Adrian's fist tore straight through the Joker's chest.
The impact shattered his heart instantly.
"Ugh...!"
The Joker had been completely immersed in the excitement of Batman's return. He never expected Adrian to attack without warning.
Confusion flickered across his bloodied face as he slowly lowered his head.
Adrian's arm had pierced entirely through his torso.
Blood poured from the massive wound, soaking the Joker's clothes and splattering across the stained floor of ACE Chemicals. The hole in his chest looked grotesque, as though part of his body had simply been erased.
Pain flooded his nervous system.
Weakness followed immediately after.
For the first time in years, the Joker felt death standing directly in front of him.
"Ha...!"
And yet he still laughed.
Even with his heart destroyed, laughter escaped his mouth like a dying animal's final cry.
Batman and Black Canary stared in stunned silence as Adrian calmly pulled his arm free from the Joker's chest.
Blood dripped from his hand.
Without a hint of emotion, Adrian wiped the blood against the Joker's ruined coat.
"I'm sorry," Adrian said coldly. "Your little Orpheus and Eurydice story was touching, but I prefer playing Hades."
The Joker staggered backward.
His body swayed violently.
"Ha... what an interesting feeling..." he muttered weakly. "I think I'm starting to like it. So this is what death tastes like."
His voice grew fainter with every word.
Then he looked up at Adrian again.
"You... you..."
It seemed like he wanted to say something important, but the blood loss was already too severe. Darkness clouded his vision, and his consciousness rapidly deteriorated.
Adrian stepped closer.
"Any last words?" he asked. "I'm willing to show a little mercy and hear your final thoughts."
"Barb... and... Lu..."
Those were the final words the Joker managed to force out before collapsing onto the floor with a heavy thud.
Silence filled the factory.
Adrian narrowed his eyes slightly as he stared down at the corpse.
"Two names for mad dogs?" he muttered.
Then he shook his head.
"No. You've got it wrong. That only applies to people like you."
Killing the Joker had never been an impulsive decision.
From the moment Adrian stepped into ACE Chemicals and saw him, the Joker was already dead.
The only surprising part was how little resistance there had been in the end.
Perhaps the Joker had devoted all his effort to reviving Batman.
Or maybe this had always been his plan.
Several thoughts crossed Adrian's mind.
Nearby, Batman stood frozen.
He had only just awakened from the Lazarus-infused chemical vat, and the first thing he witnessed was Adrian punching through the Joker's chest.
His brain struggled to process it.
"This..."
Black Canary wasn't much better.
She swallowed hard while staring at Adrian.
She had expected Adrian to brutalize the Joker, maybe imprison him, maybe torture him further.
But killing him outright?
No hesitation.
No speech.
No second thought.
Part of her actually felt satisfaction rise in her chest.
Compared to Adrian, the Joker was worse in every possible way. A monster without limits, without remorse, without restraint.
Watching him finally die felt deserved.
"Homelander!"
Batman's furious voice finally broke the silence.
"Why did you do that?!"
Adrian looked at him without concern.
"Why?" he repeated. "Aren't I supposed to be the villain in your story? This should be expected."
"No," Batman said immediately, his voice tense. "You just made the biggest mistake of your life."
Adrian gave a faint smile.
"Upset because I killed your favorite lunatic? Understandable. He did just save your life."
Batman clenched his fists.
"You shouldn't have killed him."
Adrian stared directly at him.
"Like Orpheus and Eurydice, one survives while the other dies. That was the exchange. Deep down, Joker understood that himself."
"He wanted this!" Batman snapped. "That was his trap. He wanted you to become like him."
The violent impulses from the Lazarus Pit surged through Batman's mind, but he suppressed them through sheer willpower.
"The answer to darkness isn't more darkness," Batman continued. "You don't destroy evil by becoming evil yourself."
Adrian slowly walked toward him.
"No, Batman. You're wrong."
His voice became colder with every step.
"I'm not you. I never will be."
"If you killed Joker and became another broken Batman, I'd understand. You and the Joker are two sides of the same disease."
Adrian stopped directly in front of him.
"But me? I'm different."
Batman glared at him silently.
"What now?" Adrian continued. "You're going to lecture me about justice? About laws? About not crossing the line because you're a hero?"
His eyes sharpened.
"Stop repeating meaningless ideals."
The atmosphere inside the factory grew heavier.
"Joker was human?" Adrian said. "Then what about the countless people he murdered after escaping Arkham over and over again? Were they not human too?"
Batman remained silent.
"You claim to respect the law while acting as a vigilante every night. You refuse to kill because you think that makes you morally superior."
Adrian's tone turned harsher.
"But laws are written by the ruling class to protect their own interests."
"And I," Adrian said firmly, "am the ruler of this country."
His voice echoed through the factory.
"I create laws. My will defines them."
He pointed toward the Joker's corpse.
"I declared him guilty. I sentenced him to death."
Batman's expression darkened.
"And you," Adrian continued, "why do you accept the authority of every other government but reject mine?"
Without waiting for an answer, Adrian shook his head.
"You're hypocritical, Batman."
The accusation hit harder than a punch.
"You know Gotham's real problem isn't the Joker. It isn't crime."
"It's you."
Batman's eyes narrowed.
"You preserve the system while pretending to fight it. Every time you stop a criminal without changing the city itself, people keep waiting for a savior instead of changing anything themselves."
Adrian's gaze remained locked onto Batman.
"You give people false hope while Gotham continues rotting from the inside."
Batman finally responded after several seconds.
