Unlucky Sheldon

The next day, after Schiller finished his class, he collected the assignments on time as usual. However, he noticed that all 32 assignments were neatly submitted, and judging by their thickness, they all seemed to have met the word count.

He found it a bit strange. Even though he was usually strict about deadlines, there were always one or two students who wouldn't submit their work. Among those who did, many would just slack off, writing a couple of pages, stuffing blank paper in between, or simply copying random articles.

But this time, standing at the podium, he gave them a quick flip through and found that everyone had genuinely written a paper. Although some weren't very good, clearly written by someone who had never written a paper before, at least they had tried to stick to the topic. Their wording might have sounded like a desperate illiterate, but at least they hadn't strayed from the topic.

Seeing him flipping through the assignments, the students didn't dare to breathe. Usually, by this time, class was almost over, and students would be packing up, but now, not a single person moved. They all sat obediently in their seats, waiting for Schiller to speak.

The reason for this situation was simple: the previous night, the entire class knew that Schiller had gone directly to Gotham's King of Gotham's Underworld, Falcone, to chase down Evans for his assignment.

In the era before Batman, let's call it the "Pre-Batman Era," Falcone held the most sway in Gotham, along with the twelve Mafia families under his command.

Just how powerful were these Mafia families? Sal Maroney, a boss in the East End, was merely a lapdog to the Lauren family, and the Lauren family ranked at the bottom among the twelve Mafia families.

The Falcone family ranked first, and the old Godfather Falcone had absolute authority over the twelve families.

In this era, you might not know who the mayor of Gotham City was, or even who Bruce Wayne was, but you absolutely had to know the surnames of Falcone and the twelve Mafia families. Otherwise, you couldn't survive in Gotham.

Ever since they learned that Schiller had gone to the Godfather of Gotham to get his assignment, all the students' assignment-writing sessions the previous night had been quite thrilling.

Schiller was unusually pleased, so he said, "The situation with this assignment looks very optimistic. It seems everyone has completed it quite diligently. After I finish grading these, I will add an extra ten class participation points to everyone's grade. For those who wrote particularly well, if you have no intention of pursuing graduate studies, you can come to my office to discuss a letter of recommendation..."

As a result, the classroom suddenly erupted in warm applause, it was unclear whether it was for Schiller's promised reward or for their own narrow escape.

And all of this was observed by Principal Sheldon.

Sheldon, to put it nicely, was persistent; to put it less kindly, he was stubborn. Once he set his sights on someone, he would find a way to deal with them. Although Schiller's tough stance prevented him from acting immediately, he was constantly looking for an opportunity.

The Principal had access to all the surveillance cameras in Gotham University's classrooms and could observe the teachers' lectures. This function became Sheldon's best method for monitoring Schiller.

Over the next few days, in Schiller's classes, all the students were as quiet as mice. Evans automatically took on the role of class monitor, collecting assignments, submitting assignments, distributing assignments, and organizing classroom discipline. The entire teaching situation was orderly, and no one could find fault with it.

This gave Sheldon a false impression.

When he worked in the Dean's office at Princeton, most students were generally at this level. After coming to Gotham University, he was busy establishing his position and hadn't actively investigated the students' academic levels. In his opinion, writing assignments was a student's duty. Although Gotham University's ranking was lower than Princeton's, it seemed the students' quality wasn't that far off.

At least, that was the case in Schiller's class.

Sheldon was solely focused on observing Schiller's class, and in Schiller's class, all the students were very quiet, and their academic tasks were completed very well. This allowed Schiller's teaching schedule to proceed smoothly.

So, Sheldon began to entertain other ideas.

As everyone knows, the campus alcohol ban he had implemented was stuck in a precarious position.

Most of those willing to comply with the plan had handed over their alcohol, but the unwilling ones were the die-hard dissidents. This group would rather resist with firearms than allow the school to interfere with their right to drink.

Students could resist with firearms, but Sheldon, as the Principal, couldn't force students to stop drinking at gunpoint. He wasn't a native of Gotham; his mindset was still stuck in civilized society. Therefore, the plan was stuck in a rather awkward position, unable to be pushed forward.

Discovering that confiscating their alcohol didn't work, Sheldon decided to try a different approach.

Before taking on administrative work, Sheldon had also been a Professor. He graduated from Oxford University with a degree in Modern Literature and had taught at the University of California and Metropolis University.

