Chapter 2799 - Ch: 174-181(marvel)

Chapter 174: Phantom-Reality Conversion

Lu Chen opened his eyes and gently moved away the two arms resting on his chest.

The bed was in complete disarray.

Three months had passed since Lu Chen's scavenging plan, and last night was his nineteenth birthday.

Those two women had said they wanted to give him an unforgettable birthday.

It certainly was unforgettable.

However, if he kept lying there, he could forget about getting any serious work done today.

With a slight movement of his mind, his body vanished instantly.

The next second, he vanished directly from the bed.

Lu Chen appeared in the living room, his clothes still properly on.

This was Teleportation LV5 obtained after fusing Teddy, Hughie, and several other abilities.

It was pure spatial jumping, requiring no movement process, and no longer had the flaw of Hughie's teleportation where he had to run naked. Not only could it carry clothing, but it could also carry other people.

There were also drawbacks.

Used consecutively in a short period of time, the consumption would increase drastically.

However, with Lu Chen's current Super Physique, as long as he didn't use teleportation like flashing dozens of times, it basically wouldn't affect combat.

"Finally, I don't need to run naked anymore."

Lu Chen muttered to himself, put on his outer garment, and just then his phone vibrated.

On the screen was a location sent by Hughie, along with several consecutive messages.

"Lu Chen, I really have no other way."

"The hospital says my father is already clinically brain-dead."

"Compound V on the black market is too expensive, and I don't even know if it's real or fake."

"Please help me."

After reading the messages, Lu Chen vanished from the spot.

When he reappeared, he was already standing hundreds of meters high in the sky, then adjusted his direction and flew toward the hospital.

Most original Compound V was now confiscated by the Bureau of Superhuman Affairs, and the small amount of goods flowing into the black market had its price hyped up to a level ordinary people could not earn in a lifetime.

A few minutes later, Lu Chen dropped down from the top floor of the hospital.

Hughie had been waiting on the rooftop for a long time, and upon seeing him, he hurried forward.

"Thank you, thank you so much for coming."

"Let's see the person first."

"In the intensive care unit." Hughie followed beside him, speaking at a fast pace, "The Doctor says there is no possibility of recovery anymore, and we can only rely on a ventilator to maintain him."

The two entered the intensive care unit, where the man on the hospital bed showed no reaction at all, his chest rising and falling mechanically with the ventilator.

Lu Chen took out a vial of original Compound V.

The blue liquid was pushed into his veins.

A few seconds later, the old man on the hospital bed suddenly tensed his body, the monitor values began to beat violently, and his fingers convulsed continuously.

"What's wrong with him?"

Hughie rushed to the bedside, wanting to press the call button.

"The medicine is remodeling his body."

Lu Chen grabbed his wrist, and his psychic power directly invaded the consciousness.

The body that had originally started convulsing slowly quieted down, leaving only the muscles bulging irregularly beneath the skin.

Time ticked away minute by minute.

Hughie paced back and forth by the bedside, several times wanting to speak, but swallowing the words back down.

The system panel before Lu Chen's eyes finally displayed a superpower prompt.

[Detected Copyable Ability]

[Super Physique LV3]

[Virtual-Real Conversion LV5]

[Virtual-Real Conversion LV5: Can actively change one's own molecular structure and penetrate all solid matter. In the virtualized state, the physical body has no entity.]

Lu Chen stared at the second ability.

With no entity existing after activation, it meant that the vast majority of physical attacks would directly fail.

Used in combination with teleportation, whether for surprise attacks or preserving his life, it could make his ability system another fraction more complete, adding another trump card for him heading to the new World.

"Copy Virtual-Real Conversion LV5."

[Copy started]

[Current progress: 0.01%]

"I need to take him to the Superhuman Bureau laboratory for a day of observation."

Hughie was stunned for a moment.

"Can I go together?"

"Yes, but he just awakened and could lose control at any time. You'd better not get too close."

Hughie nodded vigorously.

"I'll listen to you."

Lu Chen reached out and pressed against the hospital bed and Hughie, vanishing together with the person and the bed.

When they reappeared, they had already entered the Superhuman Bureau laboratory.

Hughie held onto the edge of the bed and retched a few times.

Inside the experimental hall, one hundred beds had been neatly arranged.

A volunteer lay on each bed, with binding straps tied around their wrists, ankles, and waist. Some were so nervous they kept swallowing their saliva, while others looked around excitedly.

After the Superhuman Bureau publicly recruited testers for the new generation of Superhumans potions, the registration website was crashed within half an hour.

