Chapter 2652

Schiller and Peter walked over at almost the same time, with Peter slightly in front, but Stark was still ahead of Peter, while there was nothing in front of Schiller, giving him a quite open view that allowed him to see the Sandman's current state very clearly.

The reason Schiller was interested in the Sandman was that he felt the Sandman's structure was somewhat similar to the Gray Mist, and although the Gray Mist factors were much more advanced than sand, it could not be denied that the two were very similar in form.

It was precisely because sand was much more intuitive than Gray Mist factors that Schiller could see the life structure of this type of creature more clearly; Schiller discovered that this mass of sand was moving with a very aesthetic rhythm, with some parts revolving and some rotating, and he could even discern the forms of primitive organs within it.

Schiller discovered that the movement patterns of the sand seemed to indicate the functions of these parts, and some of the sand was moving more violently than the rest, which looked like it should be organs such as human lungs or a heart.

Schiller was very interested in this, so he couldn't help but take two steps forward to get a better look, but as a result, the sandstorm that had been well-controlled by Iron Man and Captain America suddenly erupted.

Whoosh!!

A mass of sand lunged violently toward their direction, or more accurately, toward Peter, but with the iron lump Stark blocking in front of Peter, he was safe and sound, yet there was nothing in front of Schiller, and as such a gust of wind carrying sand and dust blew past, his glasses were instantly blown away.

Fortunately, Iron Man immediately restrained the Sandman; Schiller rubbed his eyes, which had almost been blinded by the sand; he could have turned into Gray Mist in that instant, but after all, there were cameras filming, so he could only act like an ordinary person and let his glasses drift away from him.

Schiller was actually not nearsighted at all; he wore glasses just to cover up his gaze; as an autistic person, Schiller didn't like to make eye contact with people when he was young, and wearing glasses meant no one could tell he was avoiding their gaze.

Of course, he could now make eye contact with people freely, but wearing glasses had become a habit, and being without them for a moment made him feel a bit uncomfortable.

However, Peter's shout attracted Schiller's attention; he said, "The Sandman's weakness is water; as long as he encounters water, his movements will become very slow, or even completely immobile, and he can only revert to human form."

"Really?" Stark was a bit skeptical; could the answer be this simple?

Then his head turned left and right, seemingly wanting to find something to test it with, and the three of them fixed their gazes on Schiller's hand.

Schiller was still holding that cup of juice, and because it was a straw cup with a lid, the cup hadn't been dirtied, and the juice was still drinkable.

Schiller looked down at the juice in his hand, then looked at them and said, "What do you want? If you want to drink, go buy it yourselves..."

Finally, Schiller sighed helplessly and handed the juice in his hand to Peter; Peter opened the cup and splashed it toward the Sandman, and the large chunk of sand that was splashed solidified.

Schiller saw Peter aim at the part of the sand that was moving most violently; after this part of the sand solidified, the movement of all the other sand became sluggish, and finally, it slowly condensed into a human shape.

"Baker? Baker!!!"

Someone was shouting the Sandman's name, but it wasn't Peter; the few of them looked in the direction the voice came from and discovered a black figure peeking around a street corner.

"Miles?" Peter called out the boy's name with some surprise, and Iron Man had already flown over to grab him.

Miles, being held by the back of his collar, appeared very dejected but kept trying to struggle; Steve patted Stark's hand away, looked at Miles, and said, "What's wrong with you, boy? Do you know this guy?"

Miles didn't speak but looked up at Peter; Peter stepped forward and said, "What exactly is going on? How did you and Baker end up here?"

"I was chasing him here." Miles still had a look of bad luck on his face; he said, "You guys told me to watch Robbins, but I really couldn't keep an eye on him; he's an invisible man, how was I supposed to catch him?"

"Then what about Baker?"

"I discovered him by accident too..."

Miles pursed his lips; Schiller saw that his lips were a bit chapped, looking like he hadn't drunk water for a long time, so he returned to the car to get him a bottle of water; Miles said cautiously, "Thank you."

Then he gulped down the entire bottle of water in a very bold manner, let out a long breath, and said, "God, I thought I was going to die; it's a good thing nothing major happened."

"What exactly is going on?" Stark was losing patience; if Steve hadn't stopped him, he definitely would have taught this kid a lesson.

"Robbins trapped him." Miles said, "I don't know what the principle is, but anyway, he made a big swimming pool, and then this mass of sand was soaked at the bottom, unable to move."

"You guys told me to go watch Robbins; I couldn't get into that house, so I had to wander around, but Robbins hadn't come back for a long time; I was worried I'd lost him, so I wanted to go in and take a look."

"It was an abandoned villa; after I went in, I saw that big swimming pool; I felt a bit strange at the time because I've worked cleaning pools for others; in villas like this where no one lives, there's usually no water in the pool, and if there is, it's very dirty..."

"Get to the point!" Stark said.

"This is the point." Miles raised his voice, but quickly shrank his neck again and said, "I felt the pool wasn't normal, so I looked down, and to my surprise, I saw a face appear on the sand at the bottom of the pool."

