Chapter 313: Dense Shade of Green Trees in the Long Summer Day (11)

Helen still didn't understand; in her impression, Doctor Schiller was never one to endure. On the surface, he appeared calm, but he never stopped stirring things up in the background.

There was never a "bear with it before taking action," but rather "the problem had been solved before it even emerged."

Therefore, Helen felt somewhat curious. How could there be such a large difference in the same person?

Jason stated that it was indeed the case.

"Moreover, if you say Doctor Schiller solves problems before they occur, then even if the process may be dangerous, the outcome is sure to be a happy ending for everyone."

"But when Professor Shearer finally takes action after reaching his limit, it is not to solve the problem, but rather to vent his dissatisfaction. At that time, it's just bad luck for whoever gets in his way, and he doesn't care what the problem turns into."

"You could compare it this way, if an apple has a worm, Doctor Schiller would dig it out while it's still an egg, not only saving the apple but also using the hatched worm elsewhere to achieve two goals with one stone."

"But to Professor Shearer, he doesn't care unless the worm pokes its head under the apple skin. Once the worm comes out and pushes him past his limit, he's likely to cut the apple."

"After such a cut, the apple would spoil quicker, and the worm inside would starve to death due to the lack of food. To some extent, that indeed eliminates the worm, but he wouldn't care about the apple's wellbeing."

"And the cut Doctor Schiller gives to the apple isn't because he anticipated that the rotting would starve the worm, but purely because he had the intent to kill."

After hearing Jason's explanation, Helen fell silent, astonished that the seemingly more emotionally expressive Doctor Schiller was actually the more rational conservative, while the serious and stuffy Professor Shearer turned out to be the emotional radical.

"The Professor has always been like that," Jason said. "Ever since he stormed into the kitchen and shot the broccoli, there have been many such instances."

"No surprise there," Dick said as he settled onto the couch, handing Helen an orange and adding, "Moving to a new house is always troublesome enough, and preparing for a party on top of that, with a clone popping in to cause trouble whenever there's a gap. After the opening of Battleworld, they had to join the instance, and they weren't at ease when they returned either."

"I think the main reason is the weather—it's too hot," Jason said, fanning himself with his hand. "This kind of weather can make one irritable, and with things not going well recently, someone's bound to be out of luck soon."

"Ever since I ate dragon meat, I've felt a bit sleepy," Jason said, yawning. "It's probably because I need to digest it."

"I think it's also because of the heat that makes people drowsy. I'm getting sleepy as well," Dick said lounging on the couch, "I'm going to go upstairs for a nap."

Helen felt that their judgment of Professor Shearer made sense, so she hurriedly reminded the New Warriors Team to not stir up trouble lately. If they happen to be at the wrong end of a gun, they'll be in deeper trouble than they can handle.

Luckily, the young heroes of the New Warriors Team were quite reasonable. They felt that it wasn't right to stay in the Schiller residence for so long and had recently been looking for a house.

Nightingale came from a well-off background and had always provided financial support to the New Warriors Team. Before coming here, she had prepared some expensive, but not very bulky, hard currency goods like tobacco, medicines, and canned foods, just waiting to cash them in. The total value wasn't very high, but it was surely enough to rent a house for a few months.

They were staying at Schiller's place to save time to sell their goods, and in the past few days, they had been busy and had found a way to exchange them for enough funds.

They had originally planned to use this money to buy building materials to construct a treehouse, but now that Williams had taken over the land and they didn't want to bother Schiller any longer, they decided to find a house outside.

It can be said that young heroes are, after all, not as worldly as the old and established Gotham characters; they are relatively innocent. Even though they were disgusted by Williams, they didn't want to resort to despicable methods that would breach moral boundaries.

The superhero regulations in New York are very comprehensive. If you break something, you must pay for it; if you injure an ordinary person, you must face punishment. From The Avengers to street-level heroes, the law is the same for everyone—no one can escape it.

Those reckless youths who only know how to be headstrong and uncontrolled have already been fined to the point of bankruptcy, and some are even in prison now. Those who are left can't all be said to be righteous, but they do largely abide by the law.

Growing up in such an environment, following order has become an instinct, and they generally don't harbor ill intentions. Even getting into a fight with ordinary people is usually out of sheer frustration.

So, in the confrontation with someone as two-faced as Williams, the New Warriors Team didn't gain much advantage and didn't plan on quibbling with ordinary people anymore. When Speedball Robert took advantage of the chaos to punch him, it could be considered as avenging Helen.

But coincidentally, the Guardians of the Galaxy came to Schiller to improve the climate in the East District. They first went to Wayne Manor, and then returned to Schiller's home with the New Warriors Team.

Williams's construction site was not far from Schiller's home, and the restless members of the Guardians of the Galaxy, especially Rocket Raccoon with his thick fur, were already overwhelmed by Gotham's scorching weather that seemed to be on fire. After nearly passing out from the heat, he saw the vast lake behind and suggested going for a swim.

The others also thought it was a great spot for camping, and since Schiller's backyard already had the necessary camping gear, they happily took the sunshade and fishing rods to the lakeside.