Hundreds of thousands of people fought for one hundred slots.

Even though the risks were clearly written in the announcement, it couldn't stop them.

Ordinary people knew too well what power meant.

Wealth, status, a sense of security, or even just not having to fear some bastard who liked to get physical after getting drunk.

The Wise One walked over holding a data pad.

"V1 replication has been successful. The first-generation potion developed based on Vought compound has also completed animal experiments and stability testing."

"What about the side effects?"

"I eliminated the parts that easily triggered mutation and ability loss of control."

The Wise One turned a page, "The price is that the direction of abilities will be severely restricted. The vast majority of subjects can only obtain physical enhancement, and it is very hard to awaken other superpowers."

Lu Chen looked at those one hundred volunteers.

Ensure stability first, then pursue abilities.

One must eat a meal bite by bite.

"Start."

One hundred doses of potions were injected simultaneously.

In less than a minute, repressed low roars and groans sounded one after another. Someone clenched their teeth, veins bulging on their forehead; someone's entire body turned red, and the binding straps were stretched tautly, making creaking sounds.

Hughie's father floated quietly behind Lu Chen, maintaining contact, while Lu Chen touched the subjects one by one.

[Super Physique LV1]

[Super Physique LV2]

[Super Physique LV1]

[Super Physique LV3]

Prompts continuously popped up.

The highest was LV3, and the lowest was LV1. There was no mutation, nor did any ability rampage occur.

The binding straps soon came in handy. A burly man just opened his eyes and ripped off the straps on his wrists, nearly knocking over the nearby equipment in a panic.

Lu Chen raised his hand and used psychokinesis to press him back onto the bed.

"Don't move around."

The burly man struggled twice, and finding himself completely unable to get up, he immediately quieted down.

"I was just... I feel like my strength is exceptionally great."

"That's why you were tied up."

Lu Chen released his psychokinesis, "Before you learn how to control it, don't test your fists on the laboratory walls. The repair fee will be deducted from your compensation."

Several eager volunteers around immediately quieted down.

The experiment lasted for one hour.

All one hundred people survived, their physical indicators were stable, and the awakening results did not exceed expectations.

Lu Chen found The Wise One and pushed the data pad back into his arms.

"Do a few more rounds of experiments."

"Sample size?"

"You decide. What I want is stability, not pretty first-batch data."

The Wise One nodded.

Lu Chen glanced at Hughie's father, who was still fast asleep, and added another sentence.

"After confirming there are no problems with the first generation, start developing the next generation."

The Wise One stopped recording.

"Retain the possibility of awakening other superpowers?"

"Right."

Lu Chen pinched the hand on the hospital bed that was gradually regaining warmth.

"Physical enhancement is just the starting point. For the next generation, I want a version that can stably awaken superpowers."

The Wise One closed the data pad.

"Understood."

Chapter 175: Injecting V1

Lu Chen took out three V1s from the refrigerator.

"Hold on tight to the hospital bed."

As soon as Hughie grabbed the guardrail, the laboratory in front of him disappeared.

After several consecutive teleports, the three of them, along with the hospital bed, appeared inside the Superhumans sanatorium.

Hughie leaned against the wall and retched.

"I still don't understand, why couldn't we just fly over directly?"

"Because I want to."

Hughie rubbed his glabella and looked around.

The lobby was brightly lit, and several people in hospital gowns were sitting in wheelchairs basking in the Sun.

The ones accommodated here were all defective products created by Vought Company through Compound V human experiments.

Some had deformed limbs and could only crawl on the ground using all fours; some had most of their bodies covered by tumors induced by the compound; and others had failing organs and lay in hospital beds waiting for Death.

Seeing Lu Chen appear suddenly, a few Nurses and patients were startled at first, but immediately stood up straight after recognizing his face.

"Hello, Director!"

"Mr. Lu!"

Their voices were filled with fanatical respect.

Most of them knew clearly who had fished them out of that pitch-black underground research institute.

Lu Chen smiled and nodded, calling out to the Dean who was hurrying over.

"Gather all the patients together. Push over the ones who can move, and carry the ones who can't move along with their beds."

The Dean was slightly stunned.

"All of them?"

"Right."

"Yes, I'll arrange it immediately."

Hughie watched the medical staff running around everywhere, and then looked at the serum in Lu Chen's hand.

"What are you going to do?" Hughie couldn't help speaking out.

"Quiet down."

Lu Chen moved his fingers.

