Loki and Talya felt the ground tremble. Talya pressed her back tightly against the corner of the wall to steady herself, while Loki let out a low moan of pain as his wound was jostled.
"Ugh..."
"Are you alright?"
No sooner had Talya asked this than a boom was heard. A section at the end of the corridor collapsed. Talya immediately rushed to the railing to look over, and saw a thick vine protruding from the ground, making a hole in the ceiling above the cellar.
"We can get out now," Talya said.
"It's dangerous outside," he said, his tone still annoyed.
"It's more dangerous to be trapped here," Talya said, lifting her skirt and walking to the railing to examine the lock. It was a common padlock. She straightened a metal wire from her earring and probed into it, finding that she could pry it open if she could hook onto the lock cylinder.
But it would take some time, so Talya said to Loki, "If something falls down, block it for me; I need to pry this lock open."
Talya began to work, so focused that she didn't notice a flicker of magical brilliance in Loki's eyes as a spatial rift opened somewhere.
Above the cellar, the guests were fleeing in all directions, each showing off their powers as they avoided the vines sprouting from the ground. Some soared into the air, while others leaped and landed on the surface of the bulky vines.
At this moment, the Tree Committee also revealed its true form, as the silhouettes of countless towering trees appeared above Gotham.
The tourists, who were still dancing in the bar at midnight, all rushed to the streets with exclamations. Those with camera phones took them out to take pictures, while others called their friends who were still in hotels, urging them to come and see the grand light show.
Indeed, it looked just like a light show because Roy often organized various cool light shows at the central roundabout to attract tourists.
The technology of the Bat Light was indeed advanced, and the projections it created were comparable to the true appearance of the Tree Committee, leading many to mistake it for just another large-scale light performance.
Gordon, Roy, and Falcone were also confirming with one another, unsure if it was a show put on by each other. After confirming among themselves, they realized it was not a light show, but an overture to the outbreak of a superpower war.
Considering the safety of the tourists, Gordon immediately started to evacuate the crowd, but this was the most wrong decision he had made. The people of Gotham knew very well that there was no valuable entertainment to watch before the officials organized an evacuation.
On the flip side, could any diversion that prompted James Gordon to prepare for evacuation be insignificant? Initially, only tourists liked to join the fun at the light show, but as soon as they heard this was not a light show but a real fight, the citizens of Gotham became interested.
When tourists huddled together, it was merely a squeeze and a traffic hindrance, but when the Gothamites gathered, the city was as if clad in golden armor.
In just a short ten minutes or so, the city lit up, with lights flickering on from one window to the next. Soon, the bustling city became brilliantly illuminated.
Countless superheroes charged towards the towering trees in mid-air, their silhouettes highlighted in the light below. The shadows of the vines, like demonic claws, struck the ground as if hitting drumbeats, melding with roars, screams, and cheers into a magnificent overture for a music festival.
During the fight, the Tree Committee began to feel something was amiss. It always felt like it couldn't exert its full strength, not that this would lead to a complete defeat, but just an overall sense of discomfort.
At first, it thought it was because Gotham had almost no plant power; the green elements spread throughout the city were too scarce. With few plants from the surface to the underground, the power of elements it could draw upon was also limited, leading to feeling somewhat weakened.
However, the weakening feeling grew increasingly evident. The Tree Committee became alarmed, and its collective consciousness was filled with roars and bellows.
"No, something is wrong, stop," it thundered.
"Stop, something is very wrong, this could be a trap; I feel like I am affected by something!"
"No, it's not related to these people in front of us, look around, look quickly, this is very dangerous!!!"
Eventually, all the plants began to howl in pain, and the vines thrashed wildly in mid-air. The Tree Committee was in so much pain that it could barely speak.
Those who were about to attack also noticed something was off. To be honest, the battle hadn't even heated up. Even Superman and Wonder Woman, who flew very fast, had just gotten close to the center of the giant trees, having only hit the blocking vines a few times. What was the opponent fleeing from?
Could this creature have just come to stage a confrontation?
Everyone hesitated, a bit puzzled by the premature retreat. A creature of such size should surely be more resilient; why were they screaming in agony without even being hit???
As the pain intensified, more giant vines appeared in mid-air, almost obscuring half the sky over Gotham.
Shiller, who was stitching up Pamela's wound, heaved a sigh and said softly, "Don't move. You wouldn't want to hear the price of an alternative medical fee."
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Pamela lay on the ground utterly despondent, but Batman was even more so, for he still hadn't put on his pants, and there were about 150 superheroes around—now the whole world knew what was inside the bat suit.
The most outrageous thing was that Batman could nearly feel over 120 scorching gazes fixed on his backside, yet there were only 67 ladies present.