"I was scared to death; my foot slipped and I fell into the pool; I know how to swim, and the pool wasn't deep; I could have swum up, but I felt something grab my ankle, and I choked on several mouthfuls of water."

"Just when I was about to drown, I felt something lift me up; I crawled to the edge of the pool, and when I got close to the surface, I heard someone shouting for help."

"I felt something was wrong; that sand seemed to have a life of its own, so I found the pool's drain valve and drained all the water, and then I saw that mass of sand really move, and he talked to me too."

"He said he was kidnapped and brought here, had been trapped at the bottom of the pool the whole time, and asked me if I could move him somewhere else to dry out."

"I thought that when I was in the pool, he might have saved me, so I used a vacuum cleaner to suck him up and spread him on the lawn to dry, but after he dried out, he started screaming crazily, saying something about killing Spider-Man..."

"Wait." Peter interrupted him and said, "What does this have to do with Spider-Man?"

"He said it was Spider-Man who kidnapped him and brought him here."

Peter opened his mouth and said, "And then?"

"He said he knew Spider-Man's secret; he wanted to find him and then kill him; I really didn't know how to stop him, so I could only follow behind him."

"How did you guys find your way here?"

"I don't know either." Miles said, "At first he was just looking in New York, but one day he suddenly went crazy and dragged me here; I feel like I haven't drunk water for almost three days; I almost died of thirst."

Everyone present felt that something was wrong.

First of all, it was impossible for Spider-Man to kidnap the Sandman; even if Peter and Baker had some conflicts at work, Spider-Man couldn't have done such a thing, and kidnapping him wouldn't bring any benefits either.

Connecting this to what they had investigated earlier, it should have been Robbins who kidnapped Baker, so it was possible that Robbins had disguised himself as Spider-Man, making Baker think it was Spider-Man who kidnapped him.

But there was still a problem: Spider-Man's identity was not public, which meant that basically no one knew Peter Parker was Spider-Man, but now that Baker had chased him here, it proved that he knew Peter Parker was Spider-Man.

He would scream extremely about wanting to kill Spider-Man; besides his own unstable emotions, it was also possible that he learned Peter had made things difficult for him at work first and then kidnapped him, which completely enraged Baker, leading him to choose extreme measures.

The only problem was, how did Robbins know Spider-Man was Peter Parker?

The few people present all thought of this question at the first moment; there were actually quite a few people who knew Spider-Man's true identity; just the group of Spider-Men from other universes alone could be described as a vast crowd.

But it was impossible for those who knew Spider-Man's identity to reveal it; whether it was the members of the Avengers, the Spider-Men of the multiverse, or the agents of S. H. I. E. L. D., they would absolutely never reveal Spider-Man's true identity to others, let alone reveal it to a small character like Robbins, so where did this news leak from?

Schiller quickly eliminated wrong answers in his mind; suddenly, a flash of inspiration gave him some ideas, but he knew there was no need to say them in front of the camera; today's segment about Spider-Man would also be cut, and they could discuss it privately.

But he didn't expect that at this moment, Baker woke up and fixed his eyes on Peter Parker among the few of them.

"Spider-Man!! You damn hypocrite!! I'm going to kill you!!!"

Baker's emotions erupted violently again; Steve looked at the expression on Schiller's face, seemingly asking if he should knock him out first.

Although Schiller, who was on vacation, didn't want to work at all, considering Peter, he decided to appease Baker first and figure out what was going on before doing anything else.

He had just wanted to speak when he heard Peter say, "I don't know what you're going crazy about, but I'm not Spider-Man; I think you must have found the wrong person."

Hearing this, Stark and Steve both looked at Peter with some surprise; in their impression, Peter didn't lie; although he sometimes didn't tell the whole truth because he was led by Schiller, he always upheld the principle of trying not to lie if he could.

Especially on the issue of identity, although there were cameras filming now, they also knew that such important matters would definitely be cut, so Peter didn't need to deny it.

Schiller, however, suddenly understood; Peter had talked to him before about the balance between his superhero career and family; it was likely that Peter had already made a choice now, so he said this sentence with a clear conscience; he didn't want to be Spider-Man anymore.

Baker obviously wasn't completely ignorant of Peter's character; after all, they had been colleagues for a period of time and could be considered to have seen each other often; he knew that this heaven-favored son had his own pride; he disdained to lie and wasn't good at it, and it was even more impossible for him to lie with such a serious and determined posture.

This left Baker completely baffled.

This was the benefit of being an honest person, Schiller thought; if you have told the truth your whole life, then even if this one lie is outrageous, most people will still choose to believe it.

"You found the wrong person." Peter still said in that very determined tone, "I think you might have been deceived by someone; after all, I said before that you aren't very smart; do you know that causing this kind of trouble now is very likely to make you lose your job?"

After Baker's arrogance was suppressed, he slowly sobered up, and then broke out in a cold sweat; he always felt that he had been abnormal during this recent period.

"Doctor, I think he might have been hypnotized by someone." Peter looked at Schiller and said, "Could I trouble you to treat him?"

Looking at the camera not far away, Schiller still couldn't say things like "I'm on vacation," so he had to say, "Alright, I'll do my best."