The murmur of laughter was swallowed by the blizzard and didn't carry far in the howling wind, hence, Bruce didn't hear it.
At that moment, he was in a guest room on the other side of the manor, putting on his bat suit,
Previously when he went to get the helicopter engine, it wasn't entirely to bother with Lex. In fact, it was because Selina could only carry less heavy, portable equipment. The full set of bat suit and bat equipment were left on the helicopter, which Bruce brought back when retrieving the engine.
Just like Lex, they all had their additional plans after the trio split up. Other than Clark who was called away by a mysterious phone call to the reception room, Lex and Bruce each had their own plans.
Lex's primary target was to handle Lionel's corpse in the washroom. He had no intention of actually finding the entrance himself. He was waiting for Bruce and Clark to do the work, then he could reap the benefits.
Bruce was definitely aware of this, so he had no plan to work for Lex either. His plan was to return to the guest room, put on the full suit of bat equipment, and create an entrance in his own way.
Even though using a door is a civilized method, Batman rarely did it in that way. He preferred creating his own path over betting who among them will find the entrance first or if they would share it with others once found.
If the entrance was underground, theoretically, as long as he could break out a path to the underground, that would be effectively an entrance. Hence, Batman's plan was to build a bomb and blast a hole into it.
The mayor's manor did not have usable materials, but when Bruce went to fetch the helicopter engine, it was not entirely to compete with Lex. He had planned to modify a bomb using the helicopter engine.
But an engine alone wasn't enough, he still needed to dismantle some other parts from the helicopter. Fortunately, no one else was able to reach the roof of the nearby building, so the helicopters there became his material warehouse.
At this moment, he was swiftly assembling this rather large bomb in the guest room. He strove to finish it before the other two found the entrance, and then become the first to enter the underground.
After working intently for a while, Batman had finally made a slightly crude-looking bomb. In reality, its power was very strong, much stronger than the mini bombs he brought, sufficient enough to blast open the ground and create a path.
He carried the bomb onto the balcony, lowered it down with a rope, jumped down after that and brought the bomb to the courtyard in the middle of the manor.
The reason he didn't go indoors was because he was worried that the explosive force was too strong, and it would affect the building structure. If the manor collapsed, the residents could be in danger, and that was not what Batman wanted.
Not long after the bomb was set up, a violent explosion sounded. The whole manor's ceiling severely shuddered, spilling a large amount of plaster and dust.
As it turned out, this specific directional explosive was very useful and the basement of the manor was not really deep. After the explosion, an entrance visible to the naked eye appeared in front of Batman. All below, however, was cloaked in darkness and the situation was uncertain.
With a hiss, Batman threw a lighting flare down. After the brief intense light, the interior scene was revealed. It appeared to be just an abandoned cellar, and Batman frowned, unsure if he had found the right place.
He took out a detector from his belt and threw it down again. He watched the changing readings on the screen and after watching for a while, Batman jumped down.
Upon entering, it was indeed just as it appeared from the outside, a manor's abandoned cellar with a pile of wooden shelves and barrels. It appeared to contain no secrets.
A door in the corner attracted Batman's attention because he noticed, faint light was visible behind the door. It didn't look like the oil lamps or candles typically used in English manors. Instead, it resembled the cold light emitted by a modern lighting system.
Batman walked over, but he didn't rashly push the door open. He stood at a distance and threw a Batman dart at the door.
The sound of "whistle! whistle! whistle! whistle!" rang out. Batman agilely rolled to the corner of the room, avoiding the sweep of the miniature gun from the roof.
Once the door opened, what appeared behind it was a technologically advanced corridor. The floor made out of metal pieces, LED lights on the walls and ceiling, and not far away where two mounted miniature automatic guns on the ceiling.
The scenery here was completely different from the manor above. Batman was on high alert. He stayed in the dead zone of the gun's sweep, throwing Batman darts at the guns. A few darts later, both miniature guns sparked electric fires, no longer capable of firing.
After walking into the corridor, Batman threw another lighting flare into the distance. He noticed there appeared to be a central hall, but the lights there were not on, as if the lighting system was broken.
Moving along the corridor, there was indeed a central hall. Apart from the corridor he came from, there were also three other corridors, each facing different directions. One of the corridors had lights on, while the other three were completely black.
