Chapter 101: Harley, the Joker's girlfriend, has lost her mind and actually developed a crush on me
The indicator light on the intercom went dark.
Shen Che leaned back against the leather chair.
His slender fingers tapped twice on the obsidian desktop, producing a crisp sound, one long and one short.
Red and blue dual-colored jacket, baseball bat, injuring eight exoskeleton guards.
These characteristics were too obvious; there was no one else in Gotham City except her.
Harley Quinn.
That psychologist who had always clung behind the Joker, treating madness as love.
The Joker had just been slapped into a puddle of mush by him in the plaza.
Instead of holding a funeral for the Joker in Gotham City,
was she actually carrying a baseball bat and running all the way to New York to apply for The Seven?
This mental state was indeed not very stable.
Shen Che picked up the bone china cup on the table,
and drank the last mouthful of slightly lukewarm Darjeeling black tea.
He put down the cup.
"A bit interesting."
At the same time.
Vought Tower, first-floor lobby.
Lying on the ground were eight exoskeleton guards in black uniforms.
Their alloy skeletons were severely deformed. Someone was rolling on the ground clutching broken ribs, and the screams merged into one.
A few drops of blood splashed on the marble floor tiles.
Harley Quinn sat on the leather sofa opposite the reception desk.
One leg was resting on the edge of the coffee table, while the other leg dangled in mid-air. Her fishnet stockings had a few holes torn in them.
On her upper body, she wore that red and blue dual-colored jacket. The zipper was pulled halfway down, revealing the tattered T-shirt underneath.
Her blonde hair was tied into two high ponytails, with the tips dyed in exaggerated colors of red and blue.
She was chewing a piece of pink bubblegum in her mouth.
In her hand, she carried an aluminum alloy baseball bat.
The tip of the bat was stained with blood that hadn't dried completely. A droplet of blood slid down the metal surface and dripped onto the carpet.
"Chomp. Chomp."
She chewed her gum, the sound echoing loudly in the spacious lobby.
The few clerks at the reception desk were so frightened that they shrank behind the computer monitors, hugging each other and trembling.
Harley didn't pay attention to them.
Raising her head, she stared fixedly at the giant LED screen hanging in the center of the lobby.
On the screen, the surveillance footage from Starlight Plaza yesterday was being rebroadcast.
That man wearing a white shirt.
With a backhanded slap.
No flashes of fire, no unnecessary nonsense.
The Joker's face, painted with a red smiling face, sent out ripples the moment it came into contact with the slap.
And then, along with his body,
he was directly slapped into the black asphalt pavement, turning into a puddle of purplish-red flesh.
Harley looked at that puddle of flesh.
She didn't cry, nor did she hysterically scream about avenging her "Pudding".
On the contrary,
her shoulders began to heave.
"Heh heh."
A few strange chuckles squeezed out from deep in her throat.
Then, the laughter grew louder and sharper.
"Hhahaha!"
She laughed so hard she rocked back and forth, rolling around on the leather sofa.
The baseball bat dropped to the ground with a clang.
She laughed until tears came out and reached out to randomly wipe her face, smudging the red and blue eyeshadow at the corners of her eyes.
This scene was too stimulating for her.
She had followed the Joker for so many years, accustomed to how the Joker used poison gas, riddles, and human nature's interrogation to torture others.
She had always thought that the Joker's madness was the upper limit of this World.
Until she saw this slap.
What human nature is inherently evil? What either-or game?
In front of that man named Shen Che, it was all bullshit.
He didn't even have the patience to finish listening to a sentence.
If he found it unpleasing to the eye, he slapped them to death.
Unreasonable, without a bottom line, violence purified to the extreme.
This was true madness! This was the overbearing dominance that directly overturned the table of this ragged World!
Harley felt that her brain was washed clean by this violence.
The Joker's dawdling, perverted games were too low-level.
That chaebol deity in the screen, wearing a high-end suit and exuding a casual vibe even when killing people,
was the true "madness aesthetics".
That absolute arrogance of trampling the entire Worldunderfoot was like a shot of adrenaline, injected directly into her twisted nerves.
She had become obsessed with this feeling.
Harley jumped up from the sofa,
grabbed the baseball bat off the ground, and hoisted it onto her shoulder.
"Pop."
