Chapter 1731: Bruce Wayne and the Prisoner of the Batcave (Part 13) _1

Even though the artistic phrase is "gazing at the Abyss," what Greed did after the version update was more than just learning the knowledge of the Outer God. Or, to be more precise, acquiring knowledge was only a means to an end, the initial aim of Greed's comprehensive plan was inspired by his recent journey into the Abyss.

A few months prior, Greed returned to his room in the High Tower. With the aid of the Gray Mist, he underwent a version transformation. Since a portion of wisdom waged from Batman and Iron Man was also given to the Gray Mist, they often engaged in the research of peculiar scientific theories in the room within the High Tower after that.

Desiring a breath of fresh air after holing up in his room for several days, Greed stepped out his door and into the elevator, only to notice a new button added at the very bottom of the elevator panel, labeled "-1".

Raising an eyebrow, just as Greed was wavering whether to press the button or not, the elevator doors opened and the Superego stepped in. Greed pointed to the button and asked, "Did you really extend the elevator down there? Aren't you afraid that they might ascend as a group?"

"Even without an elevator, they could climb up," The Superego shook his head, "But indeed, the elevator was their request. Mainly because the hole Arrogant made on the floor was too inconspicuous, and there already have been more than sixty accidents of personality traits plunging into it over the past half year. Morbid was quite fed up with picking up the rubbish in the Abyss, so it settled for an elevator instead for safety."

"I see your point," Greed agreed, "Morbid would seem relatively dangerous in the original world, yet in a world of superheroes, what's a mental illness?"

Moreover, his curiosity got the better of him as he asked, "Can I go down for a visit? I've never really observed what's down there."

"There's nothing impressive to see, but if you do want to go, don't forget to bring Gray Mist. That way we will not have to fish you out if you cannot get back on your own."

And so, accompanied by Gray Mist, Greed descended to the depths below the Tower of Thought, to his subconscious. This place was an endless expanse of darkness. One could not reach the Abyss simply by walking unless they traversed an inverted floor.

Greed had originally planned to visit the Abyss, but during the journey, his focus was drawn to other objects. While treading on the subconscious floor, Greed pointed upwards — deeper into his subconscious — and asked, "Why do I feel like there's something up there?"

"It's not your illusion," The floating Gray Mist replied, "The original host of this body left all sorts of odds and ends in our subconscious."

"Nobody's dealing with it?"

"They're not particularly interested," Gray Mist swayed as it answered, "It appears to be just a bunch of junk, very few usable things. Arrogant took a look last time but didn't find any clues."

Licking his lips, Greed rolled his eyes, "One man's trash is another man's treasure. Would it be right not to take a look around while we're here? Let's pay a visit."

Gray Mist and Greed ascended together, or rather, continued sinking deeper into the subconscious. As the elevator's light grew smaller and dimmer, they encountered denser darkness, in which faint shadows appeared.

Greed, much like a treasure hunter, drew closer to the shadows with Gray Mist, finding that most of them were indeed valueless debris as Gray Mist had suggested: leaves, paddles, olive branches, star rings, scraps of paper. These objects floating deep in the subconscious bore no practical value whatsoever.

Greed descended further and noticed a shimmering feather. He instantly recognized it as the one that the original owner, Shiller, had plucked from Lucifer. But he merely glanced at it before moving on.

He didn't descend any further but searched vigilantly above where the feather floated. Beyond the darkness, he discovered a solitary scale floating quietly in the subconscious.

Obviously, it wasn't a fish scale. It was larger and tougher. There was no color in the subconscious, hence he could not extract more clues from the scale itself.

"There must be something useful, right?" Greed muttered to himself. He was not ready to give up. He believed since Shiller, the original owner, had left this much stuff here, they should have some value. That's how Greed operated — he had never found anything in the world that he couldn't squeeze something useful out of.

After a moment's hesitation, he still refused to let go. In the end, he made up his mind and decided to take a risk and continue his descent with Gray Mist.

The depths of the subconscious is the void, the edge of the self. Once the collective consciousness collapses, it will fall into this void, gradually weakening the self-consciousness, and finally losing the perception of one's existence. This is the symptom of disassociation borne out by many mental illnesses, so this place is dangerous for any personality trait.

But Greed's creed had always been that the brave die only after the cowards. He fully understood that the Superego had probably anticipated his actions, otherwise he wouldn't have insisted he bring the Gray Mist along. Should anything go amiss, Gray Mist could at least fish him out.

