"So what's going on?" Little Bruce looked at Schiller and asked. At this time, they were in the study room of Wayne Manor, but there was also a light mist on the wall, which isolated it into an independent space.
Little Bruce saw everything that just happened. Unlike Dick, he was better at reasoning and could quickly figure out timelines that were too complicated for ordinary people.
From the perspective of the youngest Nightwing, that is, Dick, he fell asleep, woke up, went out, and came to the office in an instant, and then saw them sleeping in the office.
All of this is a complete timeline. The only space switch in the middle is to come to the office immediately after leaving the house, but this is not difficult to do. At most, it is just a teleport.
The sleeping people seen outside the office door are still from Dick's past timeline, because they did fall asleep before.
Then what appeared in front of Dick was another office. A series of things that would happen in the future appeared outside the office window, that is, the remaining two people were attacked by the eyes, drove the car to the roof in a panic, and then fell down.
.
There is a change in the timeline here for the first time. There is no Dick in the car, which means that Dick still left according to the original process. Then this timeline may be Dick's subsequent timeline.
Dick made a move after seeing this future, which was to return to the office showing the past scene and throw the fire extinguisher out. This means that he changed the past, and it also means that the changed will be produced accordingly.
future.
And this changed future is the story brought about by the appearance of Nightwing in the main universe later. That is, Dick threw a fire extinguisher down, causing Dick in the past to be hit, causing him to fail to go out smoothly, causing what happened when he went out.
The main universe Nightwing wanted to search for fixed equipment.
This all seems to make sense, but the problem is that when the fog cleared, the main universe Nightwing who was changed in the future stayed, and Dick in the future who was not changed also stayed. This is completely
It's a paradox.
Assuming that the future has been changed, the injured Dick should be sitting in the car and driving away with Nightwing from the Arkham Universe. Assuming that the future has not been changed, there should be a crashed Batmobile at the door.
But the current situation is that Dick stayed with the main universe Nightwing who came to find the equipment. This means that the future where Dick did not throw the fire extinguisher, which caused him to come here smoothly, and the future where he threw the fire extinguisher, which caused the main universe Nightwing to come here, are at the same time.
happened.
But human time is linear. There can only be one future on the same timeline. It is impossible to want both. So what is going on?
Little Bruce's brain began to smoke a little. He speculated that either the several timelines would merge together when the thick fog cleared, and whoever stayed would be the winner, or that time and space might have converged at a certain point in time, and they would have returned to normal.
People in the timeline will not be destroyed just because the future they live in has not happened, but no matter how you think about it, it is flawed and completely unreasonable.
"Why do you think the fog really has the ability to manipulate time and space?"
"...?"
Little Bruce stared at Schiller silently. Schiller picked up the tea cup and took a sip of tea and said, "Just because these Robins think so, do you think so too?"
"I think you should have such an ability." Little Bruce said dryly: "...You do, right?"
"Is it important whether I have it or not?" Schiller said: "Even if I have it, what evidence is there to prove that I used this ability just now?"
Little Bruce immediately figured out everything. He covered his forehead, unwilling to admit that he had been tricked.
But Schiller still played another perspective to him, that was his perspective. The thick fog appeared again, and this time they were standing on the side of the road where the car was.
The three Nightwings were discussing in the car whether to get out of the car, and then they felt that since the thick fog had invaded, sitting in the car to avoid limiting their performance would not be conducive to dealing with the enemy, so they decided to get out of the car.
The moment they reached out to push the car door, their expressions all became dazed, and then they fell into a coma.
But different from the perspective just now, this time only Dick woke up. He woke up suddenly, and then began to talk to himself in the thin mist in front of him.
Seeing his hand pressed against the car door, little Bruce knew that this should be the next episode of "Getting Off".
As a result, Dick never got out of the car.
He passed out again, which meant that Schiller never used the ability to teleport at all, and Dick never went to any office at all. The things he saw were just hallucinations.
The next person to wake up was Nightwing from the main universe. He seemed to have seen something and rushed toward the car door in panic, shouting "Dick, are you okay?" and "Where did this fire extinguisher come from?"
of?"
But he didn't get out of the car, and soon passed out again. Until finally, the two of them pushed open the door of the building in a hallucination, and they both pushed open the car door and got out of the car.
The last one to wake up was Nightwing from the Arkham Universe. This time he woke up, he really woke up, but he saw the shadow standing deep in the thick fog, stepped on the accelerator and chased after him.
Finally, Schiller randomly found a fire extinguisher from the office building, threw it from the window, and hit the two people with a loud bang.
The two people in front of the gate seemed like they were worlds apart.
