Chapter 40: Aileen Fell in Love with Aaron~

"Corrupted! That's definitely corruption!"

When the director heard Gale asking how to shoot a proper superhero movie, he slammed his hand onto the desk and said decisively, "If it's a lawful good character, you just pile external pressures on him. For example, his lover is killed, his comrade sacrifices himself, the person he wants to save dies, or the person he wants to save doesn't die but they all take turns stabbing him in the back, and so on. Generally speaking, either create a conflict between justice and the law, or a conflict between individual humanity and collective bestiality, ultimately driving the hero who is supposed to save the world to destroy it instead... Of course, people will curse at it, but the audience's bodies are honest; they will definitely grumble while contributing to the box office."

"..."

Faced with these heartfelt words delivered by the director under the influence of financial persuasion, Gale silently lowered his head and flipped through the scripts the man had been interested in over the years:

*Superman, Who Tries to Rule the World Because the Members of the Justice League Were Killed*
*Batman, Who Is Infected with Joker Toxin Because Members of the Bat-Family Were Killed*
*Captain America, Who Joins Hydra Because His Memories Were Altered*
*Spider-Man, Who Uses Lethal Weapons to Go on a Rampage in New York Because His Lover Died*

...

To be fair, isn't this aesthetic a bit too bizarre?

He couldn't help asking, "Will this even pass censorship?"

"Do you know how many times I've been reported by the Justice League and the Avengers?" The director shrugged. "Though scripts that are too specific indeed won't get approved. For instance, the ones you're looking at right now—because the character settings are too recognizable, even if I change 'Superman' to 'Brawny Man' and 'Batman' to 'Owl-Man,' I still couldn't get them greenlit. In reality, these are all my personal collections, and I suppose they'll never see the light of day as finished products for the audience in my lifetime."

Gale felt both relieved and inexplicably a bit regretful.

He admitted that watching a lawful good paladin descend into the abyss was very thrilling, but—

"The prototype of the character I want to film is not lawful good."

"Neither is Spider-Man." The director crossed his fingers and said patiently, "I've observed for a long time, and I think he should be considered neutral good: his reverence for laws and regulations is clearly lower than Superman's. However, judging by your expression, your source of inspiration is neither lawful good nor neutral good. Is he an 'elf'?"

This was a Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) reference. In D&D lore, most elves belong to the chaotic good alignment; they do good deeds, champion freedom, despise outdated and stubborn bureaucratic systems, judge criminals on their own terms, and do not hesitate to subject them to harsh punishment.

As a veteran player of D&D tabletop RPGs, Gale understood the director's point without any difficulty, but he shook his head and said, "He is a lawful neutral."

"Lawful neutral, of all things?"

The director was a bit shocked. He felt that Gale clearly gave off a chaotic neutral vibe: young, hanging out with the mafia, yet his words and actions weren't rough, and he seemed driven by a strong sense of personal pursuit. For such a person to stay with a lawful neutral would result in a fight within ten minutes, lasting at least five minutes each time.

"It's not impossible to use the corruption trope on a lawful neutral, and it's even simpler than for a lawful good one. You don't need to consider how to destroy his spirit and personality through the betrayal of fate; you just need to convert the creed he believes in into something evil."

For instance, an inquisitor who strictly follows the law in every action—whether he does good or evil is not driven by his inner heart, but rather by how flawed or complete the legal system is.

Gale replied, "That is certainly possible, but wouldn't that become boring?"

"That's true," the director said. "So in this case, the character's contrast is best manifested by breaking the creed he has always followed."

Gale thought of Elijah again.

The Lord of Destiny, who had always acted according to the instructions of the Book of Destiny, one day made himself a character within the story—wasn't this precisely what the director meant by 'breaking the creed he has always followed'?

So he answered honestly, "He is already doing it."

"..."

The director fell silent as well. He glanced at Gale's expression and asked cautiously, "So, the thing you want to shoot is a documentary?"

Does someone like that really exist in reality? Surely this isn't just a filter created by a minor's unrequited crush!

Gale said, "He is my father."

The director: Understood, parental filter.

Generally speaking, directors are unwilling to accept such clients—those who bring their own thick filters and view their characters with excessive perfectionism. He makes movies for commercial returns, not to customize large-scale daydream theater versions for individuals, only for the client to eventually feel unsatisfied, thinking the plot is smearing the character, the actors look too ugly, or the director's skill is lacking. In short, it never works out.

But on the one hand, Gale was paying too much, and on the other hand, he had a gun.

So the director was still sitting right here. After a brief contemplation, he pulled a dusty script from the very bottom of the drawer and said, "Take a look at this first. It's one of the most interesting scripts I've collected so far, but I haven't had the courage to film it."

The title of the script boldly read:

*The Boys*

After reading this somewhat baffling superhero TV show title that didn't sound like one at all, Gale nonchalantly flipped open the first page.

He had only read two lines when he saw that the boyfriend of Starlight—a character resembling Stargirl—was run over and killed by A-Train, a character with super-speed who was an obvious parody of the Flash, and was only offered 45,000 dollars as hush money.

