Just as Shiller was about to throw his second punch, Bruce grabbed his wrist. Bruce threw a punch with his other hand, but Shiller dodged it.
Shiller broke free from Bruce's restraint and was about to draw his knife when Night Owl raised the handgun he was holding and aimed it at Shiller's head.
"If you move, I'll shoot," Night Owl said.
"I advise you against doing that," the Pale Knight suddenly spoke, "I can make sure your bullets don't hit him. Want to try?"
Shiller narrowed his eyes slightly, knowing that the Pale Knight was also ready to reveal his cards. He might possess a protective talent skill, but it wasn't clear until he actually used it. Perhaps, like Shiller, his goal was to force Night Owl to reveal his skills.
From the Pale Knight's demeanor, it was apparent he had little respect for Night Owl, the Evil Batman. After all, as a righteous Joker, his natural archenemy should be the Evil Batman, and the Pale Knight probably had wanted to act against Night Owl for a long time.
Although Night Owl was the Evil Batman, he was still Batman. He understood why the Pale Knight was saying these things, but the control of this probing game was not in his hands, but in the hands of Shiller, who was holding the knife.
If Shiller attacked Bruce and Night Owl shot, but the Pale Knight protected Shiller with his talent skill, then the only one unlucky would be Bruce.
Having just slashed Greed's carotid artery, Night Owl didn't know all Shillers were the same person, but even if viewing them as counterparts from different universes, Shiller was cruel enough, perhaps even more than the famously chaotic and mad Joker, who wouldn't usually start with a stab.
"Don't get too greedy," Greed spoke again, "Isn't the information you have enough?"
"It's truly an honor to have Greed tell me not to be too greedy," Shiller wasn't in a hurry. As long as he didn't act, the round wouldn't progress, time stood still, nothing was being delayed, he had all the time in the world to play this mind game with them.
Shiller knew that Greed could see what he wanted, it was just that Greed was too greedy to give it up. If all else failed, he might really have to stab Bruce twice.
"Well, let's switch back to Batman," Greed finally relented, "I don't know what you saw in the last letter, I can only tell you we have our reasons for targeting him."
"You admit it?" Shiller smiled and said, "Then let's discuss what that is all about."
Greed pursed his lips and said, "Everyone arrives here at different times. The first corpse you saw was killed by me, and the first crime scene isn't in that room."
Shiller remembered the corpse he saw upon awakening, the detective who was split open at the upper body. He realized at that moment that such a clean cut wasn't something an ordinary person could make, but it made sense if it was sliced by a Wind Blade.
However, Shiller didn't ask Greed why he had killed him, he just asked, "Who was that man?"
"His name was Doug," Greed revealed a name, "I killed him in the forest on my way from the village to the cabin, and then the heavy snow buried all traces of blood and footprints."
"Was he the detective mentioned in the opening introduction?" The Pale Knight asked.
"Frankly, I don't know."
"You don't know, yet you dare kill someone?!" The Pale Knight frowned, "What if he's key to the plot?"
Greed's expression remained as usual, unperturbed by any accusation, he said, "If he was such a key figure, then he wouldn't have been killed by me. Since he died, it shows his importance wasn't that great."
"That's pure sophistry," the Pale Knight said.
"Fine, let me give another reason," Greed continued, "You all are aware, only we are actually the so-called key figures in this plot, aren't we?"
Shiller understood the implication of his words; everyone who died was just an NPC in the game. This did not mean they didn't have human rights, but these characters controlled by the system were far less useful than players like them who could manipulate the system to change the story.
But Shiller thought that wasn't truly what Greed believed in. Greed's worldview was rather peculiar; he believed everything in the world had a use, and killing or destroying was a form of extreme waste that he detested.
Also, he wasn't the type to kill indiscriminately just because this was a fictional replica. He believed these replicas, much like Marvel's Pocket Universe, contained beings that truly existed, and he should advocate for their right to unlimited development. Even if there were biases, unnecessary killing was not his way.
Shiller believed that Greed had two motives for killing Doug. One was that he had been driven into a corner by Doug and needed to defend himself. The other was that in Greed's view, Doug needed to die, otherwise he would face severely unfavorable circumstances moving forward.
This made Shiller think about how these people, without knowing what stories the others had concocted, managed to develop stories. How did the Transcendent handle the overlaps and contradictions in their narratives?Fill them in themselves?
Shiller didn't believe the Transcendent had that capability, yet the stakeholders of Battleworld were mysterious, one very important character was the God of Stories, Loki. Nowadays, 80% of the original replicas' stories in Battleworld were written by him, perhaps he was the only one who could cleverly weave together the potentially conflicting stories.