"The law isn't whatever one man decides it is," he said. "Twisting justice to fit your personal will doesn't make you right, Adrian."
Adrian scoffed softly.
"You know the truth, but you choose to ignore it because it makes you uncomfortable."
Then his expression hardened again.
"Either way, Joker was a terrorist. My tolerance for terrorists is zero."
A dangerous red glow slowly appeared in Adrian's eyes.
"And now," he continued, "the public supports me. Meanwhile, people see all of you as dangerous vigilantes and terrorists."
The heat inside the factory rose.
"So since you're already here, none of you are leaving ACE Chemicals alive."
At that moment, Commissioner Gordon, Nightwing, Zatanna, and Harley Quinn finally arrived.
Only Cyborg was missing, still heavily injured elsewhere inside the facility.
The moment Gordon and Nightwing saw Batman standing, relief flooded their faces.
"You're awake?" Gordon asked immediately.
Batman looked confused.
"Commissioner Gordon?"
Before anyone could continue, Harley Quinn suddenly screamed.
Everyone turned toward her.
Harley had collapsed beside the Joker's body, tears streaming down her face.
"Mister J..." she whispered brokenly. "What happened to you...?"
Nightwing stared in disbelief.
"That's... Joker?"
Even seeing the corpse himself, it felt unreal.
The Joker had caused Batman endless suffering for years.
Yet now he was simply dead on the factory floor.
Black Canary nodded grimly.
"Homelander killed him."
Adrian ignored Harley's sobbing.
"Enough talking," he said coldly. "I've run out of patience."
Everyone immediately tensed.
Then Zatanna stepped forward.
She positioned herself directly between Adrian and the others.
"Adrian," she said quietly. "We meet again."
Adrian looked at her.
"Yes. Last time was during the Witchmark incident, wasn't it?"
His expression turned colder.
"You're here to stop me too?"
"Yes," Zatanna answered without hesitation. "Because you've gone too far."
"Too far?"
Adrian frowned slightly.
"You crossed lines that shouldn't be crossed," she said firmly. "You're not the Adrian I once knew."
Adrian laughed softly.
"You never understood me to begin with."
Zatanna met his eyes fearlessly.
"I remember the Adrian who stood against the Trinity without taking a single step backward."
Her voice stayed steady.
"But the person standing here now is cruel."
"Cruel?" Adrian repeated.
"You really believe that?"
"Yes."
Then she turned toward Batman and the others.
"You all need to leave. I'll hold him off."
Nightwing immediately objected.
"Absolutely not."
He gripped his broken escrima stick tightly.
"Batman just woke up. He's in no shape to fight. We'll cover the retreat together."
"None of you are leaving," Adrian interrupted.
The next second, he vanished.
He appeared directly in front of Zatanna and threw a punch.
Batman reacted instantly.
He shoved Zatanna aside and crossed his forearms in front of himself to block the hit.
Bang!
The impact launched Batman across the room like a cannonball.
His body slammed violently into the factory wall before sliding downward.
He coughed violently while clutching his chest.
Nightwing attacked immediately after.
His escrima stick swung toward Adrian's head.
Adrian caught it effortlessly with one hand.
Crack!
The weapon snapped in half.
A backhand strike followed instantly, sending Nightwing crashing across the room.
Commissioner Gordon moved next.
After taking the enhanced serum earlier, his reaction speed and physical strength had increased dramatically.
He lunged toward Adrian with a punch aimed directly at his chest.
Adrian blocked it casually with one arm.
Then he grabbed Gordon's wrist.
Crack!
Bone snapped instantly.
"Ahhh!"
Gordon staggered backward while clutching his broken arm in agony.
Within seconds, Adrian had overwhelmed all of them.
But just as he prepared to continue attacking, something changed.
His body suddenly froze.
A violent pressure struck his mind without warning.
His movements slowed for a split second.
Zatanna immediately seized the opportunity.
"Eh tsoh kil!"
Invisible magical restraints materialized around Adrian's body, wrapping around him like glowing chains.
The spell locked tightly around his arms and torso.
Yet Adrian barely reacted.
Instead, confusion appeared in his eyes.
Something was wrong.
His mind suddenly filled with violent, twisted thoughts.
Hatred.
Chaos.
Destruction.
The pressure inside his head intensified rapidly.
The air around him distorted.
Reality itself seemed unstable.
Then Adrian saw him.
The Joker.
Standing nearby.
Laughing.
Mocking him.
Announcing his return.
Adrian knew it wasn't real.
But his thoughts were becoming stranger by the second.
Distorted.
Obsessive.
Cruel.
Another personality was forming inside him.
A darker version of himself.
Then Adrian understood.
The Joker virus.
His eyes narrowed sharply.
So that was what the Joker meant before dying.
The virus hidden inside his body had infected Adrian during the kill.
Adrian immediately thought about the Batman Who Laughs.
The Batman from the Dark Multiverse who had been infected after killing his own Joker.
That version of Batman had become something far worse than either Batman or the Joker.
A monster possessing Batman's intelligence and discipline combined with the Joker's insanity and complete lack of morality.
Even entire universes had fallen because of him.
The memory surfaced clearly in Adrian's mind.
Joker massacring Gotham.
Batman finally snapping and killing him.
Then the virus spreading.
The birth of the Batman Who Laughs.
Adrian remembered asking Batman once why he never killed the Joker despite everything he'd done.
Now he finally understood the answer.
Because sometimes the Joker's final joke came after his death.
Nightwing slowly got back to his feet while staring at Adrian's blood-red eyes.
"What the hell is happening to him?"