As it turned out, things often don't go as planned.
After the Artemis landed on the planet, Ethan and the others explored for several months, but they didn't find the slightest sign of a "prehistoric civilization."
No matter how they looked at it, this was an undeveloped, primitive planet. The civilization here was indeed at that stage. It wasn't a case of regression or a reset.
After replenishing with some local specialty food and a large amount of fresh water, the Artemis departed and headed for the next target planet.
During this time, Betty's mood wasn't very high. Her experience on this planet seemed to confirm that the hope of returning home and finding her family was growing slimmer by the day.
However, Ethan had been paying close attention and noticed her emotions were not too bad either. Perhaps she had already sensed this outcome when she awoke from her thousand-year sleep and learned how much the Empire had changed.
"What do we do next?"
"Next?"
Ethan didn't really know what to do next either.
Standing on the deck of the Artemis, those still on board included Maria Hill, Nebula, and a few others. Logan wasn't around lately, likely spending time in Atlantis with Atlanna.
At this point, Atlanna was considered part of the crew. Since she had things to deal with, she wouldn't be joining the Artemis for the time being.
Originally, Logan thought he might have to frequently travel between the two worlds in the future, but after Ethan's small world began gradually transforming into a divine realm, he had an idea. He had only briefly discussed it with Ethan so far. No one else knew about it.
The idea was that once Ethan's divine realm was vast enough and included oceans, the Kingdom of Atlantis could also become residents of the divine realm.
Ethan had no objections. If the divine realm truly matured, it would become an enormous world, and such a vast realm couldn't remain uninhabited. Atlantis had a connection to him, so he naturally wouldn't refuse.
However, he didn't think the people of Atlantis would willingly abandon their homeland and move to a new world. The phrase "reluctant to leave one's homeland" applies to all intelligent life. When the time comes, perhaps only a small number would leave with Atlanna, or maybe no one at all.
Gently running his hand across the table, Ethan looked at the star chart before him. It displayed the surrounding star field and highlighted several potentially habitable planets.
The original plan was to investigate these planets one by one. With no better idea, they would continue with that for now.
"Or..."
"Or?"
"We could switch to a different ship first."
Just as Ethan hesitated, Ada walked into the cockpit.
"I've already obtained a lot of the technical data you wanted. Most of the remaining top-secret data are newly developed or in testing phases. Those will take more time to acquire."
As for the currently deployed and widely adopted technologies, they were relatively easy to steal. Even the VF-25 and VF-27, which were highly advanced and not fully deployed yet, only used in a few elite units, were not that hard to obtain.
If she really wanted to, Ada could steal a fighter jet directly. With everyone's large storage space now, transporting two jets would be no problem at all.
"In fact, I already got a few samples, but I didn't bring them back this time."
"..."
Ethan scratched his chin in silence as he looked through the documents Ada brought back. He had clearly underestimated her capabilities.
After several upgrades and with support from advanced equipment, Ada's contribution had far exceeded expectations.
"I have two VF-27 models, four VF-25s, the VF-171 currently used by the human military, and all kinds of external packs for these fighters. Oh, and while I was digging around, I also found that the most powerful fighter developed by humans in that world is actually an unmanned drone called GHOST."
"So..."
Ethan looked at Ada. With her personality, there was no way she wouldn't act after learning something like that, right?
Sure enough, Ada said she had secured three drones as well. The large pile of items was hidden away. There had been too many, and her personal storage space couldn't fit them all. She had stolen them one by one at the time.
She had returned this time because her activity had attracted too much attention. It was no longer safe to leave the equipment hidden there. Ada planned to transfer all of it to the Starship Troopers world.
"No, I'll go with you this time and take those fighters to my place first."
At that moment, Tony also returned. With stable teleportation channels established between the worlds, moving back and forth was now easy.
"Had enough fun?"
Tony hadn't shown up since going off to enjoy himself. Clearly, he had wanted some uninterrupted couple time. Since no one in that world knew who he was, he and Pepper had a great time.
Ethan hadn't expected him to suddenly return now. Was he chasing after Ada just to get those fighter jets?
"It's just a coincidence. I came back because I got a message from J.A.R.V.I.S. The birthing room has been activated."
"The birthing room…"
Ethan was about to ask what that was when he suddenly remembered. It was the underground biological lab that Tony had dubbed the "birthing room."
That lab's equipment was for resurrection. Besides the Starks, there was only one person who would need it.
"The Ancient One?"
"Yes."
Ethan was momentarily stunned. Only then did he realize the Marvel Universe timeline had reached that point.
"I almost forgot about this. Is everything going smoothly with the birthing room?"
"According to the data from J.A.R.V.I.S., there are no unexpected issues."
After the stable connection between the worlds was set up, Tony installed a system at his base so that J.A.R.V.I.S. could contact him while he was away. Currently, they had real-time cross-dimensional communication, though remote assistance from J.A.R.V.I.S. was still limited. Tony still needed to carry a sub-program when traveling.
"Even if it's going smoothly, we should go take a look."
"Alright. Before that, I'll take those jets back with me."
"No problem."
Whether Tony studied them or sent them to Starship Troopers, the final results would still come to Ethan. There wasn't really a difference.
Although Tony would also gain new technologies from the research, after improving them and creating finished products, Ethan would have access to everything. At this point, the two were inseparable partners.
After Ethan agreed, Ada left with Tony for the Macross world. He suddenly realized Ada had come back just to ask his opinion. Even though she knew the relationship between Ethan and Tony, she still returned to consult him directly.
As the team grew larger, people like Logan and Ada were consciously maintaining Ethan's authority.
Ethan, of course, had no complaints about this. In fact, he was quite pleased. It proved that he hadn't misjudged them. These two were the ones he had personally brought aboard.
After the two left, Ethan and Betty resumed their earlier conversation.
"Switching to a better ship must be something to be happy about for you."
Betty blinked, thought for a few seconds, then understood what Ethan meant.
The maximum speed of the Artemis was close to the speed of light. While this was astonishing, it wasn't enough for intergalactic travel.
To navigate the universe, faster-than-light travel was essential. Whether through space jumping, warping, folding, or other black tech, without it, the journey would be unbearably long.
Even though Betty was considered a long-lived being, traveling for hundreds of years just to reach another galaxy with no guarantee it was the right one would be maddening.
"Even if we switch to the fastest ship we can build now, it would still take an incredibly long time to cross between galaxies, wouldn't it?"
"For now, yes. But that doesn't mean we can't build something faster. If we can pinpoint exact coordinates, we might even be able to teleport there directly."
Once technology reaches a certain point, long-distance teleportation becomes feasible.
Even if they couldn't determine the exact coordinates and teleport directly, that didn't mean there were no other options.
Ethan waved his hand, revealing a glow, as if reminding Betty that he wasn't ordinary.
As his strength grew and his understanding of universal laws deepened, perhaps one day he could reach any corner of the universe with ease.
And even if that day didn't come soon, they could still work on improving the ship's speed. Simply making it faster could solve the problem too.
For example, building a Speed Force engine or something similar. They didn't need to reach the third-generation Flash's peak speed of 1.3 billion times the speed of light. Even a fraction of that would be enough to travel between galaxies, or even to a supercluster, with ease.
Hearing Ethan's words, a smile returned to Betty's face. She realized that being in Ethan's team meant anything was possible. Her recent discouragement now seemed a little silly.
Just as Ethan finished comforting Betty, Maria Hill came over. Knowing that Ethan and Tony were returning to her world, she was also preparing to return.
(To be continued.)