PFC Chapter 3813 The School Doctor's "Daily Life" (28)
Chapter 3813 The School Doctor's "Daily Life" (28)
Chapter 3813 The School Doctor's "Daily Life" (Twenty-Eight)
“Okay, I’m not saying I’m coming to act in it or anything. I just… you know, I invested in this movie. I don’t know if it was the producer or someone else, but they called me and asked if I could invest again. I need to come and check it out…”
"So what are you here to investigate?" Strange asked bluntly. Now that they're here, he wasn't about to let them get away.
Stark spread his hands, spun around in a circle, looked around the office, and said, "I mainly came to check on your work. How are those dear little guys doing?"
"You better not be referring to Batman."
“Of course not, I meant the little wizards.” Stark slumped his shoulders and frowned. “What kind of person would call Batman ‘darling’? I certainly wouldn’t. I have absolutely no interest in them. I’m just here to see if this movie is worth my extra investment.”
“Then you can watch it,” Strange said.
“Hey, what kind of attitude is this?” Stark was very dissatisfied. He walked over to Strange’s desk, sat down, and tapped the surface with his finger. “I’m an investor. Shouldn’t you be flattering me?”
“Do you know how many people are lining up to invest in this movie?” Strange rolled his eyes. “If you dare to withdraw your investment at this crucial moment, I guarantee Pepper will throw you off the top of Stark Tower.”
Speaking of Pepper, Stark's eyes darted around. He said, "Ah, yes. It's Pepper. She sent me here. She asked me to tell you that if you want me to invest more, you have to get Stark Industries' signature product featured in a movie."
"Stark Industries' flagship product? Who do you want us to launch magical missiles at? Or send mages to attack your arms depots?"
“Hey, I’ve already shut down the arms business. And do you think those cheap weapons represent Stark Industries’ technological level?” Stark said, pointing to his Jaeger as he demonstrated, seemingly waiting for Strange to say something.
Strange was too lazy to waste words with him. He said, "Whether you can appear in the movie or not is not up to me. Everything in the plot has to be approved by director Chris. You have to go to him."
“I never intended to ask for your permission anyway,” Stark scoffed. “Where’s Schiller? I’m going to see him.”
“He should be at the school hospital.” Strange casually flipped through his lesson plan and said, “But I don’t recommend you go see him now, otherwise your medical budget for this quarter will increase dramatically again. I just saw that Director Chris sent a message in the group chat, you should be able to go and talk to him now.”
“Alright,” Stark said, standing up. “I don’t ask for much, just to walk around in the suit. He’ll definitely agree.”
Stark flew all the way to the filming location. Chris and the others were indeed still awake, even eating barbecue and drinking beer. The entire production crew was stunned to see Iron Man descend from the sky. Everyone enthusiastically surrounded him, taking pictures of the mech and exchanging pleasantries, which made Stark a little shy.
Chris walked up and shook hands with Stark, saying, "It's a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Stark. What brings you here at this hour?"
"Uh, I'm just... I heard you needed to invest more, so I came to take a look..."
Chris's eyes lit up instantly. He said, "Ah, yes, I have to explain this to you: the initial investment in props was sufficient, but some problems arose during filming, and the existing sets couldn't be used anymore, so we have to start all over again. This has significantly increased the set design budget, and we anticipate needing to invest an additional $2000 million..."
“2000 million?” Stark repeated the amount. He personally felt it wasn’t too much, but he needed to discuss money matters with Pepper. So he said, “I think it’s fine, but Stark Industries isn’t a one-man show. I need to talk to them. But don’t worry, even if the corporation doesn’t approve, I can invest personally.”
“That would be wonderful.” Chris, beaming, shook Stark’s hand firmly again, then stepped back to examine Stark’s armor, saying, “I’ve heard about your appearance as the Iron Man back then. I think the Iron Man’s magnificent image perfectly suits the tone of this fantasy film, and could play an important role in the final battle at the New York Sanctum…”
Stark immediately smiled, but then felt it was a bit too forward. He tried to suppress his excitement, cleared his throat, and said, "I don't want to disrupt your filming. The Iron God is making a bit too much noise..."
"That's alright, you can appear as Iron Man in the final battle. I heard from the Sorcerer Supreme that you have a Jaeger that also uses a magical core?"
"Yes, in fact, all my mechs can now use magic cores. Are you planning to add some plot points based on this?"
"Of course, you can appear as an outside helper in the final battle. We will arrange for the main character, a little mage, to find the magic core for you. However, the final filming effect may not fully reflect your combat power."
“Oh, it’s okay. I understand, it’s all for the sake of the plot.” Stark finally grinned.
"However, there is still one issue, which is that all the actors involved must undergo training. The training period has now ended, but in order to ensure the quality of the performance, we still need to take some time for you to have a basic understanding of the magical world and the movie's worldview."
“No problem.” Stark tapped his feet, rubbed his hands together, and said, “What should I do?”
