Chapter 184 Strange's Happy Life (Part 1) (Patreon)

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On a sunny morning in New York, before 7am, the streets of Manhattan were already bustling. Wall Street elites in suits and leather shoes held reports and spoke a bunch of professional jargon on the phone while walking. The owner of the coffee shop struggled to move the magazine rack to the door. The drive-thru of the fast food restaurant had a long line of vehicles, and the cars of all colors moved like parts on a conveyor belt, reflecting the sunlight from the rearview mirrors and the glass curtain walls of high-rise buildings.

Summer was almost over, but iced coffee was always in season. A group of young people gathered in front of the Sanatorium on the street corner, drinking coffee and reading magazines. Schiller leaned against a lamppost in front of the Sanatorium's entrance, holding a cup of coffee in one hand and a mobile phone in the other, making a call.

"...Yes, I forgot, but I'm the dean. You can't lock the dean out of the Sanatorium, can you?"

"You said you have something to do. What could it be? Didn't you already hand over your resignation at the Presbyterian Hospital? That was months ago. Besides the Sanatorium, what else do you have to do?"

"You became a special doctor hired by the Presbyterian Hospital? Hey, you didn't get my approval as the dean, and you went out to find a part-time job?... You couldn't find my people? Does that make it right? It's clearly written in the contract..."

"Okay, okay, I know you're a person with professional pursuits. Don't worry about it. Come and give me the keys quickly..."

"A crazy person who broke into someone's house came to you? Like me? I'm not... Why didn't you call the police? Don't you know the number for 911?"

"Who? A bald guy in a yellow shirt? Well, then you can take the day off today. Bye!"

"Oh, one more thing, be polite to her, and come to work tomorrow alive!"

Schiller hung up the phone quickly, took a sip of coffee, and thought happily that he had just returned to Marvel and received good news. What a great start.

Meanwhile, in Strange's apartment, the Ancient One waved her hand, and countless star-like lights surrounded her. Behind her, there seemed to be endless starry sky.

Strange looked at all this in shock. In an instant, these magical lights disappeared, and everything seemed like it had never happened, except for the Ancient One's slightly moving robes. She looked at Strange and asked him, "What do you think?"

Strange opened his mouth wide and was immersed in shock, unable to answer. He had seen Schiller use magic before, but Schiller could only make a pen float at most. How could there be such a grand scene of the universe descending?

Little did he know, the Ancient One also sighed inwardly. The development of the situation was really beyond her expectations.

This matter began with the so-called Bat God's arrival.

At that time, the guardian of the Morin family who came over, the so-called Bat God, was actually just a shameless illegal immigrant, no different from a sneaky mouse.

Because of the existence of Odin and the Ancient One, not everyone could come to Earth. When Odin got angry, even the God of Symbiotes was chopped up, let alone the Ancient One, who was either collecting debts or on the road to collect debts every day.

The invading gods who attacked with great fanfare were chopped into dumpling filling if they entered through the front door and beaten into even smaller dumpling filling if they entered through the side door. Most of the remaining ones became clever and, although they coveted this place, they did not dare to act recklessly.

But when both the front and side doors were blocked, there were still people who didn't mind getting dirty and loved to crawl through mouse holes.

Summoning evil gods has a long history in the history of Earth.

In the era before the position of the Sorcerer Supreme even existed, when humans had just formed tribes and emerged from the stage of eating raw meat and drinking blood, and began to establish civilization, many tribes had wizards and priests who used magic to communicate with this world.

Most of them were just psychological comfort, but a small part of them successfully found the real thing.

At that time, the wizards of the tribes used some rituals to summon a part of the evil god's power to Earth, and used living sacrifices to exchange for evil power to attack other tribes.

At that time, some evil gods would leave their marks and exclusive channels, making it easier for their followers to summon them.

After the Ancient One became the Sorcerer Supreme, he did not hesitate to check and correct these historical loopholes. The gods who dared to do such things paid a heavy price for their youthful recklessness and became fertilizer for Earth's defense system.

Although the Ancient One hacked to death most of the careless gods along the network cable, there were still some cunning ones. They buried more hidden channels, and despite the Ancient One's several attempts to root them out, there were always a few fish that slipped through the net.

The vampires used one of these fishy channels.

