In the endless blizzard, a massive island was rising into the sky, surrounded by snowflakes dancing like elves celebrating the descent of a god. The constant howl of the cold wind seemed like a hymn singing praises to this mighty force.
Underneath this colossal island, was a small figure, a hand raised, holding up the entire structure, flying through the snowstorm.
His face was pale as death, but his expression held steadfast determination. He did not look back, did not dare to look at the massive meteor hidden underneath the mayor's mansion that nearly covered the entire estate.
Just now when he lifted the island of the mayor's mansion, the immense amount of radiation was once again causing him great harm. But Clark pushed through, teeth gritted and flying forward with the enormous mansion amidst the blizzard.
The blizzard blurred his sight, swallowed his voice and his thoughts began to drown in confusion.
A world of total white enveloped him.
With no direction, no destination, no hope, Clark knew. He needed to fly further, as far as possible from the deadly radiation, he needed to take the mansion to a safe place.
This goal echoed again and again in Clark's mind. He didn't even know what was driving him to do this.
He was not a fool. He was well aware of what had just happened in the mansion, it reflected the hideous side of these so-called elites.
They did not care for the truth, nor for justice. As hardly more than ants on the brink of collapse, they looked down upon the world from their lofty positions in the bustling society built by ordinary people. Yet their abilities or character did not hold a candle to the nobility of those hardworking masses.
They thought they were above the rules of society, yet they bow down to power more quickly than the howling wind outside the window. Be it in the farce that unfolded or the ant-like society, they were all too absorbed in their roles.
Clark didn't know how much time had passed. It felt like an eternity. Weakened by the Kryptonite, his strength was finally exhausted.
He tried to steady himself, but in the last stretch of descending, he could not control the balance of the entire mansion. On landing, a corner of the mansion struck the ground first, and then thumped into the earth with a loud crash.
Even this small tremor caused significant changes to the mansion.
Humans are incredibly fragile. Standing in their rooms, they might have been marveling at the might of God one moment, and be struck by disaster the next.
The unsteady mansion bounced and swayed, turning the entire estate into a centrifuge.
The mansion residents were thrown up into the air, and then landed with a crash. Some even hit the walls several times, everyone was bloodied.
The only positive aspect of this landing process over an earthquake or a plane crash was that it ended quickly. Those who landed awkwardly, died even quicker.
Amongst the residents of the three-story mansion, almost everyone got hurt in the unsteady landing. The lightest injuries were bumps on the forehead or scratches on the arms.
The majority of people suffered minor fractures, the number of deaths wasn't too high, about five or six. Most of them were the elderly, who couldn't withstand the violent collision.
Clark, having exhausted his last remnants of strength, collapsed onto the ground. There, in the icy snow, he felt snowflakes landing on his face.
Clark felt his body growing colder and colder, but he sighed in relief. Because he believed that he had saved everyone in the mansion.
Without the Kryptonite, his powers would recover quickly. Not long after, he felt as though he could stand up. But just as he was about to do so, he saw a person approaching from a distance in the blizzard.
The man was in a suit with green hair, face painted like a clown. But he wasn't the clown from the banquet hall. Clark found his face somewhat familiar. In a blink of an eye, Clark exclaimed, "Professor Shearer..."
What appeared in his vision, was the Kryptonite, raised high and striking down once again.
When Clark came to, he found himself back in the banquet hall. He was tied up again, the chunk of Kryptonite firmly fixed to his chest. He knew he wouldn't be able to break free this time.
Meanwhile, Batman, in the surveillance room, finally saw the true identity of the clown's accomplice - another clown.
Batman narrowed his eyes, showing the skeptical expression he usually wore. He looked down at the Batman puppet he had thrown on the floor, absorbed in deep thought.
However, the farce in the banquet hall was far from over. The clown dressed in a long suit walked over to Clark. He knelt down, playing with a button in his hand, then said to Clark, whose face was covered in blood:
"Do you think I'd be so bored as to let a bunch of idiots execute two other idiots?"
"By god! That would be the worst script in the world, uninteresting, boring, and disregarded..."
"If that were the best I could do, I would surely starve to death, but Jack is the greatest comedian in the world!"
