equipment through tasks and gain immense powers during his experiences in this world.
Bruce knows that this power is stronger than that of all other Batmen. Other Batmen excel intellectually. Great wisdom brings about powerful transformations, but who said a strong body couldn't also get the job done?
Besides, everything has been going smoothly. He has painlessly gained power far beyond ordinary people and has been guided by a wise and upright predecessor.
There is an imminent crisis to be solved and many missions that can be undertaken for personal gain. These can be used to hone his newly acquired powers and newly learned skills. Isn't everything getting better?
You can imagine that after mastering everything here and returning home triumphantly, even if he can't completely save Gotham, he can at least make the dark city a little bit better.
Bruce just wanted the city to be a little bit better. He wasn't as ill as the other Batmen, insisting on making Gotham as sunny and bright as Metropolis.
Because he had experienced too many failures and had come to terms with being a failure of a man, he believed that it was good even if one more child's parents weren't gunned down.
He was about to achieve all of this. Everything was within reach, right in front of his eyes. He just needed to stick to the plan.
Just then, time reset.
How could Bruce accept this?
Had he never seen hope, he could accept the darkness, but not only had he seen hope, he was already on the path towards it. How could he not try his best to grasp that glimmer of light?
As mentioned before, Bruce didn't think he got his powers by being bitten by a spider. He thought it was the virus that caused it. Through the memory of his past reincarnation, he knew that the virus probably had something to do with the water supply, so Bruce started to drink water like crazy.
Aisha arrived as expected, but unfortunately, Bruce couldn't handle the sudden loss of hope and started trying to change everything in the only way a normal person could.
Bruce turned on the tap, gulped down a stomachful of water, and collapsed on the sofa waiting for his mutation to happen.
A mutation did occur, but unfortunately, the virus mutation wasn't as powerful as expected because the White Can had not yet begun the third round of the virus release.
The change was earth-shattering for homeless people who were always ugly and weak, but for Bruce, who is both handsome and robust, the impact of the change was minimal.
After experiencing a change from 1 to 10, how could he accept a change from 1 to 2? The change didn't even reach 2, it increased by a measly 0.1 at most.
Bruce wasn't willing to settle. He remembered his experiences and applied for a construction job again. Just when a group of people arrived to deploy the poison, he rushed out, stolen the medicine from them, and gulped it all down.
Things got out of control, completely out of control.
The second stage of the virus wasn't stable, that's why it needed a lot of water for dilution. Otherwise, wouldn't it be enough for the White Can to just sell the medicine?
Because of the overdose, Bruce mutated into a monster and also lost his sanity due to the side effects that came with the extreme virus.
The result – there's a Hulk in San Francisco as well.
Nick, who was watching from the screen, quickly pressed the pause button. This can't be right. Although Batman turning into Spider Man might involve a copyright fee dispute, turning him into a monster would be defaming the important image of the character, which is also unacceptable.
What else could be done? Start over.
If Shiller and the other three were present, they might have stopped Nick, because repeatedly resetting the timeline is a very dangerous matter. Most of the time, the further back the timeline is rewound, the less the desired outcome is attained.
But Shiller was preoccupied searching for Spider-Man, the one person who was convinced most that Spider-Man would not commit suicide. Peter Parker would never lose his true self under any adversity and hardly any signs of depression and frustration were seen in him.
From Spider-Man's previous experiences in Gotham, even though his diary entries were humorous, the underlying details subtly reveal the darkness and oppressive ambiance of Gotham. Yet Peter remained optimistic, not even Joker could break his defenses.
Moreover, the Zombie Universe had descended into such chaos and despair that Spider-Man had to forcibly awaken his rationality with his kind heart, how could such a person possibly commit suicide?
Moreover, there was a paradox. If Peter Parker had committed suicide when Bruce first arrived, where did the Spider-Man who called to notify Captain America of his death come from?
It couldn't have been that he died first, then resurrected, saw the dead Captain America, and then made a call, could it?
