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Chapter 522: Schiller's Hospital Routine (1)

The lush green swayed amid the soft rain, mist rising between the trees as if they had grown into towering giants overnight, piercing through the ethereal waves of clouds. Raindrops tapped on the glass like a faintly dissolved painting.

"Drip, drip, drip..."

The rhythmic sound of the bedside monitor echoed. Gradually breaking free from this pattern, breathing quickened, and with a sudden "thump," Schiller sat up from the hospital bed.

He used the palm of his hand to support his heavy head, turned his body, and sat on the edge of the bed. He looked down at his reflection on the pristine white floor tiles.

He exhaled, feeling a dryness in his mouth. Out of habit, he reached out to press the call button by the bed. After doing this, he paused for a moment, as if remembering something.

The call button on the bedside cabinet lit up, but instead of a nurse or doctor, Stark walked in wearing his Iron Man combat suit. Upon seeing him, Schiller shook his head, trying to shake off certain memories from his mind.

Fortunately, it wasn't a doctor or psychiatrist coming in to tell him that all his previous experiences were delusions, and that he was actually a mental patient who had been hospitalized all along. That kind of twist would have been too cliché.

Yet Schiller still couldn't figure out why he was here. He looked around the hospital room and realized that it was a high-end room in an advanced hospital.

The floor was spotlessly clean, the flowers on the bedside didn't emit any sharp scents, and every corner of the hospital bed was padded for protection. Schiller, who had worked at the Elder Council's hospital, knew that this was probably the best type of hospital room in a mental institution.

A metallic sliding sound came, and Stark emerged from his Iron Man suit. He walked over and sat down beside Schiller, then looked at him with his eyes.

The eye contact seemed to hover between "you can tell me anything" and "if you don't tell me, you're not treating me as a friend."

Schiller felt a headache coming on. He knew that Stark and Steve were undoubtedly onto something he had imagined. However, the problem was that when he returned to the Temple of Thought, he found no traces of spider web; he had no idea what Stark and Steve had seen inside his Temple of Thought.

At this point, Schiller had figured it out. He had certainly been manipulated by one of the personalities within his Temple of Thought. And which one? Did he even need to ask?

After all, he had left Abacus there for him, and this guy had actually turned the tables on him. Next time, he resolved to remove all the beads from Abacus and throw them away.

Now, there was an information gap between Schiller and Stark. Stark had gleaned certain things from Schiller's Temple of Thought, but due to a petty individual's meddling, Schiller had no idea what Stark and Steve had learned in his Temple of Thought.

It was like a police officer arresting a criminal for a case. The police officer knew the details of the case, but the criminal didn't.

Now, the police officer asked the criminal to confess, but this criminal wasn't an ordinary one. He was a serial murderer who had committed many crimes. He didn't know which case the police were asking him to confess to. If he spoke recklessly, he might reveal even more...

Schiller was in this state now. He knew Stark had imagined something, but he didn't know what Stark had imagined. If he revealed all the possible traps within his Temple of Thought, it might take until next year, and he might never get discharged afterward.

Based on the details he knew now, Schiller deduced that his most significant change this time was releasing a personality that had never surfaced in the world before. That was Moonlight Schiller, the young Schiller.

At the same time, Khonshu had chosen this personality as his vessel of power. When Schiller had brought this personality out to confront the Egyptian gods, Khonshu had likely been in the mental hospital room of the asylum.

Although Schiller only saw Khonshu as a tool, he had given him some authority to freely move within the 10th layer.

And below the 10th layer of the Temple of Thought, there were hardly any entities. When Stark and Steve entered the Temple of Thought and didn't use the elevator but walked up from the first layer, the first entity they encountered was probably Khonshu.

If Stark and Steve were investigating Schiller's trail and they communicated their purpose to Khonshu, he might have led them to the hospital room where the young Schiller had lived.

With Stark's intelligence, he would likely find some traces of spider web there and deduce Schiller's experiences from his youth.

Given this, Schiller thought, what he exposed to Stark might be fragments of memories from his youth.

From Schiller's perspective, this speculation made sense. After all, he couldn't have known that dc Schiller and the Id had conspired, staging a play for Stark and Steve.

The Id, essentially the most instinctual part of Humanity, the true self, was difficult to predict. It would cooperate with a task like this, and even the plotter, dcSchiller, felt surprised. MarvelS chiller wouldn't have been able to anticipate it.

Having thoroughly pondered over this speculation, Schiller found it logically sound.

