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The streets of Arkham were quiet.
Arthur's boots echoed against the cracked tile, his violet-lit eyes narrowing as his ring pulsed faster and faster, tugging him deeper into the bowels of the old city. The stench of mildew, rust, and something far worse rotting flesh, hung in the air. He didn't need the ring to tell him he was getting close.
[Life signature detected… multiple]
'multiple?'
Arthur stoped in front of an old building and pushed open a corroded door, its hinges groaning, and stepped into a chamber dimly lit by swinging fluorescent bulbs. The scene before him froze him for only a heartbeat, then his lips pressed into a grim line.
Joker.
Not the Joker he knew, not the one who had once terrorized Gotham with a mad grin and cruel games. This one was worse. A corpse in a mockery of his old purple suit, the fabric rotted and blackened, clinging to flesh that sagged and peeled away in places. His skin had taken on a gray pallor, veins pulsing faintly with black energy. And in his hand, nestled like a parasite, a Black Lantern ring burned with void-light.
Around him, thugs, poor bastards who probably thought they were hiding in Arkham's ruins screamed as tendrils of black light wrapped around their limbs, pulling them apart slowly, keeping them alive just long enough to savor the agony. Joker's lips peeled back in a grotesque semblance of a grin, the sound he made not laughter but something warped, guttural, a laugh dragged out of a throat that should no longer function.
Arthur folded his arms across his chest, violet glow washing the shadows off the wall. His voice cut through the room.
"Alive, dead, undead… it doesn't really matter with you, does it? You're the same scum either way. Hell..." his tone twisted with bitter amusement "...even my shadow Joker can't help himself. Same tendency to torture Gotham's bottom-feeders. Seems death doesn't cure madness after all."
The Black Lantern Joker's head snapped toward him, the awful grin stretching wider. His eyes glowed with emptiness, and that laugh spilled out again, jagged, broken, as if dozens of voices were trying to mimic the Joker's cackle and failing.
Arthur grimaced. His nose wrinkled as he muttered, "Ugh…"
The sound clawed at the air, an insult to memory. This was not madness anymore. This was desecration.
Joker tilted his head, black aura spilling off him like smoke. "Ohhh… look who came to play…" The voice slurred, layered with unnatural echoes, each word scraping against the walls. "Gotham's finest shadow… Blackwynd!" his voice broke into that laugh again, hideous "Now tell me...when the lights go out, who laughs last?"
Arthur's hand rose slowly, palm open, the Shadow Ring on his finger gleaming with a deep violet pulse that rippled through the chamber like a storm about to break. Shadows thickened around his boots, crawling outward, trembling with hunger.
"Enough with the bullshit. this isn't even you and I rather not waste words with a mere construct." Arthur said coldly, his gaze unflinching. "I can't let you walk out of here. Especially you."
The Black Lantern Joker clutched one of the writhing thugs closer, his fingers digging into the man's face, twisting it until bone cracked. The thug screamed. Joker leaned in, whispering, "Did you hear that, Blackwynd? Even in death… they still laugh with me..." He crushed the man's skull like fruit, black light snuffing out the body as if it had never existed. And then used a black construct pistol to finish off everyone else.
Arthur's jaw tightened. The shadows coiled higher now, licking the edges of his coat, the violet aura mixing with the suffocating black of Nekron's corruption. For a moment, the two energies snarled at each other in the air.
Arthur smiled with no humor. "You really are a sad existence."
That's when it happened. Joker spread his arms wide, and from the dark, black rings shot forth, flying like carrion crows into the stiff fingers of the dead thugs. Their bodies convulsed, bones snapping as they jerked upright, eyes igniting with hunger for death.
"I never play fair," Joker crooned, his voice splintering into distorted tones. Shadows bled from his fingers, shaping into construct knives and a revolver sculpted from black light. He leveled it at Arthur.
Arthur smirked faintly, violet energy sparking across his ringed hand. "Fine by me. It just means I have to destroy more of you."
The air cracked.
Arthur blurred forward, [Speed Step] detonating the floor behind him. Kamish twinblade flashed free, its crimson edge cutting through the air like a streak of living fire. The first Black Lantern thug lunged, claws extended, but Arthur was already inside his guard. The twinblade sliced diagonally, cleaving the corpse in two only for both halves to twitch and begin knitting back together midair.
