Chapter 60

The new principal, Xie Dun, was actually quite capable and experienced, and he had extensive connections; his only problem was that his luck was truly quite poor.

No, perhaps it should be said that it was very poor.

His friends helped him nominate a total of six professors, and among them, he just happened to encounter one of Cat Getan's future villains, Mr. Freeze, Victor Fries.

After Xie Dun reviewed their files, he intended to hire three of them, and this group just happened to include Victor Fries.

After the invitation letters were sent out, only one professor accepted the offer from Cat Getan University, and it just happened to be Victor Fries.

Cat Getan University was truly ill-fated; no sooner had they subdued a few demons and captured a few monsters, and just after the departure of the Scarecrow, Jonathan, than a Mr. Freeze, Victor, arrived.

Moreover, Victor seemed to be in great need of this job. Before Shiler could communicate with Bruce to stop Xie Dun's hiring, the invitation letter had been sent out at noon the day before, and by the afternoon of the next day, Victor had already arrived at Cat Getan University. The speed was as if he would go hungry if he didn't take this job.

However, fortunately, just like the Scarecrow, the current Victor was still just an ordinary scholar and professor.

In fact, Shiler knew that even the later Mr. Freeze could be considered relatively mild among Cat Getan's villains. He usually liked to freeze Batman and then chat with him about philosophy and art; most of his paranoia and madness stemmed from his love for his wife, rather than a necessity to oppose Batman or Cat Getan.

The Victor that Shiler met was very similar to himself; both of them were very typical scholar figures. Victor had a tall, straight build, wore a pair of glasses, and the collar and cuffs of his suit were meticulously groomed. Although his expression was somewhat haggard, he still looked like a professor full of learning.

Every professor had their own independent office, but there were also public offices where everyone could sit together to work and chat. After Jonathan left, his spot in the public office became vacant. This time, when Victor arrived, he just happened to sit in Jonathan's former spot, which was right next to Shiler.

During their first chat, Shiler noticed that Victor's gaze had been somewhat distractedly fixed on the ring on Shiler's ring finger.

After a while, he finally steered the topic to family and then asked, "You seem to be married; is your wife currently in Cat Getan as well?"

In Western countries, talking about the other person's marital status upon first meeting is actually not very polite, and some people might feel that this infringes upon their privacy.

It was evident that Victor's current mental state was not good; he seemed very anxious and eager to seek validation.

After hearing this question, Shiler was stunned for a moment; he didn't quite know how to answer. He couldn't exactly tell the other person that he had a symbiote that watched too much television, could he?

Shiler's silence was interpreted by Victor as another meaning.

People are like this; they always unconsciously seek out their own kind when they are insecure and extremely anxious, wanting to find comfort in experiences that are the same as their own.

Victor associated this with Shiler's somewhat astonishing resume, thinking that perhaps among those thrilling detective stories, there might also be a love story even more poignant than his own.

Holding onto this sense of identification as "fellow sufferers," Victor and Shiler quickly became familiar with each other.

In subsequent exchanges, Shiler discovered that he and Victor indeed had many things in common. Victor most enjoyed discussing ancient philosophy, modern art, and religious art, while Shiler also enjoyed theology and philosophy. The two of them had a lot to talk about and could even chat for an entire afternoon when they didn't have classes.

Shiler never expected that the first close friend he would find after transmigrating here would actually be the villain Mr. Freeze.

But it must be said that this Mr. Freeze, who had not yet become a villain, actually had a lot of personal charisma. He was always gentle and refined, had strong empathy, used mild and organized wording, and had very unique insights when discussing certain issues. Chatting with him reminded Shiler of the debates he had with experts in the same field in his past life, which always sparked countless thoughts.

This moderate villain gave people a quite good impression, and this was also something everyone in the office acknowledged.

As his exchanges with Victor deepened, Shiler also learned about his current situation. Victor had already used cryogenic technology to seal his wife away, but this technology required a lot of money and a venue with harsh conditions.

The research institute that originally funded his research was unwilling to continue providing a venue for Victor due to insufficient funds. That was why Victor had come to Cat Getan University in such a hurry; besides the fact that the salary offered here was quite good, it was for the cryogenic laboratory established here by the Wayne family with their own money, which could allow him to ensure his wife remained in a frozen state, preventing her condition from worsening.

If one combines this with the later story of Mr. Freeze, it might make his actions seem somewhat abnormal, but in reality, most of his colleagues in the office could understand Victor. In this era, quite a few people had proposed the theory of freezing those suffering from incurable diseases and waiting until medical technology developed to treat them.

And Victor was merely a pioneer among them.

Shiler believed that such a Victor Fries, even without encountering the experimental accident that turned him into the later Mr. Freeze, was a quite reliable ally.

Compared to the little bat who hadn't grown up yet, Mr. Freeze, who possessed world-leading cryogenic technology and a head full of knowledge, seemed more reliable.