"I need to concentrate."

Half an hour later, the lobby and the corridors on both sides were crowded with hospital beds and wheelchairs.

The people pushed out were all a bit nervous.

Some whispered questions to the Doctor, while others stared at Lu Chen, trying to read something from his face.

Lu Chen raised his right hand, his palm aiming at the crowd.

LV6 Blood Manipulation, activated.

The bodies of hundreds of people froze at the same time.

The next second, wisps of fresh blood pierced through the skin and floated into mid-air.

Screams instantly burst out, and the medical staff also stepped back in fright.

"Don't move!"

Lu Chen's voice overwhelmed everyone.

"I am repairing your bodies. If anyone moves around and causes things to grow crookedly, I won't be responsible for tearing it down and starting over."

Hughie widened his eyes. He saw the blood inside those patients suddenly ooze out of their skin, gathering into dozens of dark red blood balls above their heads.

The lobby was dead silent, with only the viscous sound of blood flowing.

This job was much more troublesome than killing people.

Destruction only required crushing the heart, but repair required dealing with different lesions in each person's body.

If cell proliferation was a fraction too fast, it would turn into a tumor; if it was a fraction too slow, it wouldn't achieve the reconstruction effect.

Fortunately, after merging the abilities of Mary and Neuman, his control over blood had penetrated to the cellular level.

The blood balls floating above everyone's heads dispersed again, turning into countless red threads that plunged back into the patients' bodies.

A young man whose right leg only remained up to the knee suddenly cried out in surprise.

The muscles at the fracture grew rapidly, white bones extended downward, and blood vessels, nerves, and skin covered them layer by layer.

In less than two minutes, a complete right leg stepped on the wheelchair footrest.

He stared blankly at his toes.

It moved a little.

It moved a little more.

"My leg..."

The severely deformed woman next to him saw her twisted spine return to place bit by bit.

She had been lying on the ground for more than ten years, straightening her waist for the first time.

More changes appeared one after another.

The necrotic organs regained their vitality, the blind eyes focused again, and the tumors covering the skin gradually shriveled and fell off.

Soon there were only cries and irrepressible laughter left in the lobby.

Lu Chen's face turned a bit paler.

This kind of group-level cell proliferation and reconstruction consumed an extreme amount of physical strength and spirit.

Even with Super Physique supporting him, he felt as if a large chunk of his body had been hollowed out.

Fortunately, the blood manipulation fused from Mary and Neuman was powerful enough. What he could do now was not just severed limb regeneration.

As long as the trunk of the body was still there and the cellular foundation had not been completely destroyed, he could pull people back.

He could even bring people who had just died back to life.

Of course, rotting corpses and people with brain Death for too long could not be saved.

He was not turning back time.

A dozen minutes later, the last mass of fresh blood returned to the patient's body.

Lu Chen lowered his hand, and his feet swayed slightly.

Hughie hurried to steady him.

"Are you okay?"

"The consumption is a bit heavy, but I'm fine."

The young man who grew his right leg first stood up from the wheelchair, staggered forward two steps, then turned around and bowed deeply to Lu Chen.

The others also reacted.

Those who could stand stood up, and those who couldn't immediately adapt to their bodies sat on the beds and lowered their heads.

No one discussed it beforehand.

Hundreds of people neatly bowed deeply toward Lu Chen.

Lu Chen waved his hand, his voice tinged with exhaustion: "Alright, stop being so sentimental here. Observe for a few days, and once you confirm your bodies are fine, go to the Superhuman Bureau to report for work. I don't raise idle people here."

The Bureau of Superhuman Affairs was short of people.

These people had been tortured by Vought for many years, had not the slightest bit of goodwill toward Vought, and owed him their lives.

As long as they underwent training, they would be the most reliable batch of grassroots members.

Doing good deeds and winning people's hearts never conflicted.

The young man who had just grown his right leg nodded heavily.

"Understood!"

Someone immediately shouted from behind.

"I'll go!"

"I'll go too!"

"Director, my life belongs to you from now on!"

Hughie stood in the back, not speaking for a long time.

Is this fucking still that ruthless Lu Chen?

In Hughie's impression, every cooperation with Lu Chen resulted in himself being used in return.

And the Lu Chen on TV was more like an ambitious person.

He formed the Superhuman Bureau, registering, managing, and suppressing, grasping almost all Superhumans in his hands.

Whoever didn't cooperate would be visited by Soldier Boy and Black Noir.

But the people before his eyes were not fake.

