Chapter 106 Daylight Nightfire Fool's Village (Patreon)

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After the winter in Gotham City passed, the temperature began to warm up. This is one of the few seasons in Gotham where it doesn't rain much. Although the weather is still cloudy and there are no sunny days, and a thin layer of fog always shrouds the city, the weather is still much better than in winter.

Mayor Roy's first reform measure after taking office was naturally to regulate Gotham's traffic.

Of course, this is not because the previous mayor died in a car accident, but because with the cooperation with other coastal cities, Gotham City has ushered in a new round of development. Various warehouses and supporting facilities have sprung up, and a large number of cargo ships are docked at the port, waiting in line to transport goods in.

However, the traffic situation in Gotham can only be described in one sentence - if it had any traffic rules at all, it wouldn't have no traffic rules at all.

This has led to a very headache-inducing situation. The capacity of the cargo ships is sufficient. Although the warehouses under construction are still somewhat imperfect, they can actually accommodate those goods. But the problem lies in the on-the-road section from Pier to warehouse.

The warehouses belong to different Gang families. Everyone wants to transport goods and basically transport goods 24 hours a day without interruption. But Gotham has no traffic rules and no one says who should go first. The solution to this kind of thing in Gotham is naturally whoever has more guns and more bullets in their guns goes first.

But there is another problem. Although the drivers are Gang members, they are not combat members. When two cars are blocked together and Gang members escorting goods start a shootout, drivers and other technical personnel on the car will also be injured.

Gotham is already short of such professional personnel. When everyone starts fighting without regard for anything else, the final result is that both sides lose their strength and go to the hospital together.

It doesn't matter if they go to the hospital. Their trucks are still lying on the road. As a result, people who come later are even more blocked and cannot move at all.

Under this vicious cycle, Gotham's traffic is almost completely paralyzed. Although most of the goods can wait for a few days without any problems, if this continues indefinitely, it will completely burn money - labor costs, warehouse costs, maintenance costs of cargo ships and liquidated damages for delayed delivery. The heads of Twelve Families are losing their hair anxiously.

Among them are actually some highly talented college graduates. But everyone has been living in this rotten mud pit of Gotham for so many years that no one realizes where the most important problem of this city lies. When everyone thinks about how to coordinate relationships here, they think about how to deal with other Gangs and make them give way.

But everyone wants others to give way to themselves. So no one gives way and everyone gets stuck on the road together.

In the final analysis, Gotham is an unordered and chaotic city. The evil order built by Gangs here is essentially still unordered…

Fortunately, new mayor Roy is a sensible person. He did not instruct them on what to do when Gangs were most angry. He just let them fight chaotically until they blocked the entire central street and no one could leave.

Until Gotham's most important central roundabout and four second-ring intersections were turned into ruins by fighting, Gangs had completely lost their temper. Money was right in front of them but they couldn't get it. No one could make things on cargo ships grow wings and fly to warehouses by themselves - no people, no cars, now even roads are gone.

"In the East District, it's the Old Cigarette Gang, and our leader is Cigarette Gun!"

"It's someone from the East District's Old Cigarette Gun. Damn, why is it always those poor guys from the East District? Don't the rich folks in the West District with their oily cars drive around anymore?"

As soon as she finished speaking, two people rode over on police motorcycles. One of them was wearing a police uniform and lazily saluted before saying impatiently, "Speeding, illegal turning, running a red light. Fine of 300."

Glancing at the rocket launcher on their motorcycle, the young man reluctantly paid the fine, and another person who had come with the motorcycle said, "Hello, this is Doyle Towing Company. Do you need towing services?"

"Doyle, why is it you? You damn bastard! Why are you wearing a suit? And when did your family start a towing company?"

The young man named Doyle straightened his suit tie. It was obvious that the suit he was wearing had been bought yesterday and didn't fit him very well.

