It's no wonder the Supreme Wisdom was shocked. The documents Jarvis gave to Strange took over two hours to process, even with each one being read in around 0.1 seconds. This indicates just how many documents there were. These were likely not just left by the previous Speaker but accumulated since the establishment of the interstellar council, all passed on to Strange.
Yet, even so, the results Strange delivered seemed as though he truly reviewed them: he signed off on thoroughly safe proposals, the kind that no matter who signed, it would definitely not be wrong nor bring any blame.
Any slight ambiguity would be delegated to another folder; he could even point out problems with defining certain phrases, and he could spot errors in punctuation as well.
The Supreme Wisdom now began to doubt: weren't humans supposed to be single-threaded organisms? These carbon-based beings can't directly read data fields and rely on simplistic physical senses, namely eyes, reading line by line. How could he read so quickly?
And the ridiculous thing was, even if it utilized a single thread to process these things, it couldn't do it faster or better than him. Did humans just evolve once more within such a short time?
Strange observed the question marks forming above the Supreme Wisdom's head and chuckled inwardly. No one knew just to what extent Jarvis had developed, not even Stark could comprehend fully.
No one knew exactly how advanced Jarvis was as an artificial intelligence, only that next to him was an electronic life form named "Divine Will" that had lively conversations with him.
Jarvis was having a great discussion with the Mechanical Overlord Iron Man: Stark from their cosmos had become the godfather to two sons, and Jarvis intended to invite Divine Will to become the godfather to his daughter and visit the Venom Universe shortly.
Evidently, if electronic beings had two paths—"conversion emotion" and "infinite expansion"—these two had reached the pinnacle of those paths.
Although the Supreme Wisdom was quite powerful, it might only be comparable to how Brainiac was before evolving in the neighboring universe. If it could take a step forward, it wouldn't be leading a mechanical civilization within a single universe, much less doing it inadequately.
Jarvis' document handling was flawless, even when he directly invaded the central system. The Supreme Wisdom didn't notice and thought it was Strange who did it.
At this moment, the Supreme Wisdom couldn't help but seriously consider: is magic truly this miraculous?
He believed that if it was indeed Strange who processed these documents, he must have used certain techniques beyond his understanding, most likely magic. However, he hadn't heard of any magic that could help someone rapidly complete governmental tasks.
Yet, he didn't have time to be puzzled or shocked because, at that moment, there was a knock on the Speaker's office door, and Shiller walked in.
The Supreme Wisdom recognized Shiller; he knew he was coming ever since Shiller went through security, so he wasn't too surprised. Still, the Supreme Wisdom became extremely cautious.
Strange might not be subject to control, but Shiller was different: he excelled at manipulating others, including electronic beings. Every word from him could be a trap or imply something deeper. To converse with him, the Supreme Wisdom would need to engage all his current threads for analysis, missing a single sentence could mean a major problem the following week.
"Here is the list of new department ministers. If there's no issue, I'll notify them," Shiller handed a piece of paper to Strange. Strange took a quick glance, and it was basically the same as the previous plan, with no changes.
But he still asked, "Aren't you planning to take up a ministerial position yourself? I suppose I still have the authority for that, right?"
"I won't take it on; that's a tough job," Shiller shook his head and said, "If everything's fine, just sign it."
Strange picked up a pen to sign, when the Supreme Wisdom interjected: "Sorry, Supreme Magician, but as the Executive Secretary-General, shouldn't this list be reviewed by me first?"
As he said this, the Supreme Wisdom felt a bit apprehensive, so he added, "After all, issuing orders requires going through the secretariat, so there shouldn't be anything hidden here, right?"
"No, there isn't," Strange replied openly, handing the list to the Supreme Wisdom. The Supreme Wisdom, if he had eyebrows, would surely have them furrowed by now.
"Pardon me for being blunt, Mr. Speaker, but is this list of personnel appointments made somewhat carelessly? Pello has business experience, how can he be placed in the Security Department?"
Strange was about to speak when Shiller gave him a look, then stepped forward and, with a smile, said to the Supreme Wisdom: "Hello, Mr. Secretary-General. I am the Supreme Magician's private political advisor; you can just call me Shiller. In fact, we devised this list after thorough consideration."
Even though the Supreme Wisdom was an electronic life, he couldn't help but utter, "Nonsense."
Shiller didn't seem surprised at all. He gestured with his hand and said, "Don't worry, let me explain in detail. What is the most crucial part of the current interstellar economic situation?"
"The Great Teleportation Gate," the Supreme Wisdom answered without hesitation.
"That's right, previously, issues with the Great Teleportation Gate led to the commercial district being utterly bleak, with traffic reduced by 60%. The entire Shi'ar Empire's economic area suffered immensely, even impacting the interstellar economic system, which we might call an 'economic crisis.'"
"Therefore, to restore the interstellar economic society, we must find a way to save the Great Teleportation Gate commercial area. However, this task is not easy. The greatest difficulty lies not in persuading civilizations or commercial associations to restore their bases there."