She blew open the pink bubblegum in her mouth and rolled the sugar skin back into her mouth with her tongue.
Turning around, she swaggered toward the private elevator deep in the lobby.
Several security guards who had just arrived raised riot shields, wanting to stop her.
"Stop! This is a private area!"
Harley didn't even lift her eyelids.
She swung the baseball bat.
"Bang!"
The alloy baseball bat slammed fiercely onto the riot shield at the front.
The bulletproof shield was directly smashed with a white mark. That two-hundred-pound guard was jolted back three steps and fell to the ground.
"Get lost! Don't block this lady's path!"
Harley's voice was sharp, exuding an excited madness.
"I'm going to see Boss Shen!"
She swept away the security guard beside her with a strike of her bat.
Her red and blue leather boots stepped on the chest of the fallen guard and directly crossed over.
She walked up to the private elevator,
reaching out to casually press a few keys next to the fingerprint sensor area.
"Beep."
The elevator door actually opened. Shen Che hadn't locked down the permissions.
Harley whistled,
walking in carrying the baseball bat.
Turning around, she made a grimace at the guards outside the door who couldn't get up.
"Tell your boss!"
The elevator doors slowly closed.
Harley's laughter came through the gap.
"I'm here to apply! I'm willing to be his most loyal dog!"
The door closed completely.
The digital indicator light began to jump upward frantically.
One hundred and twelfth floor.
President's office.
Shen Che pushed the empty teacup aside.
He leaned back in his chair, hands crossed over his abdomen,
listening to the sound of the elevator operating in the corridor outside the door.
This woman was a bit crazy, but direct enough.
On this Earth full of calculations and hypocrisy, this kind of pure lunatic
sometimes acting as a biting dog was indeed more useful than those hesitant politicians.
"Ding."
The crisp prompt tone of the elevator arriving at the one hundred and twelfth floor sounded.
On the thick carpet of the corridor, the sound of leather boots stepping came,
unhurried and unforced, even carrying a bouncing rhythm.
That was Harley carrying a baseball bat, walking over like a young girl out for a stroll.
"Boss Shen——I'm here——"
Harley's weirdly toned voice dragged out a long note outside the door.
"Bang!"
The agarwood office door was kicked open by her with one kick.
The door panel slammed against the wall, producing a dull collision sound.
Harley carried the baseball bat, blowing bubblegum,
and swaggered into this office representing the highest power on Earth.
She was just about to open her mouth to say a few opening remarks expressing loyalty or madness,
but before the words reached her mouth,
she suddenly felt that the air in the office
was not quite right.
Not because the air conditioning was on too strong,
but a materialized heat wave that could scorch human bones
rushing toward her face.
Harley's action of chewing gum stopped.
She hadn't seen Shen Che behind the desk yet,
and her vision was first blocked by another person.
Beside the mahogany desk,
stood a blonde woman,
wearing a tight-fitting uniform with blue background and red stars,
Chloe.
She stood there like a god of plague radiating high temperature.
Chloe's face was so gloomy that water could drip from it.
Her jawline was taut, and her teeth bit into her lower lip, leaving a row of deep white marks.
Her hands were clenched tightly into fists, her knuckles turning bluish-white.
The most fatal thing was those blue eyes.
At this moment,
they had been completely submerged by blood red.
Deep in her pupils, two crimson Heat Vision glows,
like two miniature Suns about to explode, flickered frantically,
staring fixedly at the woman at the door wearing a crop top, fishnet stockings, and carrying a baseball bat.
This crazy girl had run to her territory,
and dared to shout downstairs about "wanting to be his most loyal dog"?
Chloe's chest heaved violently.
Under the roasting of this anger, the surrounding air made a sizzling sound.
The fluff of the Persian carpet began to emit black smoke.
Two equally mad women,
in this highest place in Manhattan,
separated by a distance of less than ten meters,
solidly,
crashed together.
Chapter 102: Harley Quinn Runs to Vought for an Interview, Volunteering to Be a Dog
"Ding."
The elevator doors slid open. A crisp chime echoed down the corridor.
Harley Quinn was chewing gum.
"Smack."
A large pink bubble blew out from her mouth, growing bigger and bigger, covering half of her face smeared with cheap White powder.
"Pop." The bubble burst, sticking to the tip of her nose.
