The days of being a spiritual mentor in Meiman.

Chapter 4444 Dark Prelude (Twenty-Nine)
“Doesn’t he have the ability to become intangible?” Diana said. “When he fought Steppenwolf, Steppenwolf couldn’t hit him at all. As soon as Steppenwolf’s fist came out, he would immediately enter a state of intangibility, leaving Steppenwolf to hit nothing but air. Moreover, his disguise ability is based on molecular-level recombination ability, so the possibility of him being hit is the smallest.”

Clark thought about it and realized it was true. The Martians weren't actually mini-Superman; their abilities each had their own strengths. Superman's greatest power was his mental power—his belief that he could do it. But the Martians, besides possessing various superpowers, were most powerful in their ability to become intangible. They were invincible against any enemy who couldn't touch them.

To put it simply, if Ron had stuck with Steppenwolf, he could have followed him all the way to Apokolips. Steppenwolf and Darkseid wouldn't have been able to do anything to him. This was because his Protoss-like ethereal state made him immune to 99% of attacks in this world. The remaining 1% mostly targeted Martians' weakness to fire, using psychological attacks to prevent him from etherealizing and dodging, but couldn't stop him from etherealizing and reforming.

Victor goes without saying. He's collected all three Mother Boxes and is now at his complete form. His ability to modify things might even allow him to directly alter the power of death. If mastered, he would undoubtedly be a devastating weapon for the Justice League.

Thinking about it this way, the biggest problem actually lies with Arthur. It's not that he's weak. He can now command the seven seas and wields the golden trident. Moreover, he has mastered the power of the evolution of all things, making him formidable against ordinary enemies. However, these powers may not necessarily be able to counter the power of death.

Thinking of this, Clark stood up and said, "I'll go to Atlantis and talk to Arthur."

Diana quickly grabbed him and said, "You can't just go like this. Have you forgotten? You are the President of the United States, and Arthur is the King of Atlantis. Your rash trip could trigger a diplomatic incident..."

"Do we still have time to worry about all that now?" Clark said.

"Don't forget, the mastermind behind this has been watching us closely, looking for a chance to find fault with us. It's best to be cautious."

“Okay, I’ll let him know first.” Clark took out his phone, but he realized he didn’t have Arthur’s number, and there didn’t seem to be any signal in Atlantis. So he called Schiller.

"Hello? It's me. I want to go to Atlantis. Could you contact Arthur for me? I don't want to cause any unnecessary misunderstandings. Okay, I understand."

He put away his phone, nodded, and said, "Done."

Diana felt that if she entrusted this matter to Schiller, he probably wouldn't be able to handle it at all. But she didn't know how to bring it up, so she just said, "In the end, you're the most dangerous one. You're the one they want to defeat the most. You have to be careful."

Clark nodded, turned, and flew away. Diana sighed, sat back down beside her, crossed her arms, and said, "There's still something I don't understand. The Metropolitan Museum of Art didn't just lose the Serpent of Fringe; the archives on the second floor were also stolen."

Hal asked with some doubt, "Information? Information about the Serpent of Frini?"

Diana nodded and said, "And Damian said it wasn't them who sent people to steal the artifacts. Of course, I already have a clue who did it, but I think there are other people involved."

"for example?"

“Those professional robbers are probably Schiller’s men, but they probably have other buyers as well,” Diana said thoughtfully. “I believe Damian if he says it wasn’t him. After all, they’ve already prepared Steve, and they didn’t have time to prepare any double insurance. I think the real buyer probably wants the data more.”

“That’s strange,” Hal said. “If it were politicians or something like that, they wouldn’t need real information. They could just make it up out of thin air. Because they just want the public to know something, not what they actually want to know themselves.”

Diana nodded and said, “You’re right. If it’s just about manipulating public opinion, then there’s no need to get real information. Some ambiguous rumors, or even just making up a legend, might be more popular than those profound historical documents. Politicians value dissemination over accuracy.”

"So, the person who stole the documents genuinely wanted to confirm some things through authentic historical materials. That's why they came to the museum to steal them. They might be researching something."

“Then it couldn’t be Schiller,” Diana said. “He created the artifacts, he made up the historical stories. He wrote almost all of the documents, so he wouldn’t need to steal them again… Wait, is this another bait he’s set up?”

Hal became somewhat interested. He placed his hands on the table, leaned forward, and said, "It must be. Otherwise, he wouldn't have fabricated so much information for no reason. Because once the incident where you were framed happened, it would reveal the history of Martians infiltrating the human elite and concealing their activities. The scarcity of historical records related to the Serpent of Frinier would then be completely explained. It wouldn't even matter if he didn't write anything at all; he could just blame the Martians for erasing it."

Diana nodded again; the logic made sense. She continued along this line of thought: "The historical materials he fabricated must have served a purpose. For example, the red and blue snake in his fabricated myth successfully revealed Superman's Kryptonian identity. This was clearly premeditated; otherwise, it wouldn't have happened to match the color of Superman's suit."

