I, Joker (2)

"What do you think?" Schiller asked, standing by the table.

"What do you mean?" Schiller took a sip of his drink, then slammed the glass down on the table with a crisp sound. He looked up at his other self beside the table and said, "That guy tried to run away again, but got tricked?"

"That's quite funny..." Schiller took a few steps back, leaned against the wall with his arms crossed, and said, "But what I'm more curious about is, why did he climb up so tirelessly just to go out and play?"

Schiller, who was sitting in the chair, did not move, but stood up.

The light focused on the wine glass, where a bubble that had just risen from the bottom of the transparent glass floated upwards, only to freeze on the surface and become a solidified pearl.

As he took a step forward, the Joker remained frozen in his pose, and along with his chair, he was pushed back. The table was pulled away to the left, and the cabinet slid to the right. The entire room was as if the construction process had been reversed, with everything being removed, leaving only a white, empty space.

Immediately afterwards, Schiller looked up and a light came on. The black floor stretched out from beneath his feet. In a daze, he looked down at the railing of the deep well. Schiller, who had been standing next to him, had already gone down several levels.

"Do you know where I'm going?" Schiller asked.

"Weren't you planning to go to the 300th floor to borrow the elevator first?"

"You guessed it all. You know me pretty well."

"Thank you, we are one person."

Schiller quickened his pace, walking down to stand shoulder to shoulder with his other self. The two held onto the handrail and slowly descended the spiral staircase together. As they walked, the other Schiller said, "Seriously, when can we switch places? I'd like to spend a couple of days in DC too."

"Do you think this is a vacation? Putting everything else aside, are you sure your mental stability is enough to handle all these patients here?"

"Do you think this is like you're facing Peter Parker on Marvel's side? This is the first time I've ever seen someone complain that their job is too easy."

Schiller shrugged and said, "Don't say that. There are plenty of headaches over there too. Don't forget, the troubles of the whole Asgard family are far from over."

After walking downhill for a long time, Schiller turned right. There was only one corridor in front of him, and only one room in the corridor. Schiller walked over and knocked on the door. His own voice came from inside. "Come in."

The two Schiller went in one after the other, and then saw their other self buried in a huge pile of documents. When the other Schiller saw that someone had come, he put down a stack of documents and said to the two of them, "Why did you two come together? Don't tell me you have something else to deal with."

"No, no, I just wanted to use the elevator for a moment."

Schiller covered his forehead and said helplessly, "What's wrong with me lately? Why do I always like taking the elevator?"

He then complained, "Everyone knows I'm busy, and everyone comes to bother me. When I saw the two of you come in, I almost suffocated."

"Who told you to be the 'self'? And at the same time, the head steward and gatekeeper of the Mind Palace..."

"Still the elevator Administrator," Schiller said irritably. Then he waved his hand, and the two of them entered a somewhat cramped room where a little boy was kneading a ball of gray slime.

One of the Schiller walked up, squatted down, patted the little boy's head, and asked him, "Do you know where that green-haired guy went?"

The little boy silently shook his head, but the gray slime in his arms made a "gurgling" sound. Schiller up the soft slime, touched what looked like its head, and asked, "Gray Mist, can you see it?"

The gray slime chirped twice. Schiller, Schiller it in his arms, moved it a little away and asked with some confusion, "What's wrong? You've been playing with your 'id' for too long, and you can't even talk anymore?"

The gray slime paused for a moment, then said, "Oh, I can talk... He seems to have gone down to the lower level, with another green-haired person with him."

Schiller shoved the Gray Mist into the little boy's arms, then patted his head, stood up and said to his other self, "It seems he was determined to run away, but unfortunately he didn't succeed."

"Take the elevator or the stairs?"

"Of course we'll take the stairs. This busy man is driving us crazy."

Just as they stepped out and returned to the spiral staircase, a figure wearing a long trench coat and carrying an umbrella walked towards them. He looked up, saw the two of them coming down, and said, "What brings you here? Did you come together?"

"That's a question for you. How did you get that guy in here? You almost let him into the room!"

Schiller, with his green hair, sighed and said, "If he had moved in, I could have gone out and played. Unfortunately, it didn't work out. He created a Bruce Joker, used my memories to fight me, and then ran away..."

One Schiller looked at the other Schiller and said, "Has he always wanted to run away like this?"

"That's right, you didn't know?... Oh, right, you were born after me, so you didn't know."

"When I first came into this world, the 'Superego' created me, but the first time I went out at night, I turned into this guy..."

"So he had to build another one, which is me now, but this guy doesn't live in a perfectly good house and keeps running away every few days..."

