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Chapter 216: A Nuclear Bomb
2022-10-19 Author: Great Demon Spirit
"Level Four, Level Four... So this is a Level Four Mutant..." Many high-level officials watched the scene on the screen, which looked like something out of a Hollywood blockbuster, a bitter taste in their mouths.
The most famous, Magneto and Professor X, are both Level Four, but neither has ever displayed their power as violently as Tony.
Because they've never encountered an enemy that forced them to use most of their power to fight!
But Tony has! He frenziedly animated countless machines, sending them to the battlefield to serve as seemingly useless cannon fodder.
Any single Transformer, placed on a battlefield as humans know it, would be an incredible war weapon. A massive, fearless machine with strong defenses—it's nothing short of a killing machine.
But the images transmitted by the satellites cruelly told them that ordinary Transformers, even in the millions—a legion that could, to some extent, even conquer the world—were still not worth mentioning.
To put it bluntly, in front of Hulk and Predaking, calling the ordinary Transformers cannon fodder would be a gross overestimation.
"The times have changed." One high-ranking official, unable to take the shock, clutched his heart in pain, slumping onto the table and gasping for breath.
"Nick Fury, can we find a way to recruit him?" a Permanent Council Member suddenly asked.
Nick Fury rubbed his forehead, feeling a headache and a sense of helplessness. The terror of Level Four combat power was laid bare before his eyes for the first time. That feeling of powerlessness greatly irritated this control-freak of an agent chief.
"Maybe we can recruit him, maybe we can't." Nick Fury said, his face ashen as he stared at the screen. "He never resigned his commission from the Military. That could be an entry point for negotiations. But the question is, why would he rejoin the military system?"
"Isn't he short on rare metals? We can provide him with metals," an official suggested.
Everyone looked at him as if he were an idiot.
"Am I wrong? Everyone has desires, even a Level Four Mutant," the official said.
"If he doesn't have metal and machines, can't he just go and take them? Wakanda has an inexhaustible Vibranium Mine waiting for him! Even if that weren't an option, if he can animate and control an army of millions, can't he just control those machines to dive into the ocean and mine for metal?!" a short-tempered official roared furiously.
The official, who had been a politician for too long, immediately deflated.
This terrifying fact was brutally laid bare.
In the international waters, treasures are everywhere. The countless mineral deposits on the seabed are far richer than those on the continents, but humans lack the means to mine them. And Magneto, who does have the means, has already had a falling out with them!
All the oceans of Earth could now be declared to have a master! And that master is Tony!!
A Mechanical Legion of millions that doesn't eat, drink, or sleep—and no one even knows if this is the upper limit of what Tony can animate. For the nations that have long coveted the ocean's resources, this is a colossal disaster.
Magneto only uses a small amount of metal for his weapons, but Tony's craving for rare metals has no upper limit.
Thinking of more terrifying possibilities, in a modern civilization built on all kinds of instruments and machinery, Tony is a bug in the system!
Unsolvable!
Many began to make plans, trying their best to research countermeasures on one hand, while attempting to explore the possibility of winning Tony over on the other.
Countless psychologists were called in to analyze Tony's psychological profile, dissecting the thoughts and meanings behind his every action.
The world-destroying scene on the screen had indeed delivered a huge ideological shock to these high-level officials.
A single living being, a body of flesh and blood, can already achieve this much?
In an era before aliens had appeared, when the people of Earth still considered themselves the only ones in the universe, Tony's act of openly flexing his muscles to hunt the Hulk had opened a new door for many.
This was highly significant. For example, thinking from the most direct perspective, people like Tony and the Hulk, being so powerful, must also have incredibly long lifespans, right?
"Why didn't we kill him when he was weak, or just recruit him directly into S.H.I.E.L.D.?" a high-ranking official asked.
"He grew too fast! How much time has passed between his Awakening and now?" Nick Fury shook his head.
It's incredibly difficult for a Mutant to advance in level; taking several decades to advance a single level is very common. Who would have thought that this guy, Tony, could turn his potential into actual power so quickly?
"Fortunately, we've at least reached a preliminary verbal agreement to cooperate, and he has also promised to help us complete a troublesome mission... I can pay him a personal visit."
"Very good, Director Fury. Since we cannot eliminate him, let's find a way to make him one of us." A member of the World Security Council paused, then asked tentatively, "What about the Hulk? His human identity is Dr. Banner. We could try to win Banner over at the same time, as a means to counterbalance Tony."
"If Dr. Banner could control himself, he wouldn't have been in hiding for so long. Several years have passed since that experiment, but Dr. Banner is still unable to control the Hulk. Most importantly, are you sure Tony will let the Hulk go? If you recruit both the Hulk and Tony at the same time, you'll just lose them both forever!"