Batman did not choose to go into the lit corridor first, but walked towards the one closest to him. He threw another lighting flare there and discovered that it was a dead-end, and on the sides of the walls, there were two rooms.
Walking into the first room, it was a prep room filled with gloves, protective suits, masks, face shields, and so forth. Upon seeing these items, Batman immediately put on a gas mask as he anticipated that a biological laboratory might be up ahead.
Sure enough, another door on the same side bears a radiation sign. At this moment, the lighting system in the corridor is off, indicating the power was out in the entire hallway. This meant that the door to this room might no longer possess any radiation protection or be sealed.
Batman takes out his reading device, but it showed no sign of abnormal radiation. After hesitating, he decided to break in.
Although the door might not be sealed anymore, it still took Batman some effort to make a hole in it. After succeeding, he stepped into the room, where the light was still out and various experimental equipment were strewn haphazardly on the floor.
There was no radiation source here, or rather, the source had been relocated. Batman looked at the broken containers on the ground and deeply furrowed his brow.
The entire laboratory was very ordinary. He didn't see any specimens used for experiments or any live animals. But soon, Batman found some records.
"Experiment log 3221-1, the subject today showed no noticeable abnormalities, diet and activity responses are both normal. After some discussion, the radiation is increased…"
"Experiment log 3221-2, the subject today exhibited slight dizziness and nausea, decreased appetite, stiff body movements, doubled radiation..."
Batman flipped through them. It seemed to be a log for a radiation experiment. It didn't clearly state what the test subjects and the radiation source was. Batman read through the earlier part of the experiment log, and then looked at the last entry.
"Experiment log 3221-35, the spread of cancer cells in the subject today is uncontrollable, determined to be incurable, no significant signs of consciousness, unable to eat or move…"
"Conclusion, the number 01 radiation source shows no beneficial mutations, all subjects suffered from incurable cancer…"
After reading the summaries, Batman put down the records. He turned to leave the corridor because he had just read from later entries that this underground base had a morgue.
Although he was expecting it, when Batman entered the morgue down another corridor and saw the tightly packed rows of body lockers, he felt suffocated for a moment.
The level of wear on the handles of the lockers indicated that this place had been overcrowded with bodies. There could have been hundreds or even thousands of people subjected to this inhumane radiation experiment.
As he approached with anger in his heart, Batman pulled open the drawer of a locker. A loud "bang" echoed out and Batman instinctively rolled to the side. However, nothing attacked him.
What popped out from the drawer was a sign covered in red paint with a message that said: "Please go to the monitoring room at the end of corridor 3. I have a surprise for you there."
Underneath the message was a cruder smiley face. Batman didn't need to think too hard to know that this was left by Joker.
Batman took a few deep breaths. He didn't immediately follow Joker's instructions, but instead did some exploring in the morgue. Unfortunately, there were no bodies here.
All he knew at the moment was that the mysterious radiation source could cause ordinary people to contract cancer. As for Lex's claim that Lionel had discovered certain radiation capable of enhancing people's physical fitness and intelligence, it looked more like a ruse.
After searching in other corridors, he found that most of the other rooms were various types of laboratories. But the equipment inside was dusty, indicating that they had been unused for quite some time.
In the last laboratory, Batman found another paper clue. It was a fragmentary record, but the information mentioned on it was crucial. They referred to the so-called radiation source number 01 as "Kryptonite," an alien mineral.
Because some scientists found that this alien mineral had special radioactivity, they wanted to research whether it could cause mutations in ordinary people. However, after the first failed experiment, they did not give up, but instead conducted more experiments.
Batman didn't understand where they got the confidence to believe that this radiation could have a positive effect on people. Perhaps, there was a lot of information behind this that he didn't know.
After thoroughly searching all the rooms in the corridor, he methodically proceeded to the next one, not letting Joker's clue trip him up.
After reaching the end of another dark corridor, there was a door. The design was very exaggerated, seeming to lead to a huge space, but there were no lock holes, and the miniature explosives didn't damage the door at all.
After Batman tried for a while, he realised he couldn't open the door with his current equipment. So, he headed into the hallway where the light was on.
At the end of the corridor, what appeared before Batman were three walls of surveillance monitors. The light from the screens focused on a chair in the center of the room.
Just after Batman entered the room, the chair slowly turned around, but no one was on it.
On the chair were three round Batman dolls and a bunch of Batman lollipops.