[Integrated/Crossover DC/Marvel] Why Did the World End Again? - Chapter 18

Chapter 18: Death is Eternal

The camera gradually zooms out, revealing a city that is hauntingly familiar, yet at this moment, it has become terrifying. Metropolis has turned completely into a place of silence.

“So, who should be held responsible for this?”

A voice rings out inexplicably, followed by a series of crisp bells and low murmurs. A figure clad in a massive black cloak stands there, with a few strands of blonde hair peeking out from under the edge of the hood.

“Only death is eternal…”

Immediately afterward, there is a forced logout. Alice is sweating profusely. Fair, it’s just too fair. This game is egalitarian in its cruelty; it hasn’t spared anyone, and finally, after going in circles, it’s Superman’s turn.

“B…”

Clark feels a surge of guilt. He now reasonably suspects that the purpose of this game is to internally fracture the Justice League. Last night, through his mistake, he successfully blew up Gotham; today, it shows Batman a second possibility: Superman ruling the world.

Aliens’ lives matter too!

“Continue.”

Hearing Batman’s command, Alice controls her character to visit the next person Aurora, who stands behind Thea Weeks.

The other party is as shiftless as ever. Aurora leans on the sofa; even though he is just a flat 2D image in the game, Alice can clearly feel the essence of a “salted fish” (slacker) embedded in his soul.

“Hello, Aurora.”

Aurora straightens up slightly and sits up. He walks a circle around Alice’s character, Mary.

“Got Lisol locked? You’re really something.”

Even though the fourth-wall-breaking has happened before, Alice still feels a sense of wonder seeing it again.

“You don’t have any gifts left. You can’t grind for favorability, Super Mario.”

Hearing this, Alice clicks on her inventory. Sure enough, when she was giving gifts to Thea Weeks earlier, she pretty much used them all up. There’s basically nothing left.

“Batman, there’s nothing left.”

Batman stares at Aurora on the screen and says nothing. The person’s existence is strange, but more importantly, Batman needs Alice to unlock more plot to verify another possibility in his mind.

“Continue.”

Alice has no choice but to bite the bullet and continue the daily interactions with Aurora. Although the text isn’t scarce, after a few rounds of back-and-forth, it reverts to repetitive dialogue. After repeating this three times, a new topic finally emerges.

Aurora tosses his hair.

“Fine, fine, stop clicking. It’s so annoying. I know you have nothing left. How about I just give you one myself!”

Alice is a bit dazed by his words. Then she sees the system pop up with new information: Favorability +20.

“Congratulations on unlocking Aurora’s 1-star plot.”

The sequence of events leaves Alice dumbfounded. Because he got annoyed, he just gave her one? Can you even play like that? Is that legal?

Seeing this scene, Batman and Superman are also somewhat silent. Batman roughly guesses that the character might have the ability to break the fourth wall or has special system programming, but he didn’t expect the break to be so thorough—to the point of affecting the game itself. I’m annoyed, so even if I give it to you for free, so what?

Superman is speechless. Back in college, Clark actually played quite a few video games. Although he’s been idle lately due to various chores, he has never seen this kind of behavior that is essentially equivalent to cheating.

Alice’s character quickly says “Thank you,” but the other party remains indifferent and impatiently tries to shoo the guest away.

“Alright, alright, stop with the thanks. Get out. If you want to see the plot, go see the plot. Don’t just stand here.”

After saying this, Aurora pushes Mary out of his room. Thea Weeks, who is standing at the door for unknown reasons, nods in greeting. As Alice controls the character to leave, she spots something special.

In the spot where Thea Weeks was standing by the door, a brand-new symbol has appeared. It looks like a pattern carved out by some kind of high-heat thermal ray. It’s an X.

“What is this? An X? Is it an error, or is it forbidding me from entering???”

Seeing this symbol, Superman’s brow furrows tightly. It seems everything is exactly as he suspected. No one understands better than he does what this symbol truly represents.

“Superman, what is this?”

Batman notices Clark’s lapse in focus and inquires. Hearing Batman’s question, Clark nods and begins to explain the meaning behind the symbol to them.

“On Krypton, there are three great houses. The symbol of the House of El is an S, while the House of Weeks uses an X. Different symbols represent different meanings. Just as S represents ‘Hope’ and U represents ‘Conquest,’ the X represents another meaning ‘Justice.’ Because the House of Weeks administered Kryptonian laws and regulations for generations, it’s only natural they adopted a letter representing justice.”

Hearing Clark’s words, Batman’s brow furrows. In other words, this game currently contains these characters: Batman’s daughter, the descendant of another Kryptonian house, and a strange character who can break the fourth wall. More importantly, Batman has a doubt, but he doesn’t dwell on it or rather, this matter can only be prioritized lower compared to the other current crises.