Nick Fury sneered, realizing he had repeatedly underestimated the greed of these politicians, yet each time, they managed to push the lower limit of his underestimation even further, endlessly.
"We should be grateful that Tony specifically chose a sparsely populated area for the battlefield and evacuated all nearby civilians at the first opportunity. For a battle this intense to have caused zero civilian casualties is nothing short of a miracle."
Nick Fury felt a headache coming on. Complex emotions flickered in his one eye, containing calculations of various gains and losses. At this moment, he truly felt regret—not regret for failing to win Tony over sooner.
But for not killing Tony earlier, instead entertaining the idea of recruiting him. The cunning Tony had also maintained an ambivalent attitude, always leaving a sliver of possibility open.
If Tony hadn't grown so quickly, surpassing all previous records for a Mutant's advancement speed, Nick Fury wouldn't be in such a passive position.
The more he thought about it, the stronger his killing intent grew, and the more he was filled with remorse.
Never talk about feelings with the agent chief of a global organization. Only interests are eternal.
Nick Fury ended the call and fell into deep thought. Based on his understanding of Tony, as long as some things were laid out on the table, they could continue to talk. Even if they couldn't bring him in, they could still reach a cooperation agreement. Tony wasn't one of those paranoid madmen. As long as they let him kill the Hulk this time, there was a high probability they could get through to him.
But clearly, someone didn't want him to have any peace.
"Director! A nuclear bomb has been launched without authorization!" his second-in-command rushed over, shouting.
"What? Damn it, who was it?!" Nick Fury was both shocked and furious. He rushed to the window, and from his vantage point, he could even clearly see the trajectory left by an intercontinental missile as it ascended.
The sonic boom as it broke through the atmosphere was like a sonata before death, filled with the wails and screams of countless dead souls.
"Are they insane, using a nuclear bomb against a Level Four Mutant surrounded by a legion of a million?! Investigate! Investigate it immediately!"
In the impromptu conversation just now, no one had directly proposed using a nuclear bomb! It wasn't that they didn't want to, but that a nuclear bomb would be of little use! Without confirming that Tony was definitely taking an anti-humanity stance, no one would be stupid enough to try and kill him with a nuke!
Tony can precisely control a legion of millions in coordinated combat. You think he can't intercept a single nuclear bomb? He could just take control of a fighter jet and have it crash into the nuke, and it would be useless.
(end of chapter)
2022-10-19 Author: Great Demon Spirit
"Level Four, Level Four... So this is a Level Four Mutant..." Many high-level officials watched the scene on the screen, which looked like something out of a Hollywood blockbuster, a bitter taste in their mouths.
The most famous, Magneto and Professor X, are both Level Four, but neither has ever displayed their power as violently as Tony.
Because they've never encountered an enemy that forced them to use most of their power to fight!
But Tony has! He frenziedly animated countless machines, sending them to the battlefield to serve as seemingly useless cannon fodder.
Any single Transformer, placed on a battlefield as humans know it, would be an incredible war weapon. A massive, fearless machine with strong defenses—it's nothing short of a killing machine.
But the images transmitted by the satellites cruelly told them that ordinary Transformers, even in the millions—a legion that could, to some extent, even conquer the world—were still not worth mentioning.
To put it bluntly, in front of Hulk and Predaking, calling the ordinary Transformers cannon fodder would be a gross overestimation.
"The times have changed." One high-ranking official, unable to take the shock, clutched his heart in pain, slumping onto the table and gasping for breath.
"Nick Fury, can we find a way to recruit him?" a Permanent Council Member suddenly asked.
Nick Fury rubbed his forehead, feeling a headache and a sense of helplessness. The terror of Level Four combat power was laid bare before his eyes for the first time. That feeling of powerlessness greatly irritated this control-freak of an agent chief.
"Maybe we can recruit him, maybe we can't." Nick Fury said, his face ashen as he stared at the screen. "He never resigned his commission from the Military. That could be an entry point for negotiations. But the question is, why would he rejoin the military system?"
"Isn't he short on rare metals? We can provide him with metals," an official suggested.
Everyone looked at him as if he were an idiot.
"Am I wrong? Everyone has desires, even a Level Four Mutant," the official said.
"If he doesn't have metal and machines, can't he just go and take them? Wakanda has an inexhaustible Vibranium Mine waiting for him! Even if that weren't an option, if he can animate and control an army of millions, can't he just control those machines to dive into the ocean and mine for metal?!" a short-tempered official roared furiously.
The official, who had been a politician for too long, immediately deflated.
This terrifying fact was brutally laid bare.
In the international waters, treasures are everywhere. The countless mineral deposits on the seabed are far richer than those on the continents, but humans lack the means to mine them. And Magneto, who does have the means, has already had a falling out with them!
