Days as a Spiritual Mentor in American Comics Chapter 5957 - 4977: Batman Is Not Here (64)

The darkness in the surrounding air began to churn. This was a sign that Batman was under attack. The mad laughter only intensified, becoming increasingly piercing, even though they were hiding in the truck, they were still feeling dizzy. Charles had to strengthen their spiritual protection.

"Batman told us before, the situation in many dark universes is dire," Nightwing sighed, "Take Batwoman’s universe, for example, there’s trouble brewing inside Atlantis. It seems someone wants to usurp the throne. The one trying to rise plans to attack the land, the war is getting bigger and bigger, many coastal cities are at risk of being flooded."

Batwoman wants to intervene, but the Atlanteans simply don’t listen. She brought Aquaman and Superman from the Prime Universe back, barely suppressing the war for the time being. But recently, the Queen of Atlantis seems to have gone off the deep end, now she wants to release her usurping sister from the depths of the sea."

"Exactly," Damian said, "The dark universe is just perplexing, the people there seem mentally unhinged, they feel uncomfortable without causing some kind of disaster. The Batmen try their best to save them, but many still face calamities."

Charles frowned slightly and said, "Even facing the Justice League of the Prime Universe, they don’t calm down?"

"Those are just madmen," Red Hood said, "They won’t stop fighting just because they can’t defeat us, they only want to bite a piece out of you with their lives. It’s as if they’re controlled by some mysterious power, insisting on following that disastrous world line..."

"Perhaps there really is some mysterious power," Charles said, "Could it be Barbados stirring things up behind the scenes? After all, he’s the source of darkness. Or perhaps Darkseid is sowing discord, Doctor Manhattan can’t be ruled out either."

"That’s exactly the problem," Nightwing pressed his lips, "The villains in those universes aren’t much better, disasters happen equally at every corner of the cosmos. Even Apocalypse Star has fallen."

"Then it appears to be the will of the cosmos," Charles said, "We have this kind of situation too, where a certain universe will develop according to a predetermined timeline, even if there’s interference, changing the cosmos’s fate, everything eventually goes back on track."

"Rarely does a Batman want to abandon their universe," Red Robin said, "So even if the Batmen go to rescue the Dark Universe Batman, without saving their universe, they eventually return, drowning in the darkness of the cosmos. The Batmen have already lost several counterparts this way."

The atmosphere became somewhat oppressive. Everyone knew Batman is a hero. Many Dark Batmen were temporarily blinded, but after being rescued by the Batmen, they soon regain clarity.

Take, for example, Ravaging Batman, God of War Batman, and others. Once they join the Batman group, they revert back to being superheroes. However, this leads to another issue, they want to go back to save their own universe.

But many dark universes are already beyond repair, for instance, the universe of God of War Batman, its background setting of constant war has nearly destroyed the entire Earth, rebuilding it is an extraordinarily difficult task.

Moreover, the dark universe doesn’t give anyone a chance to build peacefully. The whole human race is dead, but those troublemaking villains don’t perish, they occasionally spring up with some big move. Construction could take months, destruction only a second.

These Batmen will try to seek help from other superheroes in the multiverse. The superheroes genuinely want to help, but the problem is, the Earth in the Dark Multiverse is like a bottomless pit, no matter the resources or manpower invested, it simply cannot be saved.

Sometimes, Batman and the Justice League exert their full effort, just barely rescuing a dark Earth from intensive care. Not a day after they leave, inexplicable bad things would happen, destroying all achievements.

The Batmen have also found that the Dark Multiverse is indeed cursed, where nothing ever improves, if there’s a chance of something bad happening, it surely will. It’s practically Murphy’s Law in capital letters.

The superheroes born of the dark multiverse don’t want to give up, but without restraint, even the bright multiverse could be dragged down. Yet there’s no way to make superheroes abandon saving their homeland, thus this matter is awkwardly stuck here.

Illustrate once again with God of War Batman. Those Batmen rescued from the dark multiverse share the same plight; they rarely appear at the Batman base anymore because they’ve channeled so much effort into their homeland, effectively detached from the Multiverse Batman group, unable to engage in the multiverse.

But the more you shut yourself off, the less you can save your universe on your own. Now it can only be deemed a conservative approach to not burden others, but this isn’t a long-term solution.

Most superheroes aware of this are very pessimistic. If the dark multiverse guarantees good things won’t happen and bad things will, then no one can save them, not even evacuate the refugees, because the numbers are overwhelmingly high. The only apparent end is watching the dark multiverse fade away in darkness.

"Brainiac might be a solution," Tim sighed, "Super artificial intelligence is already the least costly and most effective governance approach, particularly adept at post-disaster reconstruction. Moreover, his probability estimation is quite accurate, preventing many bad occurrences."

