"It's really big," Shiller exclaimed. "If we had such a shield, we could probably pack up the entire Milky Way and take it away, right?"
"Pack it away?" Strange stared at him wide-eyed.
"Ahem, I mean, protect the Milky Way's safety," Shiller coughed twice and said. "Using the Milky Way as a billiard ball is still a bit too much. The Solar System is just right."
"Listen, using your home planet as a billiard ball is already crazy enough. Don't even think about extending that to the Solar System," Strange warned him.
Shiller didn't answer, just looked at the azure shield, pondering as he said, "This thing must have some alert mechanism. We can't get in like this; we have to think of something else."
"Are you sure you want to go in?" Strange asked with a frown. "This is the enemy's home base."
"Whose enemy?"
"Uh...ours?"
"To be precise, yours," Shiller turned his head to look at him. "I also have an account in that world. It's hard to say which side I'm on, so attending their headquarters meetings can't be considered an invasion."
Strange opened his mouth and then said, "Okay, that's not incorrect, but the only question is why do you want to take me along?"
"You can't visit without bringing a gift, can you?" Shiller laughed and said, "If I bring the Strongest Supreme Mage over, they will definitely leave a seat for me at headquarters."
Strange rolled his eyes fiercely. Shiller coughed twice, then said, "Alright, no more jokes. Do you have a way in?"
"I'm not quite sure what nature this shield is," Strange paced on the asteroid's surface, looking up at the endless surface of the planet before saying, "We saw some celestial bodies fly in when we arrived, proving it's not entirely unreactive to the real world. There must be some discrimination mechanism."
"Life Equation?"
"What?"
"Over there they have something called the Life Equation and another called the Anti-Life Equation. You can think of it as a string of code left by God when creating life, with very powerful strength."
"In Darkseid's hands?"
"In Batman's hands," Shiller mused and said, "Batman inviting Darkseid to Apocalypse Star must have given him certain benefits. Although it may not directly give him the Anti-Life Equation, it's quite possible to use this to help him improve the Apocalypse Star shield."
"Sounds a bit evil, not like something Batman would do."
"On the contrary, it's a very smart move. Opportunities to tamper with the Apocalypse Star shield are few and far between. As long as Darkseid loosens his grip, how many surveillance cameras do you think he'll attach to this thing?"
"So, Darkseid wouldn't agree then."
"Of course, he would. To use the Anti-Life Equation and Batman's technology to enhance the Apocalypse Domain, he wouldn't miss this opportunity, even knowing Batman might have tricks up his sleeve. But this is indeed the best opportunity."
"How so?"
"If it were normal times, Darkseid might think Batman wants to sabotage the Apocalypse Star's defenses, but this time it's impossible. Now, all the superheroes in the multiverse are relying on Apocalypse Star as a base. Batman wants to win this war, so he can't tamper with the main functionalities; instead, he'll strengthen the defense with all his might."
"Oh, I see," Strange realized, nodding as he spoke. "Indeed, if I were in his place, I'd agree too, because in this war, Batman and Apocalypse Star share risk together. At this time, utilizing Batman's technology is when you least worry about him pulling tricks, or else they both lose."
After saying this, Strange saw Shiller pulling out an umbrella from somewhere. Shiller turned around to open the umbrella, and as Strange was about to look at the facade, Shiller stopped him.
"Don't look at this thing, it has a dizzying effect."
Strange gave him a puzzled look. Shiller explained, "The surface of this umbrella is Batman's cape, on which the Anti-Life Equation is written. And the Anti-Life Equation involves very profound cosmic construction science knowledge; the human brain doesn't have the organ to parse it, so a sudden look would shock the brain."
"You plan to use this umbrella to get through the shield? But concerning Batman using the Anti-Life Equation to help modify the Apocalypse Star shield is just your conjecture, what if it's not true?"
"There's no loss in trying," Shiller said. "Even if it's not true, the Anti-Life Equation might achieve unexpected effects."
"Darkseid really wants this stuff, right?"
Shiller smiled and said, "Exactly. If it's not true, Darkseid will use the shield's monitoring system to see us here and approach proactively. Then we can make a deal with him."
"You really want that shielding technology?" Strange looked at him and said, "The Anti-Life Equation is not something you can casually give to others."
"I don't intend to give him that, or Batman would come after me. I've got plenty of good things."
Seeing Shiller so confident, Strange didn't say anything more. The two flew towards the shield. As they neared the shield's surface, Strange felt a very strong repulsion field, so he reached out to stop Shiller and said, "We can't go any further, otherwise we might get bounced back."
Shiller opened the umbrella again, shielding it in front of the two of them. Strange, after feeling it once more, said, "The repulsive force has disappeared. It seems that even if Batman didn't take action, this kind of equation you mentioned has a certain influence on the power of this cosmos."
The two of them continued to fly forward with the umbrella, and the whole process was very calm, without feeling any obstacles. Their flying speed was not fast, so it took them half an hour to finally pass through the layer of shields.