Since things had come to this point, why not turn the tables? Schiller spoke up:

"Do you want to judge me?"

Schiller turned his head and looked into Stark's eyes, saying, "Without someone's consent, prying into their inner world, digging out abnormal evidence, and then using despicable means to confine them to a mental hospital..."

"Tony Stark, are you going to say that this is for my own good?"

Stark was taken aback. He hadn't expected the just-awakened Schiller to be so confrontational. He spread his hands and explained, "It's not like that. Actually, we only..."

"Then why am I here?"

Schiller stood up, glanced down at his hospital gown, then turned around to look at Stark, who was still seated on the hospital bed, and asked:

"Do you support Khonshu or Ammit?"

"What?" Stark was somewhat puzzled.

"Do you know why they're in conflict?"

"Why?"

"Khonshu believes that he only has the right to judge and pass sentence after a crime has been committed."

"What's the issue with that?" Stark asked.

"Ammit, on the other hand, believes that once a crime has been committed, it's irreparable, so the criminal should be killed before the crime occurs."

"Absurd," Stark remarked, saying, "According to that theory, everyone in this world is a criminal."

"So, what exactly are you doing?" Schiller looked at Stark.

"You dug up some old memories from my Temple of Thought, and based on that, you concluded that I should be confined to a mental hospital. That's why I'm here."

"But have I harmed anyone due to my mental instability? Have I committed crimes because of it? Aren't those abnormalities only existing in my mind?"

"Essentially, you're doing the same thing as Ammit," Schiller stared into Stark's eyes and said, "Even though he just killed me."

Stark took a deep breath. He said, "We're not trying to judge you or imprison you..."

"Fine, then I'm leaving this..." Schiller began to say, but he turned around and walked away. A shadow passed by his side, and Stark walked in front of him, stopping him. Schiller halted, shrugged, and said:

"If you were going to let me leave, you wouldn't have come in a combat suit today."

He glanced at the combat suit standing in the middle of the hospital room and smirked somewhat ironically. He said, "The cigarette I handed you back then has become the weapon you're using against me now."

"Did you feel incredibly righteous when you used it to kill Ammit? And do you feel the same way now, using it to stop me?"

"Even though I haven't done anything, you've been monitoring me as if I'm a criminal due to the potential danger I pose and my uncontrollable power. And even if necessary, you're not hesitating to resort to force..."

Schiller walked to the other side of Stark, looked him straight in the eyes, and said, "One day, you will pay the price for your mindset."

Just as Stark thought Schiller was about to leave the hospital room, Schiller turned back and returned to the hospital bed. He lay down with his back to Stark and fell silent.

In the moment before Schiller turned his head, Stark was sure he saw a deep disappointment in Schiller's eyes, which made Stark start to doubt.

Schiller didn't blame him, he just recounted the internal logic of Stark's actions. When this logic was brought to light and analyzed, it sounded just as absurd as Ammit's perspective.

This made Stark begin to wonder if he had truly done something wrong. After all, as Schiller had said, Schiller hadn't committed any harmful acts to society due to his mental instability. On the contrary, his behavior and speech were normal now, and in the past, he had used his intelligence to benefit human civilization.

If someone is born with a bomb, and no one knows if it will explode and harm others, should they be imprisoned forever and prevented from doing anything?

Between individual freedom and public safety, which should be chosen?

Previously, Stark had leaned toward the latter, but now he began to contemplate the essence of this question. Was it this person's fault that he was born with a bomb? If not, why should he pay the price of imprisonment for it?

Even Schiller, after being treated this way, still felt deep disappointment. So how many people in this world have noble ideals and are willing to sacrifice themselves to maintain public safety?

"Do you know what? In that moment when he questioned me, I was truly thinking, did we send him to the hospital for treatment or because we fear he might lose control and pose a threat to us?"

"Do I truly have the authority to do this? To look at him, even before he's done anything, with the eyes of someone looking at a potential criminal?"

Inside the Avengers' base, Stark sat at one end of the table, while Steve sat at the other end. Steve heard his question and said in puzzlement, "Why did you visit him in your combat suit?"

"If I didn't wear the combat suit, how would I get there? Drive? Do you know how bad the morning traffic is in New York?" Stark retorted.

"Why didn't you explain to him then?"

"I..."

Steve covered his forehead and said, "You didn't let him trick you again, did you?"

Stark sighed and said, "I'd almost prefer it if he were intentionally provoking me like he used to, rather than truly feeling sad and disappointed about this."

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