"It's just the beginning..."
With that, he gave a mad grin to Clark. Just then, a woman with disheveled hair ran out from her room to the banister in the courtyard, shouting frantically:
"Kill him, kill that damned monster!"
She pushed her hair back, a large wound stretched from one side of her face to her neck. It looked as if she had gotten hurt when she unluckily hit something during the landing.
Apart from her set of injuries, she was very beautiful, with a sexy figure. Her formal dress sparkled brilliantly, but the wound in her chest and the blood made her look like a hobgoblin.
"He ruined my face! He ruined my entire acting career! I have a movie to shoot in the second half of the year, I will go bankrupt if I break the contract!!! No!!!"
"Kill him! He's a monster! Wah wah wah..."
The woman's sharp screams and cries echoed throughout the mansion. Clearly, she was close to madness.
In another room, a man dressed like a politician leaning on a walking stick came out. His face was full of blood and his arm was bent at an odd angle. He looked at the Joker and said:
"It's not over! It's not over... I'm casting all my votes for Clark!"
"He moved the entire Mayor's Mansion of Metropolis, how are we going to explain this to the public? How can I face the inquisition of the State Council?! My entire career is ruined!"
"Have you lost your minds?!" Clark said in shock, "I was saving you! I was saving everyone in this mansion..."
But more people came out, all of them injured and covered in blood, screaming, "You monster!"
An older man who looked like a host stood up, pointing at Clark and said, "You don't want to save us, you want to kill us!"
With that, he pointed his arm towards the Joker and continued, "We did as he asked, we voted. We were safe at that time! But you, you've made a huge mess and got Sander killed..."
A corpse was dragged from the guest room, and a woman was crying over it, seemingly the wife of the deceased.
"You just don't want to die, you're afraid we'll vote against you, so you created this chaos!"
"If you can't guarantee our safety, why do all this?!"
"You're not human at all, you're a monster, only a monster could do all this, you're not doing this for us!"
"My arm hurts so bad, can someone save me, oh God..."
"My face is ruined, how can I host a show in the future? You've hurt all of us..."
"I'd rather have cancer than this, at least I can afford to treat the cancer, but now, I'm going to be handicapped for life!"
"You're not human, monster! Lunatic!"
All the people were wailing, dragging their injured limbs and leaving the room, shifting to the corridors of the patio, blaming Clark who lay in the middle of the banquet hall.
Clark felt like he was caught in a blizzard. The screams, wails, accusations, and curses, were like the bitterly cold snowflakes, causing unbearable pain that seeped into his bones and sapping him of all energy and will to fight.
Did he do something wrong? Clark wondered, maybe he did.
The terrifying lunatic, the lunatic who understood hearts the most, the Joker, gave everyone hope. He made people believe that only one person would die today if they voted as he wished: either Clark or Lex.
This made all of Clark's efforts and sacrifices look like selfish acts to save himself at the expense of everyone else's safety.
It was only now that Clark realized that everything was a conspiracy. The lunatic was just trying to provoke him from the very beginning.
From making him face Lionel's corpse, to misleading him to knock out Lex, then revealing the truth to make him feel guilty, even the so-called voting performance, and perhaps even that Kryptonite he easily got rid of, all were part of his plan.
Everything the Joker did was to throw him into the coldest blizzard in the world to make him realize there's nothing colder than facing human nature, nothing colder than that storm.
Suddenly, a scream came from somewhere, echoing in the empty mansion:
"Vote! I want to vote! I vote for Clark! Kill him!"
"Mister Joker, exercise your power! My vote grants you the power! Kill him!"
This scream seemed to remind everyone. They looked at Clark again, who was once again bound and incredibly weak, and saw those two Jokers holding the weapons.
They suddenly realized that the voting game had not ended. On the contrary, the performance was just beginning.
Once one person moved, everyone began to struggle back to their rooms. Even if their arms were broken, even if their bodies were bleeding, even if they were surrounded by pain, they still tried their best to press that button.
At this time, the only audience of this performance was watching everything in the surveillance room.
When the blue light climbed onto Batman's eyes, all that was left there was an endless darkness.