She unconcernedly stuck out her tongue and rolled the gum skin back into her mouth.
An aluminum baseball bat was propped over her right shoulder. The bloodstains on the tip of the bat had already dried into a dark brown.
Swaying as she walked, her leather boots stepped onto the thick Persian rug on the one hundred and twelfth floor.
The holes in her fishnet stockings stretched and grew larger with her stride.
The door was open.
That heavy agarwood door had been kicked flat against the wall by her kick a full minute ago.
Harley walked straight in.
She completely didn't take this office, which represented the highest power on Earth, seriously.
She didn't look at the Manhattan night view outside the window, nor did she care about the scorched marks on the rug.
"Boss Shen—"
She shouted at the top of her lungs.
Her voice was sharp, dragging out a long, sweet-sickly suffix, sounding like fingernails scraping across a blackboard.
Oozing a reckless, crazy vibe.
"I'm here to report for duty!"
Shen Che sat in the genuine leather swivel chair behind the obsidian desk.
His black suit was crisp and straight, with his hands folded over his abdomen.
He watched this woman swaggering in.
Into this office, some people crawled in on their knees, and some were thrown in.
Carrying a baseball bat and blowing bubble gum while walking in, she was the very first.
Harley walked to a spot two meters in front of the desk and stopped.
The baseball bat rested vertically on the rug.
She leaned forward, hands crossed and pressed on top of the baseball bat, resting her chin on the back of her hands.
That pair of eyes painted with red and blue eyeshadow stared straight at Shen Che.
"The guards outside are too weak."
Harley curled her lips.
"I hadn't even finished warming up, and they were already lying on the ground unable to get up."
She blinked at Shen Che, and the blue sequins on her eyelids fluttered down.
"But it doesn't matter. I'm not here to fight."
She straightened her body and hoisted the baseball bat back onto her shoulder.
"I'm here for an interview."
Shen Che didn't speak.
He picked up the Darjeeling black tea on the table, which had already gone completely cold, and took a sip.
Bitter.
He put down the bone china cup, the bottom clinking against the stone surface with a muffled thud.
"An interview."
Shen Che's voice was flat, as if watching a comical sideshow.
"That resume of yours, in Arkham's archives, would probably have to be loaded with trucks."
Hearing this, not only did Harley not get angry, but instead she burst out laughing.
"Cackle, cackle, cackle."
Her laughter was sharp, her shoulders shaking violently.
"Arkham?"
She laughed so hard tears almost came out, reaching out to wipe the corner of her eye.
"That dump doesn't even have a gatekeeper anymore."
Harley put away her smile.
She suddenly threw the baseball bat onto the ground.
"Clang."
The metal bat smashed onto the Persian rug and rolled twice.
She took a step forward.
Twisting her waist squeezed tightly by the tight jacket.
Her red and blue leather boots stepped into the projection light in front of Shen Che's desk.
"That good-for-nothing Joker died well."
She said these words very casually, just like talking about how last night's pizza tasted terrible.
There was no sadness whatsoever, not even a trace of nostalgia.
In Gotham, everyone thought she loved the Joker so madly that she was willing to die for him.
But in this madman's World.
So-called love was nothing more than the pursuit of ultimate madness.
The Joker used to be the craziest, so she followed the Joker.
Now, the Joker had turned into a puddle of mud,
and was casually crushed by the man in front of her like swatting a fly.
"He dawdled too much."
Harley put her hands on her hips.
"Playing riddles and human nature tests all day long, totally boring."
She stared at Shen Che's indifferent face.
Her breathing began to grow rapid, her chest heaving heavily.
The muscles beneath her fishnet T-shirt were taut.
"I just like your kind."
She bit her lower lip, lipstick smudging against her teeth.
"Unreasonable, no bottom line, slapping to death whoever looks displeasing to the eye."
"That dictatorial aura of trampling the entire Worldunderfoot."
Harley spread her arms, making an exaggerated hugging gesture.
"It's so fucking sexy!"
Shen Che leaned back in his chair.
His pitch-black eyes looked at her.
This woman was seriously ill; the circuits in her brain were completely broken.
But he didn't interrupt her.
This World truly was a giant psychiatric hospital; having one more madman performing in front of him could also be considered entertainment.
The more Harley talked, the more excited she became.