Since there were conflicts, choices had to be made, and the Transcendent did not guarantee that the background story would be realized 100%.
Could it be that Greed had learned from someone named Doug that something was influencing the people in the background story he had devised, or perhaps Doug's very existence was disrupting something in his background story?
Supposing this Doug, who was killed by Greed, was the very detective mentioned in the opening introduction, about to die, what did he know that made Greed go so far as to murder him?
This piqued Shiller's interest.
Looking at it from the beginning, the owner of the diary had invited a detective to the village. If the diary's owner was actually the Hunter played by Batman, and the invited detective was killed by the Photographer impersonated by Greed, it would prove there were both connections and conflicts between Greed's backstory and that of the Prime Universe Batman.
Now, there were no clues about Greed's backstory, but the backstory of Prime Universe Batman had already begun to unfold.
Indeed, it had something to do with the health insurance company.
Greed claimed to be a second-generation rich kid; his clothes were indeed designer, and his camera was also valuable. Could it be that he had set his parents to be the tycoons of some insurance company?
It was known that the Hunter played by Batman aimed not to resolve the Wandering spirit but to expose Silterk, so the reason he called the detective was not to investigate anything bizarre.
Shiller immediately realized that the opening narration was misleading: it first mentioned an outbreak of the Wandering spirit in the village and then mentioned a detective coming to investigate it, which would lead people to presuppose that this detective was here to investigate strange incidents.
But in fact, the appearance of the Wandering spirit in this village was intricately linked to what Silterk had once done to Madeline. His investigation into the Wandering spirit might not be for the bizarre but could also be to investigate Madeline or to investigate Silterk.
That is to say, the detective could be an assistant called by Prime Universe Batman to expose Silterk's conspiracy. No, more likely, the detective had already gathered more information outside the village, and this time he was here to deliver intelligence to the Hunter.
Shiller remembered Jeff once mentioning that Hunter Harold had a detective friend who was extraordinarily skilled, a description that made one think this guy wasn't just any regular detective, and getting involved in such matters would be plausible.
So, the process of the entire incident could be that Greed entered the game and encountered Doug, used some method to extract what information Doug had brought, believed this information was detrimental to him, so he killed Doug first, then plotted with Joker to trap the Hunter played by Batman.
It seemed Greed knew from the start that this was a player vs. player game, Shiller thought, he and Arrogant lacking experience in such games had led to their initial oversight, providing Greed with an opportunity.
But Shiller felt Prime Universe Batman must have been wary all along; his strategy of escaping grievously injured might have been prepared well in advance, even having a sense that it was just a matter of time before someone in the team made a move.
Shiller could only say it was truly befitting of Batman.
However, there were still many doubts. After thinking it over, Shiller decided to start from the beginning again and asked, "What about the second body?"
He was referring to the one who was originally thought to be the diary owner, who had lost all limbs and had a stomach full of fish.
"It wasn't me who killed him," Greed said. "When I dragged the body to the cabin, I found he had already been hung up."
Greed emphasized the verb "hung up," undoubtedly hinting that this fellow wasn't killed by a monster either, because a monster wouldn't use a rope to hang a man from the roof beams.
Shiller had been suspicious when he first saw this body, but at that time, he wasn't very familiar with the nature of the monster; what if the monster possessing someone could indeed hang a person from the beams?
But if it was also human-caused, who could it be?
Not knowing who this person really was, Shiller scanned around, not speaking hastily, waiting for someone to provide more clues.
"He was eating fish," Night Owl finally spoke after a long silence.
By this time, Shiller also realized.
From what had already been deduced about the backstory of Prime Universe Batman, Silterk breeding those fish was for stockpiling valuable goods. To achieve this, he couldn't let too many people become aware of it; he surely couldn't just take out a loudspeaker in the village to promote the detoxifying properties of the fish.
Then, those who were aware of this must be people like the Hunter played by Batman, employed by Silterk to have some insider knowledge.
Such a person, feeling they were influenced by the bizarre and having no other recourse, would definitely try to eat the fish even if it might not be effective, since at such a moment, taking a gamble wouldn't be infeasible.
If this individual was employed by Silterk, the one with the strongest motive to kill him would be Prime Universe Batman, as this could weaken Silterk's influence in the village and also prevent this person from reporting the incident.
But the biggest problem was that Batman does not kill people, not even in the game, and certainly wouldn't torture someone before their death by severing their limbs.
Wait, Shiller suddenly thought, while Batman truly does not kill, he also doesn't always prevent others from killing.
Then the only one left related to Silterk on the scene was Madeline.