The sanatorium was not fake.

The exhaustion on Lu Chen's face was not fake either.

Which one was truly him?

Hughie thought about it for a long time without finding an answer.

For the rest of the day, Lu Chen led the two of them to handle the backlog of work at the Superhuman Bureau.

By evening, the progress of [Reality-Illusion Conversion LV5] had just exceeded seventy percent.

During the break at night, he temporarily let go and pushed the still unconscious old man to Hughie.

"Don't let him out of your sight."

"Thank you."

Hughie tucked in the corners of the quilt for his father, but did not leave immediately.

He pinched the corner of his clothes and hesitated for a long time.

"You said before that I could join the Superhuman Bureau."

Lu Chen leaned against the doorway and looked at him.

"Is it still valid now?"

"What, seeing my heroic posture and getting moved, ready to change flags and banners and join my command?"

"No... Uh, there's a little bit of that too."

Hughie scratched his head awkwardly.

"I just feel that the Superhuman Bureau seems really meaningful. At least it's actually helping people here, instead of thinking every day about how to kill someone."

This was quite in character for Hughie.

Go report to Neuman.

Lu Chen turned and left.

"She will arrange a position for you."

After a few teleports, he returned to his home in Long Island.

Annie and Cate were practicing martial arts in the living room.

Cate had just been knocked down by Annie, and immediately took off her boxing gloves upon seeing Lu Chen.

"You're back."

"Stop fighting for now."

Lu Chen placed V1 on the table.

"Come, let me make you a bit stronger."

Annie stared at the serum.

"There won't be any danger, right?"

"I wouldn't dare before, but now if something goes wrong, I can save you back."

With Blood Manipulation as a fallback, as long as the two of them didn't turn to ashes on the spot, he was confident he could repair them.

V1 was quickly injected into their bodies.

A few minutes later, Annie's whole body suddenly erupted with a dazzling strong light, and the light tubes in the Underground Room instantly burst one after another due to a power surge.

But immediately afterward, those violent lights began to recede.

Annie looked at her hands in surprise, clearly feeling that the free electrical ions in the air were continuously converging into her body.

"I don't need electricity anymore?"

"To be precise, you no longer need to hug a power bank to fight."

Annie's physical stats were still in the LV5 category, but Light Manipulation had been upgraded to LV5.

The power was stronger, and her biggest weakness completely vanished.

"I don't need to touch others anymore."

Cate's voice carried excitement as she turned her head to look at Lu Chen.

"Within tens of meters, as long as I can see them, I can enter their brains. Even a group of people."

Mind Control was enhanced, its range expanded, and it no longer required the fatal restriction condition of skin-to-skin contact.

Her physical fitness also directly stepped into the ranks of LV5.

Lu Chen leaned against the door frame, looking at them with great satisfaction.

After another enhancement, he was also relieved.

With the two of them cooperating, there were hardly a few people who could threaten them, and his plan to go to the new World should also be put on the agenda.

After a simple celebration, the smile on Cate's face slowly disappeared.

She walked up to Lu Chen, her fingers grabbing the corner of his clothes. A woman's intuition was always frighteningly accurate, not to mention Cate, who specialized in mental-type abilities.

"You've enhanced both of our abilities."

Cate raised her head.

"Are you leaving?"

Chapter 176: The Two Hundred Percent Deadline

"Are you leaving?"

Cate Dunlap gripped the hem of Lu Chen's clothes, her fingers tightening continuously.

Lu Chen did not answer immediately.

He lowered his gaze slightly, and the system panel that only he could see quietly emerged in his field of view.

[System Charging Progress: 101%]

The progress had already overflowed.

Over the past few months, by absorbing various abilities, he had finally pushed the progress bar past the critical point.

He could open that door leading to the unknown at any time.

"Yes."

Lu Chen raised his head, meeting Cate Dunlap's slightly reddened eyes, "I will be leaving for a short while."

Cate Dunlap's face turned pale instantly.

The atmosphere, which had been somewhat excited due to her ability upgrade, was instantly shattered.

The light in Annie January's hand shrank abruptly, and she walked over to Lu Chen in a few steps, her brows furrowed tightly together.

"Where are you going?"

She glanced at Cate Dunlap, then stared fixedly at Lu Chen.

"Other countries? Or somewhere else? What dangerous thing are you going to do behind our backs again?"

In her subconscious, Lu Chen's so-called "leaving" meant at most going to deal with some tricky enemies, such as some hidden Superhuman terrorist organization.