She pulled her hands back and slapped her chest hard.
"Boss Shen, take me in."
She leaned half a step closer.
"As long as you say the word, I'm willing to do any dirty or tiring work."
"Kill, set fires, or go to Gotham to dismantle that old bat's wheelchair."
She grinned, revealing a row of White teeth.
"Even if you make me at the entrance of Vought Tower—"
"—act as a biting guard dog."
She pointed at her own neck.
"You tie a chain on me, and I guarantee I'll bite whoever I see and never let go."
Harley spoke with spittle flying everywhere.
She was completely immersed in pledging loyalty to her new master,
even beginning to fantasize about the days ahead following this man and going crazy unscrupulously all over the World.
As she spoke, she twisted her waist,
continuing to edge closer to that obsidian desk.
She wanted to get closer, wanted to touch the man sitting on the plutocrat's throne.
But she didn't notice,
in this spacious office,
there weren't just her and Shen Che.
Less than five meters to her left,
beside the mahogany wainscoting,
the air was already twisted out of shape.
The temperature was skyrocketing at a speed defying physical common sense,
like a pressure cooker with its exhaust vent blocked.
The fluff on the Persian rug had already begun to turn black and carbonize, emitting a pungent, burnt smell.
Chloe stood there.
The blue-and-red-star uniform was stretched almost to the bursting point by her tight muscles.
Her fists were clenched so tightly that her fingernails dug deep into her palms, blood oozing out between her fingers.
That pair of originally clear blue eyes
was now completely filled with an intense blood-red color.
Deep within her pupils,
two crimson rays of Heat Vision like two miniature volcanoes about to erupt
were frantically flashing and leaping.
She had heard it all.
This slutty woman who dressed scandalously and looked like a Joker
not only flirted with her god right in front of her,
but actually had the audacity to say she wanted to be a guard dog.
This was stealing her job.
This was a provocation to her absolute status as the "Number One Pet".
The rage Fire burned right through her reason.
Chloe's breathing was as heavy as a broken bellows, emitting a Beast-like low growl from her throat.
But Harley didn't notice this murderous intent at all, which was right close at hand.
Her mind was completely filled with Shen Che.
She reached out her right hand.
Her fingers, painted with black nail polish, crossed the edge of the desk,
wanting to prop themselves against that cold obsidian desktop,
and smoothly lean over the desk to strike what she thought was a seductive pose.
Just as her fingers
were less than an inch away from the desktop—
"Hiss——!"
A crimson high-pressure heat wave
swept horizontally across from the side without any warning.
This heat wave didn't directly hit Harley's hand,
but instead precisely brushed past her fingertips,
slicing right through like a red-hot paper cutter.
The high temperature instantly vaporized the black nail polish on Harley's nails, emitting a pungent, chemically burnt odor.
"Bang."
The Heat Vision didn't pierce through the air,
but instead smashed fiercely against the edge of that obsidian desk.
This hard, bulletproof stone
within Zero point one seconds of contacting the red light,
was directly melted.
Billowing black smoke rose from the stone surface,
and a half-meter-long, charred, deep gully
appeared on the desktop, the molten stone at the edges still sizzling and crackling, glowing with a dim orange-red light.
Chapter 103: Chloe's Death Glare, Do You Want to Die, You Crazy Bitch
"Pop."
Pink bubblegum burst near Harley's mouth, smearing half her face in a sticky mess.
She shrank back abruptly in fright.
A needle-like burning pain came from her fingertips.
That Heat Vision was less than half an inch away from her fingers.
On the obsidian desk, the charred deep trench was still smoking.
The pungent smell of scorched stone mixed with the smell of ozone quickly dissipated in the air.
Harley's heart beat wildly.
Having spent so long in Gotham, what kind of crazy people hadn't she seen?
But a scene where someone directly resorts to lasers without a word was indeed a bit beyond the pale.
Before she even had time to start cursing,
A figure in blue with red stars,
Carrying a heat wave capable of roasting a person dry, had already planted herself firmly between her and that desk.
Chloe.
She wasn't wearing her grey loungewear, but had instead changed into Vought's combat uniform.
The uniform clung tightly to her body; due to the extreme tension of her muscles, the fabric emitted a faint stretching sound.
Her blonde hair danced wildly in the hot airflow, like an enraged lioness.
