Chapter 953: Schiller's Unlucky Turn (Part 1) (Patreon)

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Schiller stood at the door, stunned for a full two minutes. Then he turned around, rubbed his eyes, and turned back, only to see the sky still filled with a sea of blue cabbage. He took a deep breath and muttered to himself,

"Grey Mist! Grey Mist! Did you sneak some alcohol again? Didn't I warn you not to drink too much of that crazy wine, or it would make me hallucinate!"

Grey Mist hesitated for a moment and replied, "Um... based on the information transmitted through your optic nerves, what you just saw probably isn't a hallucination."

Schiller swallowed hard, took a step back, and said to Grey Mist in his mind, "Are you saying that these blue cabbages are in the real world... Are you sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure. Symbiotes and humans perceive the world differently. We don't observe the world through specific organs."

"But according to the analysis from the symbiote factors just transmitted, there are now over 1,400 blue cabbages in front of you, and the smallest one is about 14 times larger than the blue cabbages humans consume..."

Schiller took another step back.

He opened his umbrella with a "bang" and covered his forehead with his hand, murmuring to himself, "My goodness, what's happening? Is the world about to be destroyed? Is Gotham going to be destroyed?!"

Just then, Pamela and Catwoman, who had gone to change their clothes, descended from the staircase in the research building. Catwoman approached Schiller with a puzzled look and said, "Professor Schiller, why are you still here? Oh, I see, is your car broken down? Don't worry, I can get you a replacement. I'm sure the owner of the car won't mind..."

Seeing them coming down, Schiller felt like he had found a lifeline. He stepped aside to make room for Catwoman and pointed outside with trembling fingertips, saying, "Please, help me take a look. Am I hallucinating? What are all those green unidentified objects outside?"

"Green unidentified objects?" Catwoman frowned, leaned over to look out the door, and then exclaimed, "Oh my God, why are there so many blue cabbages outside? It looks like the vines have all turned into blue cabbages!"

She carefully observed for a moment at the door and continued, "But it seems like a good thing. The blue cabbages are much larger than the vines, and originally, these vines could only entangle the feet of those lunatics. Now, they should be completely immobilized."

Schiller, however, stood still in a daze. At this moment, he had returned to the top of his thought tower, and he exclaimed in a somewhat frantic tone, "Quick, someone! Come on, someone replace me! My allergies are acting up, and if you don't float up soon, I'm going to pass out!"

"Superego? Superego?" Are you there?" Schiller shouted at the air, looking up. "Hurry! Find a substitute! I can't stay on this shift for another minute!"

"No substitutes," came the cold and indifferent voice of Superego. "The only stable surface personality who can float up before the superficial consciousness is you and another guy. If you want a substitute, go find him."

With a "ding," the elevator door opened, and Marvel Schiller stepped out from the elevator. He looked at DC Schiller and said, rubbing his hands, "You're having allergies, right? Hey, buddy, this condition is not suitable for work. I'll take over for you right now, don't worry, I won't mess things up..."

DC Schiller stood there, hesitated for less than a second, and then walked toward the elevator with a resolute posture.

Standing in the middle of the elevator, just before the elevator doors closed, he pointed at Marvel Schiller with his umbrella and said, "I'd rather endure the side effects of a blue cabbage allergy than put up with the endless accounting work you've found for me."

As the elevator doors closed with a faint electric sound, DC Schiller left. After he left, Marvel Schiller shrugged and said, "Well, it's not my fault."

Once DC Schiller returned, he transformed into Grey Mist and arrived at the rooftop of the research building. The building wasn't exceptionally tall, but he could still see the entire situation at Gotham University.

As he had seen at the door, blue cabbage had submerged the entire city. However, as Catwoman had pointed out, in a way, this was a good thing because the dense blue cabbage had trapped those irrational lunatics.

Of course, some uninfected individuals had also been buried in the blue cabbage, but because they retained their sanity, they could struggle and call for help, and they would soon be rescued.

As for those who had already been infected, their sharpened claws could scratch human skin, but they were not powerful enough to cut through the thick stems of the plants.

They could only scratch the outer layer of the blue cabbage stems, but they couldn't slice through an entire head of blue cabbage like an axe. Thus, they could only flail their limbs helplessly, trapped within the giant blue cabbages.

These invading blue cabbages in Gotham were not the usual ones found on dinner tables. First of all, they were much larger than regular blue cabbages. According to Schiller's estimate, the largest blue cabbage was about several tens of meters tall, and the smallest was at least half a meter.

Moreover, each blue cabbage grew in a perfectly symmetrical manner, with the upper half forming a dense spherical structure, making each one look like a mushroom cloud. Amidst the various sizes and heights, there was a strange beauty in their arrangement.

On the Gotham skyline, one after another deep green blue cabbage, scattered among the Steel Jungle, appeared as if they had awakened a determined will to avenge humanity, just like a commonly consumed food item finally rising against its consumers.

However, in reality, their effects did not lead to revenge on humanity because these blue cabbages did not contain common allergens found in the natural world.

At the same time, they lacked the unique aroma of cilantro or celery. The majority of people simply disliked the taste and texture of blue cabbage, but it did not reach the level of a physiological allergy.

Many people are aware that physiological allergies can have severe symptoms, including skin itching, difficulty breathing, and even shock, with severe allergic reactions possibly leading to death.

