Chapter 3896

"I'm afraid someone has reached the opposite conclusion," Peter said. "You feel that Scott is already prepared to give up on you, but he can't accept this decision himself, which is why he's taking his anger out on Wolverine. But I feel that he was never prepared to give up on you; he just doesn't love you as he did before, and he realizes he doesn't love you enough, yet he doesn't know how to make up for what's missing. His attacks on Logan are just an attempt to buy more space to keep you."

Jean stared blankly at Peter, seemingly not expecting him to say such a thing at all. Her shoulders began to tremble slightly. Peter reached out a hand and pressed it onto her shoulder, then said, "Don't be nervous; actually, this is good news for you. Because if the decline in Scott's affection for you is perhaps partially due to the instigation of a mastermind, and he himself is unwilling to give up and is still struggling, then there is actually still a possibility between you two."

Jean swallowed and said, "You mean someone is influencing and inducing him, causing his feelings for me to gradually weaken. But he himself doesn't want this, so he is trying hard to seize every moment to win me back. And in order not to let Logan take advantage of this time to step in, he keeps targeting him?"

"Yes, just like a wounded beast; in order not to let competitors get ideas about him, even though he is injured, he must bare his fangs and claws to show his strength."

"But I don't understand, is one person's love for another so easily influenced? If someone can just say a few words and make Scott love me less, then doesn't that mean he didn't love me enough in the first place?"

"I don't think so. Because you said before that your pursuit of a sense of security is almost pathological, yet he is still trying hard to provide it for you, and you are able to realize this problem and are adjusting as much as possible—this isn't something just anyone can do. Many couples can't get past this hurdle, which proves that the feelings between you aren't that shallow."

"Then why would he waver?"

"This proves that the person who shook him definitely didn't just say a few simple words," Peter said. "No matter how capable a person is, there's no way to guard against someone else's calculated schemes, which is why there are so many scammers and victims who get taken in. You should have heard similar stories, right? Graduates from top universities get swindled out of all their savings, executives at Fortune 500 companies fall for illiterate people, and powerful political figures are toppled by ridiculous little schemes. When a calculated mind targets an unsuspecting one, no one dares to say they can definitely resist it."

"And," Peter paused deliberately to attract Jean's attention, then said, "we speculate that that thing might be an electronic lifeform. You understand electronic lifeforms, right? Like Ultron. Back then, we fought until the sky went dark..."

Jean immediately became nervous. She clenched her fists and said, "Now that you mention it, I do remember. Just a few days before the incident, we went to eat at a restaurant we like. Before the food was served, he kept playing with his phone. I tried to start a conversation several times, but he ignored me. He wasn't like this before."

"Playing with his phone? How was he playing with it, roughly?"

"Just pressing the keyboard," Jean said with some hesitation. "He might have been typing, but he didn't type this fast before. I thought he was playing a small game like Pac-Man, but he wasn't repeatedly pressing a few keys, and it didn't look like he was playing a game."

Now Peter was certain that Cyclops's chat partner definitely had a problem. Because Phoenix and Iceman both physically saw him typing and chatting, but no information could be found on the internet—it was precisely because it had been cleaned too thoroughly that there was a problem.

"Wait," Peter said after a sudden pause, "are you saying you saw the whole process of him typing?"

"Yes, because I was very surprised, and I was also dissatisfied with his attitude, so I kept staring at him."

"Let's go." Peter stood up immediately and reached out to pull Phoenix. Jean was startled by his action; one must know that no one had ever dared to treat her like this before, as everyone was always cautious.

Jean was thus blankly pulled by him to Professor X's office. After entering the office, Peter slammed the door shut and said to Professor X, who was sitting behind the desk, "Professor, I'm afraid you must break your principles for a moment. This lady saw the entire process of Cyclops typing; as long as you can read her memory, we can know what Cyclops chatted about with the other party."

Professor X was also stunned, clearly baffled by Peter's somewhat novel line of thinking. Peter thought he didn't understand, so he took out his own phone, pointed at it, and said to Professor X, "Professor, look at this phone; there are 26 keys on it. When operating a phone, it can be roughly divided into four areas. As long as you observe the other party's hand movements—that is, which area each tap landed in—you can deduce the vocabulary the other party typed, and then crack the content of their chat."

"Of course, I recognize a phone, and I know there are 26 English letters; I am a British person, after all," Professor X said with some helplessness.

Phoenix's mood had been a bit low, but she broke into a smile upon hearing this. Peter also felt a bit awkward, but this couldn't be blamed on him; after all, Professor X was an old man and didn't look like the type who would use smart devices.

"I just don't quite understand," Professor X said, looking at Peter, "aren't we already planning to rely on Scott to lure the other party out? Why do we still need to deduce the chat content?"

"Of course, it's to understand his motivation," Peter said. "The other party is an electronic lifeform; there is basically no possibility of a third party intervening. This thing is a logical creature and fundamentally cannot understand human emotions, so it's impossible that it went to flirt with Scott. Then the reason it did this is very worth investigating."