She didn't look at Shen Che.
Those blue eyes completely submerged by blood red, with two scarlet lights deep within her pupils,
Like two hell searchlights cranked to maximum wattage,
Locked firmly onto Harley's face.
This gaze didn't look like it was looking at a living person.
It looked like it was looking at a piece of rotten meat ready to be thrown into a meat grinder.
Harley swallowed hard, her throat tightening.
She wasn't afraid of Death, but in front of this kind of pure, dimensional-reduction violence,
Her body's survival instinct still made her involuntarily take half a step back.
Her red and blue leather boots stepped on the chewing gum wrapper she had discarded earlier, making a crunching sound.
This tiny sound struck heavily upon Chloe's taut nerves like a pluck.
"Bitch."
Chloe squeezed out those two words from between her teeth.
Her voice carried an icy chill that could freeze bones to shards.
A yandere's sense of territoriality was completely blown open at this moment.
Her territory. Her god.
When was it ever the turn of a crazy woman who crawled out of Gotham's dump to muscle in?
And she even dared to say she wanted to be a guard dog?
This was simply even more driving her crazy than being stabbed with a knife.
"Who are you talking to?" Chloe stepped closer.
The heat wave washed over Harley's face, scorching her stage makeup a little runny.
"Shen doesn't need other women around him."
Chloe gritted her teeth, the muscles on her cheeks bulging into a hard lump.
"And even less does he need a stray dog dressed like a circus monkey."
Harley was provoked by these few words.
That crazy streak deep in her bones surfaced once more.
"Who do you think you are?" Harley stiffened her neck, reaching out to grab the baseball bat that had fallen on the ground.
"I'm talking to Boss Shen. Is it your turn, a little cat in heat, to butt in?"
She gripped the handle of the aluminum baseball bat,
Preparing to swing it in a full circle and give this blonde-haired, blue-eyed bitch a whack on the head.
But the moment she raised the baseball bat,
Chloe moved.
No starting form, no wind-up.
A fair hand, carrying an afterimage,
Passed directly through the trajectory of the swinging baseball bat.
"Thud."
A muffled sound.
Chloe's hand tightly grasped the shaft of that aluminum baseball bat.
Harley felt as though she had smashed into a solid steel pillar anchored deep in the earth's crust.
The huge counter-shock force numbed the web of her thumb, almost making her let go.
Before she could even react,
A terrifying high temperature suddenly erupted from Chloe's palm.
This wasn't Heat Vision. This was the thermal conversion of a biological force field.
"Siss — —!"
The harsh sound of metal melting rang out.
That sturdy aluminum baseball bat, in Chloe's palm,
Like an ice lolly placed under the Sun,
Quickly softened and turned red.
In a mere two seconds,
The middle section of the metal turned directly into a pool of scorching molten iron.
"Drip-drop."
The molten iron dripped onto the expensive Persian carpet,
Instantly burning through the thick carpet and sending up a thick plume of white smoke, the scorched smell choking.
In Harley's hand, only a small bare handle remained.
She stared blankly at the broken baseball bat,
Her brain still failing to catch up.
Chloe had already tossed away that half-section of scrap iron in her hand,
Flipped her wrist, and thrust forward,
Like an eagle catching a chick,
She grabbed Harley by the throat in a tight grip.
Her five fingers closed.
Harley's exclamation stuck in her throat, turning into a series of wheezing sounds like a broken bellows.
Chloe exerted strength in her arm,
Harley, weighing less than two hundred pounds, was lifted halfway into the air by her single hand.
Her feet left the ground, her red and blue leather boots kicking wildly in the air.
The soles of her shoes kicked against Chloe's uniform, not even leaving a gray mark.
Oxygen was instantly cut off.
Harley's white powder-coated face rapidly turned purplish-red.
The whites of her eyes were covered with red blood vessels, and her eyeballs bulged outward due to the congestion.
"Cough... Let..."
She grabbed Chloe's arm with both hands,
Her fingernails digging into the flesh, desperately trying to pry open those iron-clamp-like fingers.
She couldn't pry them open.
Chloe's arm didn't even shake the slightest bit.
Those scarlet eyes leaned close to Harley's face,
Close enough to smell the mixture of cheap perfume and body odor on Harley.
"You want to be a dog?"