"Other Worlds."

Lu Chen looked at the two of them.

"Perhaps another Earth, or perhaps another Universe. As for where exactly I will go, I don't know either."

Annie January opened her mouth in astonishment, stuck in her throat for a long time, before squeezing out a sentence: "You... you must be joking? What other Earth?"

Although she had witnessed all kinds of absurd superpowers, something like crossing Universes still directly shattered her cognitive baseline.

"Wait."

Annie January pressed her forehead.

"Are you talking about that kind of... parallel Universe in comics? Different versions of Earth, different humans, or perhaps completely not humans at all?"

"Pretty much."

"When did you know about this?"

"My eighteenth birthday."

"Then you really hid it well."

Annie January gritted her teeth.

Lu Chen knew she wasn't angry.

The system was his biggest secret, involving his true origin and relating to the root of all his abilities.

Before having sufficient strength, telling anyone was not safe.

Even the closest people.

His past self dared not gamble.

Now he didn't have this concern anymore.

In this World, no one could rely on threatening Annie January and Cate Dunlap to force him to bow his head.

Whoever dared to reach out, he would uproot them along with the forces behind them.

Cate Dunlap didn't care about all that.

She didn't care at all about some other Earth or Universe; she only cared about Lu Chen.

She suddenly threw herself into Lu Chen's arms, her hands tightly wrapping around his waist, her cheek pressed against his chest, her voice carrying undisguised urgency.

"Can I go with you?"

"Not yet."

Lu Chen answered quickly.

"Why?"

"This is my first time going to other Worlds. I don't know what's on the other side, nor do I know if we will get separated after crossing."

Lu Chen raised his hand, gently patting her back, taking the opportunity to press her tense body into his arms.

"I'm not afraid of danger."

Cate Dunlap pressed her face against his chest, her tone firm.

"As long as it's with you, anywhere is fine. If you go to another Earth, I will go to another Earth."

"As long as it's with you, anywhere is fine. My abilities are very strong now, and I can help you control them."

"But I'm afraid you'll be in danger."

Lu Chen patted her back.

"Besides, it's not like I'm not coming back."

Lu Chen smoothed her light golden long hair, his gaze crossing over her shoulder to look at Annie January beside them, who was likewise filled with worry in her eyes.

Cate Dunlap did not let go.

"How do you guarantee that?"

"This World is my home and also my base camp for future development. The Superhuman Bureau, the serum laboratory, the sanatorium, and all of you are here."

Lu Chen lowered his head to look at her.

"I spent so much effort to dismantle Vought and brought all the Superhumans in the World into the Superhuman Bureau. Could I just throw it all away and run off to another Universe to start working odd jobs again?"

Annie January's mouth twitched slightly.

This remark was truly very Lu Chen.

"Then when are you leaving?" Annie January asked.

"Not right now."

Lu Chen glanced at the system panel.

One hundred percent could only open one crossing.

This meant that after going over, he might not be able to return in a short time.

It was too risky.

He never wagered all his retreats on the unknown.

At least he had to wait for the charging to reach two hundred percent, ensuring he had a chance for a round trip, and upgrade his existing abilities by another round.

The Myriad Realms were wonderful.

But only by staying alive would one be qualified to see them.

"I need to prepare for a while longer."

"I will set off once I'm certain I can make a safe round trip. I'll go scout the way myself the first time, and after confirming there's no danger, I can take you along."

"Really?"

"When have I ever lied to you?"

Annie January gave a light cough beside them.

Lu Chen looked toward her.

"Do you have an opinion?"

"I was just wondering if this sentence also belongs to part of the deception."

The originally oppressive atmosphere finally eased up a little.

"Furthermore." Lu Chen looked at Cate Dunlap in his arms and Annie January in front of him, his tone turning serious,

"When I'm not here, someone needs to watch over this place. The Bureau of Superhuman Affairs, as well as those newly incorporated people. Only with you helping me look after this World can I rest assured."

He needed absolutely reliable people to guard the rear.

Annie January's light energy was no longer restricted by the environment, and Cate Dunlap's Mind Control was an even greater ultimate weapon.

With the two of them here, plus Soldier Boy and Black Noir, basically no major chaos would break out.

"Then I'll help you look after this place."

"Whoever dares to cause trouble after you leave, I'll make them dig out their own heart with their own hands."

Annie January frowned.

"We can catch them first."

"And then let them dig it out."

"Cate!"

"Just kidding."

But not the slightest hint of joking could be seen on Cate Dunlap's face.

