After the loud "bang", Benjamin fell to the ground. Shiller, watching Benjamin slowly collapse, looked up in surprise at Lex.
Shiller was genuinely shocked; Lex's behavior was beyond his expectations.
Although he knew from the start that Lex wasn't being controlled, he had no idea why Lex would attack Benjamin. Benjamin identified him as the murderer, but he didn't identify Lex as one, so why did Lex hit him?
Shiller replayed the whole incident in his mind.
Lionel invited him to the parlor to threaten him with a certain handle, and then he used an umbrella handle to strike Lionel, knocking him down, and left.
Later, Selina ca to the parlor to set up surveillance and bumped into Lionel, who had just managed to get up. They clashed, then Selina picked up a vase and hit Lionel. After knocking him back down, she left.
Perhaps Benjamin wanted to discuss sothing with Lionel, so he ca to the parlor. But Lionel, whose defenses were broken, started shouting furiously at Benjamin, disclosing to him the fact that Shiller had killed soone two years ago. Benjamin fought with him and then knocked him out.
Benjamin was an agent; his control over his force was supposed to be reliable. As a representative of a certain official power, it was impossible for him to kill Luther outright. That is to say, until then, Lionel was just unconscious, not dead.
But now, the Lionel lying on the ground was unquestionably dead. This ans that the first, second, and third persons who t Lionel did not kill him. The real murderer was the fourth person.
Shiller looked at Lex and asked, "Did you kill Lionel?"
"No." Lex shook his head. He said, "He committed suicide, or rather, he died from an accident."
As he spoke, ti went back to when Benjamin had left the room.
Although Benjamin didn't kill Luther, knocking him out here also violated the agent's rules. So, he left the room quickly without noticing the slight noise coming from the parlor's attached washroom.
A few dozen seconds after he left, the washroom door opened and Lex ca out.
He walked over, looked at Lionel lying on the floor, took a small transparent bag with a small pill from his pocket.
Lex stuffed the pill into the unconscious Lionel's mouth, then fetched a glass of water from the washroom and splashed it on Lionel's face.
After a while, Lionel finally woke up. Seeing Lex's face, he was choked for a mont, coughed violently a few tis, and struggled to get up from the ground.
"You...you..."
"Are you wondering why I'm here and why I'm not in my room?" Lex started.
Lionel, weak, wasn't a young man anymore. It was impossible for him to stay fully conscious after being repeatedly hit on the head. He fell back to the ground shortly after getting up. His eyes were wide, staring at the smiling Lex, "How could you... Didn't you take your dicine???"
Hearing his words, Lex let out an expression of utter boredom. He smoothed his hair slightly, then said, "I haven't taken any dicine since two years ago, and you haven't noticed at all."
"How can I put it? Father, you are so stupid it scares ."
Lex looked down at Lionel lying on the ground. "You murdered my mother in front of , then forced to take sedatives that made incapable of thinking or speaking as soon as I showed any signs of genius."
"Whenever you needed my wisdom, you would reduce my dosages, and then you'd get answers from . Because of this, the Luther Group's business flourished since every vital decision was made by ."
Lex took a deep breath. "When you needed to make decisions, you would lessen the dosage to allow to have the feelings of a normal person. At that ti, I even felt very happy..."
"Because you're my father, and you needed . At least in that mont, you loved ."
"I figured that's how normal people were. I gave you correct advice, then you would smile at , tell that I did a good job and that I was your beloved son."
Lex's eyes shone under the dim light. He looked down at Lionel's bloodshot eyes and continued,
"Until two years ago, a man saved from that state..."
"He saved , but more importantly, his actions taught an ordinary sense: you, are not normal."
Lionel was coughing heavily, his face abnormally flushed, seemingly feeling his blood rushing too quickly, his heartbeat speeding up.
"By abnormal, I don't just an your continual abuse of , but... you really are an imbecile, an imbecile that gives everyone a headache."