He leaned against his sports car and lit a cigarette, saying, "Don't talk nonsense. This is a family business passed down for eight generations. Since we're old acquaintances, I'll give you a 30% discount. I'll tow your car to the nearest avenue. You know, only I know which avenue isn't congested. You must be in a hurry to see the factory in the east, right?"

The young man in the car rolled his eyes and said, "Okay, it looks like your boss really trusts you. He gave you this job to do. Help me tow the car, and we'll walk to Arkham to get some medicine."

As they were talking, the girl turned her head and saw a black Mercedes about to turn around. She picked up the horn at her waist and shouted, "Stop!! You broke the traffic rules!"

Within seconds, there was another gunshot, and the police and towing company personnel didn't even have to move. They quickly made another deal.

Continuing down the street, there were two intern doctors at every intersection, responsible for stopping cars and providing diagnostic certificates. They carried walkie-talkies, and once a traffic accident was detected, the police and towing company personnel would quickly ride their motorcycles to the scene. They would issue tickets, fines, and sign towing agreements all at once, and within ten minutes, the car would be taken away from the scene.

Of course, this was only on the main roads and intersections further away from the central city. In the six major battlefields near the central city, things were much more intense.

Bruce turned to one of his bodyguards behind him and said, "Go and stop that red Lamborghini. Tell him he made a wrong turn and needs to go back and redo it. He can come to me later to get a diagnostic certificate."

"And where did that foul-mouthed guy just now go? Bring him here so I can beat him up and say Wayne did it."

As soon as he finished speaking, Bruce heard a "whoosh" sound and took two steps back. In front of him, a car exploded, and the driver crawled out while yelling at the person on the high platform in the middle of the intersection with a rocket launcher, "Are you blind?!! I was going straight!! He changed lanes! He took my spot, why did you blow up my car?!!"

Before he could finish, the shockwave from the explosion seemed to have also hit the car that changed lanes. The engine hood of that car made an explosive sound, and then burst into flames.

The driver who changed lanes also crawled out of the car, and the two were about to start fighting. But when they saw the person on the high platform had reloaded the rocket, aiming at them, the two started swearing and left. Soon, they each encountered someone claiming to be from a tow truck company, and the wreckage of the two cars was quickly removed from the battlefield.

"Listen!! You bastards over there! Are you deaf?!! It's our turn to go on the next green light!! Did you hear me?!! It's our turn to go!!"

"Have you guys never watched a TV program before?!! Look in my hand! What's this?!! The Gotham Driver's Manual! See it? You've gone twice already! Next time it's our turn!!"

On the row of trucks across the roundabout, a heavily tattooed man with a rifle in his hand got off and flipped the person yelling off, then said, "Is your brain full of shit?!! If you're going to go, go east first! Then it's our turn, and you have to wait for another round!"

Bruce listened to them cursing each other, and tried to think hard, but couldn't find any evidence of the so-called traffic rules that these two men were claiming were right, even with his genius brain.

He asked a bodyguard behind him, "The Gotham Driver's Manual? Is that a thing? Go get me a copy."

The bodyguard said, "There is one, but it was just printed yesterday, and it's a handwritten copy. Our mayor was a little drunk when he wrote this manual..."

However, he still went to get a car and brought back a copy. Bruce opened it and found that the bodyguard was right. If even a pound of vodka was consumed less, one could not write such an absurd driver's manual.

Above are Roy's extremely sloppy handwriting. This mayor is also a grassroots person, never attended college, and many words are misspelled, not to mention the scattered grammar. After writing wrong, he just scribbles with a pen, with some lines squeezed together, and some lines far apart.

Bruce turned off his brain and tried to read through this driver's manual from the perspective of these idiots. He found that although the handwriting was sloppy, the content was chaotic, and there were more swear words than the actual text, it actually made a lot of sense.

The central idea of the entire driver's manual can be summarized in one sentence: There are no traffic rules in this rotten place, and anyone you see holding a steering wheel here does not have a valid driver's license. If you want to drive here, all you need to do is grip the steering wheel, step on the accelerator, and pray to God.