Even more outrageous was the fact that Gotham's main news-hungry reporters had already arrived at the scene, and if all went as expected, by tomorrow another rough 30 million people would know what the bat suit looked like inside, and by the day after, probably three billion.
Batman didn't even want to consider the tourist revenue this could bring to the city guarded by Batman.
"Don't look at me," Shiller said, looking back at Batman, "You wouldn't want to know how much the diagnosis fee I charged the other Batman was."
The situation above Rodrix Manor was growing more tense, the Tree Committee kept screaming tragically, and the heroes exchanged looks of uncertainty, not knowing whether to continue fighting or to try to save him, after all, his cries were truly miserable.
"He's in trouble," a shout came, and everyone looked in that direction to see Bruce Wayne descending along the vines.
Today, Bruce wore the protective suit that Superman, Diana, and Green Lantern had crafted for him, which gave him some aerial combat ability and cushioned his fall, so he wasn't too worried about falling. He agilely descended vine after vine to the ground, and looking down from above, the surface of the earth, now obscured of all light by gigantic vines, was pitch black.
Clark followed closely behind Bruce, as if worried that he might get hurt, but his descent wasn't as graceful, more like crashing through without finesse.
Also, because of his crashing, the vines above the small patch of ground where Bruce was got torn open, and when the bright light from the banquet hall shone on the ground, people saw black lines spreading across it.
This was clearly not a trick of light and shadow, because this thing was so dense it started swallowing the light.
"This makes me feel very uneasy," Clark said, frowning deeply. It was rare for him to look so serious, "Everything should contain the heat from the sun, but there is none here. It has swallowed the sun."
Strange and Constantine, the two experts in mysticism, immediately knew it was their turn to step in upon seeing this. They jumped down, one on the left and one on the right, cautiously eyeing the black lines from where they stood.
"Something's very wrong," Constantine said, "This isn't naturally occurring, it's almost like a law."
However, Strange's gaze sharply pierced through the soil, too familiar with these Demon God-like beings' tactics of causing trouble.
"Underground," Strange said, "Someone has been infusing this power into the ground, and as a result, this green big guy got poisoned when drawing his energy from the soil."
Upon hearing this, everyone sprang into action, putting their unique skills to use and began digging down. They hadn't dug very deep when they found signs that a structure once stood there.
By this time, Batman had arrived. He and Bruce approached and took a look at the familiar blue walls engraved with patterns, and Batman sighed, "These nocturnal bird aficionados really are everywhere."
But Constantine's expression grew more solemn as he said, "This Dark Power feels very odd to me. It's not evil energy, but rather an innate darkness of the cosmos. If that is the case, we're in big trouble."
Regardless, the group needed to open up the building first. Stark finally let go of Pepper's hand; in truth, he hadn't joined the battle at all, having stayed in the resting room with Pepper the whole time.
His gauntlet became armed, releasing two small drones with explosives. Since these were miniature bombs, the explosion was much more powerful than anticipated, covering everyone nearby in dust and ash.
Fortunately, the mysterious building was opened, and Batman chose to jump down. Clark and Diana quickly followed, and from the Marvel side, Captain America and Natasha chose to go down. The remaining heroes stayed above ground, since the Tree Committee was still insane; they needed to restrict its movements to prevent harm to the local residents.
Once he was below, Batman was in his element, after all, when Sky Island Gotham soared into the sky, it had completely exposed the Owl's underground labyrinth.
Batman had studied the labyrinth's structure multiple times, only to conclude that its architectural quality was utter dogshit, and its ability to confound people relied purely on its esoteric elements.
But since he didn't have much understanding of mysticism, Batman hadn't delved deeper. However, Constantine now spoke up.
"This is a labyrinth, but it fundamentally doesn't entrap people with walls like other labyrinths, or rather, it's shaped like a labyrinth to make one think so," he said.
"But actually, this place is a cage. There's no exit at all. The trap is the omnipresent darkness here."
Constantine pointed towards the darkness at the far end and said, "You think it's merely a physical optical illusion, where there's light, there are shadows, but it's not so. This darkness is not the common darkness we know, yet it is diluted from the same source."
"What do you mean?" Diana asked.
"The common darkness we see is diluted from this substance. If I had to name it, I'd call it the Dark Source. Although it looks like the darkness we're used to seeing, it is actually a force of law that can be manipulated by people."
Batman furrowed his brows deeply. He realized that with his limited knowledge of mysticism, he would likely struggle to understand such philosophically symbolic explanations. If he were trapped in this labyrinth, he might believe the walls were the only barriers.
Thinking it was a labyrinth, naturally, one would want to find an exit, falling right into the trap. Because this had never been a labyrinth, but a prison, meant to doom anyone trapped within.
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