After making Batman depressed that night, Schiller returned to the Marvel Universe. And after giving Stark a pep talk, Nightcrawler from Hell's Kitchen went into hiding to avoid a vendetta, and Little Spider had just gained his abilities and hadn't officially debuted yet, so Schiller found himself with free time.
After that night, Schiller discovered he had another chance for a random chat. He had figured it out by now: as long as he had a significant impact on a character from a certain World, he would get a chance to randomly match with a chat partner. Clearly, his conversation with Batman that night had a profound impact on him.
Schiller decided to use this chat opportunity while he had the free time. Professor Charles seemed to be busy with student recruitment lately, and Little Spider was too excited about his new abilities to reply to messages. Suddenly, Schiller had no one to chat with, and he felt quite lonely.
So, he used the random chat opportunity, and a voice call interface suddenly appeared in his mind. This had never happened when he chatted with Charles or Little Spider.
Both of them replied by typing, and what appeared in Schiller's mind were chat boxes, but this time it directly turned into a voice call.
Schiller looked at the avatar: Sorcerer Supreme Gu Yi!!!
Sorcerer Supreme Gu Yi sent you a voice call invitation. Accept or decline? What to say if accepted?
Schiller scratched his head and finally accepted.
"...Mysterious cosmic sound, where do you come from...?"
Schiller felt a series of sounds. To call them sounds wasn't entirely accurate; it was more like thoughts and brainwaves. Schiller didn't hear any sound but understood the other party's meaning.
Schiller replied with his thoughts as well: "...Who are you?"
On the Himalayas, Ancient One, sitting cross-legged on a meditation cushion, was deep in meditation. Suddenly, she frowned as a voice replied to her.
Ancient One often sought answers through meditation from the noisy cosmic sounds. Various echoes in her mind represented different mysterious omens in the Universe. She could divine, cleanse her mind, and find peace by listening to these cosmic sounds.
But these cosmic sounds were always disordered noise, never any logical notes. Ancient One firmly believed that any conscious spiritual entity wandering in the Universe was a future Cosmic God.
So she immediately became vigilant. She concentrated all her energy, and her thoughts were incredibly powerful, capable of sweeping through all nearby Universes in an instant. But she scanned around and found no abnormalities.
The voice that answered her seemed to appear out of nowhere, with no origin and no energy anomalies.
Schiller knew Ancient One was powerful. If combined with the comic settings, she would be several times stronger than in the movies. Moreover, the current Sorcerer Supreme was not a young Batman; she was already at her peak. But Schiller still decided to take a calculated risk.
He said: "...Answer me...answer me..."
"...No matter where you come from, no matter who you are...stay away from Earth!" Ancient One's reply was very firm.
"...Guardian of Earth?...Answer me..."
"I am the Sorcerer Supreme of Earth...Who are you...Why are you emitting cosmic signals...?"
"I come from Carcosa...Aldebaran star system, Lake Hali...The dark Sun already hangs high in the sky..."
Ancient One felt a series of incomprehensible messages coming from the other side. She knew that connecting and conversing with an unknown entity in the Universe was extremely dangerous, but she had to figure out if the other party would harm Earth.
The other party's information was very obscure and profound, but Ancient One heard several recurring pieces of information: Carcosa, Hastur, Lake Hali.
After a completely nonsensical exchange, Ancient One more or less understood. The other party seemed to be warning her. She heard the other party repeatedly saying, "When the stars align, the Old Ones shall return..."
Ancient One believed the person on the other side might be called "Hastur," living in a place called Carcosa, where there was a "Lake Hali" shrouded in mist, and his enemies, the Cosmic Gods called "Old Ones," would return to Earth when the stars aligned.
Under Ancient One's questioning, she learned that the entity on the other side seemed to be imprisoned, unable to personally deal with his enemies. He was broadcasting signals near Earth to warn Earthlings.
But Ancient One knew that Earthlings and these Cosmic Gods had different life forms and simply couldn't hear those cosmic signals. If it weren't for her daily meditation, no one would understand what the entity on the other side was saying.
Even Ancient One couldn't fully comprehend the brainwave signals transmitted from the other side. They seemed to be mixed with too much information: Old Ones, leader of the Cosmic Gods, Azathoth. The other party seemed eager to give her all the information, but unfortunately, Ancient One couldn't fully understand Him.
She didn't actually trust such unknown cosmic entities, but she couldn't sense any presence from the other party, nor did she feel that Earth was receiving extra attention. However, the other party's warning attitude made her feel pressure. Where did another group of Cosmic Gods come from?