"Several times, he deliberately tried to get the attention of that Bruce guy, and things only got a little better after I got back in place."

"I don't really understand you DC people." Another Schiller shook his head.

"Are you done talking? If you're done, don't block my way, I still have to go up," said Schiller, the green-haired man.

"What are you trying to do? The person you were trying to fool has already left. Do you intend to chase after them?"

Schiller, with his green hair, said somewhat impatiently, "You don't actually think you can handle that lunatic outside by yourself, do you? The 'Superego' wants me to go up and talk to him..."

The two Schiller standing on the upper steps exchanged a glance, and one of them asked the other, "You can't lie here, right?"

"Theoretically, that's how it is, but this guy is acting crazy, and I don't know what's wrong with him."

Just then, a voice rang out from the spiral staircase. "I told him to go. Stop chatting, the wine is almost gone."

"The wine is almost gone." Schiller shook the bottle and poured the last bit of wine into his glass. Jack across from him clicked his tongue in dissatisfaction and said, "I bought this wine, so I should save the last bit."

"Stop it. The disgusting thing you just did made a mess of my floor. A Bruce Wayne with Joker makeup... it was utterly disgusting," Schiller said with disdain.

Jack said with dissatisfaction, "Didn't you create this concept first in order to scare me?"

"Trying to trick me into your Mind Palace, and then go to jail for you, huh..." Jack sneered twice.

"And..." Jack pouted, giving a disdainful look, and said, "You can't even control his Mind Palace."

Schiller opposite him, gave a forced smile and said, "Why don't you try it?"

Jack's expression stiffened for a moment, then he said, "No, I just went in for a look..."

After saying that, he looked at his wine glass and laughed, saying, "I built a 330-story skyscraper in my own Mind Palace, and then divided each floor into different star ratings, scores, membership levels, and tiered permissions, and set up thousands of traps on every step of each floor..."

"He said he's just an ordinary person, hahaha, that's the funniest joke I've heard recently..."

Schiller sighed and said, "Can you imagine how I climbed over 190 floors? If that elevator Administrator hadn't opened a back door for me, I'd still be struggling up the stairs right now..."

"Let's not talk about this anymore. Do you know where the other me is?" Jack asked him.

"How should I know? I thought it was Evans, but Batman didn't choose him, so it seems it wasn't him. The last one couldn't possibly be inside Batman, could he?"

Jack's expression suddenly darkened. He said, "It better not be, or I'll tie Bat up here, crack open his brain, and drag that damn guy out..."

"I haven't checked the cases of falling into the chemical pool or the circus, but it probably happened in one of those two situations. If you find him, what do you plan to do? Kill him?"

Jack stared into Schiller's eyes and said, "If your situation weren't so complicated, I would have killed you long ago."

"There's no need for that," Schiller concluded. "Even if you don't kill me, there's nothing I can do. I still have over 100 floors to climb and over 200,000 steps to take. By the time I reach consciousness, Batman will probably be dead from old age."

"But I might not be the worst off..." Schiller said with a hint of schadenfreude, "What do you think would happen if some unlucky guy were born into Batman's family?"

Jack's lips slowly turned down, but Schiller smiled and said, "Why are you so serious?"

"Why aren't you happy that there's another you, one with the person you love most? After all, that's still you."

Jack said, very angrily, "To merge with a bat? Don't be ridiculous, people who dress up as bats are the perverts!"

"Alright, I'm going back to climbing the stairs now. Good luck to you. Seriously, my house is really big. Aren't you planning to stay here for a while?"

Jack rolled his eyes, finished the last drop of wine in his glass, and said nothing.

Schiller leaned back in his chair, turned to look at the other Schiller beside him with his arms crossed, and waved his hand, saying, "I think I can work a little longer, what do you think?"

"Superego is telling you to go back, or you can expect to be kicked back down another level by him."

"Okay, this is troublesome. See you later."

Schiller moved his chair forward, looked at the completely empty bottle, and said to Jack, "Thank you for buying me a drink, but I still have to say, this cheap liquor you bought is absolutely awful."

Jack covered half his face with One Hand, revealing a slightly manic smile on the other side, and said, "What did you put Riga the drink?"

"What?"

"Don't play dumb... I feel like every single brain cell in my head is boiling, and so are yours, aren't you?"

Schiller paused for a moment, then said, "Well, but it's not poison; on the contrary, it's wine..."

Schiller took out a small bottle and placed it in the center of the table. Jack and Schiller's eyes were focused on the bottle. Then Schiller reached out and pushed the bottle toward Jack, saying, "... and it's the best-tasting wine in the world."