"Ah!!!!!!"
Penguin Man let out a scream that didn't seem humanly possible.
But that wasn't really his fault, as anyone would be scared out of their wits if they stumbled upon such a gigantic, bloodthirsty mouth upon opening a door.
The other criminals also took a unified step backward, not because the figure was frightening, but because it was hideously ugly.
Actually, the Laughing bat's overall design wasn't too bad. Though he was rather thin, his pallid skin and the excessively tight clothing might appeal to a certain crowd. Moreover, because there was a lot of creative space with that skin-tight costume, in numerous fan creations he was referred to as "My laughing treasure, my laughing treasure."
The only problem was that the Laughing bat was not sporting his usual outfit, instead, he was wearing the official Batman costume. Already skinny, and without the sexy skin exposure his usual costume provided, the suit was a disaster on him.
Additionally, Batman's costume was fairly conservative, almost devoid of any punk elements and more oriented towards a sense of order and aesthetic. But paired with a punk hairstyle framed by a ring of spikes and a messy mouthful of sharp fangs, it made his head and body seem like parts of different artworks; it looked as ugly as it possibly could.
"Perhaps you don't know, the important factor for a dream to maintain itself is how close it is to reality," Shiller said. "Thoughts by day, dreams by night. Only when the basic rules within the dream don't severely violate the dreamer's common knowledge will they not wake up and believe they are still dreaming."
"Of course, there could be many bizarre twists and turns, but they still won't awaken. However, the more these illogical elements pile up, the more likely someone will realize this place is a dream."
"Once they realize that, the dream becomes extremely unstable. And you just had to bring in Jason, someone who is fully aware that he's dreaming. The moment he entered, the dream bubble you created began to wobble dangerously."
"To help you realize your brilliant concept, people in the studio pulled out all the stops. I can state with certainty that each of their efforts was infinitely more fascinating than the crappy film you directed."
Shiller also turned his head away and sighed, saying, "Since you insist on playing a character in this drama, let's start with you."
"If you want to demonstrate that being powerless means you don't have to take responsibility, you must first put yourself in a desperate situation to show incapability. But how could Bruce Wayne be incapable? He's destined to inherit the Wayne Family's legacy and become the world's wealthiest man, which completely unfulfills the script's demands."
"So you altered the background setting. You were just an ordinary person, struggling against the wolves desiring your shares, even with Gordon's help. In the end, you received nothing and became a nobody."
Shiller looked up at him, but the Laughing bat showed no intentions of reflecting. He simply said, "It's not impossible, is it? When I was about to inherit the fortune, indeed many jumped out. If it weren't for my strategic planning, the inheritance would have been lost long ago."
"Yes…" Shiller said.
He had only started speaking when another person let out a heavy sigh, seemingly unable to hold back anymore. Two-Face, Harvey Dent, flipped a coin, and looking at the side facing up, his Adam's apple bobbed. However, he managed to contain his fury and said, "Do you know how much effort I put in to climb to the position of Federal Prosecutor, to amend the inheritance law so that you could easily lose all your inheritance?!"
Harvey took a deep breath and said, "Yes, if you weren't so clever and easy to bully, it could indeed be very easy for you to get tricked into trading away your shares or even be diluted through all manner of shady methods."
"But you've always been a rich young master; you just don't understand that the single trust fund left by your parents is enough to support thousands of paralyzed patients for generations without worries about food or drink, let alone they left you more than one."
"Not to mention the trusts and foundations, just the liquid assets left by your parents amount to several million dollars. After they died, you were the sole heir."
"In terms of real estate, you also owned numerous houses and cars, all of which were certified by the real estate certification office, and those certificates bore only your name – you were the sole inheritor."
"First, I collaborated with a consortium to modify the personal trust law, specifying a cap on the holdings and income of personal trusts, which restricted the trusts left by your parents that could generate a large amount of dividends. Then, I changed the real estate registration laws, going through over twenty drafts to overhaul the registration model of your real estate assets."
"In the end, we couldn't entirely finish and had to resort to bribery to alter the certificates at the notary office where your parents had gone, all the while killing all the notaries involved, before blowing up the entire office. This forced them to relocate and lose records, making it an unsolved case."
"But I never anticipated your parents would be so cautious as to hide more than a million in cash in your basement. If it weren't for the fact that I had investigated all of your parents' financial activities for the year before they died, you would have become a millionaire the very first day you packed up and left Wayne Manor!"
"And then there's Alfred. Before your parents died, they gave him a large sum of money to deposit in an English bank. Right after their death, Alfred immediately went back to England to withdraw the funds. It was me who bribed the airline to crash his plane!"
"Alfred was cautious to a fault. Before heading back to England, he had his daughter withdraw half of the money and transfer it to a Swiss bank. I even started a diplomatic incident between America and Switzerland just so Alfred's daughter wouldn't be able to successfully transfer the money to you!"
