The owl finally appeared...
Those who know will naturally understand what the owl means. Those who don't know will never understand it in their lifetime, unless they take the initiative to reveal it. () But often by the time you understand, you are already dead.
Everyone says the Dark Knight, who roams the night sky, is Gotham City's protector. With Batman around, Gothamites can sleep peacefully. Even Batman himself considers himself Gotham's protector. He loves this city, believing he knows every blade of grass and every tree in it, knowing everything about it like the back of his hand.
But in reality, it's not Batman who rules Gotham, nor the mayor or the judge. It's the owl who rules Gotham, the owl that only comes out at night.
Although they also appear at night, owls are natural enemies of bats.
For hundreds of years, Gotham City has had only one ruler: the Court of Owls.
"I finally lured you out, otherwise my trip to Gotham would have been worthless." Donny's attention seemed to be on Iron Batman, but his mind had already drifted to the little bird that seemed to appear by chance.
Downey had initially gone to great lengths to rescue Klein, even at the cost of Batman's displeasure, with the ultimate goal of uncovering the Dionysus Factor. Unfortunately, despite Scarecrow's dedication to the League of Shadow Warriors, he knew nothing about such a highly confidential secret, not even the location of the League of Shadow Warriors' Middle East headquarters.
Disappointed, Downey had to turn his attention to the option that had been eliminated from the beginning - the Court of Owls.
The Court of Owls is the true ruler of Gotham City. Hundreds of years ago, when Gotham was still a small city, a group of prominent families secretly banded together to form the underground organization known as the Court of Owls. True to their name, they act like a high court, brutally judging those who rebel against Gotham City. They would round up the awakened populace like rats and execute them with bloody hangings.
For hundreds of years, whenever someone with a "conscience" appeared in Gotham City and wanted to reform the evil side of Gotham City and was about to succeed, the Court of Owls would appear, and the undead court killers would kill all those involved.
Batman thought he knew everything about this city, but he had never found any trace of the Court of Owls. Ever since the Wayne family took root in Gotham City, many people had been secretly killed by the Court of Owls, but the Wayne family simply believed that their family members had died in accidents.
In Gotham, a city of sin, owls are everywhere. They are the source of Gotham's sins, the foundation of the darkness that has grown in Gotham, and the true masters of Gotham.
"It took a lot of effort to lure you out.
A bunch of old, idiotic birds, finally can't sit still anymore..." Tang Ni sneered, thinking secretly in his heart.
After the Joker appeared, he crazily slaughtered Gotham City's top brass, even killing most of the middle-level officials. Many of these high-ranking officials were actually members of the Court of Owls - they themselves were of course unaware of this, but in fact, all the shady deals they took over were influenced by the Court of Owls, and many people were actually led by the Court of Owls.
But this group of people were almost killed by the Joker, and a large number of gang leaders were also killed by the Joker.
And what about Donny? He went even further, starting from the bottom, inciting civilians to an armed revolution and overthrow everything that was rotten and outdated.
Even if the leadership is killed off like the Joker did, as long as the filthy mud remains, new flowers of evil will sooner or later grow out of it. So even though the Joker enjoys killing, the Court of Owls is not worried at all.
But until that bastard Tony showed up, he would just shovel away the mud and flowers together, and then lay a layer of cement on them... In the hundreds of years of history of Gotham City, there has never been a guy like Tony.
It would be strange if the prominent families of Owl were not anxious. Their first option would be to find a way to kill Donny and then lie in wait before the mutant forces launch a crazy counterattack.
Then, members of the Wayne family, their "good neighbors" who had lived together for hundreds of years, took the initiative to give them a big gift. Batman damaged Downey's strength, and a bunch of powerful Transformers were torn to pieces. Downey's combat effectiveness was directly reduced by more than half.
Without those Transformers, how could Downey, on his own, withstand the siege of countless undead killers?
In reality, Donnie himself knew that bringing out the Court of Owls was a risk, a hazard of his own. Don't underestimate the Court of Owls simply because they were formed by a prominent local family. They possessed the technology to create the Dionysus factor, allowing them to resurrect the dead en masse, transforming them into immortal night assassins.
If the normal timeline had developed, Batman would have gathered a large number of people and established the Bat Family many years later, specifically to fight against the crimes in Gotham City, with remarkable achievements. Then Batman was attacked by the Owl Killer and almost died several times.
Batman's "Thresher Suit", which was powerful enough to cope with world-class wars and could fight directly in outer space, was destroyed under the siege of a group of owl killers armed with swords and daggers. He himself almost died, and in the end he won a tragic victory by relying on trickery.
The Court of Owls is a formidable foe, but victory would also be enough to drive anyone insane! The technology used to create the Dionysus Factor could not only mass-produce self-regenerating Transformer bodies, but even for flesh-and-blood humans, it could grant them a long lifespan. If Donnie could master this technology, it would be a massive bargaining chip, and anyone would be driven crazy.
Of course, the Dionysus Factor possessed by the Shadow Warrior Alliance and the Court of Owls are not strictly speaking the same thing. The Court of Owls possesses the technology to produce the Dionysus Factor, while the Shadow Warrior Alliance does not. However, their method of immortality also uses the same raw material as the Dionysus Factor. The Shadow Warrior Alliance calls this unique material the Lazarus Pool.
The Dionysus Factor, and more importantly, the technology to create it, including the "raw materials" whose origins were unknown but whose efficacy was astonishing, were all Donnie's goals. What Donnie desired most was the technology. Although the raw materials were precious and scarce, at least he had the Shadow Warrior Alliance as a channel. If negotiations could be smooth, then negotiate; if they failed, then go for it. Did he really think he had a good temper?
"The Dionysus factor, plus Wolverine's special adamantium skeleton doped with a self-healing factor... As long as we get these two things and find a way to mass-produce them, the organic life form of Cybertronians can be completed."
"Now, we need to deal with Batman first. We should just tear his armor into pieces and take them away. The materials are very precious..."