Chapter 1586

On the bridge of Asgard, Thor walked in front, full of spirit and moving with the wind. Loki followed behind with a helpless expression. She hurried a few steps to catch up to her brother and said, "Listen, Thor! You cannot go and tell Frigga and Odin. This matter has no basis at all; it's just a misunderstanding!"

"Dr. Schiller is pursuing you!" Thor stopped in his tracks, raised his voice, and looked at Loki with shining eyes. "I told you long ago that your self-assessment was wrong. That was entirely your own self-pitying thought. The most outstanding people on Earth are admiring your beauty; how can you not be more confident?"

"He only drew a picture." Loki walked quickly to stand in front of Thor, facing him, and said while walking backward, "That proves absolutely nothing. Perhaps he drew others too, and those drawings just aren't there."

"Then why was only your portrait kept in his bedroom?"

"Maybe it's just a coincidence." Loki frowned and said, "Perhaps he just happened to leave his art supplies in the bedroom that day and didn't take the sketchbook with him. It's just a very simple accident. Can you please not go around telling the whole world about this!"

"Loki, why is it that sometimes I think you are very clever, but other times I think you are very slow?" Thor walked forward, arms crossed, and said, "A man draws you and keeps your portrait in his bedroom—how could that possibly mean anything else?"

"But he never said anything to me. He doesn't want to..."

"That is his problem, not yours." Thor stopped again, hands on his hips, and looked at Loki. "That is why I have to tell Odin and Frigga. Frigga's old matchmaking plan makes it seem like you are some unloved little wretch who needs to find enough contestants just to get married, but in reality, that is not the case at all!"

Loki looked a bit dazed. She turned her head away and used that sharp, mocking tone she hadn't used in a long time: "Why is it suddenly not the case? Hasn't it always been like this? You have to look at thousands of people in this world to find one who is determined to choose me. That is the reality!"

"Oh, don't be like that, Loki." Thor gave Loki a firm, gentle hug with his strong arms and stroked her hair. "It is not your fault that they don't appreciate you. But now, someone does appreciate you. Dr. Schiller is a quite excellent human. I think he is much better than that Tony Stark; at least he is self-disciplined. I haven't heard of any scandalous behavior from him. He would be a good match."

"But he..." Loki felt as if she had been choked. After a while, she lowered her voice, almost whispering: "There must be some mistake. You should think about it, Thor! I haven't just met Dr. Schiller today. If he were seriously thinking of pursuing me, would he have had no opportunity?"

"Maybe he has as little emotional experience as you do. He's worried you'll reject him, so he..."

"Oh, for heaven's sake, stop talking nonsense!" Loki was truly losing her patience. She looked at Thor and said, "Schiller is probably just concocting some strange scheme again, and I am just a part of it. In any case, it is absolutely impossible for it to be what you think."

Thor looked at Loki in silence. Suddenly, he stepped forward and gave her another gentle, firm hug, stroking her hair, and said, "Loki, have you ever noticed that you seem unable to accept others appreciating you?"

"Let's assume, perhaps one day Dr. Schiller suddenly wanted to draw a picture and decided to pick a model from among his female friends. Whether he thought of you first or chose you after deliberation, the fact that you appeared on the paper proves he appreciates your beauty."

"Yes, perhaps he didn't think much of it when he drew it, and it has nothing to do with love or pursuit, but at the very least, the you in his painting is beautiful, which proves he thinks you are beautiful. Why can't you accept that?"

Loki crossed her arms and looked at the water beneath the Asgardian bridge. Her profile was full of silence, but Thor read some things from those curves and contours.

"Loki, one day, you will receive from these weak, sentimental human lives the fervent affection you never received from Asgardians. They are good at appreciating every kind of beauty, and you must respond to it. Because if you refuse, they do not have the sturdy shields of Asgardian warriors; your coldness will pierce them."

Thor's tone softened, no longer so intense, but Loki looked as if she were about to cry. She stared at Thor with red-rimmed eyes, full of anger.

"How do you want me to respond? When have I ever had the chance to respond to praise? When have I ever, like you, stood among the masses and taken my handsomeness, strength, and popularity for granted? How can I accept without hindrance that I am the special one in someone else's eyes... I have never been special!"

Thor looked sad as well. He pursed his lips, his resolute face seeming to melt. He looked into Loki's eyes and said, "I thought I had conveyed it well enough. Have you never felt that you are special to me?"

"And so what? Only you! And you suffer from misunderstanding because of this specialness toward me, damaging your heroic majesty. Thor, is that not enough?"

Loki walked a few steps closer, staring into Thor's eyes. She took a deep breath and said, "Let me tell you what kind of reaction you will get if you rush into Odin's palace now to tell them this news."

"Will they be overjoyed? No, they will be just like me—they will think this is just another part of Schiller's plan and feel he has ulterior motives."

"They will feel that even the simplest, most basic physical and sexual attraction I possess is not enough to attract a human male known for his promiscuity and lewdness."

"Worse, they will be shocked. They might even think I bewitched him in some way, because I have a record of doing so. Even though everyone knows bewitching Schiller is impossible, they will still think so."

