Stark hung up the phone and said, "The ladies are fine, but Jarvis said there are some matters he needs to discuss with me, so today's schedule is over. What do you all think?"
Peter glanced at Beck, who was still somewhat groggy, then turned to Shiller and asked, "Doctor, he doesn't seem to be in good shape. Do you need any medication? Perhaps we can have someone send it over."
Shiller shook his head and replied, "It's nothing serious, but I think ending the day's activities so abruptly is a bit hasty. Eddie probably hasn't managed to capture much footage, right? Maybe you guys could go have some more fun at the beach tonight, isn't there a bonfire party?"
"It seems like Wanda and Jarvis have run into some trouble," Stark said. "It might be about the children. I think I should go comfort..."
"That's all it would be, comfort," Shiller said. "Besides, you've never been great at comforting people. It's more likely you'll say the wrong thing and get smacked by Wanda."
Stark opened his mouth to retort, but after pausing, he realized he had nothing to counter with and could only mutter, "She wouldn't hit me. At least I'd run."
Steve looked at Shiller and said, "We just don't want to be out having fun while you're left alone to deal with work. It's not fair to you, and we can't always rely on you to solve our troubles."
"I'm not particularly interested in the bonfire party," Shiller said, shaking his head. "Besides, my glasses have gone missing. I need to buy a new pair before I go anywhere crowded."
"How myopic are you?" Peter asked.
"Over 300 degrees," Shiller casually threw out a number and then added, "Though it's not completely blind, I'm still worried about bumping into someone. I'll take Beck and head back; you guys go have fun."
Hearing Shiller say this, the others had no choice but to let him go. Stark sent Jarvis a text message, and Jarvis and Wanda said they would head back as well.
"Your current situation is not suitable for staying in a hotel anymore," Stark said. "I was planning to invite you over once the house in Hollywood was bought. But now, it seems you will have to stay at the Beverly Estate. Jarvis is coming to pick you up..."
Just as he said this, Jarvis's car arrived. He drove a very spacious family van. Wanda sat with the children in the second row, while Shiller and Beck sat in the last row.
Wanda turned back and glanced at Beck, appearing a bit vigilant as she obviously noticed he was not a normal human. But seeing Shiller sitting next to him, she relaxed.
"What's going on?" After the car started to move, Shiller asked, "You seem a bit panicked, and you're paying more attention to the children. You know this isn't good for your mental state."
"Yes, I am quite panicked right now. I'm just forcing myself to stay strong," Wanda's voice quivered as she said, "Billy... Billy's abilities have awakened. Sooner than mine, even earlier than his grandfather's—while he's still just an infant! He..."
Shiller's brow furrowed slightly. He remembered that in the original story of Wanda and Vision, Billy was supposed to have mind-sensing abilities, or what one might call mind control, while Tommy had super speed.
But in this storyline, these two children were actually formed from Mephisto's powers and weren't real children, merely characters in an illusory world; thus, not a reliable reference.
In general comics, the demon God associated with Wanda is the Great Shadow Cision, who also once extended his magic claw towards her.
However, in Shiller's cosmos, neither Mephisto nor Xeseon had any connection with Wanda. Xeseon might still be somewhat persistent, while Mephisto simply didn't recognize Wanda at all.
Moreover, the power of the Scarlet Witch in this universe had increased, almost controlling the Chaotic Power within the cosmos, becoming the mistress of Chaotic Power in this Individual Universe. It would be very difficult for others to influence her children by affecting her.
Shiller didn't see any influence on the two children, nor was there any gray mist. Their birth and growth process were normal, so it's very likely that their awakening abilities indicated that they were indeed very powerful.
Professor X once told him that mutants would all have a day when their powers burst forth. The timing of this burst was unpredictable, possibly occurring in childhood or even after adulthood.
But the only rule they could figure out was that more powerful mutants had unstable abilities during their youth, which is why they tended to manifest earlier and thus had a saying that the earlier the ability burst forth, the stronger it became.
After all, the most powerful mutants in the world all manifested their abilities in childhood. No one waited until adulthood to burst forth. Scarlet Witch, Polaris, and Quicksilver all became aware of their abilities around the age of five or six. Bobby even earlier; as soon as he could talk, he found he could turn water into ice.
However, none of them ever considered that mutant abilities could manifest during infancy. There had never been such a precedent. Even among those Epsilon Class mutants with abnormal appearances, none were born looking like Nezha. It was only as they grew that they progressively exhibited abnormal traits.
According to Beast's research, the X-gene seemed to have mutated to adapt to human society, similar to how the fetus stimulates hormones in the mother's body to protect itself. The X-gene chose not to exhibit dominant symptoms during the carrier's youth so that the individual could survive.