Unfortunately, Apocalypse Star actually doesn't have an atmosphere. It's more like a star system, with many different celestial bodies distributed, a lot of which are obviously artificial military garrison planets, and some seem to be natural celestial bodies that accidentally wandered here.
"And then?" Strange asked.
Shiller was also a bit perplexed. He didn't expect Apocalypse Star to be so vast and empty. But thinking about it, it makes sense. This thing might be larger than the Milky Way. Finding a planet slightly larger than Earth here is like looking for a needle in a haystack.
The celestial bodies here are completely unfamiliar, and there's no star map available. The two of them didn't dare to use teleportation, fearing an energy alert. Besides, even if they could teleport, they wouldn't know where to teleport to. What if they accidentally teleported onto Darkseid's face? That would be interesting.
"No, we need to go back." Shiller said, "Once we're out, we need to determine the location of Apocalypse Main Star, find the closest shield position, teleport there, and then come in from there. That way, we can find the main star faster."
Strange indeed didn't have a better plan. After all, this is not a natural star system. There's no way to ask the locals for directions, and they certainly couldn't ask one of the Type Demons, right?
The two of them flew out of the shield with the umbrella again and immediately encountered a new problem, which was how to determine the position of the main star.
"Why not the very center?" Strange questioned.
"Not likely," Shiller said, "Darkseid is a very cunning person. Even if he is invincible within the Apocalypse Domain, he might not place the most important main star at the very center. That would be too easy to guess. I guess he would hide the main star in some corner here."
"And then he specifically blocked people like us," Strange said disgruntledly, "I thought you would have prepared a bunch of plans. I didn't expect you didn't even know the way."
"That so-called 'bunch of plans' doesn't happen overnight; they all have to start with such exploration missions, right?"
"So, when you were working on those big plans before, you often encountered this kind of issue?" Strange couldn't help but laugh as he spoke. The more thrilling plotting in the later stages may well be prefaced by the hilarious preparatory work where you often lose your way and hit walls.
But come to think of it, when cooking, the ingredients don't jump into the pot by themselves; it always requires buying, washing, and cutting, all sorts of tedious and boring work. It seems like doing anything is like this.
Then the two of them began to study how to find the main star of Apocalypse Star. Even though there's a possibility it's at the center, if it's not, it would be cumbersome to fly back out from the center. So, it's best to search the perimeter first and then explore the center.
"We select 8 evenly spaced points on this spherical surface, fly inward for a while. If there's nothing, we change to another 8 points. This should be the fastest," Strange suggested.
"Isn't this the Exhaustion Method?" Shiller asked.
"Do you have a better method?" Strange retorted.
"We can ask a local for directions," Shiller said, "I mean someone who used to come and go from Apocalypse Star, someone who didn't strictly use teleportation portals, right?"
"Come on, you don't seriously think you're teammates with those guys, do you? Even if you are, they probably won't tell you. After all, you're Shiller." Strange was scornful.
"Others might not necessarily tell me, but there is one person who might." Shiller laughed again as he spoke.
Strange looked at him, and Shiller looked at Strange. After glaring at each other for a few seconds, Strange said, "You're not talking about Constantine, are you? Damn it! You did it on purpose!"
Shiller shrugged and said, "It's the fastest way, and he is the most likely person to get into Apocalypse Main Star from outside without using a teleportation portal."
This piqued Strange's curiosity. He asked, "Why?"
"Constantines really dislike using magic. As long as there are other methods to achieve the goal, their first choice will certainly not be magic."
"That's because using magic comes at too great a price for them. However, now that they've come to another world, they may not lack energy, so they might not be like before..."
But Shiller shook his head and said, "They will be. Constantines are completely different from you guys, I mean different from Doctor Strange. You are very confident and proud of your talents, but he feels tortured by his talents, yet infatuated with them."
"Sounds very morbid."
"Actually, it's a toss-up. Can you say that the Main Universe Doctor Strange is a normal person?"
Strange hesitated for a moment but didn't say anything. Although Main Universe Doctor Strange seems much more normal in appearance, in reality, it's not like that. After experiencing such a major loss, the negative emotions didn't even last for a few hours, not including any self-doubting, and then he was alive and kicking, debating with others again. It indeed resembles a manic madman.
It's just that Constantine is the opposite; he takes no pride in his talents but always considers them a curse. Yet, he is fascinated by the pain the curse brings, much like an addict who is hooked on drugs.
"These are two entirely different psychological motivational mechanisms," Shiller continued flying in another direction, "'I believe, I achieve, I am happy' seems healthier, but it is easy to develop into 'only when I achieve, I feel happy'; while 'I don't believe, I give up, and I suffer for it,' doesn't seem like positive feedback, but there is a sense of relief in 'It can't get any worse'. The positive and negative mindsets are two sides of the same coin; move forward from the positive, and it's mania, move forward from the negative, and it's depression. The human race is always tormented in the tug of war between these two emotions."
"But I see both of them seem to enjoy it a lot."
"Therefore, they are not normal."