In the wake of the Battle of Manhattan, Red Hulk had been beaten unconscious by the Hulk, later locked away inside the Raft alongside Samuel Sterns, the Leader, who was brought to Bat Island.
Samuel Sterns had once been a porter at the Adirondack Mountains base; Batman had recognized their familial connection the moment he learned his name.
The name Philip Sterns had naturally entered Batman's scope as well.
Unlike the Leader, however, Philip Sterns was not in New York, nor had he ever been associated with S.H.I.E.L.D. or Hydra, leading a mundane life in Spain instead.
Batman was not an extremist when dealing with criminals; he would not drag every single friend and relative of a perpetrator off to prison simply because one person committed a crime.
Philip Sterns had remained unmolested as a result, yet it was precisely this restraint on Batman's part that allowed the Enchantress—or rather, Hydra, operating in collusion with her and Loki—to exploit a loophole, employing dark means to transform him into his current state.
"You see, Batman? These people are all connected to you, one way or another. Had you never appeared, perhaps they could have lived out the rest of their days in peace and quiet."
The Enchantress watched as Batman took a straight punch from Madman. The kinetic absorption of the Gargoyle Suit reached its absolute threshold once more, detonating a dark-purple ring of light with a heavy hum.
Relying on the suit's automated discharge, Batman briefly disengaged from the trio's joint assault, though another stream of fresh blood spilled from his lips.
Batman still said nothing; he simply raised his fists anew.
Not far from Batman, Venom Robin and the Executioner were locked in a fierce, inseparable struggle, swinging their double-bladed battleaxes in wide arcs toward one another from the very start.
The Executioner despised Robin for stealing his axe—the item he treasured most besides the Enchantress. Moreover, his previous defeat at Robin's hands had caused the Enchantress to subtly cast him aside.
Robin despised the Executioner for blocking his path to assist Batman, especially after catching sight of the fresh blood dripping from the corner of Batman's mouth, which pushed Venom Robin to the absolute brink of wild fury.
Though no personal enmity had existed between the two beforehand, every swing and strike now abandoned all regard for self-preservation, desperately aiming to deliver a fatal blow.
Pfft! Pfft!
The wet sound of axes biting deep into flesh echoed continuously. One of Venom Robin's arms was severed clean by the Executioner, while the Executioner suffered a deep, bone-exposing wound across his shoulder.
Both had long since turned blood-blind, battling from the left side of the engine room all the way to the right, and from the front to the back.
Save for two guards stationed near the nuclear fusion reactor, the rest of the level had been completely reduced to their personal battleground.
Gradually, Venom Robin's physical stamina began to drop, making it increasingly difficult to turn back the Executioner's savage, brutal swings.
In just a few short minutes, Venom Robin reverted to his full Venom form—what Venom called "Phase Two"—just as he had beneath the royal city of Wakanda.
With the power of the moonlight spent, Robin stood three meters tall in his reverted Venom form, his musculature massively built out. When bare-handed previously, he had been capable of taking down the Executioner in a matter of a few punches and kicks.
Let alone now, with an indestructible double-bladed battleaxe held firmly in his grip.
Seeing he was on the verge of overcoming his opponent while Batman's side had reverted to passive evasion once more, Venom Robin grew frantic, wishing he could split the Executioner's head open with a single stroke and send him straight to the underworld.
Yet this was no one-on-one duel, and the Enchantress had no intention of allowing the Executioner and Venom Robin to settle their match honorably.
"Piledriver, Bulldozer, Thunderball, Wrecker—it's time for you Wrecking Crew boys to make your entrance. Play with our little friend for a bit," the Enchantress instructed.
Four men stepped forward immediately. All possessed tall, heavy builds clad in mundane attire, appearing vastly different from the likes of Zzzax or Madman. Rather than looking like individuals who could match a base-level Hulk, they resembled construction laborers.
Their weaponry served only to reinforce that impression.
At the head of the Wrecking Crew, Wrecker held a crowbar in hand; Piledriver was bare-fisted; Bulldozer wore a thick metal helmet; and Thunderball gripped a heavy chain with a massive iron ball attached at the end.
As the four closed in, Venom Robin pinned the Executioner's head down with one hand while raising the double-bladed battleaxe in his other to strike.
Wrecker brought his crowbar down straight toward Venom Robin's head with a heavy swing.
Venom Robin didn't even glance up, fully intent on taking the blow if it meant cleaving the Executioner's head off first.