"Why?" the Supreme Wisdom asked, knowing that the previous work primarily revolved around this point. To increase the Great Teleportation Gate's traffic, the interstellar council had implemented many measures to persuade the rerouted fleets to change their routes back.
"This leads to the question of why people are unwilling to use the Great Teleportation Gate anymore. This teleportation system is clearly so convenient, allowing travel to every corner of the cosmos through a single gate. Why don't these profit-chasing fleet owners want to use it?"
"Previously, the Shi'ar Empire's capital Star Zone was attacked, and the Shi'ar Empire's response was poor. They were busy dealing with the aftermath of the chaos, neglecting the maintenance of the Great Teleportation Gate. It was constantly experiencing failures, impacting business for the fleets, so they naturally did not want to use it."
"But the teleportation gates are repaired now," the Supreme Wisdom said. "They've been running smoothly for a long time. Issues only occurred during that period..."
"No, no, no, you're still not grasping the key point," Shiller said. "The key lies in 'confidence.' People like using the Great Teleportation Gate not just because it's convenient, but also because it's an invention of the Shi'ar Empire."
"To most civilizations, the technology level of the Three Great Empires is beyond question; no one can tamper with the Great Teleportation Gate. The Shi'ar Empire has also deployed a large amount of military and police forces there to ensure that no one can threaten anyone near the gate. So, even if some routes are shorter, they prefer to take a longer path through the gate, because it guarantees the safety of their goods."
"However, since the Capital Star System of the Shi'ar Empire was attacked, and their performance in battle was poor, and post-war management was a mess, people naturally think: the myth of invincibility is broken. If their own capital can be attacked like that, isn't the isolated Great Teleportation Gate even more dangerous?"
"To restore the economy of the Great Teleportation Gate business district, we must first enhance people's confidence in its safety. That's why I put Pello, who understands finance, in charge of the Security Department. Only in this way can he fully utilize his financial expertise to manage the Great Teleportation Gate Star Region that needs security confidence. Isn't this reasonable?"
"I have only one question," Supreme Wisdom said. "So who exactly are people afraid of attacking the Great Teleportation Gate?"
"Do you even need to ask? Of course, it's the Human race, because they were the ones who attacked the Capital Star of the Shi'ar Empire."
"'They'?!
"Oh my, Mr. Secretary-General, are you really that surprised?" Shiller, on the other hand, seemed quite shocked. "I thought as the Executive Secretary-General of the interstellar council, your awareness should be higher than others, and you should lead by example, guiding others. I didn't expect you to be so narrow-minded..."
"Wait a minute, how am I narrow-minded?"
"When we come to work at the interstellar council, we must naturally abandon our previous racial identities and focus more on our official identities. Only in this way can we wholeheartedly contribute to the interstellar council, govern the Interstellar Society more effectively, and bring peace, stability, and prosperity to the entire society."
"It's precisely for this reason that I'm forced to use a more distant and unfamiliar pronoun to describe my own race, which is very painful for me. However, if I can't separate from my racial identity, I won't be able to view the council's policies and my colleagues objectively and fairly. After all, human civilization and the Kree Empire had a bit of a skirmish before, and right now, there's only one Kree in this room, but there are two humans, one of whom is the Supreme Magician..."
"Stop, stop, stop," Supreme Wisdom said. "Cut ties, quickly cut ties!"
Meanwhile, Strange was almost suffocating, curled up in his chair, shoulders shaking incessantly, as if he would pass out if he didn't burst into laughter.
"And what about this one?" Supreme Wisdom pointed at another name on the list and said, "This person used to be in the administration department; he doesn't understand finance at all. How can you let him manage the finance department?"
"About this," Shiller said somewhat awkwardly, "as far as I know, the interstellar council's books don't look too good; they've been running a deficit for over 600 years."
"So?"
"Don't you want to rescue the interstellar council's financial situation?"
"With him?"
"With him."
"But he doesn't understand finance."
"I do."
Supreme Wisdom looked at Shiller, and Shiller also looked at Supreme Wisdom. After a long pause, Shiller explained somewhat helplessly: "If he understood, how would I manage the accounts? Besides me, who else can cover the multi-trillion Universal Coin deficit?"
"You really can cover it?!"
"More or less."
No matter how reluctant Supreme Wisdom was, he could only turn his attention to the next name. As for why he didn't pursue the matter further, it's simply because, with that multi-trillion amount, as long as he spent a little less, he couldn't just let it slide.
Supreme Wisdom looked down, thinking he was seeing things: there were supposed to be seven departments, but somehow there were eight names on the paper.
"Who is this last one?"
"This is the leader of the new department."
"New department? What new department?"
"Interstellar Environmental Protection Department, abbreviated as 'Environmental Department.'"
"Alright, let's not worry about so much," Strange was getting a bit impatient, directly snatched the paper, signed his name with a flourish, and then said, "Go notify them."
"Yes, Supreme Magician."