That doubt is: all character cards have detailed introductions, but when it comes to Aurora, one seemingly unimportant detail is missing Gender.

Everyone else is marked as Male or Female, but Aurora simply has no data for that category.

“Fine. Let’s see his plot.”

Alice has become very accustomed to this process. She skillfully clicks on Aurora’s character card, and the unlocked plot is displayed.

“Congratulations on unlocking the plot Dark Law.”

The computer screen turns a familiar black. A pure white prologue appears at the front, but it looks a bit distorted as the words jump out one by one.

“Hahahaha! They’re all dead, you know.”

This prologue makes the three people present frown. This doesn’t look like it has a positive meaning…

The subsequent scene appears to be from a pinhole camera clipped to a collar. It moves as the character advances, and it’s a bit bumpy. Alice can tell this character probably doesn’t have much money; the camera footage is a bit grainy with static.

A voice rings out, perhaps talking to himself.

“A sunny day. Normal work. Don’t know when things will get better. Somehow we’re arguing again. Maybe we should break up. We’re still fighting. I don’t understand what he wants. Anyway, we ended up coming to blows.”

“He still can’t beat me, but who told me to care about him? We fought back and forth, and in the end, it seemed to turn into a joke. I hate Gotham. I hate everything here…”

The person speaking walks slowly. Alice can see from the worn footage that this is indeed Gotham, but it seems to be in a specific small alley.

Soon, there is a burst of gunfire, and then the screen goes completely blank. Only pitch black remains, along with the sound of cursing. Alice guesses this might be another cliché Gotham event a gang shootout. This person just happened to be unlucky and got caught up in it, so the camera was broken.

“It’s always like this. This shithole of a city isn’t worth saving at all. He must have a problem with his brain to choose to stay here forever. If it were up to me, I’d just fly far away. Any other city. Even Blüdhaven is slightly better than here.”

the person speaking seems to have escaped the shootout zone. Although he is running, his breathing remains very steady as he speaks.

Then follows a period of static noise. Listening to it gives Alice a headache. Brother, I’ll give you some money, go buy a better one. This intermittent sound is so annoying.

“I’ve been locked up. I asked him why he’s doing this. He just won’t speak. He’s become so unfamiliar, it’s a bit frightening…”

After this sentence, the air seems to become exceptionally heavy. Only the sound of a heartbeat remains. This heartbeat also strikes Superman as strange. A human heart rate changes constantly unless under specific conditions where the period remains constant. Superman listens to the heartbeat in the video; it remains fixed at exactly 72 beats per minute.

“BATMAN IS DEAD!!!!!!!!!!! BATMAN IS DEAD!!! BATMAN IS DEA.”

The voice is forcibly disrupted, followed by a piercing scream.

Startled, Alice swallows hard and looks back at Batman. Batman looks calm. In real life, if a superhero dies, so be it; dying in a game isn’t a big deal either.

What kind of storms hasn’t he seen? He thought it was something major, but it’s just this?

“Nothing in this world is absolutely eternal. Even so-called powerful gods have a day when they are destroyed. People always fantasize and feel smug about all this, but in reality, we are no different from so-called lower animals. Everyone is just an ant.”

The scene then shifts to a massive spaceship. However, this ship is dilapidated. It looks like no one lives there, or rather, it has been abandoned. A figure hides wretchedly. When the face is revealed, Alice falls silent. She recognizes who this is: it’s Annabelle.

She seems to be hiding from something. A familiar figure appears it’s Aurora. His pace is very light. He is wearing all-black clothes and humming a broken tune. There is a smile on his face, but it isn’t a mocking or friendly one; rather, it’s a very doting one, as if he has discovered something fun. In other words, Annabelle doesn’t even seem like a person to Aurora.

“Where do you want to go?”

Aurora finally speaks. He grabs Annabelle by the hair and chokes her. Alice is shocked what on earth happened? This is the first time she’s seen a crossover interaction.

Can someone explain what the hell this is? What is the relationship between these two?

“It’s useless. Even if you kill them all, there won’t be a good ending!”

Anna says these words with a look of numbness. she doesn’t even show any reaction of struggle. Aurora laughs.

“I thought you’d struggle desperately.”

“Running away is useless. Maybe it can delay death for a moment, but what use is that?”

Hearing Annabelle’s answer, Aurora smiles. The corners of his mouth keep rising, looking exactly like a certain old acquaintance.

“Don’t be afraid. See you in hell.”

Support [Integrated/Crossover DC/Marvel] Why Did the World End Again?