Slowly sinking, the surrounding darkness gradually disappeared. All that remained was the hollow domain, where every personality trait that ventured into this land would progressively lose the sensation of all things.

Thanks to his obstinacy as an inherent quality, Greed could linger here longer than others. However, that didn't mean he could stay indefinitely. Having sought fruitlessly in this space filled with uncertainty, Gray Mist suggested, "I think it's time we return."

However, much like a deep-sea diver running out of oxygen without finding pearls, Greed was still reluctant to concede.

Some time later, when it became clear there was nothing left here and the threshold of danger was imminent, Greed finally decided to abandon his search. However, instead of letting the grey mist carry him swiftly toward the surface, he decided to rise slowly on his own.

As he approached the surface of the void, his self-awareness had almost entirely faded, like a dream. He needed only wake from it unharmed, with the boundary of the void in sight, no more than a second away from breaking the surface and breathing air again.

However, at that moment, Greed heard an echo resonating from the infinite vastness of the void.

Wanting to listen closely, he stopped his ascent. An indeterminate period of time passed, akin to either a year or mere seconds before he found himself lying on the floor of the Tower of Thought.

"You scared me to death!" The grey mist cried out gently with a tone of reproach, circling around Greed's body. "I thought you could float up on your own, but for some reason you just stopped. Do you realize you nearly drowned?"

Greed cleared his head gently, realizing he had heard the echo. It was still lingering in his mind, right on the brink of his fading consciousness.

It wasn't a sentence, more like conveying an idea. To Greed's excitement, he found instructions for using the pile of junk. The idea was simple and straightforward. To sum it up in one succinct sentence – "This sheep hasn't been sheared, remember to do it later."

Greed remembered that his predecessor, Shiller, had borrowed a large sum of debt and then exploded into oblivion, defaulting on his debt and leaving all the energy he had borrowed to the current Shiller. Although Greed didn't think his predecessor had done this solely to save the Soviet Union, the imparted energy was indeed substantial.

Shiller's understanding of the mystic arts was not deep at the outset, hence he could not determine how much the magic energy, acting as a universal currency, was worth. It appeared to be abundant, but if inflation in the magical realm was severe enough and the energy expenditure was too high, it might not be much after all.

Through some exchanges in two magical realms, Shiller realized that while the energy was surprisingly vast, causing a fundamental change, the quantity was not absurd considering Shiller's past act of shearing all the sheep.

Now Greed knew that Shiller hadn't completely plundered all the 'sheep', some tended to get lucky and escaped. However, it was more likely that Shiller felt the wool was not long enough in some instances and planned to let it grow before shearing it again. But he had to abandon this plan due to his hasty exit.

As a skilled fleece shearer, Greed could now perfectly empathize with Shiller's distress at leaving before fully conducting the shearing operation. This distress was even more agonizing than his own death.

The greatest fear for anyone greedy was not that they died with their wealth unspent, but knowing that they would die before borrowing from every available high-interest loan.

With this understanding, Greed realized, the pile of junk left in his subconscious didn't inherently possess any significant value. It was more like a notepad, used for recording which powerful entities in the cosmos he hadn't borrowed power from yet.

It is well known that sheep can feel pain. The first shearing yields the most wool. Once deceived, the sheep, regardless of who approaches it next, is likely to stay distant. If one could continue shearing, the wool would not be as plentiful.

Conversely, these markers representing the powerful entities were sheep that had never been sheared; pure and trusting lambs. For Greed, this was an unexpected windfall, the most precious knowledge and wealth, even more precious than his recently earned breakthrough ability to transcend limitations.

The thought of countless sheep in the boundless depths of the DC Universe, untouched by shears, ignited a fire in Greed's heart, revealing a favorable situation and hopeful days ahead.

Upon his return to the Tower of Thought, Greed shared his findings with his superego and his arrogance. The superego neither confirmed nor denied, silently approving of Greed's continued shearing practice, but his arrogance led to speculation.

"If each item left deep within the subconscious represents a god, then who are they representing?"

"That's a good question. But we cannot send out a universe-wide broadcast to claim lost items. We might be able to guess a few, right? Shall we try analyzing a couple of them?"

Arrogance and the other Shillers agreed to the proposal. Hence, Greed, accompanied by the grey mist, ventured down once again. This time, however, he wasn't interested in the shallowly buried bones; the more deeply something was buried, the better.

In the end, Greed chose a scale.

When he dragged the giant scale, half his height, back to the Tower of Thought, free from the blurring influence of his subconscious and the pervasive darkness, the scale revealed its true form—

It was a black, iridescent, almost symbolic... dragon scale.