There is no Batman in Gotham City comics.

Chapter 143, Section 40: The Lingering Ghost

Chapter 143, Section 40: The Lingering Ghost

If the timeline hadn't fluctuated, the "Court of the Owls" would have been nothing more than a secretive Jewish financial group with a history of several hundred years, and its assassins known as "Claws" would have been nothing more than highly skilled mortals.

But now? As this world is influenced by some unknown force, the ironclad rule that "if a person is killed, they will die" no longer applies to these guys whose blood is injected with the synthetic substance "Amber Gold"!

This is perfectly exemplified in William Cobb.

Look at this guy.

Born in 1901, he should be lying in a coffin, rotting away until his bones are gone. But now he's lying on the hood of the Batmobile, one hand gripping the cockpit canopy, the other flicking out his hidden blade, intending to make a few holes in Jason's chest.

Jason pressed the forced closure button, and with the powerful thrust of the hydraulic valves, the closing cockpit canopy brutally severed William's four fingers.

"Damn it, cleaning the interior yourself is such a hassle!"

Dark brown blood splattered onto the red mask. Jason cursed and floored the accelerator, causing the Batmobile to spin out of control with a screeching tire screech, throwing the uninvited guest off the hood.

The car turned around, and the dark figure was exposed under the blinding headlights. The Gatling gun barrels spun as they popped out of the weapon compartments on either side of the wheels.

Born at the beginning of the 20th century, William was an old-fashioned man who had never been to the battlefield; his understanding of heavy firearms was still stuck in the era of bolt-action fire.

In his youth, he had heard that tens of thousands of British and French soldiers in the Somme region were riddled with bullets by the damned Germans using a type of gun called the Maxim.

He had never seen Maxim, but his intuition told him that the two guns in front of him were probably much more dangerous than that thing.

Rat-a-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat!!!

With the help of the locked aiming, the Gatling gun accurately locked onto William's position, followed by a barrage of crossfire.

The snow was covered with spent bullet casings, but William, who should have been shredded into mincemeat by bullets, suddenly quickened his pace, dodging left and right like a skilled tap dancer showing off his skills under the spotlight.

He did a forward roll followed by a backflip, then a dazzling series of butterfly-like dodges; bullets grazed his ankles.

It slipped under his armpits and disappeared like a fleeting passerby behind the curtain woven by the wind and snow.

Although William successfully dodged the first round of shots, he was still on the defensive. He dodged while moving rapidly toward the abandoned bus, attempting to use it as cover to turn defense into offense.

But just as he hid behind the bus, the thin sheet metal was shredded into pieces in the blink of an eye.

Despite having mentally prepared himself, William was still terrified by the high rate of fire and destructive power of the monsters that had emerged from over a century of firearms development.

Left with no other option, he fled towards the houses along the street.

Amidst the deafening roar of gunfire, the ground behind William crumbled, and the solid asphalt road became as brittle as a wafer in the face of the 7.62 bullets.

If this guy were given another chance, he definitely wouldn't provoke Jason so closely, or rather, he would have taken care of Jason before Jason even got in the car.

But there are no "what ifs" in life. Not to mention William, this old-fashioned man, even a modern person with a normal mind would never have guessed that this strange-looking car actually contained a terrifying weapon.

Seeing that he was about to be caught by bullets, William leaped and slipped into the gap between two houses.

Jason was forced to cease fire.

Continuing the pursuit might kill or injure the enemy, but it will certainly cause civilian casualties.

So far, all those who have died at Jason's hands have been heinous criminals; he has a bottom line in his heart that cannot be crossed.

Putting away the machine gun, he floored the accelerator and sped away from the scene. William's ability to come back from the dead made him uneasy, but what convinced him to retreat was the enemy's adaptability.

The machine gun had an extremely high rate of fire, but the enemy managed to quickly recover after a brief moment of panic. Jason had only ever seen that dazzling series of bullet-dodging maneuvers in The Matrix.

No! It's not adaptation, it's evolution.

Jason quickly overturned his own conjecture.

As someone who experienced it firsthand, he knew all too well that if his opponent had possessed the speed to dodge bullets from the start, he might have already died in the first wave of hidden blade attacks.

Or perhaps—the other party already possessed this ability, but just climbed out of the freezer, and their stiff body needs time to recover?

Jason recalled the cold touch of the shadowy figure's skin, and his body involuntarily trembled slightly.

He felt that this was the correct answer.

Just how strong is this guy really?

He dared not think any further. If the enemy was truly that dangerous, he had to share the intelligence with everyone as soon as possible.

But as soon as the call connected with Qin Wei, a piercing alarm sounded in the cockpit, followed by a series of electronic voice prompts.

[WARNING! The hood is under attack!]

Warning! Engine radiator damaged.

[Warning! Engine cylinder one has stopped running.]

Before Jason could react, the engine exploded. If the Batmobile's cockpit hadn't been so sturdy and durable, he would have been engulfed by the flames.

"He's afraid of low temperatures, use low temperatures against him!!!" In this emergency, Jason didn't care whether Qin Wei heard him or not, and shouted to transmit the information he had analyzed.

Hopefully Qin Wei can hear this.

The next instant, the ejection seat launched him high into the air.

With its rear end on fire and billowing black smoke, the Batmobile crashed through the fence and plunged into the dark sea.

Seizing the opportunity, Jason unbuckled his seatbelt and escaped the ejection seat before the parachute opened, crashing heavily onto the roof of a residential building.

No sooner had he left than three throwing knives pierced the back of the chair.

As Jason stepped onto the slippery, sloping roof tiles, he had just pulled out his pistol when a dark figure attacked him head-on.

Just as Jason had predicted, when they met William Cobb, the latter had only just been summoned from his dormant icy coffin by the court, his body still cold, and both his reflexes and speed were at their lowest. Thanks to Jason's sparring partner, the blood of this clawed killer, forged from the compound "Amber Gold," was beginning to warm.

With a slash from his hidden blade, a turn and an elbow strike, and a spinning horizontal slash, William delivered a series of blows to Jason as soon as they met, leaving Jason, who was off-balance, with no choice but to draw his retractable wolf-fox staff from his waist to defend himself.

But to achieve this is already quite impressive. In terms of skill alone, William is better than Qin Wei now, and probably on par with Isaiah Thomas.

It's also thanks to Jason's significant growth over the past six months that he was able to survive those first three moves; otherwise, those three moves alone would have been enough to kill him.

Knowing that the sloping, slippery roof was not conducive to combat, Jason took advantage of the moment when William turned around, bent down and grabbed the drain outside the eaves, firing back as he slid down to the ground.

But just as he rolled over to dissipate the force and raised his head, William appeared in front of him like a ghost.

The hidden blade lunged at his throat. Jason parried with a stick in one hand and a gun in the other, but was slammed against the wall by a brute force.

William may look thin, but his strength is no less than Jason's.

"Child, blame the cruelty of fate; all who have seen claws must die."

Amidst the swirling snow, the blade slowly drew closer to his throat.