An ordinary passerby gets run over and killed by a superhero, only to receive a pittance that could hardly be called compensation as hush money!

"...?"

Gale thought he must have misread it, so he read it again, only to find the content straightforward and completely unvarnished. The next section of the content was even more shocking and basically impossible to pass censorship, because *The Boys* featured an enigmatic superhero team whose main members included, aside from the bootleg Flash who could turn people into red mist, a narcissistic, sadistic, and Oedipal bootleg Superman, a perverted rapist bootleg Aquaman with gills, an alcoholic bisexual bootleg Wonder Woman, a nut-allergic African-American bootleg Batman, and a gender-swapped bootleg Wolverine...

A gathering of elites!

Except the angle of the gathering was completely wrong.

Clearly, this script was not meant to be seen by Gale.

He was still a minor.

Seeing him shocked into speechlessness for a long time, the director said, "If we make adaptations to this extent for the sake of the box office, can you accept it?"

He was purposely steering it toward the worst-case scenario to give the client a preemptive warning; he wouldn't actually turn someone's father into a despicable villain. To his surprise, Gale quickly recovered, frowned, and asked, "We agreed that the character setting should be lawful neutral, so at the end of the movie, will you reveal that he did all of this simply to uphold the so-called 'creed,' and that in the end, driven by his true inner heart, he did a 'correct' thing that was 'out of line,' yet paid a tragic price for it?"

The director: "...Why don't you come be the screenwriter?"

He couldn't help making a joke.

But the client really understood the traffic code!! This timeless plot twist trope is frequently used in various works. As long as it is successfully portrayed, every single one of them becomes immensely popular or at least profoundly memorable. The most famous example is probably Inspector Javert in *Les Misérables*, who relentlessly pursues the protagonist Jean Valjean, only to voluntarily let him go later and jump into the river. However, characters like that aren't usually suitable to be the protagonist; they are frequently the foils to the righteous side.

Discovering that the investor actually understood the genre very well, the director's expression softened in a way it never had before. He began to seriously consider whether this project could succeed and how much profit he could rake in from it: "Mr. Esposito, when do you plan to bring me the complete script?"

"I need to think about it." Gale also felt there was great potential here. "Before that, we can test the waters with some existing content."

Written as 'test the waters,' read as 'make quick cash.'

He couldn't help looking back at *The Boys* script. This wasn't a movie, but an American television series. If it were born in a universe without superheroes, it probably would have become a massively popular work due to its brilliant satirical undertones. However, in a reality where Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and Aquaman genuinely existed... the content of this show was somewhat out of step with the times.

Still, the story itself and the themes it expressed remained interesting.

"Give me some time, let me think about it."

Gale was reluctant to let it go, and said to the director, "I have other matters to attend to, so I'll take my leave. We can talk again in a few days."

He had promised Elijah he would be home by nine o'clock tonight!

Before that, he still needed to swing by the International Gang's headquarters. Throughout his five days of attending school, the International Gang had operated as usual, and its booming business never halted; Gale commanded everything remotely via his smartphone every day.

Other mafia bosses usually stayed locked inside prisons to command grand affairs from afar without stepping outside, but he was doing it from inside a school, inadvertently lacking a bit of the imposing aura others had.

But it couldn't be helped. Ever since he recognized Black Lightning in Gotham City, and Black Lightning recognized him in return—leading everyone from the Justice League to Elijah to be completely aware of the dual identities on both sides—the school had transformed into a battlefield where righteousness clashed with evil. The school bell ringing was the first shot of gunfire, the lecturers were Black Lightning's informants, and the classmates were Gale's thugs. Both sides launched attacks through classroom roll calls, homework assignments, periodic exams, and impromptu parent-teacher conferences, creating an extremely brutal scene.

When Black Lightning taught his classes, he still had to keep an eye on the International Gang's movements, suppressing the expansion of criminal forces by frequently calling on students to answer questions.

They all had bright futures.

Even so, the money the International Gang earned through arms smuggling since Gale took the throne far exceeded the dynasty of the previous boss, Maroni. His superpower allowed him to perceive the movements of the high-dimensional 'editorial department,' and flipping through manga and anime in his dreams actually only utilized a small fraction of this ability. A much more practical application in reality was that he could vaguely sense which factions would rise in prominence over the next period and which organizations were about to collapse into oblivion.

Through this hazy intuition, every time he did business with others, he managed to buy low and sell high, positioning the International Gang at the absolute right place at the exact right moment. His unique vision amazed countless peers and made the subordinates of the International Gang utterly loyal, obeying his every command without question.

This time, when he rushed to the headquarters in person, he issued only a single order: "Completely terminate our cooperation with Hydra. They are about to exit the stage of history."

The members of the International Gang meticulously executed Gale's instructions. Even if people had doubts at first, after being proven right countless times by reality, they became entirely convinced.

——Hydra was bound to go under; they just didn't know how it would happen.

Who would be the one to finally sever the Hydra's multi-headed beast? Would it be Captain America, or S.H.I.E.L.D.?

The answer would catch everyone completely off guard and leave them utterly shaken: it would be the Sinestro Corps from across the universe, who had nothing to do with any of them.