Arthur didn't stop. His foot whipped up, crushing a skull in with bone-breaking force, then he pivoted, extending his hand, [Ruler's Authority] hurled three corpses upward like ragdolls, smashing them through a crumbling wall.
The building trembled.
Joker cackled, firing construct bullets that shrieked as they tore through the air. Arthur spun his twinblade, deflecting the first volley in a rain of sparks, then dashed forward. The blade carved a brutal arc across Joker's chest, flinging him into a pillar. Rotten flesh and black ichor sprayed across the cracked tiles.
But Joker only laughed harder, pulling himself upright. "Ohhh, Batsy would just hate you. Strong, fast, merciless, shame he can't do what you do! it would have been so much fun!"
Arthur sneered and tightened his grip. Two more Black Lantern thugs slammed into him from both sides, black claws raking. Arthur let them, then vanished, [Speed Step] igniting again. He reappeared above, twinblade raised high, and brought it down with [Mutilation]. Countless strikes tore through the floor, a crimson shockwave ripping outward like a dragon's maw. The ground collapsed, dragging corpses into the depths.
The building screamed as its foundations gave way, concrete and iron crashing down in waves. Dust clouded the battlefield.
When it cleared, Arthur stood among the rubble, standing in calm posture. Around him, the corpses began to twitch again. Their black rings pulsed, reassembling shattered limbs, knitting torn torsos. Joker climbed from the wreckage, his jaw hanging too far to one side until it cracked back into place.
Arthur rolled his shoulders, twirling the twinblade once before resting it against the ground. A smile crept across his face.
"Figured," he said, his tone more amused than angry. "Had to test it. You can't really die, can you? The body's just a construct after all. It's the ring that's in control."
Joker tilted his head, eyes gleaming like hollow coals. "You sound like you've read the rules of the game."
Arthur let the twinblade dissolve into shadow. He raised his ringed hand, violet energy already sparking brighter, the glow intensifying until the ruins lit like a furnace.
"You've had your little fun." His eyes narrowed, his voice dropping into something cold and absolute. "Now. Regenerate after this.."
Then it came.
A roar of violet and obsidian energy tore from Arthur's ring, not like a beam but a living storm tendrils of raw, clawed force lashing outward with savage precision. The blast split in midair, carving into five perfect streams, each one a spear of annihilation. They didn't simply strike the Black Lanterns, they latched on.
The tendrils hooked into the black rings at their cores, digging like talons into rotted bone. The constructs on Joker's hand shuddered as if screaming, the surface of his black ring spiderwebbing with cracks of violet light. The same agony spread to the other four, each ring screeching in resonance, a chorus of death shrieks vibrating through the ruined streets of Arkham.
Arthur's boots scraped across the debris-strewn floor as he walked forward, his voice low but cutting, a hunter whispering to prey.
"This power is merely borrowed, using your rotten remains to do Nekron's bidding. Mine… is inexhaustible."
The Joker staggered, clutching his hand as his undead flesh burned from within. Still, that awful grin split his half-decayed face, teeth flashing through rotted lips. His laughter started low, bubbling like swamp gas, before rising into a warped, mechanical shriek that didn't sound human anymore.
"Y-you… you think you get the punchline, don't you? Heh… hhhh-hAHa HAHAHAHAH!" His voice cracked, warped by the vibration of his failing ring. "But I was just getting started! Arkham was warming up, Batsy wasn't even invited yet..."
The laughter broke into a cough, black ichor spilling between his teeth. His eyes, white and clouded rolled to Arthur with something almost resembling sorrow, but only for a moment.
"Shame… we never got to finish the joke. I had… so many more corpses to play with...so much death to..."
Arthur didn't bother with him. His ring pulsed, pouring more shadow energy into the black rings like poison into an open wound. The cracks widened, jagged lines of violet fire racing across the cursed metal. The undead thugs writhed, jaws dislocating in unholy shrieks as their rings began to splinter, burning out from the inside.
The Joker wheezed, his body spasming, still laughing in broken fragments.
"Hhhehh… ahh… you really love me, you can't stay away from me Blackwynd!" His skeletal fingers twitched, clutching at the cracking ring as if it were his last cigarette. His final laugh came out hollow, echoing through the rubble.
"…guess… the punchline's on me."
/-\
If you Like this story! Check out my other stories! Solo leveling in Westeros.
&
If you wish to read more or simply support me than check out my patreon at
"https://www.patreon.com/FrenzyAren"
You can Get Access to 3 More Chapters OR 7 More Chapters if you want