Sheldon believed that to control Gotham University, he also had to connect with the students. Being welcomed by everyone, like Harvey, was also a good path.

Therefore, he wanted to teach a course himself.

Coincidentally, Gotham University had almost no Literature Department. There was only one teacher who taught basic courses. The Literature and Philosophy majors had not recruited students for many years, as this damned place really didn't have any soil for literature and philosophy.

To revitalize the Literature Department and lead the revival of the Literature major, if he could recruit a group of students taught by himself, he would have his own loyal faction within the school. This was Sheldon's plan.

And it seemed that Schiller's class was peaceful, and his teaching objectives were being met well. In short, the sky had cleared, the rain had stopped, and Sheldon felt he was capable again.

Although he was a university professor, the process of his lectures was no different from teaching elementary school. Sheldon was like a "cloud gamer" watching videos, observing Schiller's class from the surveillance feed and thinking it was effortless.

Schiller's lecture process was simply walking into the classroom, waiting for the students to settle down, taking out the textbook, and starting to lecture. There would be one or two discussion sessions. After the discussion, either Schiller would ask questions, or the group would designate someone to speak. After the presentation, Schiller would give a summary, then talk about something else, and collect assignments near the end of class. The beginning of the next class would have a segment reviewing the assignments.

University classrooms in the 20th century were like this. There were no flashy slideshows. Most teachers just read from the textbook, especially for subjects like Psychology that required a lot of memorization of theoretical knowledge. If you didn't thoroughly explain the book, you wouldn't learn anything.

This process, when viewed on the classroom video, was indeed not difficult. If the students cooperated, they could even finish the teaching objectives ahead of schedule, and there would be time for casual conversation at the end.

After the students started becoming particularly obedient, Schiller was also willing to chat with them about the crazy murderers he had encountered. Although Schiller couldn't remember many details due to his amnesia, these legendary experiences still captivated the young students. They discovered that this exceptionally strict professor truly had his unique qualities.

When the Faculty of Arts was announced, Sheldon fired the teacher of the basic literature course and took over the teaching himself.

Just like most cloud gamers watching game videos, they feel they could do it themselves when watching, pointing fingers wildly from a god's-eye view. But when they actually get into the game, they are usually slaughtered, and they immediately quit, uninstall, and demand refunds.

Sheldon was no exception.

Once he actually started teaching, he discovered that Schiller's classroom was merely an illusion. There wasn't a single obedient student there. Basic Literature and Basic Psychology courses were similar in some ways: they required a lot of memorization and also involved writing papers.

For the first assignment submission, out of dozens of assignments from the entire class, only two were submitted. One of them was only half-written.

Sheldon adopted his strong political style and publicly denounced the failure to submit assignments in class. As a result, for the second assignment submission, not a single one was handed in.

While subjects like Mathematics and Physics might have some students who are naturally interested, courses like basic Literature, which were tedious and boring, were not something any student at Gotham University would pay attention to.

Students in the classroom did all sorts of things. Sleeping was considered a good hobby. Some ate, chatted loudly, clicked their game controllers loudly, and some even openly smoked weed.

No matter how much Sheldon shouted, no one paid him any attention. Even if he slammed the door in anger, it only turned the class into a similarly chaotic self-study session.

Sheldon also didn't understand Gotham. If he did, he would have known that the students were already quite good. The quality of students who could attend university in this city was already quite high.

In this city, there were no threats of students shooting each other, no physical bombings of the school, and no kidnapping of teachers and professors. Gotham's students could already be considered models of civilization in this city.

But Sheldon was almost driven mad by them.

Especially since many students knew that the damn alcohol ban was Sheldon's doing. So, they started protesting in Sheldon's class. Someone brought a whole case of champagne, popped the cork in the front row, and sprayed Sheldon all over, drenching him in alcohol. They even organized a drinking party in class.

Sheldon shouted about deducting credits and expelling them, but these students didn't care. Sheldon expelled two students, and the rest became even more frantic. As a result, on a dark night, Sheldon was walking through the school when two bottles, thrown by someone from the bushes, hit him on the head, and he was hospitalized.

He couldn't understand why the students who were as quiet as quail in Schiller's class turned into crazy extremists when they were in his.

Perhaps he just hadn't heard Schiller say one thing: "Here, the only ones who can deal with criminals are criminals."