Deathstroke was staking out near Rand Bridge.

This was the only route between Blackgate Prison and the old town. If his target, “Bella Bettywen,” were to return, she would have to pass through here—unless she chose to take a helicopter. If his ambush failed, Deathstroke planned to infiltrate Blackgate Prison to kill Bettywen inside.

As dawn broke and the clock struck noon on April 28th, he received a call.

“This is Roman, Roman Sionis,” Black Mask’s voice came over the line. “Deathstroke, the contract is canceled. I’m calling off the hit, but I will still pay you the full remaining balance.”

Deathstroke remained silent for a moment before asking, “Is the target dead?”

Roman took a deep breath, as if suppressing his anger: “No, the target isn’t dead. That bitch… she’s right in front of me. We’ve come to an agreement.”

Deathstroke’s voice was calm: “I’ve received your payment. I’m withdrawing from this mission.”

Black Mask seemed to sigh in relief, which made Deathstroke suspect there might be a knife to his throat.

However, Deathstroke then said, “Now, killing Bettywen is not your task anymore. It’s my personal action.”

“Good luck, Sionis.”

He hung up.

Before the explosion, Deathstroke might have agreed to Black Mask’s request to abandon the mission. But now, Bettywen was a huge mystery to him, and he didn’t mind spending some time solving it—or simply eliminating the target and sealing the answer in his mind.

Deathstroke rubbed his katana, pondering how far Bettywen could go.

While Black Mask was on the phone, Vivi, in her Bella persona, stood right in front of him, listening to the call on speaker.

She opened the map, noting that the red dot near Rand Bridge hadn’t moved. Despite his tough words, Deathstroke was still cautious and remained on watch.

He was indeed smart—

Vivi had left Blackgate Prison as Bella and then switched to Vivi to confront Black Mask, aiming to send a message to the assassin: “Your target is no longer in the prison.” If the assassin infiltrated the prison to kill her, it would be disastrous.

From Black Mask, she learned that this assassin was one of the strongest in the world, having even bested Batman before. With enhanced strength and intellect from a serum, killing him was clearly difficult. Vivi had lost her house but hadn’t managed to take him down.

Having such a person watching from the shadows was unsettling.

“Bella?” Someone climbed over the wall and saw Vivi standing in front of Black Mask from a distance. “You’re here? Are you escorting Black Mask?”

Vivi had used the threat of “moving the entire house to Blackgate Prison” to make Black Mask make the call—since the walls of the room were mostly destroyed, offering little cover, Black Mask and his men had no choice but to stay put, exposed to everyone. If this continued, he might start killing people!

Moreover, they had to carry out daily activities in such a room, essentially living in an open-air setting, which was terrifying.

Black Mask contacted his people outside, even urging them to send him to prison. Currently, there were people protesting outside the steel mill—members of the Prisoner Rights Protection Association, claiming this treatment violated the prisoners’ dignity.

Vivi had said, “Right, right, you’re absolutely right. So, are you willing to donate some money for renting a heavy-lift helicopter to airlift both the people and the house?”

The helicopter was already on a temporary helipad nearby—courtesy of Black Mask’s payment.

The person who had climbed over the wall was Dick Grayson. Seeing him made Vivi quite happy; he was a good cop, a rarity in Gotham, like a pearl in a mud pit.

She waved, signaling her men to prepare the helicopter for takeoff—without the walls, moving just a group of men wasn’t too difficult—then casually complained to Dick about the troublesome “assassin.”

Vivi said, “Maybe he’ll infiltrate the prison and cause havoc. Just the thought is annoying. With so many prisoners in Blackgate, it would be disastrous if something went wrong.”

Dick thought the same. Black Mask’s communication had been monitored by the Batcave, and the Bat-family wouldn’t let anything go wrong with his transfer to prison. It seemed the warden knew the assassin was sent by Black Mask.

To keep Blackgate stable, the warden couldn’t be harmed either.

Right now, Batman had located Deathstroke via the comms, and they were already fighting.

“By the way,” Dick asked, “What did you do yesterday? I was just about to get solid evidence against Black Mask when I heard he was already arrested. It was quite surprising.” There wasn’t much to be surprised about; he had infiltrated Black Mask’s lair as Nightwing, teamed up with Vivi to gather evidence, and then sent the villain to prison.

“Nothing special,” Vivi shrugged. “I heard the assassin blew up my house, so I went back to the city to gather information on him. Looks like I hid well. After finding out Black Mask was behind it, I came to confront him. Unfortunately, negotiations failed.” Indeed, nothing special—she had switched to Vivi, infiltrated Black Mask’s lair, teamed up with Nightwing to subdue Black Mask and his zombies, then tricked and sent him to prison.

They both smiled, thinking they had hidden their identities well.