This race lived long and always managed to get some strange things. In some ancient books of witchcraft left over from ancient times, they found a way to communicate with the universe.

Ignorance is bliss. They directly sent a signal into deep space, and the Morin family happened to have a member hunting in this universe. He quickly locked onto this place like a bloodhound smelling blood.

He silently came to Earth through this illegal channel and planned to hunt down Spider-Man while chaos reigned.

The story was normal until the giant Venom bat took off. After communicating with certain higher-level mystical powers, the Earth's Supreme Sorcerer, the Ancient One, received the answer that a new beast totem was being born.

Naturally, she became busy. If a new beast totem was really going to be born in this universe, the Ancient One had a lot to prepare for, such as collecting debts, making dumpling stuffing, and a new round of fighting demons and evil spirits.

After all, the busiest person after this big event would be the Ancient One.

This led to a problem - during this short period of time, she had no time to keep an eye on her future successor, Strange. Or rather, the busy Ancient One forgot about this matter altogether.

Who knew that during this short period of time, Strange's life underwent a huge change.

The most significant and impactful change was that he became rich overnight.

Before, Strange couldn't be considered poor. As the world's best neurosurgeon, his income was quite high. But obviously, nothing could beat making money through shady means.

Since he became the medical consultant for the Stark-Osborn pharmaceutical joint venture and gave speeches around the world as an elite doctor to promote the effectiveness of the Elixir of Life, Strange suddenly found that it seemed like the whole world was busy stuffing money into his pockets.

Stark and Osborn's companies would give him a large sum of money as salary, and in addition to that, SHIELD and the Sanatorium would also give him a portion of their payment. However, these were not even his main source of income.

There are many people in this world who are so poor that they only have money left, such as Middle Eastern tycoons who control black gold, Far Eastern oligarchs who control finances, and monopolistic bigwigs in certain industries. You could say that these people really don't know the hype about the Elixir of Life? Actually, they might know.

It's just that they have too much money. Even if they spend money just to hear a sound, as long as it sounds good, they are willing to do it.

In this situation, they are willing to pay a large amount of money to have a top doctor tell them every day that "it works," even if it's just a placebo effect. After all, money is just a number to them.

In this situation, even the price that one of them offered to Strange could make him dizzy for a long time.

And Strange was indeed stunned by the money.

Essentially, at this time, Strange was not like Peter Parker, a natural good person. His high pursuit of his profession was also largely due to the rich rewards and prestigious status it brought him, which is human nature.

But the sudden wealth almost instantly wiped out his views on money. Strange suddenly realized that money was not a reward for his work at all. He didn't really put in any actual work, he just repeated a few sentences like a parrot, then went to fancy banquets to eat and drink, and said a few words to the richest people in the world, and the money flew into his pocket by itself.

Strange found that the way the world's economy operates seems to be a scam. After he jumped from a victim to a scammer, he suddenly wasn't so entangled in it anymore.

After all, being rich is being happy.

So, when the Ancient One returned after being busy for a while and took a glance at Strange, she found that he seemed to have let it go.

Just as she was about to investigate what had happened during this time, she was tied up by a problem - the head of the New York Sanctuary cried and asked to be transferred. The Ancient One had to go and appease these apprentices and figure out how to reconnect the Sanctuary's WIFI.

But she didn't expect that the quantity change of money could lead to a qualitative change.

Not long after, Pepper finished the important work of transferring the power of the Stark Group and began to reorganize the industries related to the Elixir of Life, establishing the Foundation of the Elixir of Life, and Strange naturally became a member.

When you get a stake in such an important industry, everything becomes different.

Simply put, he went from being a worker to a capitalist overnight.

Whether or not Strange had a heart for wealth and luxury, he himself didn't know, but obviously, when the Ancient One came back after being busy, she didn't think he did.

After the Supreme Sorcerer returned, she found that things were heading in a completely wrong direction and were running without looking back.

Due to Schiller's absence, Strange became an indispensable figure in the entire Elixir of Life industry, and his importance was rising step by step, even reaching a pivotal position. He gained the credibility of the Elixir of Life in the medical field, and therefore had the final say.

This meant that he had become just as important as Stark and Osborn in this industry. In order to implement this credibility, Osborn Industries planned to open a company for him to improve the industry's standards. Before the Ancient One could reach him, the process of opening the company was almost complete.