They were on the south side of the lake, while Williams' construction site was on the north side of the lake, which was quite large, so the two parties were only looking at each other from a distance, with neither interfering with the other.

Rocket Raccoon dove into the water, and since he didn't want to scare the ordinary people, he didn't swim toward the construction site but just took a couple of laps along the southern shore of the lake; the others were all fishing and chatting on the east side.

However, it wasn't long before a group of people arrived, insisting that they were disturbing the lake's ecological environment and destroying the local fisheries resources, demanding that they leave.

If this place had really been a primeval jungle, that would be one thing, but this lake and the downstream creek were part of the community's water system, one of its assets, just like public squares and parks, available for the residents to use.

Indeed, everyone there except for Star Lord was an alien, but they had all been on Earth for quite some time and understood such principles. They were in high spirits—how could they possibly be driven away by such an absurd reason?

After Star Lord dismissed these people, he was eager to barbecue. Rocket Raccoon, having swum to his heart's content, came ashore, dried off his fur, and skewered the big fish they'd caught onto the grill.

Less than ten minutes passed, and another group showed up, claiming they were trespassing on a certain company's development rights, constituting illegal invasion, and they were to leave.

At this point, Star Lord wasn't too angry and still spoke politely, explaining the situation, but unexpectedly, the leader of the group pulled out a gun.

Generally speaking, in America, it's permissible to draw a weapon against unlawful invasion; even in states without castle doctrine, brandishing a gun without firing it is considered a legitimate self-defense, not a personal threat, which is why many farmers resolve conflicts by drawing a gun. The other party usually doesn't dare to bet on whether they would actually shoot, making this tactic quite effective.

But the Guardians of the Galaxy were real tough nuts to crack. They were mercenaries making their livelihoods in the cosmos, and even though they enjoyed the backing of the Nine Major Kingdoms, to secure a foothold in the perilous universe meant they were always on high alert with full aggressiveness.

They were not the perennially rule-bound young superheroes; they had the strength and means. The moment the opposing guns were brandished, everyone on this side was armed within a second.

Rocket Raccoon fired off a shot, blasting those on the other side away, and a couple of them even fell into the lake. Star Lord didn't say a word and even instructed Groot, who was pretending to be a tree, to let them nearly drown before saving them.

Capturing those who had come to cause trouble wasn't a big deal for the Guardians of the Galaxy; they forced them to make a call, telling their hidden mastermind that they were detained and to bring some sincerity if they wanted their people back.

Williams wasn't one to take things lying down; he immediately called the police, specifically requesting James Gordon to come, banking on Gordon not daring to pervert justice in this matter, while the young folk would be no match for him due to their thin skins.

What he didn't expect was that the disturbance wasn't caused by Helen and her group but by someone even more shameless.

Groot posed as a big tree, Gamora and Nebula used fire hoses to hang everyone on it, Drax followed behind Star Lord like a mob enforcer, with Rocket Raccoon lying in his arms, baring his teeth and grinning.

Gordon was taken aback by this scene. As soon as he and Williams arrived, Star Lord started yelling about animal abuse, accusing Williams' men of illegal logging and injuring his pet, with Rocket Raccoon cooperating by howling in distress and Gamora seriously recording with a smartphone on the side.

Gordon didn't dare to speak recklessly upon seeing this and asked Williams if there were surveillance cameras on his construction site. Williams, to curb Star Lord's haughty attitude, said there were.

Once the surveillance footage was reviewed, it was clear that Williams' men hadn't abused any animals, but the issue was that Star Lord and his group hadn't even entered his construction site.

The footage showed them camping clearly on the south side of the lake, which wasn't within Williams' property at all. Yet this group had gone there, full of confidence, to cause trouble, and Gordon immediately cuffed them.

But that wasn't the end of it. Star Lord gave Gordon a bad suggestion, saying, "These people mistaken their presence on the construction site was simply because the limits between the construction site and the community aren't clear."

"To prevent the community members from accidentally entering his construction site, why not just build a wall to encircle the site? That way, no one would disturb anyone else."

Gordon felt there was reason in what he said, but the Gotham Police Department didn't have the funds to deal with that, but Star Lord didn't care. He took the site plan from Gordon and used high-tech alien weaponry to construct a ring of iron walls around Williams' construction site—made of metallic alloy and indestructible.

Once the wall was built, everyone realized that Williams' construction site was actually quite small, comprising just a little strip of woodland on the north side, along with a tiny portion of the lake.

But the construction site he had now expanded took up almost the entire eastern and northern woodland and included half of the lake as well.

The wall was timely; after marking out the standard boundaries, if Williams wanted to exceed them, he would have needed a way to cut through the alien alloy Star Lord had erected, or else the entire resort would be cut in two, divided into inner and outer sections, with an unsightly metal barrier in between.

The wall was over four meters high and also had an electric fence on top.

Yet Star Lord, filled with vindictiveness, grinned at Williams saying, "Maybe it's just a difference in local customs, but where we come from, when people think of vacationing, they don't go to concentration camps."