All the oceans of Earth could now be declared to have a master! And that master is Tony!!
A Mechanical Legion of millions that doesn't eat, drink, or sleep—and no one even knows if this is the upper limit of what Tony can animate. For the nations that have long coveted the ocean's resources, this is a colossal disaster.
Magneto only uses a small amount of metal for his weapons, but Tony's craving for rare metals has no upper limit.
Thinking of more terrifying possibilities, in a modern civilization built on all kinds of instruments and machinery, Tony is a bug in the system!
Unsolvable!
Many began to make plans, trying their best to research countermeasures on one hand, while attempting to explore the possibility of winning Tony over on the other.
Countless psychologists were called in to analyze Tony's psychological profile, dissecting the thoughts and meanings behind his every action.
The world-destroying scene on the screen had indeed delivered a huge ideological shock to these high-level officials.
A single living being, a body of flesh and blood, can already achieve this much?
In an era before aliens had appeared, when the people of Earth still considered themselves the only ones in the universe, Tony's act of openly flexing his muscles to hunt the Hulk had opened a new door for many.
This was highly significant. For example, thinking from the most direct perspective, people like Tony and the Hulk, being so powerful, must also have incredibly long lifespans, right?
"Why didn't we kill him when he was weak, or just recruit him directly into S.H.I.E.L.D.?" a high-ranking official asked.
"He grew too fast! How much time has passed between his Awakening and now?" Nick Fury shook his head.
It's incredibly difficult for a Mutant to advance in level; taking several decades to advance a single level is very common. Who would have thought that this guy, Tony, could turn his potential into actual power so quickly?
"Fortunately, we've at least reached a preliminary verbal agreement to cooperate, and he has also promised to help us complete a troublesome mission... I can pay him a personal visit."
"Very good, Director Fury. Since we cannot eliminate him, let's find a way to make him one of us." A member of the World Security Council paused, then asked tentatively, "What about the Hulk? His human identity is Dr. Banner. We could try to win Banner over at the same time, as a means to counterbalance Tony."
"If Dr. Banner could control himself, he wouldn't have been in hiding for so long. Several years have passed since that experiment, but Dr. Banner is still unable to control the Hulk. Most importantly, are you sure Tony will let the Hulk go? If you recruit both the Hulk and Tony at the same time, you'll just lose them both forever!"
Nick Fury sneered, realizing he had repeatedly underestimated the greed of these politicians, yet each time, they managed to push the lower limit of his underestimation even further, endlessly.
"We should be grateful that Tony specifically chose a sparsely populated area for the battlefield and evacuated all nearby civilians at the first opportunity. For a battle this intense to have caused zero civilian casualties is nothing short of a miracle."
Nick Fury felt a headache coming on. Complex emotions flickered in his one eye, containing calculations of various gains and losses. At this moment, he truly felt regret—not regret for failing to win Tony over sooner.
But for not killing Tony earlier, instead entertaining the idea of recruiting him. The cunning Tony had also maintained an ambivalent attitude, always leaving a sliver of possibility open.
If Tony hadn't grown so quickly, surpassing all previous records for a Mutant's advancement speed, Nick Fury wouldn't be in such a passive position.
The more he thought about it, the stronger his killing intent grew, and the more he was filled with remorse.
Never talk about feelings with the agent chief of a global organization. Only interests are eternal.
Nick Fury ended the call and fell into deep thought. Based on his understanding of Tony, as long as some things were laid out on the table, they could continue to talk. Even if they couldn't bring him in, they could still reach a cooperation agreement. Tony wasn't one of those paranoid madmen. As long as they let him kill the Hulk this time, there was a high probability they could get through to him.
But clearly, someone didn't want him to have any peace.
"Director! A nuclear bomb has been launched without authorization!" his second-in-command rushed over, shouting.
"What? Damn it, who was it?!" Nick Fury was both shocked and furious. He rushed to the window, and from his vantage point, he could even clearly see the trajectory left by an intercontinental missile as it ascended.
The sonic boom as it broke through the atmosphere was like a sonata before death, filled with the wails and screams of countless dead souls.
"Are they insane, using a nuclear bomb against a Level Four Mutant surrounded by a legion of a million?! Investigate! Investigate it immediately!"
In the impromptu conversation just now, no one had directly proposed using a nuclear bomb! It wasn't that they didn't want to, but that a nuclear bomb would be of little use! Without confirming that Tony was definitely taking an anti-humanity stance, no one would be stupid enough to try and kill him with a nuke!
Tony can precisely control a legion of millions in coordinated combat. You think he can't intercept a single nuclear bomb? He could just take control of a fighter jet and have it crash into the nuke, and it would be useless.
(end of chapter)