Endless fury blazed in Lionel's eyes, but at this point, he was struggling to speak. Lex walked over, squatted down beside his head, and said:
"The most ironic part is, to match your stupidity, a group of people who couldn't possibly be any smarter had to use this most straightforward thod to kill you."
"Do you feel your heart still beating? Does it seem to be beating a little too fast? That's right, that's proof that you're alive, even though you're about to die soon."
Lex stood up, his shadow cast on Lionel's face, causing his entire face to be engulfed in the shadow, making any expression he made obscure.
Lex turned to leave, but before he did, he looked back and said:
"Oh, right, I forgot. The man who saved was Professor Rodriguez, the one you hate the most."
"And now, I'm going to ask him if he'd like to beco my godfather, and you..."
"You're not only far from a genius, but you don't even deserve to be the father of a genius. Goodbye, Luther."
Watching Lex's departing figure, Lionel clutched his chest, gasping heavily. After so coughs echoed the dying man, he reared back forcefully. After a montary expression of pain crossed his face, his eyes gradually lost focus, and his breathing slowly stopped.
"He died of a heart attack. I did use so drugs on him, but they were of the most common kind. Seeing my father collapse, using so first-aid dication was the least I could do, right?" said Lex.
Shiller looked down at Benjamin, who was also laying there. Walking over to him, he turned and said to Lex, "While I don't know why you were so eager to attack him, I have to tell you that the thod you used will hardly make him stay unconscious for long."
"By now, he should be waking up... oh, it appears that he really is waking up."
At Shiller's words, Benjamin twitched a little. He twisted his neck, his hand went to his nape, and then he tried strenuously to lift himself off the ground.
Without rushing, Shiller turned his umbrella upside down, the cane pointing downwards, the point upwards. He gripped the middle section of the umbrella with both hands and jabbed it downward hard.
With a "bang", Benjamin was again lying on the ground.
Bruce, on the side, swallowed hard. With no outsiders present, he dropped the act. Standing straight, he straightened his clothes and walked over to Benjamin, began frisking him with practiced ease.
Coming up empty after patting down Benjamin and his jacket pockets, Bruce stood up, looked at Shiller and asked, "What in the world is going on? What did you do here two years ago?"
"Would you believe if I told you I lost my mory?" Shiller responded rather arrogantly.
After recalling his own experience in Shiller's Thought Palace, Bruce slowly shook his head.
"I can very seriously tell you that I have indeed lost my mory. I rember the things I've done in the past, but I have absolutely no mory of this incident."
Shiller stroked the handle of his umbrella and asked Bruce, "Do you want to judge ?"
Bruce walked forward a couple steps, stopping right in front of Shiller. He looked into Shiller's eyes and said, "I want to investigate the truth about this. It matters to the future situation on the East Coast, and it also matters to Gotham."
He turned to look at Benjamin lying on the ground and said, "He told he once dispatched an agent to Gotham to investigate the Philby List and Soviet agents."
"Do you want to find that Soviet agent?" asked Shiller narrowing his eyes and looking at Bruce. He asked bluntly, "What are you planning to do if you find him? Hand him over to the CIA?"
"I don't care if the Federation allows espionage or not. I just know that Gotham does not. I won't let such a dangerous person with so many uncertainties operate unrestricted in this city," Bruce responded, sounding very much like Batman.
"Bruce, you should know that whether I have genuinely lost my mory or not, you won't get the answers you want from ." Shiller's attitude was very cold. He said, "My past concerns only and is none of your business."
Clearly, Bruce wasn't about to give up; the two of them stood in the middle of the room, tension filling the air again. Compared to the standoff between Shiller and Benjamin, this storm was bigger and more dangerous.
Just then, the sound of a gun being cocked, "click-clack," broke the silence. Bruce rolled over; a bullet hit the spot where he had just been standing.
The dark barrel of the gun fell, revealing Lex Luther's face behind it.
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