Otherwise, ancient humans wouldn't care so much. If they saw an infant with anomalies, they would simply kill it. If that were the case, the X-gene, after so many generations, wouldn't have been wiped out but would certainly have become extremely rare.
On the contrary, displaying the ability a little later as they grow up can greatly increase the survival rate of young mutants because, aside from the protective support of emotionally attached parents, the transformation from a non-walking infant into a child who can run and jump also provides the space for those special abilities to be used, at the very least, young mutants would have the option to run if they couldn' t win a fight.
That was exactly what Wanda was worried about, even if mutant abilities appeared after the children learned to walk, she wouldn't be as anxious, but right now, she held an infant in her arms who couldn't even speak yet, but already possessed mutant abilities, and she feared they would be completely uncontrollable.
Wanda cautiously told Shiller about the incident that had just happened at the shopping mall and shared her speculation, "I believe Billy might possess some kind of psychic ability, otherwise why would everyone start crying as soon as he did?"
Shiller, however, had a somewhat different view. After watching the surveillance footage from the mall that Jarvis had played, he instinctively noticed that people didn't start crying when the infant made a crying face or opened his mouth, but when the infant let out the first scream, that's when anomalies occurred.
"Ma'am, I guess you're not familiar with mind power users, but that's okay, I'll just explain the emotions of ordinary people to you."
Shiller's voice remained steady and strong, which did a good job of calming Wanda down. She nodded, wiped the tear marks from her face and said, "Go ahead, Doctor, I'm sure I can remember."
"Humans don't feel sadness when they cry out, they let out a cry because they feel enough sadness, crying is the result, not the motive."
"Knowing this, you should understand that your child felt the emotion of sadness before he cried out."
Wanda nodded.
"If he is a mind power user like Professor X, then in his inability to control this ability, the moment he felt sad, others would have reacted immediately, not after he started crying."
"So the crying itself is the key?" Jarvis asked while driving.
"Yes, I felt a sort of contagion from this crying sound. Did you feel sad when you heard this sound?"
"I... I don't know." Wanda took a deep breath and said, "I don't know if I'm sad because the one crying is my child or if I'm affected by something else, but I just feel bad right now."
"Many people react to the crying of infants, but not with such a strong reaction. When I heard the crying in the video just now, I also felt some emotions I couldn't control."
Both turned their heads abruptly, looking at Shiller with some shock, this was the first time they had heard Shiller admit to not being able to control his own emotions.
The situation was actually more serious than what Shiller had described. The moment the crying sound was emitted, High Tower triggered an alarm.
But Superego and Self detected no signs of any external breach. It was purely an emotional loss of control on Shiller's part, and they observed irregular functioning in the department of emotions.
Shiller was suffering from horizon solitary, where their emotional channels are essentially closed. Children with solitary afflictions have emotions inside them but lack the channels to communicate with the outside world, meaning when they are happy, they don't laugh, and when they are sad, they don't cry.
Their emotions, after brewing and erupting, do not travel through the body's channels, so there would naturally be no physical language or facial expressions, their emotions are completely internalized, as if pouring into another world.
However, just now, Shiller's feeling of sadness took a path wholly unexpected by all Shillers, simply put, it went straight for the eye sockets, which was absolutely abnormal.
Shiller wouldn't cry from the heart, he could feel sadness, and he could imitate the action of crying from others, and through learning, link these two things together, realizing he was in a sad atmosphere, he would learn to cry like others did. That was the situation for most individuals with solitude afflictions.
But just now, without rational analysis of the emotions, without any assessment of the surroundings, Shiller felt like crying.
Since there was no external brainwave intrusion, it indicated that this was Shiller's instinctual reaction, but where did this instinct come from? It certainly couldn't be some kind of limited-time horizon solitary healing experience card, could it?
The underlying cause of horizon solitary is basically a lack of a certain instinctive neural response. To suddenly manifest this response is almost like turning a piece of bacon back into a live pig, which defies the laws of physics.
Without any organ to enable this process, how could it be possible for it to complete out of thin air?
So that leaves only one possibility, that this reaction wasn't completed by Shiller's psyche but by the body of this cosmos.
Note that Shiller's previous life's body did not have this function, which led to his spirit also not doing this job because it had never been done before, just like humans can't breath with gills, they don't have that part, therefore, they can't master the method.
But whether this body has gills or not, Shiller really couldn't say, for this body was actually kneaded out by Superego and had not been fashioned after his past life but was created out of thin air, so is this body actually healthy?