"You know how much effort I put into making you a complete penniless loser, exactly as your own script outlined, and you just blurt out 'It's not impossible'?!!"
Shiller loaded the film into the projector, and the scenes from the pictures that the Laughing bat had seen in the corridors began to play. Apparently, in this series of background stories he had concocted, there was a figure who was exceptionally busy somewhere out of sight.
Now Harvey had not only repaired his face, but also kept his job and his girlfriend didn't run off. Since graduating from law school, there hadn't been a single day when he was idle. He went on to earn three master's degrees, two PhDs, and held teaching positions at various prestigious universities, making a very broad network of friends.
He then became the legal advisor for the then opposition party's presidential campaign, using his connections to strategize and dance in the sleeves, eventually climbing to the position of the core team's chief advisor.
After becoming the chief advisor, he was even busier. For the presidential election, he was on his feet non-stop, busy as could be. He even had to find time to marry his girlfriend, showing off their happy marriage to the public, painting a good image in preparation for the next step of the campaign.
It was no easy feat getting this president-elect onto the platform, and then he had to compete for the Attorney General position with the most powerful rival's relatives. For three years, without a single error, he was applauded by everyone, seeming even more like a Justice Messenger than Batman himself.
Finally, he was in a position to achieve his ultimate goal, but those bills were too bizarre, affecting too many people's interests; to pass them would require everyone, from the president to Congress to the citizens, to lose their minds.
Harvey also had to lower his pride to seek extrajudicial scientific aid, teaming up with Mad Hatter and Scarecrow to implement a federal water source improvement plan. He had to replace all the good water pipes with toxic ones laced with hallucinogens, turning all Americans into mental residents of Florida, in order to push these laws without being discovered for being mentally ill.
After fixing the common sense issues, he was then targeted by those interest groups specialized in trusts.
In the following decade, Harvey was both working daily and dodging assassination attempts, managing to forcefully push through hundreds of entirely nonsensical and irrational bills in less than 20 years.
From a third-party view, Harvey's maneuvers in this script would have the Soviet Union forcibly awarding him a Red Flag Medal, the Eastern Great Nation would have to call him an internationalist warrior, and even the show Hardcore Tough Guy would have to dedicate two episodes to him.
After the entire film was shown, the audience was left in silent awe. Only the Prime Universe's Batman looked at Harvey with a hint of admiration. Truly worthy of being my friend, even if from another universe, that level of capability is truly solid.
That was the end of the main storyline. Had the main storyline not been completed, another ten years and he could destroy the entire American legal system on his own, turning The Great Gatsby into The Great Harvey Dent.
Harvey sighed deeply, all was implied without saying a word.
Shiller made a gesture, signaling Harvey to keep calm, and then said, "After losing all your inheritance, in order to pave the way for Gordon's storyline, you had to shoot him and paralyze him, but did you ever consider that you had never used a gun before that, and you ran away immediately after shooting, so how could the police possibly find no evidence at all?"
Harley Quinn blew her hair out of her face and let out a cold snort, "The cops and doctors in Gotham don't know anything else, but they're professionals at treating and investigating gunshot wounds. The reason they couldn't find out who killed your parents back then was because someone was obstructing the investigation, the corrupt cops didn't dare to look into it—what if they stumbled upon someone important?"
"But by then you had lost all your inheritance, become an orphan with no one to rely on, and what's more, there were countless people who wanted you dead. Even if you didn't do it, they would find ways to pin the blame on you, lock you up for hundreds of years at least, so you couldn't turn over a new leaf," she said.
"Do you know how much pressure I was under as Gordon's most promising protégé not to uncover this case? For that, I had to assassinate six wealthy businessmen trying to frame others, three corrupt medical examiners, and two colleagues who were bribed!"
Harley Quinn's eyes almost rolled into her head.
When Shiller loaded the new film into the projector, Harley Quinn's story began to play on the screen, which was even more of a whirlwind of operations and maxed-out maneuvers.
Harley Quinn, of course, played the role of Ge Yin; she was still a psychology major, but she was on a mission this time. She managed to skirt the internship at Arkham Asylum and specifically participated in a joint mission with her university and the FBI, where her talent in criminal investigations was naturally discovered.
To make her motives logical, she also purposely purchased all the newspapers reporting on Mr. and Mrs. Wayne's murder at the time, and using her strong deductive skills, found something amiss.
Then, fueled by her strong sense of justice, feeling that she had to unearth the dark secrets behind this case and bring the murderer to justice, she resolutely gave up her identity as a student from a prestigious psychology school and transferred to the police academy instead.
During her interaction with Gordon, Gordon accidentally found out that this highly talented and hard-working girl was investigating Mr. and Mrs. Wayne's case, and after his own investigation, it turned out that Vigus Gwyn was a little girl once sponsored by the Waynes in an orphanage. She was investigating this case because she had discovered inconsistencies and wanted to avenge her benefactors.
This also perfectly provided the motive for the female officer's frantic efforts to exonerate Bruce after Gordon's accident.