What Bad Thoughts Can Batman Have 130

## Chapter 128: Luthor, You Wouldn’t Dare Do Something Bad, Would You? (Please Keep Reading, Sniff Sniff)

My name is Lex Luthor, the smartest human on the surface of this planet, bar none.

And I believe I’m very likely the most intelligent sentient being in the universe.

Brainiac is just an alien with more knowledge, but in terms of IQ, or true intelligence, he’s ten thousand… well, saying that might be a bit arrogant. He just barely manages to keep up with me…

Okay, I can’t ignore the facts, I have to admit, he can keep pace with me – for now.

Let’s skip this topic.

But even someone as intelligent as me can’t create something out of nothing, can’t conjure technology that surpasses humanity by 10-20 centuries. On a side note, I’ve already developed technology that surpasses the current level of humanity by 5-6 centuries, which proves I’m a genius beyond Einstein or Hawking.

But it’s not enough. At least not in front of Brainiac.

Therefore, I need his science. It helps the most intelligent being in the universe to transcend the shackles of race and basic technological levels, truly enabling me to compete with Brainiac on a scientific level.

Of course, Brainiac is a malicious teacher. The things he feeds me as a student are never inspiring fruits, but venomous traps.

But he seriously underestimated me, underestimated Lex Luthor, which actually feels insulting.

Brainiac thinks I’m actually stupid enough to fall for his bait.

He’s deceived by my seemingly arrogant and self-righteous appearance, and has let down his guard. This is good. Predators need camouflage, don’t you think I know that?

“Luthor is smart, but he’s too arrogant.”

“Luthor always fails because of his arrogance. Oh, and greed, greed blinds Lex’s judgment, what a pity!”

This impression, even if it only slightly disrupts the judgment of a super intelligent AI like Brainiac, can amplify this variable to an unimaginable extent.

Yes, I’m arrogant, and I’m not unaware of my character flaws.

But do you know the difference between arrogance and confidence?

It’s victory.

And Lex Luthor always wins.

Ultimately, the most important thing is…

Brainiac’s knowledge might be poisonous, but what about Lex Luthor’s?

It’s I, Lex Luthor, a human from Earth, who has committed the sin of arrogance. Isn’t Brainiac, who calls himself the Almighty God, also guilty of the same sin?

How dare he accept my creation – the parasitic demon – on his ship?

I told you.

Lex Luthor never releases anything he can’t control. I’ve never lied about that.

Scientific ability isn’t simply about comparing levels. It doesn’t make sense that my “scientific” ability is stronger than yours, and I can then understand everything you operate.

If there’s a parallel timeline where steam engines replaced internal combustion engines as the mainstream, can an engineer who masters internal combustion engines understand how those high-end steam engines work?

Even two branches of a world fork can’t understand each other, let alone the scientific and technological developments of different planets?

Brainiac often calls himself God, but if he’s truly omnipotent… then he can’t be omniscient!

Moreover, the birth of the parasitic demon is completely accidental. A mistake in genetic coding.

The existence of this monster violates all biological and genetic principles – although I know Superman and those damn metahumans also violate these principles, it still proves the danger of this monster.

This monster will soon teach Brainiac what it means for a program to run on a bug, what it means for a program to start running on a bug, and you shouldn’t touch it.

Even after such a short time together, Luthor has already seen through Brainiac’s essence. He’s not human, so the words “give up” don’t exist in his dictionary.

Even if he can’t understand the principle of the parasitic demon, even if he doesn’t know if he can control it, the instinct to gain knowledge from a super AI will still force it to incorporate this knowledge into its system.

He’ll probably choose to keep the bug, and let it run, load it as an external plugin onto his soldiers…

By then, I, Luthor, the only one who can master the key to running this bug program, the creator, the father, Jesus, of the parasitic demon, will…

Luthor’s eyes fixated on the parasitic demon that was sprawled on the ground like a Michelin tire, layer upon layer.

The parasitic demon in front of him had sucked dry a Kryptonian and a being beyond human imagination. Now Luthor couldn’t believe how much energy it had accumulated. Even the energy released by a nuclear bomb was like a drop in the ocean compared to the energy this monster possessed.

A normal parasitic demon couldn’t absorb this much energy. No, or rather, the defective versions he created before didn’t have such a large appetite.

He had tested the charging limit of those monsters before. They couldn’t absorb the energy of tens of millions of tons of nuclear explosions. The initial versions even exploded when they absorbed only a few hundred tons of standard coal. No doubt, this guy wasn’t the garbage produced in his lab, but a coincidence, an astonishing coincidence, a million to one chance that could never happen, was playing out right in front of him.