After a while, Bruce's mobile phone rang, and he answered the call, saying, "Hello? Oh, Professor... Yes, the internship is going smoothly. I'm currently at the intersection on the east side of the central roundabout. The road conditions here are not bad. The west side is more chaotic because there are too many racing cars there..."

In the end, there was no other choice but to seek the old Godfather's help. The leaders of the major families sat at the negotiation table, silent and subdued, knowing that they were in the wrong and being scolded by the formidable old Godfather. Some of Falcone family's men were also present, blocking the road. The situation had become clear - continuing the fight would only worsen things. Soon, not just the roads, but the entire city would be destroyed, and then how would they make money? They would starve to death.

The situation had developed to a point where a proper solution was needed to improve traffic in the city.

So, on the second Sunday after the weather in Gotham began to warm up, Mayor Roy Brown held a televised speech on Gotham TV. In the screen, Roy was not dressed in a trench coat and a fedora like he was in Chicago, but instead wore a suit with a tie, a flower on his lapel, sitting in his mayor's office, speaking in a calm tone.

"Dear citizens of Gotham City, I am your new Mayor Roy Brown, and I believe that most of you already know me."

"The main purpose of my speech today is to advocate for compliance with traffic rules and to explain the new city policy that I will be implementing in Gotham."

"As we all know, we have come together and made progress in this historic city to reach where we are today. Now, Gotham City is once again facing a revival and a great opportunity for development lies ahead of us."

"Therefore, as the mayor, I am proposing a new policy to serve the citizens of Gotham."

"The name of this new policy is the 'Gotham Civilized City Development Plan', and its main contents are as follows: starting from tomorrow, the 6 major transportation hubs, 17 main roads, and 22 minor roads in Gotham will begin to implement the 'Gotham Traffic Civility Day Action'."

"During this period, there will be professional traffic guides to manage the traffic. I urge all drivers to comply with traffic rules, otherwise, they will bear the consequences."

The TV speech ended here, and Bruce turned off the TV. He suddenly had a bad feeling.

And as it turned out, Batman's intuition was always accurate, or rather, Gotham's first law was: in Gotham, no matter how correct your intentions, how clever your methods, or how perfect your plans, in the end, they would all turn into a mess.

The next day, in the central roundabout of Gotham's downtown area, a flashy painted sports car slowly slowed down, and the person inside rolled down the window and leaned out, whistling at a beautiful woman standing on the street. A hippie youth covered in tattoos shouted loudly, "Hey! Look here, beauty! Check out Gotham's racing kid..."

Before he could finish speaking, the girl turned around and threw the cigarette butt on the ground. She picked up the rifle that was behind the street lamp post and fired a shot at the tire of the running car.

With a loud bang, the two people in the car were startled. They were about to get angry when the girl walked over with the gun. She looked young, not older than 20, with a good figure and wild dark skin.

She lit another cigarette, took out a small notebook from her jeans pocket, flipped her eyelids, and looked up and down at the two stunned people in the car. She said, "Racing kids, right? Irritable, tension headaches with prodromal symptoms of schizophrenia. Recommended treatment period of three months."

She scribbled in the notebook as she spoke. After she finished, she tore off the piece of paper and threw it directly into the car. The young man with tattoos all over his body picked up the paper and looked at it. The title read "Arkham Mental Hospital Diagnosis Form."

He immediately showed a flattering smile and said, "Sorry, miss, I didn't know you were from Arkham Mental Hospital. How about giving us another one of these?"

"By the way, what they said is true, right? We can use this diagnosis form to get some effective medication for headaches."

The girl glanced at him up and down and said, "Yes, go to the office of the attending doctor at the hospital within three days for an in-person consultation, and wait for room assignment."

"Can I have another one? I think I might have some mental illness too," shouted the other young man.

The girl ignored him and took the walkie-talkie from her waist and said, "Fourth Avenue! Fourth Avenue! A modified supercar with a flat left front tire, two passengers. Who are you guys?"

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