Professor X thought for a moment and felt that Peter made sense. Jean also chimed in from the side, "If it's really as you say, that there's an electronic lifeform behind the scenes instigating the feelings between us two, then what is its purpose? Could it be to stimulate the Phoenix to erupt? But what good does this do for it? If the universe is destroyed, wouldn't it die along with it?"

Peter shook his head and said, "If it really wanted to guide the Phoenix to erupt in a way that could destroy the universe, then it should have killed Scott directly. The stimulation of seeing the person you love most die right before your eyes is enough to force out the Phoenix's potential."

Jean shivered. But she soon seemed to remember something and couldn't help but turn to look at Peter, just happening to catch the sadness lingering at the corners of Peter's face.

Jean pursed her lips tightly and couldn't help but walk to Peter's side, placing her hand on his shoulder. At that moment, Jean suddenly had a strange feeling, and the Phoenix, which had been somewhat restless from imagining the scene of Scott's death, suddenly calmed down.

Jean was impacted by that feeling and didn't notice the Phoenix's state for a moment. But Professor X, who was exceptionally sensitive in this regard, blinked his eyes gently and shook his head slowly.

"Can you do it, Jean?" Professor X asked.

Hearing Professor X's voice, Jean slowly pulled herself out, and then she discovered that the Phoenix was surprisingly calm. She felt a bit lost but also pleasantly surprised, and couldn't help but take a light breath.

"Yes, no problem, Professor," Jean said. "It really is necessary to see what Scott is chatting about with the other party. If I hadn't been completely unable to judge the words being typed, I wouldn't have needed to trouble you all."

"It's alright, come sit here, just like the psychological therapy before, close your eyes and follow the rhythm of the metronome to breathe..."

After Jean sat down, Peter went out. But before he could even turn around after closing the door, Professor X's voice came from inside: "Alright Peter, you can come in."

Although he had already witnessed it, Peter still sighed at this—not sighing at Professor X's power, but sighing at the fact that two such powerful people had been busy for more than half a century and still hadn't accomplished much; they were probably just busy flirting.

"Next, there might be a video projected into your mind, but this won't read any content in your heart. You don't need to... oh, my god, I wasn't flirting with Erik!"

As soon as the words fell, Professor X realized he had let it slip. He hurriedly coughed a few times forcefully, then said, "That thought of yours was too prominent; the moment the brainwave connection was made, it jumped into my mind; it can't be counted as me actively reading it. And this is also a bit too impolite; Erik has three children, after all..."

Peter just giggled, then left the office. After going out, he asked someone for paper and a pen, found an empty office, and began to deduce.

This sounds simple, but it's actually a bit difficult to do; after all, one area has quite a few letters, and there are many combinations with letters in other areas. Some longer words are easy to deduce, but some prepositions with only two or three letters can only be inferred based on semantics.

Moreover, the finger trajectory can only show what Scott said on this side; fortunately, the angry Scott refuted the electronic lifeform's words point by point, so one can also see what the other side roughly said through his replies.

Peter wrote and drew, deducing for a long time. And as the chat content became more complete, his brow furrowed deeper and deeper. Finally, looking at the finished draft on the paper, he sighed deeply, feeling that what the moonlight told him that day was right, but it was only a part of the truth.

Scott's love for Jean was indeed weakening, but it wasn't that he himself wanted to give up. If that were really the case, these feelings wouldn't have converted into a paranoid possessiveness and finally been vented on Logan.

The truth might be exactly the opposite. Scott realized that his love for Jean, the tolerance he gave Jean, and his almost bottomless actions of giving her a sense of security might be wrong and harmful to Jean, which is why he had to gradually withdraw them.

Peter couldn't help but clench that piece of paper. He didn't know whether he should tell Phoenix about this; perhaps the moment she realized it, everything would be different.

But Peter's moral bottom line didn't allow him to hide or modify it either. He could only sigh again, clutched the paper, walked out, hesitated for a long time in front of Professor X's office door, and finally knocked on the door.

When he walked in, Professor X was chatting with Jean. It wasn't hard to see that Jean's state was much more relaxed and much calmer than before. When Peter walked in, he kept his head down, and Professor X keenly sensed the fluctuation in his emotions.

Standing in front of the desk for a long time, Peter finally placed the somewhat crumpled paper on the desktop. The other content and sentences written on it were relatively short, looking like two people arguing about whether someone loved him or her, and whether he loved someone enough.

Only one paragraph was very long, which Peter had marked with a different colored pen, proving that it was sent to Scott by his chat partner. Jean focused and looked closely:

"Have you heard of 'nurturing addiction' in psychology? Some people will constantly provide food to their partners, growing their appetites, making them become increasingly obese until others cannot accept them and cannot provide them with so much food, binding the partner to their side.

Such people will turn their partners into helpless individuals who only know how to receive, making them increasingly greedy, even craving to the point of madness, while they themselves enjoy the pleasure of saving and providing.

In my view, your relationship with Jean Grey is just like this. Your promises that far exceed reason and your bottomless giving have become the most convenient and quick way for her to obtain a sense of security. As long as she feels insecure, she hides back in your nest, never thinking of other ways.

However, one day, she will realize that what makes humans feel truly secure and satisfied is not playing the weakling being saved, but becoming the strong, becoming useful to others, becoming their support, and becoming their savior."