And they seemed to be able to silently arrive near Earth and broadcast signals. Who could guarantee that they wouldn't affect human minds?
It must be said that Ancient One's years as Sorcerer Supreme were not in vain; her concerns were very reasonable. If this story wasn't fabricated by Schiller, then the cthulhu mythos truly drove anyone who touched it insane.
Fortunately, however, this was just Schiller's fabrication to trick Ancient One.
Just as Ancient One wanted to continue probing, the communication broke off. The other party seemed to have encountered some trouble.
He didn't make any demands, didn't want to lend power to anyone, and didn't spout any nonsense about ruling the Universe. This, surprisingly, made Ancient One believe Him a little.
Cosmic Gods rarely knew how to conceal themselves; they couldn't control their madness and chaos. If the other party were a dangerous fellow, the experienced Ancient One would have immediately followed the "internet cable" to cut him down.
But now, the Cosmic God on the other side seemed gentle and rational. However, Ancient One did not relax her guard in the slightest; this might just be an illusion.
Schiller mastered the essence of always leaving half of what he said unsaid. Before Ancient One could ask for more details, he hung up the call, then rubbed his hands, intending to replicate Ancient One's abilities.
He tapped, and the system prompt came: "magic Ability (Low-Level) loaded."
Schiller knew that Ancient One's ability must be from the mystic arts, and definitely related to magic.
After loading the magic ability, Schiller began to test it, and then he found that this ability was a mixed bag of good and bad.
The good part was that he didn't have to follow the Marvel Universe's magic settings. Schiller could cast magic without paying any price or suffering any side effects. The bad news, however, was that this was indeed only a low-level magic ability. What Schiller could do included: telekinesis, Fire magic, and a short-distance flash.
The range of telekinesis was about 10m. This was somewhat similar to a floating charm. Schiller could move objects within 10m at will, but it only included objects that didn't exceed Schiller's body weight. Things like houses or cars couldn't be moved.
The Fire spell also had almost no offensive power. Schiller could light a flame in his palm. The power of this flame was probably enough to light a cigarette or burn a piece of paper or a book, but hoping to use it to fight people was probably wishful thinking.
The most useful was undoubtedly the flash. Schiller could appear or disappear at any point within a range of about 20m. This was enough for him to escape many dangers.
However, although he didn't need to pay a price to cast magic, it would still consume stamina and mental energy. After about five or six continuous flashes, Schiller would be too tired to stand up. More importantly, his brain would start to be filled with noise, making it difficult to concentrate. This was the consequence of overuse of magic.
However, compared to the high price other Marvel sorcerers had to pay to cast magic, Schiller was already very lucky.
The abilities he loaded often had "Low-Level" marked next to them, which indicated that these abilities could definitely be upgraded, but Schiller had not yet found a way to upgrade them. He guessed that perhaps he needed to increase his intimacy with the chat characters, help them, or save them, in order to obtain higher-level abilities.
Continuous flashing in extreme conditions could allow Schiller to leave his original location over a hundred meters in a very short time, and this ability ignored obstacles along the way; it could pass through walls.
He could perfectly sit in his psychological clinic and then instantly appear in a house two streets away. The greatest benefit this brought to Schiller was that S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents could finally no longer catch his tail.
S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents had, of course, long since pursued him to Hell's Kitchen, but just as Schiller had expected, it was crowded and chaotic here, and the gangs would be very wary of outsiders. S.H.I.E.L.D.'s operations would often encounter various obstacles, such as when they rented the house opposite Schiller's clinic, they were extorted a large sum of money.
Ever since Schiller started using flash to go out, S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents were completely baffled. They clearly didn't see Schiller leave, but after a while, Schiller would walk back from the street. Or they would see Schiller leave, but not see him return, yet after a while, he would reappear in the clinic.
This completely disrupted S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents' predictions about Schiller's daily routine.
However, it solidified Nick Fury's belief that Schiller was an unpredictable and dangerous individual, especially as his contact with Stark became increasingly close. This was not good news.
S.H.I.E.L.D.'s intention to use Stark as a card was already written all over their faces. Clearly, Nick Fury wanted to use Stark's sense of justice to work for S.H.I.E.L.D.
And it wasn't just S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents who encountered strange things; Schiller also discovered strange occurrences around the clinic these past few days. It wasn't until four more pounds of the cake in his refrigerator went missing that Schiller confirmed that his clinic must have been burglarized.