At that moment, news came from the prison. Vivi heard that Batman had subdued the assassin Deathstroke and helped her by sending him to Blackgate.

“Wow…” she marveled to Dick, “Batman is really fast.”

“Yeah…” Dick murmured, “He was my idol when I was a kid. Because of him, I decided to become someone who fights for justice.”

The timing was perfect, Vivi thought.

She cautiously asked, “And then you became a cop in Blüdhaven? I heard Blüdhaven’s crime rate isn’t too good.”

Dick smiled wryly, “To put it accurately, it’s pretty awful, but we’ve been doing pretty well these past few years.”

If having one vigilante per city was the standard, Blüdhaven had Nightwing, while Gotham had more than one vigilante, indicating Gotham’s terror level was several times that of Blüdhaven.

She sighed, “Richard… okay, I’ll call you Dick. Would you be willing to stay in Gotham? I mean, you know, this city is pretty messed up, including the management of Blackgate Prison. You have good skills, but that’s not the main point—”

“Skills can be trained, but the heart cannot. I need a deputy warden to help me manage the prison, and there’s no suitable candidate within the entire facility. Would you consider changing jobs? Although it’s a shift from being a cop to a prison guard, I went through a similar promotion sequence, so it’s not too difficult—”

Dick seemed surprised because inviting a cop from a neighboring city to become the deputy warden of this city was quite outlandish.

But Vivi had her reasons. Currently, as Dick was from a neighboring city, she couldn’t check his attributes. Once he was under her command, she could see his stats and other details. However, there was something peculiar—

Something peculiar—

About why Dick had a red name, which she hadn’t paid much attention to due to the many red names in the city.

Did he dislike the mayor, the warden, or Mr. C? It couldn’t be VV, could it?

Even those under her command, if they had red names, she couldn’t check their stats, like pre-converted Shelk, which made things difficult. Gotham City was clearly improving, yet the number of red names was inexplicably increasing.

“Sorry,” Dick finally said.

“Oh…” Vivi drew out her tone, nodding before heading toward the exit.

The helicopter’s downdraft blew her bangs, and her coat flapped in the wind. She heard Dick say, “…Sorry, I love Gotham, but I won’t leave Blüdhaven.”

So, people from neighboring cities couldn’t be recruited.

Vivi felt a bit regretful, perhaps due to some hidden condition not being met? She waved her hand behind her, “With the assassin dealt with, I’m heading back.”

She mounted her motorcycle, and Dick watched her ride off. Speaking into his comms, he said, “Can’t tell if she knows where the serum is.”

“Of course, you couldn’t tell,” Tim said, “You didn’t even ask, too busy turning down her offer.”

Dick: “Come on, Red, Bettywen never showed up there. From the wiretapped conversations, you didn’t hear her mention the serum to Black Mask either…”

After Vivi left, Black Mask refused to cooperate. They searched the freezers and found the number of stored serums was off. Either a large number of serums were missing, or there were still undiscovered undead—at four injections per undead, that would be at least three hundred more.

Only Dick and Vivi were present at the time, so he couldn’t help but suspect Vivi. But she was elusive; prying open clues from Black Mask might be better.

Meanwhile, Vivi, carrying 1,200 THE1 serums, returned to Blackgate Prison.

Blackgate Prison felt like home, her territory.

Because the whole house was too big, the room with Black Mask was currently placed in the open yard where inmates usually had their outdoor time, which had been canceled for these few days. Other helicopters occasionally landed, and Vivi knew these were the machines she had ordered arriving.

She wasn’t stockpiling these serums to fill her inventory slots.

“Controlled, awakening with no memory,” as long as you say the activation password—no, the command word—they could perform mechanical, low-intelligence tasks and forget everything upon waking. Black Mask was too narrow-minded, thinking only about using these undead to take over Gotham. Had he never considered sending them to Africa for mining?

Since they forget upon waking, they wouldn’t know to demand their wages. How great is that!

Currently, Vivi had a few thousand freeloaders, rarely working, who caused trouble due to their excess energy, like plotting escapes or bullying others.

She wasn’t a demon, wouldn’t send them to mine, but doing some digging, garbage collection, or wall plastering wouldn’t be too hard, right?

However, these people couldn’t appear openly; they needed some disguises—

She looked at the 【Business Investment – Investment Channels】—

【Invest/Establish a New Pharmaceutical Plant】

【Invest/Establish a New Clothing Factory】

Injected individuals could only perform simple mechanical labor under the controller’s orders, so Vivi also needed a controller—

This person should have experience in leading others, adept at handling unexpected situations in Vivi’s absence, and absolutely loyal.

…Wasn’t there such a person in the prison right now?

Penguin stared at the ceiling of his cell, gritting his teeth.

Life was unbearable. To get out of this cell and into a better one, he was willing to do anything!