Chapter 4437: Dark Prelude (Part 29)

"Doesn't he have the ability to phase?" Diana said. "When he was fighting Steppenwolf, Steppenwolf couldn't hit him at all. Steppenwolf would swing his fist, and he would directly enter a phased state, making Steppenwolf hit only air. And his camouflage ability is also based on molecular-level restructuring ability; the possibility of him being hit is the smallest."

Clark thought about it, and it really was like that. In fact, Martians aren't mini-Supermen; their abilities each have their own emphasis. Superman's most powerful thing is idealistic power, which is "I think I can do it." And Martians, besides having various super powers, the most powerful thing is actually this phasing ability. He is invincible in front of any enemy who can't hit him.

Let's put it this way: if J'onn had followed Steppenwolf closely at the time, he could have followed him all the way to Apokolips. Steppenwolf and Darkseid couldn't do anything to him either. Because his phased state, similar to a star spirit, is immune to 99% of the attack methods in this world. The remaining 1%, most of which are aimed at the Martian weakness of being afraid of fire, are used to conduct psychic attacks on him, making him unable to phase and dodge, but they cannot stop him from phasing and restructuring.

There's no need to mention Victor. He has collected all three Mother Boxes and is now a complete entity. It's even possible that his ability to modify things could directly modify the power of death. As long as he masters it proficiently, he will definitely be a big killer for the Justice League side.

Thinking about it this way, the biggest problem is actually Arthur. If you say he isn't strong, that's certainly not true. Now he can command the seven seas and has the Golden Trident in his hand. And he has mastered the power of the evolution of all things, so he isn't afraid of ordinary enemies. However, these powers might not necessarily be able to restrain the power of death.

Thinking of this, Clark stood up and said, "I'll go to Atlantis and talk to Arthur."

Diana hurriedly pulled him back and said, "You can't just go over like that. Have you forgotten? You are the President of the United States, and Arthur is the King of Atlantis. If you go rashly, it might trigger a diplomatic incident..."

"Can we still care about so much now?" Clark said.

"Don't forget, the mastermind behind the scenes has been watching like a tiger, wanting to catch our mistakes. It's better to be cautious."

"Okay, I'll notify him first." Clark took out his phone, but he found he didn't have Arthur's number, and there seemed to be no signal in Atlantis. So he called Schiller.

"Hello? It's me. I want to go to Atlantis; help me contact Arthur. I don't want to cause any unnecessary misunderstandings. Okay, I got it."

He put away his phone, nodded, and said, "Done."

Diana felt that if he left this matter to Schiller, it probably wouldn't be handled well at all. But she didn't know how to open her mouth to remind him, so she had to say, "All in all, you are actually the most dangerous. They want to defeat you the most. You must be careful."

Clark nodded and flew away. Diana sighed, sat back down next to her seat, hugged her arms, and said, "There is one more thing I haven't figured out. At the time, it wasn't just the Serpent of Frigine that was lost from the Metropolis Museum; the data in the second-floor archives was also stolen."

Hal said with some confusion, "Data? Data about the Serpent of Frigine?"

Diana nodded and said, "And Damian said, it wasn't them who sent people to steal the artifacts. Of course, I already have a clue as to who made the move, but I feel that other people were involved in this."

"For example?"

"That group of professional robbers should be Schiller's people, but I'm afraid they have other buyers." Diana said while thinking, "Damian said it wasn't him, and I believe it. After all, they had already prepared Steve and didn't have time to prepare any double insurance. I feel that what the real buyer wants more might be the data."

"This is very strange." Hal said. "If it were politicians or people like that, they wouldn't need real data. Just making it up out of thin air would do. Because they just want the public to know something, not that they really want to know something themselves."

Diana nodded and said, "You have a point. If it were just to manipulate public opinion, it seems unnecessary to get real data. Getting some ambiguous rumors, or just making up a legend, might be more popular than those profound historical data. Politicians value spreadability, not accuracy."

"In this way, the person who stole the data really wants to confirm some things through real historical materials. That's why they came to the museum to steal."

"Then it couldn't be Schiller." Diana said. "The artifacts were made by him, and the historical stories were all written by him. That data was almost entirely written by him; he didn't need to steal it again... Wait. Is it another bait he threw down?"

Hal became interested. He put his hands on the table, leaned his body forward, and said, "It must be. Otherwise, he wouldn't have made up so much data for no reason. Because, as soon as your framing incident comes out, involving Martians mixing into human high-level circles to cover up history, the fact that there are few historical records related to the Serpent of Frigine can be completely explained. Even if he didn't write anything at all, it wouldn't matter; it could all be blamed on the Martians erasing it."

Diana nodded again; this logic was all sound. She followed this line of thought and said, "The historical data he made up must have its role. For example, the red and blue snake in the myth he made up successfully led to Superman's Kryptonian identity. This was clearly premeditated; otherwise, it wouldn't happen to be the same color as Superman's uniform."

