Chapter 40: Breaking the Devil
Daredevil leaned heavily against the cold metal dumpster, gasping for air. He was too weak to continue the fight; each shallow breath sent a searing, intense pain through his internal organs, threatening to drag him into unconsciousness multiple times.
But Daredevil persisted. An astonishing, almost inhuman willpower was supporting him, refusing to let him collapse completely. He still had one final, crucial question to ask. He slowly raised his battered head, fixing his damaged gaze on the assassin who stood before him. His voice was hoarse yet resonated with firm conviction.
"Why... why did you do this?"
"Why?"
A text message on Tommy Vercetti's phone had just arrived, alerting him that his employer had successfully prepared the payment and placed it at the designated drop-off location. In a surprisingly good mood, Tommy was content to offer a few more words to the defeated vigilante.
"Killing is just my job. People die every day in this world; it's honestly no big deal. Just try to keep a normal mindset. Besides, the people who died weren't exactly good people: a ruthless drug dealer, a pimp who forced women into prostitution, a gang leader who terrorized an entire area. You could say what I did was eliminate scourges for the people."
These chillingly pragmatic words momentarily left Daredevil speechless.
Indeed, Tommy Vercetti's killing of three men in one night was ferocious, but he truly hadn't harmed a single innocent civilian. Aside from the excessive commotion caused inside the bar, his actions were precise and contained. Especially compared to his old nemesis Bullseye, Tommy Vercetti seemed almost benevolent. Moreover, as a defense lawyer for this very case, Daredevil naturally knew the true nature of those three targets. Although they now seemed to have testified in court and turned over a new leaf, this did not erase the egregious crimes they had committed in the past. Daredevil was well aware of this and was working towards a resolution.
However, he did not wish to resolve the matter with violence; instead, he planned to meticulously collect irrefutable criminal evidence on the three, hand it over to the prosecutor's office, and use the weapon of law to execute a fair trial.
"Law?" Tommy Vercetti laughed, a dry, cynical sound. "So, you're planning to convince me to be like you? To put career criminals in prison with your bare hands, and then wait for a day when those same freed felons come out to do evil again, harming more people?"
Daredevil opened his mouth, as if he had something left to say.
But Tommy didn't give him the chance. He directly extended his arm, lifted the barely conscious Daredevil above his head, and spoke with cold finality: "I know I'm not a good person, Daredevil, but isn't your approach just another form of dangerous indulgence toward true criminality?"
As he spoke, he raised his right leg, then suddenly exerted crushing force with both arms, slamming the vigilante hard down onto his raised knee, directly impacting Daredevil's spine.
In an instant, the horrifying sound of bones breaking filled the entire empty alleyway.
The faint moonlight illuminated a body lying curled and broken in the alley like a discarded rag doll.
Daredevil was completely defeated.
Tommy Vercetti ultimately did not kill Daredevil. But he left the vigilante with devastating, irreparable injuries. This was not due to soft-heartedness, but because he deeply understood the implications. Injuring Daredevil was one thing; actually killing him would be cutting off his own line of retreat, immediately cementing himself in a perpetual adversarial camp against the entire heroic community.
The current extent of the damage was just right. Superheroes fight each other all the time, don't they? Captain America and Iron Man even led armies in a world-dividing group brawl, but when true foreign enemies invaded, everyone eventually got along, and it was a big family reunion. Therefore, as long as the person is not dead, there is a chance for things to be salvaged down the line.
Tommy Vercetti was not worried about letting the injured "tiger" return to the mountain. Leaving aside whether Daredevil's injuries could ever fully recover, even if a miracle occurred, it was no big deal. Tommy could defeat him once, and he would be able to do it a second, third, and fourth time. Moreover, he would not stand still; his strength would continuously increase, and the gap between him and Daredevil would widen over time, making it nearly impossible for the other party to catch up.
He wouldn't even need to act personally. As the old saying goes, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. If Daredevil was determined to cause him serious trouble, Tommy could simply use a trick of killing with a borrowed knife: revealing Daredevil's true identity directly to Wilson Fisk, also known as Kingpin, the infamous crime boss of New York. He believed that ruthless fellow, upon learning that Daredevil was Matt Murdock, would be more than happy to do him the favor.
Without the persistent Daredevil standing in his way, Tommy Vercetti successfully returned to his residence. In the living room, Kingpin was still asleep on the sofa, just as he left him. The intricate trap he set in the bedroom had also not been triggered.
"This is very good."
Although there was a small interlude, with the 'wild' Daredevil coming to stir up trouble, Tommy Vercetti believed he had handled it quite well, at least successfully getting rid of the suspicion on himself. The only possible flaw was whether any surveillance recordings still existed in the bar. However, Tommy had already considered this point. As early as when he was scouting the location in the afternoon, he had deliberately wandered around the bar to get a general idea of the surveillance camera positions. Therefore, when he fired the gun just now, he deliberately stood in a blind spot of the surveillance, trying his best not to be seen in the action. The dim lighting in the bar, along with the mask he wore, also served well to conceal his identity.
There was one critical thing Tommy Vercetti still didn't know. Earlier, to lure Daredevil, he deliberately left his pistol behind. It was precisely because of this abandoned pistol that Daredevil, by a strange and cruel twist of fate, was now officially considered the "real culprit" by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
To be honest, the FBI might not truly believe that Daredevil was the killer. But sometimes, who the killer is isn't important; whether there is a killer to blame is what's most important to closing a case. With Daredevil as the killer, everyone could report a successful case to their superiors. Then, they could gather evidence around this high-profile target. As long as the "evidence" was sufficient in the end, and the story was reasonable and looked good, then even if it wasn't the truth, it would become the official truth. Moreover, compared to the identity of an ordinary, unknown assassin, the public was more willing to believe that this matter was done by the erratic vigilante, Daredevil.
At the same time, the Federal Bureau of Investigation could use this opportunity to propose the theory of the danger of masked vigilantes and request more funding from their superiors. As for where the funds would be used once obtained? Uh, that's another matter entirely.
The night grew deeper, and this grand, bloody drama had finally come to an end. Except for Daredevil and the three unlucky individuals, everyone involved in the machinations received a satisfactory, if brutal, outcome.
Time quickly moved to the next day.
The "Daredevil Murder Case" had splashed onto the front page of the Daily Bugle. According to information revealed by New York Police Department personnel, they were absolutely certain that Daredevil was the real culprit in this serial murder case. As soon as this news broke, it immediately caused a huge public uproar.
Many people paid attention to it initially, but there was no further progress reported. As time passed, and with Daredevil's complete disappearance, this sensational news slowly sank into oblivion, no longer noticed by the general public.
Only those who truly cared about or genuinely hated Daredevil maintained their concern, all pondering the same important question:
"Daredevil, where is he?"
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