If one wants to solve the trouble of Mr. Freeze forever, one must first solve the degenerative disease his wife was suffering from.

Shiler followed Victor to see the cryogenic chamber where his wife was sealed once. Mrs. Fries was not considered very beautiful; she was just an ordinary white woman, but the look in Victor's eyes when he looked at her was always full of love.

Shiler asked the symbiote in his mind, "Is there a way?"

The symbiote said, "The nerves have atrophied; it's very troublesome."

Victor looked at the cryogenic chamber and said, "My wife's neurodegenerative disease is almost incurable. The speed at which her nerve cells are dying is too fast. I only had time to seal her away; it's impossible to reverse it. Even if I could barely control the cell death, immune inflammation would still damage her brain..."

Victor squatted down, and anyone could hear the despair in his tone. Perhaps he himself knew that freezing his wife and waiting for a solution that might never come was actually just him deceiving himself.

Shiler frowned and pondered. He thought that although Victor was considered a nameable villain in Cat Getan and was indeed a world-class cryogenics expert, professional matters still had to be left to professional people to do, for example, a certain even more top-tier neurosurgeon.

The next day, Shiler returned to Marvel's New York.

When Strange saw Shiler in his home, he threw the coat he had just taken off onto the entryway nearby and said, "Good heavens, you just appeared in my home so brazenly!"

"I haven't even settled accounts with you for selling my information to a certain agency."

"That was them asking me; I couldn't help it either."

In the process of staring at each other, Strange had no choice but to back down. He said, "Fine, but you can't expect me to be like a well-trained agent and say nothing, and it was indeed you who threatened me first."

"Let's not talk about this. I have a way to make a fortune now; do you want to hear it?"

Strange asked quite suspiciously, "A way to make a fortune? If there really were such a way, would you come to find me? I heard you charged that Stark a consultation fee of 1 million dollars an hour, and he actually agreed!"

"When I heard this news, I wished I could go back to college to study psychology!"

"Now, there is a lady who has a very severe neurodegenerative disease, and her husband might possess the world's only unique cryogenic patent technology. You know, the kind of technology that one can live off of just by relying on patent fees."

"If you can cure this lady's disease, then we can share this patent together."

Strange pursed his lips, sighed, and said, "I'll say it again, I am a doctor, not God."

"Do you think you can't cure this disease?"

"But first, shouldn't you let me see the patient instead of you, this middleman?"

"Due to certain reasons, I'm afraid you can't see her, but I have all her pathological data here."

As he spoke, Shiler conjured a large pile of paper out of thin air. Strange took it, glanced at it roughly, shook his head, and said, "Impossible, can't be saved, give up."

Just as Shiler was about to speak, Strange said, "This is no longer a matter of neuroscience. If you want her to fully recover her health, the difficulty is almost equivalent to restoring a piece of roasted bacon back into a pig."

Then he looked Shiler up and down and finally fixed his gaze on the ring on his ring finger. Strange said, "... Fine, my wording just now was a bit absolute. Otherwise, you could go find someone else, although I don't think there is a better neurosurgeon in this world than me."

"What if you cooperate with Stark?"

Strange just wanted to deny it, but he thought for a moment and said, "That Stark might have some research in mechanics, but if his technology is to be applied to neurosurgery, it still requires a lot of research and modification. If you can convince him to spend so much effort to research this technology, then I could give it a try. However, you'd better be prepared with a consultation fee that satisfies me."

Before Strange's voice had even faded, Shiler had already disappeared. Recalling the ring he had just seen on Shiler's hand and then thinking of Shiler's attitude, Strange obviously misunderstood something as well. He sighed and muttered to himself, "Ha, love... truly stupid enough."

Shiler, who suddenly appeared behind Stark, gave him a big fright, and then he shouted loudly, "I know you have this magical magic! But that's no reason for you to walk up 30-plus floors without an elevator! Aren't you afraid of getting stuck in the wall?"

Shiler said, "What kind of nonsense are you talking about? How could magical teleportation get stuck in a wall? That's too stupid."

"I hope I won't receive a call from a repairman one day, telling me that a human-shaped hole has appeared on a certain wall of Stark Tower."

"Alright, I came to find you for serious business."

Shiler took out that large pile of data again.

Ten-plus minutes later, Stark said, "Actually, you really found the right person; I have some research in neurology."

He took a pen, walked around the table, and said while walking, "You know, last time I obtained a large amount of biomechanical data from Obadiah's database, and among them were some technologies related to the adaptation of the nervous system to mechanical control."

"Although these technologies are very dangerous, it cannot be denied that if successful, it would allow the human body's control precision over mecha to reach an unprecedented height."

"If the machinery could directly receive commands from the central nervous system, it would save all the time required for secondary operations, allowing all battle armors to truly reach the level of being as flexible as an arm."

"So you can do it?"

"No, not yet. Obadiah's research on this technology also stopped at a bottleneck phase. There is a key technical threshold that needs to be broken through, and currently, we have no ideas."