Chloe's voice was as cold as the Siberian ice field.
"I'll grant your wish."
Her fingers tightened bit by bit.
Harley's cervical vertebrae emitted an unbearable creaking sound.
This wasn't just choking her neck; this was going to crush her bones raw.
The fear of Death descended upon this madwoman so clearly for the first time.
Harley rolled her eyes, her tongue sticking out uncontrollably.
The flapping motion of her hands grew weaker and weaker.
Just at the final second when her consciousness was about to slip into boundless darkness,
"Don't dirty the carpet."
A flat voice resounded in the spacious office.
The voice was not loud,
Without fluctuation, and without any emotion,
Just like reminding a custodian not to splash mop water onto the wall.
Shen Che sat behind the obsidian desk.
He picked up that freshly refilled cup of Darjeeling black tea,
Took a sip.
The teacup blocked half his face, revealing only a pair of unfathomable black eyes.
He watched the farce unfolding before him for the sake of vying for favor,
His gaze full of the casualness of someone watching a show.
He had no intention of saving anyone, nor any intention of adding fuel to the fire.
He just felt that the carpet scorched by that pool of molten iron smelled really choking.
Chapter 104: The Shura Field of Two Crazy Women Just Feels Noisy to Me
"Don't dirty the carpet."
Five bland words.
No ups and downs, no emotion.
But to Chloe, this was more effective than the harshest scolding.
It was like a basin of ice-cold water poured straight over her about-to-snap nerve of fury.
The five fingers pinching Harley's neck instantly froze.
The knuckles were tinged with a pale, bluish-white color.
The two wildly flickering red lights in Chloe's eyes flashed twice.
And were forcefully forced back down.
She didn't dare go against Shen Che's wishes.
Even if there was an active volcano about to erupt in her heart, in front of Shen Che, she had to obediently suppress the fire in her stomach.
Chloe let go of her hand.
The action was full of disgust, just like throwing away a bag of stinky garbage.
"Bang."
Harley's body, weighing less than two hundred pounds, lost support and crashed heavily onto the Persian carpet.
Her knees hit the floor, making a dull crashing sound.
Harley was like a fish just landed ashore.
Her hands covered her neck, gasping heavily.
Greedily forcing air into her burning lungs.
On her fair neck, a shocking deep purple fingerprint circle was left behind.
At the edges of the skin torn by the fingernails, tiny beads of blood were still seeping out.
"Cough cough..."
Harley coughed violently, coughing until tears streamed down.
Her flashy red and blue eye shadow smeared and clumped at the corners of her eyes.
But she didn't feel scared.
Before her coughing stopped, she suddenly grinned and laughed.
Revealing white teeth stained with saliva and a bit of blood.
She raised her head, looking at Chloe standing nearby and panting heavily.
Her right hand lifted from the ground.
Unceremoniously giving Chloe a high middle finger.
"Hehe."
Harley laughed out loud, her voice hoarse like a broken gong.
"I thought you were so fierce."
She rubbed her neck, looking at Chloe provokingly.
"Turns out you're just a guard dog afraid of the Mastergetting angry."
"When the Master says stop, you don't even dare to let out a fart."
Harley had mixed in Arkham and Gotham for so long, and she knew best how to poke a madman's sore spot.
These few words hit the nail on the head.
Chloe's newly extinguished anger was like having a bucket of high-octane gasoline poured over it.
With a "boom", it rushed to her head once again.
Her blue eyes instantly bloodshot, the whites frighteningly red.
"I'll trample your skull to pieces!"
Chloe roared.
Raising that red-and-blue leather boot, the sole aimed straight at Harley's white-powdered face.
Ready to step on this noisy head directly into a rotten watermelon.
Just at the moment the boot was about to fall.
"Clack."
A dull clacking sound.
Shen Che slammed the bone china teacup in his hand heavily onto the obsidian tabletop.
A few drops of leftover tea splashed out from the cup and fell onto the tabletop.
The sound wasn't loud, but in the spacious office, it was as piercing as a gunshot.
Chloe's boot abruptly stopped in mid-air.
Only an inch away from Harley's nose tip.
She turned her head, looking at Shen Che behind the desk.
Shen Che raised his hand and rubbed his brow bone.
"Too noisy."