However, Schiller's reaction to blue cabbage is not a physiological allergy, so he won't experience the severe symptoms mentioned above. Even if he does, Grey Mist can forcefully reverse such reactions. His allergy to blue cabbage is psychological, albeit somewhat severe.

"Grey Mist, take me back to Manor quickly. I need to pack my bags. Gotham is no longer safe for me. I need to go to Metropolis... Oh, no, that won't work. The entire East Coast... Forget it, I need to go to Los Angeles... Maybe the whole U.S...." Schiller gasped.

At this point, Schiller suddenly froze and muttered to himself, "If Gotham, as a Coastal City, is invaded by blue cabbages, won't there be a lot of blue cabbage seeds entering the Pacific Ocean through Gotham's drainage system?!"

"Oh my God, I'm afraid I can't stay on Earth anymore!"

"Grey Mist, take me back to Manor quickly. I need to ask Merkel if the Soviet Union has any recent moon landing plans..."

Schiller turned into a cloud of mist, swaying as he drifted back to Rodriguez Manor. In a somewhat dazed state, Schiller landed right in front of the manor's door and walked towards the building.

The good news was that the interior of the manor had not been invaded. The living room and staircase were all as usual. Schiller didn't even notice that his butler, Merkel, was missing. He practically ran up the staircase in a panicked rush to start packing.

As he placed his regular clothes into his suitcase, he muttered angrily, "Don't let me find out who did this..."

He continued to pack while his head was spinning, speculating, "The only one with the ability to turn all plants into blue cabbage must be All Things Green. But we just made a beneficial deal, and he has no reason to do this..."

"Moreover, he doesn't know about my blue cabbage allergy, and the only ones who know are..." Schiller remembered the three people he saw in the memory space of his room. He folded his clothes and placed them in the suitcase, then sighed and said, "It must be those three..."

"Putting aside the guy dressed as Zatanna, that leaves Batman and Constantine."

"Batman? Didn't I delay his graduation thesis for a few months? Didn't I throw it into the evolution lab's dye vat? Is he really this petty?"

"Constantine? That rotten guy! Didn't I hit him with an umbrella a few times? Didn't I use Curse Spirit to pass the buck to him? Doesn't he understand the concept of being more forgiving?"

"Sneaky, dirty, taking advantage of the situation..."

Just as Schiller turned back to his closet to organize his suit, he suddenly remembered his butler. Where was Merkel?

Schiller was confident in Merkel's abilities, but given the recent strange events, he had his doubts. So he stopped his current task, set the clothes aside, and glanced outside the door.

There was no sign of Merkel in the corridor, which was quite strange. As a butler, he should have welcomed Schiller when he entered the manor. Even if he was busy at the time, he should have appeared within a few minutes to inquire about his employer's needs. However, since Schiller had entered the room and started packing, more than ten minutes had passed, and Merkel hadn't shown up at all.

Schiller looked at the disheveled closet and suitcase, realizing that it would be better to leave this to a professional.

Schiller left his room, crossed the corridor, descended the staircase, and entered the living room. Through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the living room, he saw his butler, Merkel, wielding a massive axe and chopping away at what used to be a giant oak tree in the center of the garden, now transformed into a massive blue cabbage.

Before Schiller returned to the manor, Merkel, who had been working on the garden, witnessed how these plants turned into blue cabbage. He was well aware of how much Schiller despised blue cabbage. Upon discovering this transformation, he had hastily grabbed any tool available to start removing the blue cabbages from the garden, fearing that his employer might go insane upon returning due to an extreme allergic reaction.

Most of the other living plants in the garden had not survived, coupled with the earlier damage from the collapsed awning. The only sturdy one was the oak tree in the middle, which had now become the largest blue cabbage.

Seeing that Merkel had left such a large blue cabbage, Schiller was sure that his employer would go mad upon his return. So, he decided to find a way to cut down this giant blue cabbage.

Schiller, who was watching Merkel chop the tree, was still unaware of the severity of the problem.

In his current dazed state, he failed to realize that, regardless of the circumstances, using an axe meant for cutting down woody plants on the stems of blue cabbage, which were essentially herbaceous, was like using a sledgehammer to crack a walnut.

Moreover, Merkel had received professional training and had much greater strength than an average person. He was in a hurry to remove the evidence before Schiller's return, so with a few powerful swings, he created a large gap in the stem of the giant blue cabbage.

Unfortunately, due to the position where Merkel stood, half of the blue cabbage's stem, which had been cut by him, was completely blocked from Schiller's view.

Schiller stood by the floor-to-ceiling window, intending to call Merkel back, but suddenly, a shadow appeared over his head.

The enormous blue cabbage, towering like an oak tree, was slowly tilting in his direction.

At this critical moment, Schiller's Blink saved his life. With a thunderous crash, the giant blue cabbage shattered the living room's floor-to-ceiling window and a portion of the building on the west side of the manor.

What was even more terrifying was that the blue cabbage that crashed into the living room, its branches closest to Schiller were less than ten centimeters away from his nose, as they stared at each other.

About five minutes later, Batman found Schiller in the manor's hall, looking exhausted and pale, something he had never seen before.

[Read at www.patreon.com/shanefreak, and thanks for the invaluable support!]

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Next Chapter>>Chapter 954: Schiller's Misfortune (Part 2)