"Are there any other details in this legend?" Hal took out his phone and started flipping through historical news, looking at it bit by bit from the very beginning of the incident, and then said with some uncertainty, "How did Tutankhamun defeat the snake again?"

"It seems like it was with some kind of scepter?" Diana couldn't remember clearly either. It might also be her brain's self-protection function, which was gradually deleting things about this snake. After thinking for a while, she suddenly remembered a key point, "Oh! Green gem!"

"What?"

"The legend says there was a green gem on Tutankhamun's scepter. It was this gem that got stuck in the snake's body and defeated the giant snake. Later, it was inlaid in the tail part of the Serpent of Frigine. Then..."

Speaking of this, Diana suddenly stopped speaking. Because she remembered that Schiller made up this part to induce Luthor to use the green gem to deal with Clark. And the result of him dealing with Clark was that Clark was injured and lost his mind, smashing her computer when he stayed at her house.

Very good. Sure enough, one shouldn't break the limits of self-protection and try hard to think about the plot of this damn snake. No matter which link it is, there is an unlucky self.

Seeing Diana stop talking, Hal thought something big had happened. He hurriedly asked, "And then what happened?"

"Nothing. I just..."

Thinking of the green gem, she thought of Clark; and thinking of Clark, besides thinking of her unlucky self, Diana also thought of Clark's recent television speech.

She stood up with a "whoosh," revealing a look of sudden realization. Hal looked at her with a daze and said, "What's wrong? What did you think of?"

"Don't you think Clark's last television speech was strange?"

"... Where is it strange? He spoke quite well."

Diana shook her head and said, "The first half was not bad. He announced his identity and emphasized that he grew up on Earth, but the second half was wrong."

"What do you mean?"

"What time is it now? Everyone is counting on him to defeat the Martians. Although it is indeed necessary to render the power of the Martians to put greater pressure on various countries. However, I have already rendered it during the interview. If Clark continues to render it, it is indeed a bit of a boost to others' morale and a blow to his own. If the spring pressure is too high, it will break."

"Unlike me, he is the President, and what he says carries weight. It would have been enough to just say that red and blue refer to the award uniform on Krypton and emphasize his Kryptonian identity. But he had to repeat the process of Tutankhamun slaying the snake. Isn't this emphasizing that Kryptonians didn't beat the Martians?"

Hal nodded and said, "This is indeed a bit wrong. From a political point of view, this kind of thing can be blurred over; there is really no need to talk about it at length, after all, it is not a glorious thing. The audience watching will definitely think, it was cut by someone thousands of years ago, can it still lead us to defeat the Martians today?"

Diana started flipping through her phone. Under the comments of the video of the television speech, she really found this kind of comment. But fortunately, this kind of person is a minority, and most people didn't think that much.

It may also be that most people didn't react, or felt that there are differences between Kryptonians. But this kind of thing is completely avoidable. Even if Clark didn't think of this point, Schiller, who has eight hundred hearts, couldn't have not thought of it. The President's speech draft must have passed through the secretary's hands.

Schiller didn't change this part but let Clark say it, which shows that he felt this part was no problem. Or, this part was simply added by him.

Diana now understands Schiller's style of doing things a bit. He won't force any arrangements; it has always been a case of willing fish taking the bait.

Take the Serpent of Frigine as an example. He found her and Luthor, and didn't say you must do as I say. Even talking about conditions was a bit perfunctory. It was more like he made a special trip to inform them of this matter. Anyway, I have told you the matter; how to do it, you choose for yourself.

Diana and Luthor both had a choice. Diana admitted in her heart that although she did agree because she didn't want to be harassed by agents, it was actually more because she was a bit curious about the royal scandal. Especially this kind of scandal related to her profession, she was still willing to know what was going on. So she took the bait.

Luthor was the same. Not to mention Wikipedia. As long as he didn't believe in the ethereal legend of slaying the snake, he wouldn't have fallen into the trap. But it just so happened that he felt threatened at that time, so he also took the bait.

Rather than saying Schiller is good at manipulating emotions, it is better to say that he is very good at grasping certain fleeting emotions of others, and at that critical moment, throwing out an attractive bait, and few people can not take the hook.

Thinking from this line of thought, many things that couldn't be figured out had answers. Diana said, "The stolen data must also be some kind of bait, fishing for people who want to know certain things."

"The television speech is the same. This sentence that shouldn't have been added for any reason is the attractive bait. He must have noticed some fish shadows wandering under the hook. All of these are used to lure him to take the hook."

"Sounds very powerful." Hal said. "I will never understand the world of such people. However, I seem to have guessed what kind of person he wants to fish."

"Tell me." Diana raised her eyebrows.

Hal smiled confidently and said, "Fishing is a game of patience. For anglers, they must have enough patience to wait for the fish to take the bait. And what they are waiting for is not the fish relaxing its vigilance."

"Then what is it?"

"It's the fish being hungry enough." Hal said. "As long as it's hungry enough, it will definitely take the bait. Who do you think is the hungriest now?"