Peter heard Him speak.
"The universe is about to be destroyed."
Peter opened his mouth, but he did not look particularly surprised. After hesitating for a while, he sighed with a complicated expression. "I know."
What he had not told Bruce was that after the High-Energy Physics collider had been activated, during the brief gap between bursts of high-energy particle streams, Peter had gained a detached perspective.
He saw the universe as a massive server, while the configuration files of its various universes told him that their lifespans were nearing their end.
"You know something, don't you?" Peter looked up at the enormous black sun and said, "You don't belong here. You're an outsider, so you can see everything."
"The Spacetime distortions in that mysterious space within the thick fog weren't accidental." Peter took a deep breath and gathered his courage. "I know it is riddled with holes. This is a sign that it is about to collapse, and you took advantage of that sign."
The black sun hung silently in midair, its intricate patterns constantly turning. Peter wanted to read knowledge from them, but a thin mist always lingered in his mind, preventing him from glimpsing the whole picture.
Yet the desire to see through The Truth and decipher its secrets filled Peter with an instinctive chill, as though that perfectly natural curiosity was leading him toward death.
"Thank you for saving me." Peter lowered his head. "Even though I was prepared to die, no one truly wants to die. And every good thing in this world comes at a price. What do you want me to do?"
"Go destroy it, then wait for its rebirth."
In that instant, the magnificent and bizarre particle streams within the black sun formed one mysterious pattern after another. Countless pieces of knowledge