This future Supreme Sorcerer was about to disappear on the road of a capitalist.

But the Ancient One knew that if Strange really became a capitalist who controlled the fate of the industry like Stark or Osborn, then no matter if there was a car accident or the death of an important family member, he couldn't escape the entanglement of worldly fame and fortune, and couldn't turn to mysticism.

Even if he wanted to do so, those who could dig interests from him would not allow him to do so.

For example, if Stark now decided to abandon everything and enter a monastery, the first person to panic would be the President of the United States, and he would be extremely anxious.

Once these people are involved, things will become very complicated. The Ancient One has been in the position of Sorcerer Supreme for so many years, adhering to non-interference. Now, Strange's departure is related to the Eternal Industries, which is related to Stark Industries, Osborn Industries, SHIELD, the military, and Congress. She doesn't want to conflict with so many powers because of her successor's problem.

At the same time, the Ancient One was very suspicious. With Strange's current willpower and morals, would he really not be corrupted by money?

What if he really became a wicked capitalist, lying on a pile of money every day, indulging in the pleasure of not working and enjoying himself? What should she do? She couldn't just chop him up like dumpling filling, right?

At this point, in order to prevent her favored successor from blindly throwing himself into the arms of capital, the Ancient One decided to make special arrangements. The testing steps could be omitted for now, and it was more important to ensure that her Strange did not go astray.

So, on this morning when Schiller forgot his key and got locked out of the Sanatorium, Strange truly understood the magical world for the first time from the Ancient One, and received an invitation to study abroad from Kamar-Taj.

Yes, it was an invitation to study abroad, not something like a compassionate master taking in a disciple.

After all, the current situation was not that Strange was begging everyone to cure his illness, but that the Ancient One saw his talent and did not want him to be blinded by worldly fame and fortune. So, she took the initiative to find him. Naturally, this invitation was more polite.

The Ancient One also knew that under these circumstances, Strange could not just leave. Too many people were counting on him to make money, and if he was just taken away like that, the internet that had just been connected to the Sanctum would be cut off again.

Therefore, the Sorcerer Supreme very open-mindedly expressed that Strange could attend as a day student, for example, by taking the Sanctum portal to attend classes for a few hours after work, and returning in the morning.

The Ancient One also asked Strange to consider for two days before answering. After all, she also had to think about what kind of car accident would make him turn over a new leaf if he did not agree.

When Strange came to work in the afternoon, he was still in a daze, apparently even more shocked by the magic shown by the Ancient One.

Schiller's floating ballpoint pen and other tricks were not unfamiliar to him in magic, but compared to magic, they were more like tricks.

But the Ancient One was a real Sorcerer Supreme, and every move and technique was honed from thousands of chopped-up demonic bodies. When a master made a move, even someone like Strange, who had spent his entire life studying science, or even the most creative magician in the world, would be overwhelmed by the infinite power of magic emanating from her.

"Is what we're doing really meaningful?" Strange sat at his desk, his eyes a little blank as he asked, "I've been studying knowledge and technology for so many years, and that kind of magic... they can do all of it just by waving their hands..."

Strange looked down at his fingers, pointing to a wound on them. "Before, when I was cutting vegetables, I cut my finger here..."

"Then she just waved her hand, and the wound was healed, without any medical technology, without medicine, without a doctor..."

"So what is the meaning of human medicine? What is the meaning of my existence?"

"A patient can just lie on a hospital bed and go find a group of magicians to wave their hands at him, and then I can get lost, because there is no longer a need for ten hours of surgery, or any postoperative recovery..."

Strange opened his hands, he opened his mouth, but nothing came out.

Then he asked Schiller very puzzledly, "You guys are all in cahoots, right? You magic users, what do you think of ordinary people? Do you think we're stupid and ridiculous? Spending decades learning knowledge and honing skills, only to end up..."

He chuckled self-deprecatingly and said, "Like a group of ants just spinning around in the mud, right?"

"Why don't you try it yourself?" Schiller sat across from him and said, "Go and see for yourself if magic is as easy and effortless as you imagine."

"What could be easier than waving your hand? This simply makes no sense." Strange sighed, covering his forehead and said, "I've known since I was very young that there are some people in this world who can easily get things that you will never get in your lifetime."

"They don't have to make any effort, it's just because of their luck. This world is inherently unfair."