"At present, the best way is to stay in the magic school for a period of time. Of course, since you are not playing the role of a student, I think you could consider being a visiting professor for a period of time."
“Professor?” Stark hesitated for a moment, then said somewhat awkwardly, “But actually, I don’t use magic. I mean, my way of using magic is different from that of a mage. Stephen and the others say I’m a heretic. If I teach a student the wrong thing, wouldn’t he fight me to the death?”
"Oh? So there are different schools of thought when it comes to using magic? Which school do you belong to?"
“I…I might be from the engineering school.” Stark was also a little unsure how to explain. He said, “Mages directly output energy and transform it into something according to their ideas, which is to say, they make their wishes come true; while I create something and then use magic to drive it, using a special form of energy to give the thing I create different effects.”
"It sounds a bit like alchemy."
“The name is a bit old-fashioned, but you can call it that if you want,” Stark said. “In reality, the transformation of machinery by magic is more akin to metamorphosis, which means that it not only speeds up or slows down the operation of machinery due to the injection of energy, but also affects the machinery due to the evolution and transformation of the energy itself. And this term originally evolved from alchemy.”
Stark used some technical terms that Chris didn't quite understand, but he could tell that Stark's argument was similar to some things described in the encyclopedia he had been looking at recently. Thinking of this, he asked his assistant to bring him the encyclopedia and handed it to Stark, saying, "Take a look at this."
Stark assumed he had a script and casually flipped through it, but he was stunned after only a few pages. He picked it up and started carefully reading from the first page.
He read very quickly, skimming through the text without hindering his comprehension. After finishing, he slapped his thigh: "Stephen has finally figured it out! I've always said his mystical training methods wouldn't work. For magic to truly be passed down and have better room for development, it needs systematic organization and summarization. He's always been quite resistant to this, but I didn't expect him to be secretly working on it!"
"So you didn't write this?"
"No, this is the first time I've seen this illustrated guide. Isn't this written by Stephen?"
“He probably had a friend write it,” Chris said. “I thought that friend was you, but it turns out it wasn’t.”
These words made Stark narrow his eyes. He thought to himself: This kind of thing really doesn't seem like something Strange would write. Don't let Strange's relatively short time studying magic fool you; before entering the wizarding world, he was a highly educated intellectual, but he was indeed a legitimate wizard, and his understanding of the world leaned more towards the mystical. He wouldn't use this kind of logical reasoning to analyze the animals and plants of the wizarding world. But if it wasn't Strange, then who was it?
Stark suddenly had a flash of inspiration: "Could it be Batman?"
Stark once shared a body with Batman from the main universe, so he has some understanding of Batman. This kind of thing is obviously something Batman could write.
Stark's feelings were complicated: on one hand, he was happy that someone was on his side, using scientific thinking to explain these things, and opposing Strange's belief in mysticism and nihilism; but on the other hand, he was anxious—no matter how much he emphasized this to Strange before, he disagreed, but then Batman arrived, and Strange changed his mind. He was no longer the only person around him who used scientific thinking to analyze magic.
Stark immediately realized that his healthcare budget would have to go up again next quarter.
However, he did feel it wasn't a good idea to go see Schiller in the middle of the night. So he asked Chris for a copy of the guidebook, spent the whole night carefully going through all the contents, made some annotations, wrote down some of his own thoughts, and then returned it to Director Chris.
The next morning, Stark rushed to Strange's office and told him about Chris's idea. After a moment's thought, Strange said, "Then you can teach alchemy."
"What?" Stark didn't react at first.
"I mean, you can teach whatever you know, except the course is called 'Alchemy.' However, I'll make it an elective, meaning anyone interested can take it. What do you think?"
"You've really figured it out," Stark said with an incredulous look. "Aren't you afraid I'll lead your genius astray?"
"Hmph." Strange snorted coldly and didn't say anything.
Previously, he was indeed reluctant to let Stark interfere in the affairs of the magical world, let alone let him teach the students in the school, because most young mages could not multitask. Strange also believed that only by focusing could one reach the pinnacle, and he did not want Stark's theories to interfere with the students' thinking.
But things are different now. The whole school is full of Batmen. These guys can not only multitask, but they can multitask four, five, or even six times at once. It's like every cell in their body is a brain cell.
The lesson plans submitted by the professors clearly show that Batman and his crew are learning at an incredibly fast pace. Their limited knowledge will be quickly depleted. If you don't allow Batman to multitask, they might run out of things to learn in just a month.
Putting aside the chaos a Batman with nothing to do would cause, the fact that he had nothing left to teach after a month is incredibly embarrassing. Strange didn't just agree to let Batman come and teach magic for free; he wanted to showcase the advantages of his universe and demonstrate his power, paving the way for his future leadership within the League of Humans. If that's all he's capable of, wouldn't he become a laughingstock across the multiverse?
Stark's theories, while contrary to mysticism, happen to be very close to Batman's ideas. It would be ideal to discuss them together.