"Are there any other details in this legend?" Hal took out his phone and started scrolling through historical news, examining the events from their very beginning. Then, somewhat uncertainly, he asked, "How did Tutankhamun defeat the serpent again?"

"It seemed to be some kind of scepter?" Diana couldn't quite remember. Perhaps her brain's self-protective mechanism was gradually erasing information about the snake. After a moment's thought, she suddenly remembered a crucial detail, "Oh! The emerald!"

"what?"

"Legend says that Tutankhamun's scepter had a green gem. It was this gem that got stuck in the serpent's body and defeated it. Later, it was set into the tail of the Serpent of Phrygia. And then..."

At this point, Diana suddenly fell silent. She remembered that Schiller had written this part to trick Luther into using the Emerald to attack Clark. And the result of his attack on Clark was that Clark was injured and suffered mental breakdown, smashing her computer while staying at her house.

Very well. I shouldn't have broken through my self-protective boundaries and tried to force myself to think about this damn snake's plot. No matter which stage you're in, you'll inevitably be the one who suffers.

Seeing that Diana was silent, Hal thought something terrible had happened. He quickly asked, "And then what happened?"

"It's nothing. I just..."

The thought of the green gemstone brought to mind Clark; and when Diana thought of Clark, in addition to her own misfortune, she also thought of Clark's recent televised address.

She jumped to her feet, a look of sudden realization crossing her face. Hal stared at her, somewhat bewildered, and asked, "What's wrong? What did you think of?"

"Did you find Clark's last televised speech strange?"

"...What's strange about it? He explained it quite well."

Diana shook her head and said, "The first half was alright. She revealed her identity and emphasized that she grew up on Earth, but the second half was wrong."

"What do you mean?"

"What time is it now? Everyone is hoping he can defeat the Martians. While it's true that we need to emphasize the Martians' strength to put more pressure on other countries, I've already done that in the interviews. If Clark continues to exaggerate, it would be like boosting the morale of others while diminishing our own. Too much pressure on a spring will break it."

"Unlike me, he's the president, and his words carry weight. He could have simply said that the red and blue colors refer to the medal-awarding uniforms on Krypton, emphasizing his Kryptonian identity. But instead, he repeated the story of Tutankhamun slaying the serpent. Isn't that implying that Kryptonians couldn't defeat Martians?"

Hal nodded and said, "That's definitely not right. From a political point of view, this kind of thing can be glossed over; there's really no need to make a big deal out of it, since it's not something to be proud of. The audience who sees it will definitely think, 'He was killed thousands of years ago, so how can he lead us to defeat the Martians today?'"

Diana started scrolling through her phone. Sure enough, she found such comments under the video of her televised address. Fortunately, these people were in the minority; most didn't think much of it.

Perhaps most people didn't realize it, or thought there were differences among Kryptonians. But this kind of thing was entirely avoidable. Even if Clark hadn't thought of this, the cunning Schiller couldn't possibly have. The president's speeches definitely had to go through his secretary.

Schiller didn't change this part, but instead let Clark say it, which means he thought it was fine. Or, it's possible that he added it himself.

Diana was now starting to understand Schiller's style of doing things. He wouldn't force anything; he always let people take the bait.

Take the Serpent of Phryne as an example. When he approached me and Luther, he didn't say, "You have to do as I say." Even his negotiations were somewhat perfunctory. It was more like he came specifically to inform us of the matter. "Anyway, I've told you what to do; the choice is yours."

Diana and Luther were both options. Diana admitted to herself that while she did agree to the job to avoid harassment from secret agents, she was also more curious about royal scandals. Especially scandals related to her profession; she was eager to know what was going on. And so she fell for it.

Luther was the same. Let's not even talk about Wikipedia. If he hadn't believed those far-fetched tales of slaying the snake, he wouldn't have fallen into the trap. But he felt threatened at that moment, and so he took the bait too.

Rather than saying Schiller was good at manipulating emotions, it would be more accurate to say that he was good at seizing on other people's fleeting emotions and throwing out an enticing bait at that crucial moment, which few could resist.

Thinking along these lines, many things that seemed incomprehensible become clear. Diana said, "The stolen documents were definitely some kind of bait, designed to lure people who wanted to know certain things."

"The same goes for the televised address. That part, which had absolutely no reason to be added, was just a tempting bait. He must have sensed some fish lurking under the hook. All of that was there to lure him in."

“That sounds impressive,” Hal said. “I’ll never understand the world of these kinds of people. But I think I already have a guess at what kind of person he’s trying to hook.”

“Tell me about it.” Diana raised an eyebrow.

Hal smiled confidently and said, "Fishing is a game of patience. For anglers, they need to have enough patience to wait for the fish to bite. But what they are waiting for is not for the fish to let its guard down."

"what is that?"

“The fish are hungry enough,” Hal said. “If they’re hungry enough, they’ll definitely bite. Who do you think is the hungriest right now?”