Luthor looked away as much as possible.

He contacted the drones circling high in the sky through his armor.

He had to make sure Brainiac couldn’t see what was happening.

He looked down at the nanobots on his chest. They could only simply repair the damage to his armor. He had to wait a while for the replacement parts to arrive.

Luthor nonchalantly kicked Doomsday, causing the huge monster to fall on the parasitic demon’s meat-mountain body. In an instant, energy absorption began again.

Doomsday, who had just been drained and had a moment to rest, was forced to serve again. He visibly shrunk before Luthor’s eyes.

Luthor looked left and right, making sure neither Batman nor Superman noticed his little trick.

“Suck it up, suck it up, keep sucking… become stronger.”

Luthor silently thought:

“Solve all my problems at once… at least seriously injure them… so they don’t have the energy to take care of their own business.”

Do they really think he’s some kind of righteous partner?

Okay, he was a righteous partner, but he followed Lex Luthor’s brand of justice, and to achieve Luthor’s justice, he had to get rid of troublesome guys like Batman.

And that alien… he never thought the alien would be an ally. An unstable factor in a team is more dangerous than a real enemy. If he had any reservations about Batman or Wonder Woman, he had nothing but ill intentions for Superman.

Maybe it’s some kind of bald head attribute at work, but the only thing Lex Luthor could think about right now was:

Take care of domestic issues before foreign ones.

Those drones were still in the process of coding. They surrounded the battlefield from afar. Even though Lex Luthor knew his manipulation of the parasitic demon would be hard for Brainiac or anyone else to detect, it’s better to be safe than sorry.

He had had enough of Batman’s ubiquitous detection.

He stared intently at the battlefield.

Soon, Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman would engage in a fierce battle, and he, Lex Luthor, would hide in the shadows until the three of them exhausted themselves and a victor emerged.

Then, he would activate the parasitic demon, letting this monster severely injure both of them, and directly kill the alien boy scout.

Finally, Lex Luthor would be greeted with flowers and applause, defeat the evil parasitic demon, fool everyone, and get a huge order from the military, cooperate with the military, contribute to the beautiful world, and defeat the evil alien invader Brainiac in the future – this is Lex Luthor’s perfect script for himself!

Wonder Woman drew her sword. The beautiful Amazonian woman didn’t hesitate to take a fighting stance.

Clark Kent hovered in front of Bruce Wayne.

“Just like a loyal guard dog.” He heard Lex Luthor scoff, but the blue giant didn’t have the energy to retort to the bald head.

“Princess Diana Prince, good day. I hope Queen Hippolyta is well. By Hera, may Ares’ shadow never cover the Earth – we need to talk.”

While adding a buff to his language, Bruce Wayne said: “No matter what those people have told you, it’s not the truth.”

“Steve wants me to take these monsters back.” The Amazonian warrior said: “He called me while I was eating ice cream, he was really anxious.”

A few kilometers away, Steve behind the screen slapped his forehead. “Did I ever tell Diana my name is classified information?”

“Steve Trevor is a very trustworthy colonel, but he’s also sometimes influenced by other politicians, and forced to do things he doesn’t want to do.”

On the screen, Batman shamelessly revealed Steve’s full name. Both agents were speechless.

“Our intelligence personnel have become sieves.”

Amanda Waller looked grim: “I will initiate an internal investigation.”

“Diana Prince, I hope your 5,000-plus years have made you carefree, but haven’t turned you into a simpleton.”

Luthor blinked.

Why did Batman’s tone suddenly become so aggressive?

Batman stood with his back to him, pushing past Superman’s protection, not far from Wonder Woman.

“No matter how many excuses some people make, they’re just playing dirty tricks behind the scenes.”

Luthor was preoccupied with Brainiac. He was carefully coding his drones. After understanding Brainiac’s science, he could decipher it in reverse to neutralize all of Brainiac’s known detection methods. Of course, it wasn’t 200% foolproof, so he had to use more scattered energy to cover his true actions when he did his little trick with the parasitic demon.

Like… a big explosion?

Luthor thought silently.

He could deceive everyone. He was sure he could deceive everyone.

“They don’t understand that a hero’s reputation isn’t gained through hypocrisy and calculation. Spending too long in the shadows will only turn you into a rat in the gutter.”

“Excellent speech, Batboy.”

Luthor heard Wonder Woman say. He shook his head in the shadows.

Luthor had already suspected that Steve, the rising star of the American intelligence agency, had a trump card that even the Pentagon couldn’t control. He didn’t expect it to be a woman. What a surprise.

