A blue light flashed and faded!

Everyone looked up, their nerves frayed as they stared at Jason. It felt as if the very air had solidified. Jason remained motionless, his deep blue eyes as calm as a still lake. He simply scanned the faces of his gathered comrades from left to right.

"Pretty interesting. This gem actually glows."

At his words, Harley's body jolted, and the expressions of the other core members turned grim.

What's happening? Since they obtained the Scepter, it had never failed. Why was it suddenly useless?

"Yeah... it glows," Harley said, her heart hammering against her ribs while she forced an indifferent smile. "Pretty, right? Let's try it one more time."

With that, she repeated the gesture, stroking the scepter. This time, she watched with agonizing focus. She saw the blue light spark from the tip of the scepter, but the moment it touched Jason, it vanished without a trace. The light didn't enter his body, and it certainly didn't enslave his mind.

Impossible. Why was this happening?

Harley completely lost her cool, staring at the scepter in confusion. If the scepter couldn't control Jason, then everything they had done was for nothing.

Jason's expression remained composed, as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred. He raised his champagne, took a slow sip, and said leisurely, "You... aren't Harley, are you?"

The moment those words left his mouth, a collective gasp filled the room. The core members' eyes went wide.

"No... I..." Harley stammered, trying to formulate a defense.

Jason suddenly looked up, staring directly at her. Those deep eyes had turned bone-chillingly cold, stripped of every ounce of the previous tenderness. Harley met his gaze for a few seconds before finally shrugging her shoulders and letting out a defeated sigh.

"Sigh..."

With a shimmer of golden light, Harley's form melted away, revealing Loki. "My disguise was flawless. How did you know?"

Jason tilted his head, ignoring him entirely. Instead, his disappointed gaze swept across his sitting comrades. "And to think you're supposed to be the core member of the Joker organization... taken down by this piece of junk!"

Even if he was Loki, the God of Mischief. Even if he could shapeshift. Even if he held a mind-controlling scepter... No matter how many excuses there were, for the leadership of the Joker organization to be wiped out by a single enemy was a disgrace!

This wasn't just anger; it was the bitter disappointment of a leader whose pride had been wounded. Fortunately, Loki was alone today and couldn't cause too much of a stir. Had he allied with S.H.I.E.L.D. or the U.S. government—or simply stayed undercover longer—the Joker organization might have truly been finished.

Jason's words sent a shockwave through the room. The core member scrambled back, dropping into combat stances, their eyes filled with wariness.

Jason shook his head in disappointment and turned back to Loki. "Where is Harley?"

Loki, annoyed by the previous snub, gripped his scepter and said, "Why don't you guess?"

Jason's brow furrowed, and he vanished instantly.

BOOM!!!

A deafening explosion rocked the banquet hall. Fissures spider-webbed across the reinforced floor, and the heavy luxury table was torn to shreds by a sudden gale. In the next heartbeat, Jason had Loki by the throat, slamming him so hard into the stone wall that he was practically embedded in it.

He struck with pure rage; one second was all it took to settle the matter.

"The organization's leadership is my bottom line... the mother of my child is my bottom line... and being intimate with a man is definitely my bottom line."

"As luck would have it... you managed to snap all three at once."

"So, why don't you guess... what am I going to do to you?"

Loki's face was contorted in pain and a hideous grimace. His throat was constricted so tightly he couldn't make a sound. "I... cough... cough..."

With their master pinned, the core member behind them didn't dare step forward. They knew that if Jason applied just a fraction more pressure, Loki's life would be over.

"I'm asking you one more time!" Jason pressed him deeper into the masonry. "Where is Harley?"

"I'm right here!" A sharp, familiar voice rang out behind him.

Jason whipped his head around to see Harley suddenly appear in the hall. She bore no signs of injury, but the way she looked at Jason was as if she were staring at the murderer of her kin. He never imagined their first meeting in a year would look like this.

Flash!

Seizing the moment of Jason's shock, Harley flicked her fingers. Loki vanished into thin air.

The moment Loki disappeared, every core member struck simultaneously, as if by a prearranged signal. A barrage of diverse powers slammed into Jason. No one held back.

RUMBLE!!!

The base shook violently, as if hit by an earthquake. Jason was blasted through the stone wall by the sheer force of the combined attack, crashing into the adjacent room. Fortunately, his energy shield held; the volley caused no actual damage.

I can't fight them inside. I have to lure them out!

The base held a thousand members, all of them elite. If Jason and the core member let loose, the facility would collapse instantly, and those elites would be turned into collateral damage. Despite the organization's wealth, Jason wasn't about to waste his resources like that.

"Chloe! Chloe!" He stood up and pulled out his communicator, praying the AI hadn't been compromised.

"Sir! What are your orders?" Chloe's voice came through.

"Thank God," Jason breathed a heavy sigh of relief. "Something's gone wrong! The core members are under Loki's control! They're engaging me at the New York HQ! Issue an immediate evacuation for all HQ personnel through the emergency tunnels. Also, lock down the Houston branch completely. No one leaves."

Recalling the events, the first member to act strangely was John. He was the one who suggested the reunion in New York, which meant he was Loki's first target. Until the situation was cleared, the Houston branch had to be quarantined to prevent the leak of secrets.

"Understood. Should I deploy the Armored Legion?" Even in the face of such a crisis, Chloe's voice remained cool.

"With Franklin there, the suits are useless. And—though it might sound arrogant—I don't need backup." Jason said with total confidence.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

The base's emergency evacuation siren wailed. Since the HQ's founding, the members had never heard that piercing sound. But they were the best of the best; after a few seconds of shock, they sprinted toward the escape routes.

CRASH!

The wall collapsed. The core member stood in a line before him. Jason brushed the dust from his suit and said flatly, "It's too cramped in here to move. Let's take this outside."

Loki, hiding behind the others, chuckled. "Jason, you can't run!"

"Run?" Jason's lip curled in a smirk. "I'm going to beat every single one of these idiots until they wake up!"

With that, he rocketed upward, smashing through the ceiling and flying out into the sky!

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You can read advance chapters and view R-18 images of the characters on pat reon page.

pat reon.com/GreenBlue17

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