Thud!
That seemingly ordinary crowbar struck Venom Robin's head with tremendous weight, splitting Venom's head cleanly in two halves that dangled limp over his shoulders.
The impact immediately brought a slight delay to Venom Robin's axe swing.
Bulldozer then tucked his head down, rumbling forward like a runaway train just as his moniker suggested, slamming into Venom Robin with a heavy boom that sent his massive body flying backward, embedding him deep into the distant alloy wall.
Clatter! Clang!
Thunderball spun his chain, sending the massive iron ball at the end whistling through the air with a rushing wind. Friction between the air and the iron sphere produced a heavy metallic stench.
Releasing his grip, Thunderball sent the massive iron sphere hurtling straight toward Venom Robin embedded in the wall.
The impact punched a gaping hole clean through Venom Robin's chest, the iron ball dropping onto the deck before Thunderball yanked it back inch by inch with his chain.
"Oh, looks like I won't be needing to step in after all," Piledriver shrugged, speaking in a humorous tone.
Watching Venom Robin get battered until he was riddled with holes, the Enchantress turned her eyes toward Batman with a curve of her brows.
"Oh dear, your little Robin has been beaten to death," the Enchantress remarked to Batman in a remarkably light tone.
She wanted to see an expression of anguish and despair grace Batman's face, rather than the same unyielding coldness he maintained while under siege by three heavy hitters.
Yet even as her words fell, Batman offered zero reaction, continuing to dodge incoming strikes while relentlessly searching for weaknesses in Zzzax, Madman, and Wonder Man.
The Enchantress rolled her eyes, her seductive posture causing the Executioner—who had just caught his breath—to experience a sudden spike in heart rate.
Just as the Executioner was about to say something to his beloved goddess, a raspy, eerie chuckle echoed out from the Venom Robin embedded in the wall.
That same skin-crawling, piercing laugh Batman had first heard upon encountering Venom reverberated through the engine room. The Wrecking Crew, the Executioner, and the Enchantress all snapped their heads toward Robin in unison.
They watched as the two dangling halves of Venom Robin's head slowly fused back together.
Inside the gaping hole across his chest, pitch-black symbiote matter squirming at blinding speed sealed the wound, revealing the stark-white, jagged bat emblem traced across his torso.
A long crimson tongue, razor-sharp fangs, and sinister, stark-white eyes—every detail made Venom Robin resemble a demon straight out of legend.
"Hmm? He doesn't die even from that?" The Enchantress pouted her lips, appearing somewhat dissatisfied that Robin hadn't perished so easily.
Just as she prepared to issue another command, Venom Robin let out a thunderous roar, sending a visible shockwave spilling from his maw that spread rapidly across most of the engine room.
Amidst the roar, Batman seized the opening, stepping inside Zzzax's guard in a flash. Holding a compact device retrieved from his utility belt, he slammed it straight onto Zzzax's chest.
Zzzax let out a sharp shriek as his coalesced, liquid-mercury-like body shuddered violently, his wheat-awn-like yellow-green electric currents discharging recklessly in all directions.
Yet after a split-second of wild discharge, the currents suddenly collapsed inward, pouring straight into the device Batman had pressed against his chest.
This was a gadget Batman had prepared specifically for Electro, Max Dillon—utilizing a miniature Arc Reactor engineered by Batman himself as its core to siphon and store electric currents from a target's body.
Zzzax's shriek instantly drew the attention of the Enchantress and the others once more.
Amora the Enchantress's heart skipped a beat. Seeing Zzzax's body rapidly go limp, a flare of green magical radiance lit up her hands, preparing to intervene.
However!
Rustle!
Another massive commotion erupted from Venom Robin's side. From behind Robin's back, a pair of massive bat wings webbed with dark red patterns snapped open with a violent burst, generating a gale-force gust that threw the Enchantress off balance, nearly knocking her to the floor.
Having consumed chocolate continuously over this period, though Venom Robin could not deploy dual wings in his normal state, his Venom form had fully matured, granting him true wings of his own.
"All of you, attack together!" the Enchantress shrieked, backing away as green light flared in her palms once more.
As she retreated, the remaining combatants surged forward in unison, sending a carpet of overwhelming attacks hurtling toward Batman and Venom Robin.
--
Support me & read more advance & fast update chapter on my pa-treon:
pat reon .c-om/windkaze
(Just remove the hyphen - and space, to access Pa-treon normally.)