Brainiac remained silent for a long time. He seemed never to have expected Schiller to seriously answer that question. It was neither an easy question to answer nor one that needed answering. Yet Schiller had answered it anyway.
After thinking it over, Brainiac decided he could not simply attribute it to Schiller suddenly being in the mood to talk. Perhaps, he thought, it was because he had previously made his attitude toward humanity clear that he had received such an answer.
Of course, Brainiac had investigated Schiller's past, but that era had been too distant. Humanity's Internet had not yet been so developed, and little information had been left behind. He could vaguely glimpse traces of Schiller's legendary deeds, but more than half remained hidden in the fog.
The professor was like a jigsaw puzzle. The large pieces that could be assembled always appeared around the edges, while the most central and crucial clues remained scattered. Until today, Brainiac had finally grasped some threads.
In truth, Brainiac had always been curious about how Schiller could even tolerate Jonathan Crane. The man was a genuine psychopath, a hopelessly twisted pervert. Like Schiller, he was a psychologist, yet he had once attempted to poison Gotham University. Every single one of those things should have hit Schiller's sore spots.
But in reality, Schiller did not bear him much ill will. Although he taught Jonathan a lesson whenever he went too far, Brainiac could tell that Schiller had never intended to kill him.
By comparison, the deaths of Hugo and the Mad Hatter became somewhat suspicious. They might indeed have been accidents, but the two people who died just happened to possess mental manipulation abilities. It was hard not to read more into it. Brainiac had also considered what distinguished Jonathan from those two.