There must be something fishy going on.
But regardless of what had transpired, Shiller had to go and bring Spider-Man and Captain America back.
Upon hearing Shiller might try to retrieve people from the Realm of Death once more, Loki and Doctor Strange became worried. It was well known that every time Shiller was exposed to death, trouble followed.
Loki went off to find Hela in preparation to wait in the Realm of Death, while Doctor Strange followed Shiller, advising him to be more discreet, at least not to cause any earth-shattering incidents during the Battleworld trials.
With no one else around, Nick had to reset the timeline when he saw it veering off course. Even if he didn't want to reset, he had to.
Consequently, Nick had to cut off the future of this timeline and rewind it to when Bruce first arrived.
Now, Bruce, who retained his memories from the past two lifetimes, found himself back in the apartment in San Francisco.
Could Bruce not go insane? Wasn't this just God messing with him?
Other Batmans were all born with everything; extraordinary intellectual ability, strong willpower, robust physique, and even a complicated but still warm family. But he had nothing.
Was this fair?
Once someone started questioning this, it's inevitable their thoughts spiraled down a pessimistic rabbit hole.
Generally speaking, Batman wouldn't crave power excessively. There would be a part of his brain warning him that an excess of power represents loss of control.
Unfortunately, once human wisdom fails to reach a certain level, rationality becomes hard to maintain in face of temptations.
Bruce had already experienced the power of strength, he knew how much he needed it. For the sake of his responsibility, his mission, he had to obtain it.
Bruce knew that this resetting was not accidental, there had to be someone he was preventing. Thus, he decided not to follow the original path, not to seize the virus formula at the construction site, but to go directly to the Osborn Group laboratories.
This time, without superpowers, he did not get the special attention of Osborn, but obviously, from the previous two resets, Bruce knew that someone would contact him to obtain the Osborn group's intelligence, so he informed the Osborn group.
Sure enough, the cunning old Norman Osborn was very sensitive to the fact that someone was trying to steal his corporation's intelligence, everything went back on track and the man from Osborn corporation brought Bruce to New York.
This time, Bruce did not have spider-sense. He did not choose to escape, but decided to confront Norman Osborn directly.
As a result, Bruce misinterpreted again.
He learnt from Osborn that the Osborn Group was also just investigating the virus in San Francisco. They were neither the perpetrators, nor did they possess any original body of the virus, and it was impossible for them to provide powerful strength to anyone.
Bruce was not convinced at all. Since he had no ability to tell if Osborn was lying, he presumed that Osborn was concealing the truth and not telling him the whole story.
He was chucked out of the building by Osborn, but this time Aisha did him a big favor. Bruce proposed that he wanted to investigate the Osborn Group. Aisha was unsure why he wanted to do so, but still assisted him, helping to disable the Osborn group's security system for some time.
Bruce sneaked into the Osborn Group's building at night. He originally wanted to look for the original body of the virus.
But to his disappointment, perhaps what old Osborn said was true. Even though the Osborn Group was a biochemical pharmaceutical company, it had not conducted any virus research for a long time.
However, Bruce's luck was really good. Bruce didn't find the Terminal Virus, but he found the Symbiotic Battle Armor, specifically, the unfinished Green Goblin Armor.
Now Bruce didn't become Spider-Man, instead, he was turned into his worst nemesis, Green Goblin.
In fact, this was better than him becoming Spider-Man, but the problem was that the Green Goblin Armor was not complete, and Bruce did not voluntarily put on the Green Goblin Armor, but was possessed after breaking the isolation chamber, resulting in him going out of control again.
Nick also realized that this could not go on. He saw that Bruce's actions were very peculiar, and it was very likely that his memory had not been reset and that he was stuck in the vortex of pursuing power.
But considering that continuing along this timeline could potentially cause irreversible damage to Bruce, and furthermore, that would infringe rights, Nick chose to cut off this timeline once again and reset everything back to the beginning.