"But..." He paused for a moment, and then said, "The degree of its unfairness still exceeds my imagination."

Strange smiled, but it looked very difficult to smile. He said, "It seems that those rich people are also fools who have been deceived. That's the only good news I heard today."

"Do you know how Stark views magic?"

Strange looked at Schiller and he actually wanted to say that he didn't care about Stark's opinion, but he really wanted to know how this group of people who had already reached the top of ordinary humans and had gained the most fame and fortune in the world, viewed these extraordinary things.

"During the vampire invasion, he also thought about this question. The longevity and even immortality that ordinary people dream of, the group of big bats were born with it. They are very strong and powerful, even a well-trained ordinary person can only deal with one of them by forming a group. This looks very unfair, like a joke by a biased creator."

"But later, I thought that this kind of thing had happened millions of years ago, in the ancient wilderness era. Human physique was completely incomparable to those beasts with sharp claws and teeth, but we still survived to this day and developed such a prosperous civilization."

"But this is different." Strange pointed out the loophole in this view, "Those who can use magic are still human beings, not beasts. They have all the advantages of human beings, intelligence, the ability to think, and the ability to pass on."

"And she mentioned to me that they are also organized, just like ordinary humans, working in groups and cooperating with each other. They have all the advantages of ordinary humans, plus magic..."

"So why don't they rule over humans? Or why have you never heard of them in your previous life? Why doesn't such a superior and powerful group stand in front of the public and lead humans to greater glory?"

Strange fell silent and Schiller said to him, "Perhaps there is a possibility that their abilities are completely superior to ordinary people, they are more noble than us, and they will not use this ability to enslave ordinary people."

"And as we all know, when humans have intelligence, they will have ambition and desire. If they are really so superior, they can achieve things that ordinary people cannot achieve in decades in an instant, without paying any price. Then we will definitely see on the pages of history books, a series of fierce wars between them and ordinary people."

"Human beings even try to rule over other human beings based on nationality and skin color, let alone a truly superior ability?"

"So..." Strange hesitated to say.

"So they must pay a price," Schiller said with an outstretched hand. "If you still don't believe it, why not try it?"

"I..." Strange closed his eyes, his brow furrowed, looking a bit painful. After all, anyone who has been denied the years of hard work will feel very discouraged.

But he had to admit that he was very curious about this magical power. Or to put it this way, when he learned about magic in this way, Strange was more puzzled. He wanted to know where this power came from, why it was so powerful, and whether it really had no flaws.

Schiller looked at Strange and thought that now, this future Sorcerer Supreme was not actively pursuing magic because of a strong desire to save himself or others. Instead, he learned about the other half of the truth of this world on such an ordinary morning.

The impact he received was great, but the questions he was thinking about were different. Strange still had the luxury of thinking about some philosophical questions like a leisurely stroll, instead of like a stray dog, clutching at magic as the only straw to save his life.

The change in social status gave Strange more initiative when facing the Ancient One.

Strange still had a retreat. Even if he didn't become the Sorcerer Supreme, he could still be a happy billionaire in the ordinary society. Even if he later became the Sorcerer Supreme, he could still play an important role in this society.

This was also Schiller's goal.

Schiller always believed that a Sorcerer Supreme who was completely detached from human society was not good enough. When they placed themselves in a position of seclusion and superiority for a long time, their mentality would gradually change and they would become estranged from ordinary people, forgetting that they were also born in this ordinary society, which was the root of all things.

And this could very well make them the greatest threat to human society.

Even if Strange, like the Ancient One, could truly transcend the world and remain true to his heart, the role he played would still be too small. With the status and ability of the Sorcerer Supreme, they could do more.

If others did more, Schiller could do less and have more time to slack off with pay.

Therefore, Schiller chose a money attack, using a pie that fell from the sky to knock out this future Sorcerer Supreme, and not let him stray too far from this society.

Schiller asked Strange, "Isn't it happy to be a rich person?"

"Of course it's happy," Strange answered instinctively. "How can you not be happy with money?"

"You may think it's happy to be a rich person now, but after you have contact with the magical and great magic, you will find..."

"Being a rich person isn't really happy?"

"...you will find that being a rich person is really happy."

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Next Chapter >>Chapter 185 Strange's Happy Life (Part 2)