Chapter 520: Secret Exploration of Schiller's Past (Part 2)

When Stark and Steve walked into the asylum, the whole corridor was pitch black. Only one door was open, and the light coming from inside shone on the opposite wall, like leaving a cyan painting.

The two slowed down and gradually approached. When they arrived at the door, Steve leaned close to the wall first and poked his head in. The ward was very small and could be seen at a glance, but there was no one, or rather, what was there was not a person, but a god with a skull falcon head.

Khonshu sat on the edge of the hospital bed, holding a wooden pole in his hand. Stark recognized him. He walked in and said angrily: "Khonshu??? Why are you here?! You controlled Schiller! Where is he now?!"

Khonshu saw him and Steve walk in and showed a very strange expression. Stark felt that he might have had an illusion. He actually saw a feeling of grievance on a skull bird-head face.

But soon, Khonshu's actions told Stark that this was not an illusion, because he heard Khonshu sigh deeply. This sigh contained too many complex emotions: grievance, worry, and deep regret.

Steve, who had just walked in, was not concerned with the strange-looking Khonshu, but with the wooden pole in his hand that looked like a clothes pole. Besides this pole, all kinds of rings and glowing beads were scattered on the ground. Steve turned around, but couldn't understand what had happened here at all, so he could only ask:

"Uh, hello, this Eagle? Are you an eagle? Why are you here? What happened here? Did you see Schiller?"

Steve heard Khonshu sigh again, put the bare wooden pole aside, looked up at the ward, and said:

"You should be Schiller's friends, right? Since you have found this place, you must have some understanding of the dream world."

"That's right. Actually, the time we first came here was much earlier than you." Stark narrowed his eyes and said: "But we haven't been to this room. Which of Schiller's personalities lives here?"

Khonshu sighed deeply again and said slowly:

"The one who can fight the best."

Then, he told Stark and Steve in a rather heavy tone how he met Schiller and how he came here. After finishing all this, he added:

"I am one of the Theban Triad, but I don't live in heaven. This has to start from a previous split war."

"The relationships between Egyptian gods are complex. The conflict between nature gods and animal gods is the most intense. When the war started, I was not in heaven, but after the war ended, I was told that I could no longer enter the home I once had."

"Many gods like me were the same, including Anubis, who is very famous in your human world. His situation is very similar to mine. He is not a pure animal god, but because he has an animal-featured appearance, he was expelled."

"Why did animal gods and nature gods fight?" Steve asked with some confusion: "You are all in the same pantheon, the kinship should be very close, just like Asgard."

Khonshu shook his skull falcon head and said: "Animal gods are more similar to you humans. They have joys, sorrows, and anger, need to survive, and need to fight. But those nature gods who were born from nature and also take nature as their god position, they are more like natural phenomena: cold, arrogant, and fickle."

"I was once incomparably angry at their actions. When I mentioned this story to Schiller, he said he had a plan to help animal gods take back heaven..."

"At first, I wasn't interested because I knew that I and other animal gods didn't want to start a war. But later, I wavered because if I could have a chance to take revenge on those arrogant nature gods, I was willing to pay some power..."

"So, he went to challenge those nature gods one-on-one?" Stark asked with wide eyes, and then he made a cross on his chest and said: "God bless them."

"One-on-one?" Khonshu touched his bird beak with his hand, his jaw moved up and down, making a "clatter" sound. Stark actually saw a trace of a complex expression on his face again, and then he heard Khonshu say: "One-on-one is not a very accurate word..."

"Wait, since you didn't control him, why was he so... before?" Steve pursed his lips, obviously remembering the cold temperament Schiller had when fighting before, especially remembering Baron Zemo, who was stabbed in the throat by Schiller, with blood splashing three feet.

Khonshu sighed deeply again. He held the wooden pole in front of him. Stark and Steve both stared at the wooden pole. Khonshu said sadly: "This is my scepter."

"Hmm... very simple and unadorned, with a kind of primitive beauty." Steve pondered and evaluated.

"But it wasn't like this before."

Hearing Khonshu say this, Stark looked down at the parts scattered on the ground. He suddenly showed a strange expression, pursing his lips constantly, seemingly trying to hold back laughter. Steve obviously thought of something too, but before the two of them could start mocking, Khonshu said it himself:

"I represent the ever-changing moon phases, so I will choose believers with chaotic and complex souls as my agents. When Schiller came to me, I had never seen such a chaotic soul, so I chose him..."

"In the past, when I bestowed power on Moon Knights, I would choose the most chaotic part of their souls to strengthen. As a result..."