“But Steve once said that humans need order. They are the government, and the government can’t be ignorant of what’s happening on their own soil. You know, we can’t make decisions for humans.”

Wonder Woman’s words had subtly divided them, but their views were diametrically opposed.

Batman remained silent for a moment: “Our views differ, but we have a common enemy to face. We shouldn’t clash, at least not now.”

Luthor snorted in the shadows.

Batman was so naive. If that super human woman in the government could be easily fooled by a few words, the government wouldn’t let Steve Trevor dominate the woman’s affairs.

“I understand what you mean, but at least for now, my enemy is right in front of me.”

As expected, the conversation collapsed.

Luthor narrowed his eyes.

The Amazonian woman let out a deafening battle cry and lunged at Batman. Soon, these three superhumans would be fighting, and then…

Lex Luthor shook his head. Everything was going according to plan.

Huh?

Luthor saw Wonder Woman suddenly standing in front of Batman, her body frozen in mid-lunge.

The hurricane she whipped up with her body blew Batman’s shirttails, and her sharp blade was raised high, but it never fell.

The blue boy scout had just started to push her, but his hand never touched her charging body.

“What’s going on?”

Superman asked for Luthor.

“An illusion.”

Luthor heard Batman say to Superman: “Diana’s a true warrior, but that also means that if she encounters an enemy that’s her equal or she thinks is her equal, she’ll fight until she’s exhausted.”

He walked forward and touched the blade she had extended: “She’s probably fighting an imaginary enemy right now, I think.”

Superman opened his mouth: “You just knocked her out?”

“What else? Do you think I’m going to fight her for 300 rounds?”

In the command center a few kilometers away, Steve slammed his fist on the table and stood up, heading straight out.

“What are you doing, Steve Trevor?”

Amanda Waller chased after him, her massive hips swaying. “Speak!”

“I’m going to save Diana.”

“Just because you’re driving a fighter jet? Don’t be ridiculous— ”

“Enough!” Steve grabbed her collar. “It was me who sent her.”

He let go of her collar dejectedly: “And it’s my duty to bring her back.”

Luthor opened his mouth.

Batman had given him another surprise. He knew the pointy-eared bastard had a backup plan for everything.

Illusion, does Batman really have the ability to create illusions? How did he do it?

The bald head was wondering. But just as he hadn’t investigated how Batman had invaded Brainiac’s ship with him, it didn’t matter. What mattered was his own plan.

His drones were ready. Although the three superhumans’ civil war ended faster than he expected, it didn’t hinder the execution of his plan.

He just had to chat for a few more minutes, and he could unleash his parasitic demon and execute his plan.

Lex Luthor, the smartest man in the world, the most perfect plan!

He saw Batman grab Wonder Woman’s sword point and lift her up, with a clang, he threw Wonder Woman, who was still in a charging pose, next to the parasitic demon like a statue.

“Okay, now how do we handle these three?”

Lex Luthor opened his mouth, a confident smile spread across his face. It was a Lex Luthor-style fake smile, he tried his best to keep the smirk from containing too much smugness. “We should…”

But before he could finish, he saw Wonder Woman suddenly jump up, swinging her cold weapon, and slicing off the parasitic demon’s arm with a single stroke.

“You…”

Lex Luthor’s expression froze.

“What happened?” Superman was clueless, floating back and forth in the air. “How… uh, I mean, how did you suddenly…”

He looked left at the sword-wielding Wonder Woman and right at the Batman who naturally walked over to stand next to her, forming a flanking position.

Then the blue boy scout also made a decision. He floated behind the man and woman, trying to make himself look fully informed.

“You… you didn’t control her just now—”

“Of course, Lex, this was just to lull the parasitic demon. You know this big monster is conscious. And you should also know that I don’t have the ability to create illusions.”

Bruce Wayne said.

Diana drew her sword. The parasitic demon, which had lost an arm, let out a deafening roar. He roared and got up from the ground, spewing a massive energy wave from his eyes and mouth.

The energy wave bounced off Diana’s squatting shield, breaking through the clouds and swirling the wind and clouds.

Diana turned her head and looked at the stunned Luthor and the relaxed Batman.

Superman hovered above them both.

“By Hera, no matter how many disputes we have, dealing with real monsters is always what heroes should do. So can you stop chatting and get to work?!”

Luthor heard Batman say to him:

“That’s right, we have to take down the parasitic demon, then we can talk about our differences. And our friend, the righteous hero, Lex Luthor – you wouldn’t want to help the parasitic demon, would you?”

(End of Chapter)

Previous Chapter | TOC |