amaotonovel Chapter 4685 The Demise of the X Royal Family (6)
Chapter 4685 The Demise of the X Royal Family (6)
Chapter 4685 The X Royal Family: Demise (Part Six)
"Where did you get all this stuff?" Schiller asked, looking at the documents on Stark's desk with some surprise.
The two guests were in a suite, meaning two bedrooms opened into the same living room. At that moment, Stark was at a round table in the center of the living room, studying a table covered with documents.
Most of the drawings were extremely complex, with so many numbers and letters that it was dizzying to look at. Some of them weren't even in English, but in strange scripts that seemed to come from nowhere, like an alien language. Schiller felt they looked familiar, but he couldn't quite place them.
While Stark was studying, Schiller surveyed the entire living room. The living room was still decorated in a naturalistic style. At the far left was a floor-to-ceiling window, and although it was night, the moonlight was still bright, and the luminous plants were swaying gently.
A round table was placed by the window, with bookshelves on either side, and a sofa on the side closest to the door, with a bedroom on each side. Most of the furniture was made of wood, carved with patterns of vines and flowers.
The chandelier hanging above the round table was very beautiful, made up of six lily-of-the-valley-shaped lampshades, emitting a bright but soft light. This light did not seem to be produced by a light bulb manufactured by modern technology. Although the lampshades focused the light downwards, there was no obvious boundary of the light spot, making it look more like a magical creation.
Whether it was Schiller's imagination or not, he saw the vines on the lamp twitch slightly, as if waving to him. Schiller waved back, but the vines stopped moving.
He looked away, just as Stark reached out to him. Schiller pulled a monocle from his pocket and handed it to him. Stark put the monocle in his eye socket and then asked, "How did your talk with the professor go?"
“Same as always. Conservatives think radicals are too conservative,” Schiller sighed. “Mutants are always so naive. Perhaps the biggest thing they can’t share with humans is their understanding of the wickedness of the human heart. And you? Have you encountered anyone from the main universe yet?”
“They’re still the same,” Stark said without looking up. “The multiverse war has matured them a bit, but it’s clearly not enough. I suspect they might do something stupid.”
"for example?"
"Keep dragging it out until the mother model is fully awakened, and the mutants are at a critical juncture of life and death, then let them turn the tide."
"Do they think they can salvage the situation?"
“They’ve launched a full-scale attack this time, and Doctor Strange is here too,” Stark said, looking up. “If they genuinely wanted to help the mutants, they might be able to turn the tide, but we all know that’s impossible.”
Schiller was well aware that the people in the main universe were there to gain fame, not to genuinely help the mutants, or rather, they themselves were wary of them. After all, the Avengers were on the side of humanity, and the maximum help they could offer was mediation. They didn't care whether the mutants could establish a nation or what price they would have to pay.
This line of thinking isn't hard to understand. It appears that the relationship between humans and mutants is a zero-sum game, a zero-sum game where one's gain is another's loss. Helping mutants gain an advantage means that the Avengers in this universe might be suppressed. This is not good news for the Avengers in other universes. Especially in universes where they have no ability to compete for dominance, the desire to win over and help them far outweighs any attempt to suppress them.
But they didn't want to give up this rare opportunity to ask for help, so they came under the guise of offering assistance. They wanted a good reputation but didn't want to genuinely help, so they kept dragging their feet.
"Can you expose them?" Schiller asked.
“It’s difficult,” Stark said. “The Redgate Orchid factory is very technologically advanced. It’s not entirely human technology; it seems to have some connection to the Shi’ar Empire as well. To be honest, I’m not surprised that Iron Man in the main universe doesn’t have a perfect solution.”
"Why? Because his skill level is insufficient?"
Stark shook his head and said, "The main universe is still too young. They haven't undertaken any large-scale projects on a galaxy scale, which limits his perspective. You can also tell from the content of his research materials that he's trying to understand the principles of the master model."
"Isn't this wrong?"
Stark shook his head and said, "He seems to want to destroy the last remaining pillar. It looks like the best way, since there's only one left. It's not entirely impossible if all the mutants attack. As for sacrifices, they're not considering that."
"But mutants would never agree to that."
“Then they can say that the mutants are afraid of sacrifice, rather than that their plan is flawed,” Stark said. “This plan is a win-win situation for them no matter what. If the mutants actually follow this plan, they will suffer heavy losses, and even if they establish a nation, they probably won’t be able to compete with the Avengers. If they are unwilling to do it, they can’t blame the reinforcements; they should be treated well and thanked for their help.”
“That sounds good,” Schiller said. “While I don’t sympathize with mutants either, we have to find a way to stop the main universe. Otherwise, my ghostwriting of Strange’s medical records will be exposed sooner or later.”
Stark rolled his eyes, took off his glasses, and said, "I do have a better plan, but you tell me yours first."
“I do have a plan, but I think you should go first.”
"Why don't we both say it together?"
They looked at each other and said in unison, "The sun!"
Then the two of them laughed together, a slightly helpless laugh. Stark threw down his pen, put one hand on his hip, and said, "Schiller, you're incorrigible, you damned cosmic destruction engine!"