Little Bruce covered his eyes and said: "This thick fog is not that powerful at all. The effect of putting hallucinogenic drugs is the same."
Schiller shook his head. Little Bruce thought he could say something noble, but Schiller said: "You don't need hallucinogens, you can do it with hypnosis. After all, opening the car door is not a complicated action. Give me ten minutes."
, I can guide them to do it.”
"But why are you doing this?" Little Bruce didn't understand.
Schiller said: "Just to make them believe it."
"Usually I don't express any specific images in my works, but people come to view the works for two purposes."
"The first kind of person tries to interpret the work and dig out the author's creative purpose and creative ideas from the author's picture performance. If he can understand and dig it out, he can get something like 'My aesthetic level is very high, I
The self-satisfaction of understanding everything about the author."
"The second type of people try to resonate with the work. They read the strong emotions that the author wants to express from the author's pictures, and then resonate with their own emotions. They can get something like 'His emotions were the same as mine at that time.
Sure enough, there are still people in this world who understand me' and other emotional satisfaction."
"But no matter what, they came with a purpose, and they also hope to gain something in the process of appreciating the works."
"If they can't get it, they won't think 'It's because my aesthetic level is low and I can't understand all this', or 'No one can understand me at all, not even artists.' They will skip it in a hurry and don't understand it.
Think of it as exhibits, and look for those that allow you to experience them.”
"So in addition to conveying his own ideas and emotions, a good artist must first satisfy some superficial needs of the audience, so that when they first see the work, they will have a sense of 'I will definitely gain something from it'
I feel like this can attract people to stop.”
"If you make everything too abstract from the beginning, as I said, without showing any specific images, then they will just treat you like a white wall in an art gallery and rush past without any understanding.
.”
Little Bruce thought of the Robins' initial comments about this dense fog. Although they also mentioned some phenomena, the general meaning was that it was just a very common natural phenomenon that would not have any impact and there was no need to pay attention to it.
But I believe that after this time, they will not think so. Although they still did not suffer any substantial damage, what impressed them was the regularity shown in the thick fog.
Sure enough, he heard Schiller continue.
"In the early stages, you have to create a pattern that is easy for them to understand at first, but then explore the possible patterns in depth. For example, since they understand the performance of some witnesses to mean that time and space in dense fog are chaotic, then we will
Do this.”
"To tell you the truth, I do have a way to manipulate space and time, but I'm not powerful enough to do it in every universe. It's limited to special areas and special events. I usually don't use such troublesome methods.
Which one saves time and effort, a dream or manipulating time and space?”
Little Bruce was speechless. Of course it was the former. They were not gods with rules of time and space. No matter what method was used, it would always be laborious to achieve this.
And this kind of illusion is not that Bruce is overconfident. He has quite in-depth research on the power of the evil god. The creation of illusions can basically be said to be the basic skill of the evil god and his followers.
After all, the righteous gods can bless you generously, making you strong and lucky, but the evil gods usually don't do this. They mainly rely on trying to fool believers, and hallucinations and insanity are necessary to make the pie bigger.
Skills, if any evil god doesn't know this, he won't be able to survive at all.
It's just that Schiller's way of drawing pie is so unique that little Bruce can't react for a while. The evil gods usually present things in their hallucinations that believers want, such as a happy family, resurrection from the dead, money and...
that power.
Schiller was better off, let alone contentment and happiness. After this trip, there was probably nothing left but fright and fear.
And this kind of fright and fear is not a threat, it does not mean that these people feel afraid and therefore obey. They are afraid, but they don’t know what they are afraid of.
"So what's the point?" Bruce asked.
"Don't you find it interesting?" Schiller said with a smile: "Those rules they discovered, the loopholes they thought they could exploit, all the investigations and explorations they conducted, and the truth they worked hard to find were actually just the results of your director's work.
False."
"And the most subtle thing about this performance is that they will think that all this is the evil consequences they have brought upon themselves, and that their initial prying and curiosity are original sins."
"They will naturally abandon these most precious qualities of human exploration of the external world, and even warn their hopeful peers that their exploration and pursuit are meaningless, because those things cannot be heard, seen, or
Look straight.”
Little Bruce felt a chill on his back, but he still looked at Schiller and said, "Aren't these Robins your descendants? Why do you treat them like this?"
"My target is not them." Schiller looked at little Bruce and said: "They are too mentally healthy, and they always think about Batman, and they are not committed enough. If the protagonist of this play is them, it will be too boring.
Already."
"The most wonderful thing is that the moment the protagonist in the painting turns to look at you, he is shocked when he realizes that the glorious world he was so sure he owned is actually just a small corner in a much larger horror.