Khonshu's huge bird mouth made a "clatter" sound again. Stark and Steve recalled the Schiller who was completely different from the past, and then looked at Khonshu with sympathetic eyes at the same time.

Stark started wandering around in this ward, while Steve said: "Okay, then can you send us to him? We have to confirm he is still alive..."

Khonshu also stood up, carrying his already bare scepter, but Stark said: "Wait, I want to investigate here."

He said to Steve while rummaging through the cabinet next to him: "Don't forget what we saw before. Schiller's psychological problems might be very serious and cannot be left alone. We have to collect more clues..."

With a "clatter," an old cabinet door was torn open by Stark with violence. The moment the cabinet door opened, a pile of things fell down with a "clatter."

Stark was stunned looking at that pile of things. Those things were very strange: sharp plate edges, old wooden pencils, spoons made into strange shapes, wires, ropes, and even two plastic toy ducks.

And, all these things were stained with blood.

Steve walked over and squatted down, pushing those things away with his fingers. He said hesitantly: "I remember you said before that every thing in the dream might represent a memory."

"A bloodstain under the carpet represents a tragedy, so, so many things here..."

When Steve said this, he and Stark were both silent. Stark lowered his head and said: "I read in psychology books that there is a type of person in this world called 'genius psychopath'."

Steve looked at him, and Stark continued to stare at the pile of things and said: "It has a more widely spread term, called 'high-functioning antisocial personality'."

"If I'm not mistaken, each thing here represents a murder case he once committed." Steve picked up one of the pencils, looked at the direction of the bloodstains on it, and said: "Like this..."

He held the pencil in a forward-hand knife-holding posture, then raised his head, pressed the pencil against his neck, and said: "... Stab it in, pull it out, and it will leave such bloodstains. And if you want to kill, it's best to stab directly into the trachea..."

"And this..." Steve picked up the plate fragment that seemed to have been broken off. It was triangular, one corner was the ordinary round corner of the plate, and the other two corners were very sharp and pointed.

Steve pinched the round corner and said: "If it were me, holding it like this, I could kill someone. But if the strength is not enough, you can tie a handle to it. This pencil is not bad."

Saying that, he pushed the pile of things away completely, pointing to each item inside and saying:

"It can be seen that he is constantly exploring the skills of killing. Perhaps at the beginning, his strength and skills were not enough, so he chose the wire that was the most labor-saving and had the highest lethality. As long as you find the right force point and strangle from behind, the target is very difficult to struggle free."

"Afterward, he started using sharp weapons, metal with sharp cuts, which didn't need much strength to cause serious damage to people..."

"Afterward..." Steve threw away the things in his hand, then stood up, lowered his eyelids, looked at the ground, and said: "Perhaps you are right, he is indeed a genius murderer. He only used a few murder cases to become a professional killer, and even, far more than that..."

Stark reached out and picked out the things in these things that didn't look like murder weapons, such as the two rubber toy ducks, half a picture frame, a small box that seemed to be for jewelry, and many other strange things.

"He started to be dissatisfied with doing it himself, but used the environment and props to create accidents..." Stark continued Steve's words: "Perhaps he was exploring the manufacturing method of perfect murder cases. Perhaps he also embarked on the criminal path of those cases in psychology books..."

"No..." Steve denied him and said: "But now it seems that Schiller's state doesn't look like the criminal you said, and if he has already become a criminal, the third, fourth, and even hundreds of personalities can't be split out one by one like this, right?"

"It is very difficult to completely analyze a person's personality and inner world, let alone someone like Schiller whose inner world is too rich." Stark looked around the room and said: "All this is just our speculation based on existing clues, and it's still in a dream."

"In short, we have to find Schiller first, and then ask clearly what he wants to do."

Stark and Steve turned to look at Khonshu at the same time. Before they asked, Khonshu said himself: "When he told me this plan, he didn't tell me everything, but he kept asking me about the details of how gods in the Egyptian pantheon can resurrect believers..."

Stark keenly captured a certain word in Khonshu's words. He asked: "Resurrection? Can you resurrect people?"

Khonshu sighed and said: "In a sense, yes. This has to start from the judgment that believers accept after death..."

"The key... the key lies in the judgment that believers accept after death!" Osiris, who was hung on a coconut tree, said out of breath.

He looked down at the various Schillers surrounding him and said in despair:

"To be resurrected through judgment! Or rather, if you pass the judgment, you won't be accepted by death... The key lies in the balance used for judgment! And the feather used to determine whether the judgment is passed, that is a token of a great existence..." ===== CHAPTER 521 =====