Shen Che opened his eyes, a deep sense of disgust showing in his pitch-black pupils.
"Two madmen screaming here, making it look like a low-class asylum."
He looked at Chloe.
His gaze was as cold as two bone-scraping knives.
"If this office is turned into a slaughterhouse by you again—"
Shen Che's tone didn't fluctuate in the slightest.
"I'll throw you into the Sahara Desert and make you eat sand there for a few months to reflect on the rules."
Chloe shivered all over.
Her foot slowly lowered.
The red boot stepped on the carpet without daring to make a sound.
She lowered her head, her blonde hair hanging down to block half her face.
Her hands were tightly twisted together, not daring to reply with a single word.
The Sahara Desert wasn't a death penalty for her, but that kind of long, boring exile was harder to bear than death.
Shen Che turned his head and glanced at the security personnel outside the door who were still peeking and trembling.
"Drag the trash on the floor out."
He pointed at Harley, who was still grinning.
"Lock her up on the third level of the Underground Room. Don't let her make a commotion."
The security guards felt as if granted amnesty and hurriedly rushed in.
Two people on each side grabbed Harley's arms and dragged her out like a sack of potatoes.
Harley didn't resist.
Her leather boots dragged two marks on the carpet.
As she was being dragged away, she turned her head sideways to look at Shen Che.
"Boss Shen——I'll be waiting for you——"
She was still laughing wildly, her laughter sharp and piercing.
Until she was dragged into the elevator and the heavy doors closed.
That piercing laughter was finally isolated outside the corridor.
The office finally quieted down.
Chloe still stood in place with her head lowered, like a primary school student being punished to stand.
Shen Che ignored her.
This woman needed to be left to cool off, lest she forget who the Master was.
He extended his finger and pressed the communicator button flashing with blue light at the corner of the obsidian desk.
"Beep."
The internal line connected.
"Ashley."
Shen Che leaned back in his swivel chair.
"What's the situation over in Gotham right now? Report."
Chapter 105: Poison Ivy wanted to control the city with plants, but was instantly killed by the freezing breath.
The indicator light of the intercom flickered with a dim blue light.
"Bzzzt."
After a slight burst of static, Ashley's voice came through.
It carried a clear tremble, her voice somewhat hoarse, as if she hadn't drunk water in days.
"President Shen..." Ashley swallowed a mouthful of saliva. "Something happened in West Gotham."
"Large areas of mutated plants are destroying the streets. The security forces can't hold them back."
Shen Che tapped his finger on the obsidian tabletop.
The holographic projection screen lit up in mid-air, cutting into the street surveillance of West Gotham.
In the footage, there were no robberies, no gang gunfights.
There was only a rolling ocean of green.
Countless thick mutated vines, like hundreds of maddened green giant pythons,
drilled frantically out of the sewer manholes and from the cracks in the asphalt road.
The surface of the vines was covered in sharp barbs, each as thick as a water vat.
A riot armored vehicle was entangled by two vines.
"Creak—"
A harsh metallic twisting sound rang out.
The heavy armored steel plates were directly crushed like soda cans, and the bulletproof glass burst into a puff of white fog.
The raw iron gates of the Gotham Police Department, along with the two stone lions outside,
were forcefully uprooted by a giant man-eating flower vine rising from the ground, and flung half a street away.
Police and civilians dropped their guns and cars, screaming and fleeing in all directions.
At the center of the green plant ocean,
a giant red poisonous flower standing over thirty meters tall was slowly blooming.
In the center of the pistils stood a woman.
Poison Ivy, Pamela Isley.
She wore a green battle suit woven from mutated leaves and vines, her long red hair fluttering in the cold wind.
She looked at the city full of despair and screams.
A fanatical smile hung at the corner of her mouth.
Batman was paralyzed, and those scheming gangs had their wits scared out of them by Shen Che.
Gotham City appeared to have a huge vacuum period.
And nature's revenge did not need to bow to any capital or tyrant.
"The cancerous tumors of reinforced concrete, today is your doomsday."
Poison Ivy raised her arms, and green poisonous mist spread outward from the edges of the petals.
"Gotham will become the holy land of nature."
"A primeval forest where no human foot has ever trodden!"
Her voice echoed over the empty block through the resonance of the plants.
Filled with overbearing arrogance.