"But with that logic, can’t Doctor Manhattan work too?" Pamela spoke, "Can’t he alter probability? Why doesn’t Batman choose him?"

"It’s not that he isn’t chosen, but he certainly wouldn’t be willing," Nightwing sighed deeply, "I’ve heard about some of Doctor Manhattan’s behavior from our Batman. He lacks empathy and doesn’t care about any individual in the cosmos or even the life and death of singular universes."

"So what does he actually care about?"

"No one knows," Red Robin said, "but I speculate that he wants to always play the role of a high-dimensional observer, but not just observe. He also wants the power and ability to intervene at any time, like a god."

"Doesn’t sound great." Charles shook his head, "Power should be equivalent to responsibility. God has the power to observe and shape us because he has the responsibility to create and maintain the entire world. If Doctor Manhattan only wants power and not responsibility, then he’s just an arrogant evil god."

"How should I put it?" Nightwing sighed, "I feel he just wants to be responsible for the easy parts, only being a god in the bright multi-universe. As for troublesome situations like the dark multiverse, he doesn’t want to go near them at all, even feels they’d be better off disappearing quickly."

"That’s the difference between him and Batman," Red Hood said, "Batman realized early on that they are on different paths. Although Doctor Manhattan too needs the ordered universe to fulfill his dream of being a god, in a way, they are on the same side, but they can never be allies."

"Indeed, compared to Doctor Manhattan, at least Little Bruce is a good teammate." Harry chuckled, "At least he didn’t run when our universe faced a strong enemy."

"Because Brainiac wants to rule Earth," Tim said, "It sounds classic and traditional. But like certain times when an emperor from the classical period would choose to stand with civilians against the nobles, in the multiverse, it turns out the traditional ambition-seekers are better."

"If it were Doctor Manhattan, he would probably aloofly pick one of the forces invading Earth to be Earth’s ruler, and then say ’This is for your own good.’

Everyone grimaced, evidently disgusted by such behavior. In fact, both Brainiac and Darkseid belong to the category of traditional ambition-seekers. They do many things based on interests, while never denying they are evil tyrants, nor do they demand others worship them, preferring instead to be feared.

Doctor Manhattan is different. He wants fame and profit, wants to maintain his status as a high-dimensional observer, looking down on all creatures like a god removed from earthly dust, but enjoys the thrill of manipulating the cosmos’s fate. He cannot truly be objective and impartial, instead, intervening in cosmic development to satisfy private desires.

Moreover, his intervention in cosmic development only involves those easy to intervene with, where a casual tweak guarantees the cosmos will follow his will, down the path he hopes.

As for those difficult to intervene with, like the dark multiverse, he doesn’t even glance their way, pretending they don’t exist, let alone using his abilities to interfere in these universes’ fate. Because it’s exhausting and not fun, it doesn’t satisfy his desire to show off for fun.

No one likes a person like this. Let alone Batman, even Joker would have to call him an evil god, and the Robins even more look down on him.

Charles paused and then said: "Didn’t Batman give him no choice?"

Everyone looked at him, and Charles continued: "Modifying probabilities is indeed a very useful ability, very effective against your dark multiverse here. Batman shouldn’t need to consider his personal opinion, right?"

The others hadn’t quite understood yet, but Bruce had already reacted. Yeah, Doctor Manhattan’s opinion doesn’t matter; since he has this ability, he ought to save the dark multiverse. He’s not human now, and Batman doesn’t need to overly consider his personal wishes.

Wait, did Batman really consider this?

Back to the point, Bruce thought, when you hand this matter to me, frankly, you don’t treat this matter seriously either.

If Batman truly wanted to mediate the conflict between Brainiac and Doctor Manhattan, he wouldn’t have sent Bruce.

If Bruce is merely a temporary measure, since Batman doesn’t want to see Bruce, this fake Batman, in the base, then what’s with Deathstroke and the agent? These two don’t seem the type for patient intelligence work, do they?

Deathstroke is a mercenary who likes wielding a great sword, almost never taking on jobs other than killing. The agent may be a spy, but he’s a professional mole; Batman surely knows this. These two have no expertise in electronic life or artificial intelligence.

Lilith and Constantine are magicians, but both Brainiac and Doctor Manhattan belong to the science realm, one is AI, the other quantum life, clearly beyond the magician’s scope.

One could say Batman sent such a bunch of people, none of whom have relevant expertise, perfectly avoiding the correct answers. Isn’t this intention already obvious?

"It seems you don’t need to hide from him," Bruce said to Brainiac, "He probably couldn’t wait for you to grasp Doctor Manhattan’s weak point and directly give him an unbeatable poison, leaving him with no choice."