Thor's hands gripped the bridge railing tightly, even warping the ornate decorations. Loki turned away, the muscles in her neck trembling slightly. She lifted her eyelids to let the moisture in her eyes distribute more evenly rather than overflowing.

"Regarding this painting, I have prepared for the worst. But the worst isn't even that he just wants to sleep with me; it's that he might be unable to sleep with anyone else for some reason."

"Loki!" Thor could not listen anymore. He glared at Loki and said, "If he really dares to do that, no matter who he is, I will make him pay!"

But Loki had already turned and left, leaving only one last sentence drifting in the wind: "If you want to tell them, go ahead, but this is absolutely impossible."

"Because the best way to repay this doctor is to make him give up this idea immediately if he really wants to pursue me, so it won't seem like he has no taste. I am going to find him now to talk about this, so this news doesn't leak out and affect his reputation."

"Seriously, Doctor, your standards must be very high. I really can't think of any beautiful lady in New York who could catch your eye."

Seeing Natasha was still trying to find a way to get that name out of him. Her level of effort was enough to make all the Hydra agents in S. H. I. E. L. D. break into a sweat.

"Not in New York," Schiller replied.

The lightbulb over the female agent's head lit up immediately. Parts of her brain whirred at a speed of five names per second, beginning the process of elimination.

"Is she very beautiful?"

"Of course."

"Then powerful... well, needless to say. Is she married?"

"No. I have a bit of a moral obsession in that regard."

"Good, so do I. Is she cute or sexy?"

"It's hard to describe. Perhaps both."

Seeing Natasha paused. The elimination in her brain ended, and she quickly spat out a name: "Loki Odinson?!"

The female agent looked at Schiller with her mouth agape in shock. Schiller seemed to find her shock quite unreasonable and said, "Is there anything worth being surprised about? Or is she not within the range of beautiful ladies in New York that you imagined?"

"Uh... she is indeed quite beautiful, and powerful enough, but... why..."

"Does there have to be a 'why'?" Schiller flicked the fishing rod with his fingertip and said, "Don't you feel offended by the shock expressed by Steve, Nick, or anyone else when they learned I might be pursuing you?"

Seeing Natasha suddenly fell silent. After a while, she pursed her lips and said, "Their shock is not without reason."

"What reason is there? We are both single, one man and one woman, both heterosexual, have known each other for a long time, and don't exactly dislike each other. What is so shocking about developing feelings beyond friendship?"

Seeing Natasha seemed to fall into thought. After a while, she let out a light breath and said, "They might feel that someone like me, or rather, a woman like me, would be avoided by others once they realized my true nature. That is not entirely incomprehensible."

Seeing Natasha leaned back and said unconsciously, "In this society, some things are classified as normal, while others are special. I am clearly the special one, because I am not a typist working nine-to-five, but a promiscuous and dangerous female agent."

"And am I not dangerous?"

"But their perception of you should be more positive. The world is like this: if a well-known good person and a bad person are together, they will definitely feel there is a hidden agenda."

"Are you so simply casting yourself in the role of the bad person?"

"I have always been a bad person, haven't I?" Seeing Natasha spread her hands. "No one would expect a former Soviet female agent to be as pure and kind as a little lamb. Even setting aside my profession, my private life can hardly be called conservative."

Schiller leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and said, "Suppose I say now that I am formally pursuing you. Would you think it more likely that I appreciate your personal charm, or that I have a conspiracy?"

"It must be the latter."

"Then if I have a conspiracy against you, does the problem lie with you or with me?"

"... With me. Perhaps some trait of mine, some aspect you might find useful."

The moment this answer was spoken, Seeing Natasha fell into thought. Clearly, the flaw in this logic was too obvious.

Schiller leaned back against the chair again, fingers interlaced in front of him, thumbs slowly rotating, and said, "Humans' perception of their own charm comes largely from the evaluations of others. People usually call those who fantasize about people with status and wealth far beyond their own falling in love with them 'delusional'."

"If someone's evaluation of you is significantly higher than everyone else's, their strength acts like a brick, stacking that evaluation even higher. You think it's impossible for me to pursue you or any other woman because you believe there is an essential gap between us. Where do you think that gap lies?"

"Like... a god wouldn't fall in love with a human."

"That is the problem."

Seeing Natasha suddenly let out a breath and looked at Schiller with a strange expression: "But I am certain that even if you were in a relationship with any of us, they wouldn't really think you are an ordinary person."

"Because emotional details are often very private. Even the most tactless person wouldn't pry into these, or most would assume this is just another of my divine plans."

"Probably so. But judging by your expression, you seem to have other plans." Seeing Natasha began to feel uneasy again.

Just then, Charles's gentle voice echoed in both their minds: "Loki just called me, asking if Schiller is attending class at the Dream School, because she couldn't find him at the sanitarium or the clinic. Should I tell her where you are? Doctor."

"Of course," Schiller gave an affirmative answer immediately.

With a "splash," a hooked fish flew out of the water, shining in the sunlight. Schiller grabbed the fish by the tail and slammed it onto the ground. Seeing Natasha's brain instantly flashed through eight hundred frames of Schiller gutting fish.

The female agent "whooshed" up from her stool and shouted at Charles in her mind.

"No! Professor! Don't let her come!"

!"