In the office on the 112th floor,
Shen Che looked at the aggressive patch of green on the screen.
In his pitch-black eyes, there was no anger, no worry about the ecological crisis.
Only a pure annoyance.
Just like seeing an unsightly patch of weeds growing on his freshly trimmed lawn.
It was too green, too messy, and didn't conform to the uniform order he wanted.
"Noisy."
Shen Che turned off the projection screen.
He brought no weapons, nor did he wear a suit jacket.
He just wore that white shirt, with his hands shoved into his suit pants pockets.
He turned and walked towards that shattered floor-to-ceiling window.
His legs slightly bent.
The marble floor emitted a muffled explosive sound.
A circle of white sonic boom clouds exploded outside the window.
Shen Che transformed into a streak of black light, shooting straight into the clouds.
A distance of two hundred kilometers, for the speed of Silver Age Superman, was just a matter of a few breaths.
Above West Gotham,
the sky was gloomy, and the drizzle mixed with green toxic powder floated down.
The air was filled with a pungent, fishy plant odor.
"Boom!"
A thunderous sonic boom exploded beneath the clouds.
The white airflow ring forcibly blew away the surrounding toxic mist.
Shen Che hovered at a high altitude of several tens of meters,
just overlooking that huge red poisonous flower.
Poison Ivy raised her head,
and saw that man wearing a white shirt.
She had seen this face on television, knowing he crushed the Joker with a single slap, knowing he made the entire World kneel.
But so what?
In her plant kingdom, she was the master.
"You think you can fight nature with brute force?"
Poison Ivy sneered.
Her hands suddenly waved forward.
"Drag him down! As fertilizer!"
The mutated plants along the entire street rioted instantly.
Dozens of man-eating vines, as thick as water vats and covered in barbs, like green steel whips,
carrying a whistling sound that tore through the air,
slashed fiercely from all directions at Shen Che in mid-air.
The vines blotted out the sky, almost sealing off all of Shen Che's retreats.
Shen Che hovered in mid-air,
not dodging, his hands still shoved in his pants pockets.
He lowered his head, looking at the aggressive green forest below,
and looking at that arrogant face.
"Nature?"
Shen Che twitched the corner of his mouth, revealing a mocking sneer.
"On my ledger, even nature has to pay property management fees."
He didn't throw a punch, nor did he use Heat Vision to burn those vines.
Plants feared fire, but they also feared cold.
Shen Che slightly raised his head,
his chest under the white shirt swelling slightly.
His lungs instantly inhaled a massive amount of surrounding air, compressing and cooling it.
Breaking the lower limit of thermodynamics and heading straight to absolute zero.
Those thick vines lashing over were less than a meter away from his body,
to the point where he could even smell the sour, corrosive liquid secreted by the vines.
Shen Che lowered his head,
aiming at the boiling green ocean below,
and gently blew out a puff of cold air.
"Hoo—"
There was no sound of wind, only a dead silence that froze everything.
A white cold current gushed out from his mouth.
This was not ordinary cold wind; this was an absolute zero storm sufficient to make atoms stop moving.
The white fog swept across the entire West Gotham in a fan shape.
"Sizzz."
Those man-eating vines less than a meter away from Shen Che, within 0.01 seconds of contacting the white fog,
instantly formed a thick layer of white frost.
Their forward kinetic energy was forcibly frozen.
The white fog pressed down like a tsunami.
Wherever it passed, all green faded away in an instant.
Those thick mutated plants that had crushed armored vehicles and uprooted the Police department gates
didn't even have time to react or struggle,
directly turning into giant ice sculptures that were entirely pale white and exuded a piercing chill.
The moisture in the air was frozen into ice crystals, falling rustlingly down.
Poison Ivy stood in the center of the giant flower's pistils,
the arrogance on her face freezing over.
She wanted to control the plants to counterattack, but her nerve signals couldn't even reach the petals.
The white fog swept across her body.
There was no pain, because the pain nerves were frozen dead in an instant.
She maintained the posture of swinging her hands forward.
Her long red hair was frozen into icicles in mid-air.
Along with her proud nature's revenge, along with that thirty-meter-tall man-eating flower,
within half a second,
completely and thoroughly,
she was frozen into a crystal-clear, lifeless giant ice sculpture.
Half a block turned into a dead World of ice and snow.