“You’re no less impressive.” Schiller seemed to laugh in exasperation. “Mr. Mad Scientist!”
The two laughed for a long time before getting back to business.
"The best solution isn't to dismantle the Redgateland factory, but to find a way to control the sun. To be precise, it's to use the sun as a hostage to threaten humanity. For mutants, that shouldn't be too difficult, right?"
“You’re wrong about that,” Schiller said. “The humans in this universe are far more powerful than you think, otherwise they wouldn’t have driven mutants to this point. They not only have sophisticated anti-mind control devices, but also magnetic field correction equipment, and Sentinel robots, a deadly weapon against mutants.”
"I understand the first two, but what's the deal with the last one?"
“All you need to know is that even Phoenix, who was pregnant with Phoenix, was silently killed by the Sentinels.” Schiller shook his head and said, “No mutant can escape the Sentinels. Phoenix, Magneto, Scarlet Witch, all of them.”
"That powerful?!" Stark said in disbelief, "Even those Omega-level mutants couldn't escape it?"
Schiller nodded and said, "Yes, you can think of it as the Sentinels being the rule-based forces that indiscriminately suppress all mutants, the natural enemy of their race. In front of the Sentinels, all mutants are as fragile as paper."
Schiller's description wasn't an exaggeration. In most mutant comics, the Sentinel is indeed that strong; it's more like an insurmountable weakness that the editors forcibly added to the mutants to curb their numerical inflation.
Regardless of unified field theory, chaos power, or the Phoenix Force, any mutant wielding these powers is no match for the Sentinels. You could say the Sentinels are specifically designed to target the X-gene; anyone possessing that gene can be easily killed by them.
This is why, despite having Phoenix among the dispatched squad, the entire team was wiped out, and the Phoenix Force failed to activate. Because when the last pillar was on the verge of collapse, humanity sent out the Sentinel robots.
“This is a bit troublesome,” Stark said. “It seems I misjudged the strength of the mutants in this universe; they are weaker than I thought.”
"That's not quite right. The mutants in our universe acted lawlessly because no one used Sentinel robots to hunt them down. On the contrary, when they were suppressed by the three great empires, ordinary people would help them, which allowed them to unleash their full potential. But the mutants in this universe are outnumbered."
Stark nodded, clearly agreeing. Mutants in this universe are truly caught between a rock and a hard place. They want to unleash their full individual power, but they fear the Sentinels will wipe them out. Without teammates they can trust with their backs, many things become very difficult.
“But it’s not like there’s no way to break this,” Stark said. “If a direct assault doesn’t work, we’ll have to resort to some tricks. But we need to persuade the mutant leader first.”
“Professor X and Magneto are easy to deal with. But the White Queen is now in charge of diplomacy in Clarkia. She’s tough, but she doesn’t use her strength effectively. It will take some effort to persuade her.”
What are you planning to do?
“We can contact another person, her archenemy Sebastian the Black King, and arrange a secret meeting,” Schiller said after thinking for a moment. “I need to talk to Magneto.”
“Sebastian?” Magneto frowned. “The White Queen went to great lengths to get rid of the Black Emperor. If we bring him back to Clarkia at this critical juncture, the White Queen will probably be very angry.”
“That’s exactly what we want to do, to make her angry,” Schiller said. “We can’t let her go to the UN General Assembly.”
Magneto narrowed his eyes and said, "If we don't let the White Queen go to the UN General Assembly, then who will represent us to propose motions and witness the votes?"
“Nobody will go,” Schiller said. “And you’re going to spread the word that there’s infighting among the mutants, that there are even signs of collapse, and that establishing a nation is probably going to be difficult.”
"Why do this?" Magneto's expression turned cold. It seemed that if Schiller hadn't left a decent impression on him earlier, he might have already wanted to get rid of him. "This is a crucial moment in the founding of our nation. How can we boost the morale of others while diminishing our own?"
Schiller sighed. The chances of finding out if any mutant understood politics seemed so slim that he had to spend some time on prenatal education.
"If mutants are the biggest threat, everyone will target you. But if the mutant threat is gone, who should own the megafactory hanging over their heads and the powerful weapons it produces?"
Magneto was stunned; he hadn't considered this question. Schiller continued, "Such a powerful super artificial intelligence, once fully awakened, could not only exterminate mutants but also have a tremendous impact on the situation on Earth. If it's not used to deal with mutants, then nobody wants it to be used against them, right?"
“In a way, the annihilation of the raiding party is actually a good thing for you.” Schiller stepped forward, looking into Magneto’s eyes, and said, “You have proven to the human government that you are not as strong as you think, and that the Sentinels are more than enough to deal with you. But the Redgate Orchid Factory is already built, and the Mother Model is about to awaken. Humanity doesn’t have much time left to decide which superweapon to fire at.”
"X-Royal Family" is really, really good. The art style is exquisite and the lighting is beautiful. The scenery of Clarkia is beautiful and the plot is also of a good standard. The character designs of Magneto and Professor X are superb. Everyone should definitely check it out!