"With you here, I can leave with peace of mind."

Annie January hugged his arm.

"Then you must promise me to contact me the very first thing when you return."

"Alright."

"You can't provoke a bunch of women in other Universes again."

"That might not be controllable."

"Lu Chen!"

Annie January walked over, reached out to grab Lu Chen's collar, and kissed him fiercely, "If you dare to die outside, I swear I'll dig your ashes out of whatever Universe that is."

Cate Dunlap eagerly hugged him tightly from the other side, her gaze revealing a hint of dangerous trance-like blurriness.

"Don't you even think about leaving me behind."

That night, the two used practical actions to express their dissatisfaction with that sentence.

When everything subsided, only the sound of even breathing remained in the bedroom of the Underground Room.

Annie January and Cate Dunlap leaned against his sides to the left and right, falling into a deep sleep, exhausted.

Even when asleep, Cate Dunlap's fingers were still tightly gripping his wrist, for fear that he would vanish into thin air.

Lu Chen had no sleepiness.

He opened his eyes, looking at the pitch-black ceiling, yet his mind was exceptionally clear.

He recalled the trajectory of his journey all this way.

Eighteen years ago, he was dumped in an abandoned garage in Queens.

At that time, all he thought about was how to survive.

How to live like a human being in this fucking World controlled by Vought, where Superhumans flew all over the place.

When awakening the system, his thoughts were also very simple.

To survive.

Copy a few abilities, avoid being caught back into the laboratory by Vought again, and preferably earn some money to move out of that old apartment.

Later, the people he came into contact with grew stronger and stronger, and matters became more and more numerous.

From Godolkin University to The Seven, and then to the entire Vought.

The behemoth that once suffocated him now only left behind a sign taken over by the Superhuman Bureau.

He had already stood at the pinnacle of this World.

As long as he was willing, he could completely stop.

Power, wealth, women—he lacked none of them.

Even if he did nothing starting today, he could comfortably be a local emperor for a lifetime.

But looking at the progress bar for crossing Worlds, Lu Chen still couldn't suppress that urge.

In fact, he could have always lived more steadily.

Back then staying at Godolkin University, not participating in any conflicts, silently interacting with students—maybe in three years, maybe in five years, he still could have weathered his way to become the strongest.

But he didn't.

Just like how he clearly knew that maintaining the status quo would allow him to live carefreely, yet he voluntarily gave up this option.

Two hundred percent.

Once the charging was enough for a round trip, he would go see what was truly on the other side of the system.

Before that, whatever this World could still give him, he wanted to get all of it into his hands.

Blood control, telepathy, teleportation, reality-illusion shifting—these were not yet the limits.

In the Superhumans archives registered by the Superhuman Bureau, there were still quite a few abilities worth copying and fusing.

First, push himself to the apex that this World could bear.

Then completely turn this place into a back garden, a base camp that could be returned to at any time for resupply, recuperation, and mobilization of manpower.

As for the Myriad Realms...

Since he knew that besides here, there were countless Universes and countless wonderfully brilliant Worlds.

There were gods capable of holding stars in their hands, technology capable of reversing time, and extraordinary powers beyond imagination.

How could he possibly stop here?

Since heaven had given him the chance to live a new life and given him this system capable of plundering everything,

these Myriad Realms were destined to bear Lu Chen's name.

Chapter 177: Crossing Initiated

"Open the isolation door."

Lu Chen stood in front of the observation window, his gaze falling on the man in the center of the laboratory.

The Sage turned her head and glanced at him.

"The drug's efficacy hasn't fully stabilized yet."

"His vital signs are very normal."

The isolation door slowly rose.

The man walked out shirtless, raising his hand toward the test wall.

The next second, searing flames spewed from his palms, rapidly turning the metal plate red-hot.

Lasting for over ten seconds, the flames extinguished.

"LV3, Flame Release."

The Sage looked at the data, "No organ distortion, no mental derangement, gene chain temporarily stable."

"Temporary?"

"It needs at least another three months of observation."

The Sage put down the tablet, "I eliminated all gene fragments that would lead to awakening failure and physical distortion, and integrated the physical enhancement effects of V1."

"The safety has gone up, but the potency is at most on par with the original Compound V, just safer."

Lu Chen walked into the laboratory, grabbed the man's wrist, and perceived the changes inside his body.

Genes stable.

There was also no sign of the flame ability continuing to strengthen.

Half a year had passed since he confessed to Annie January and Cate Dunlap.

The first-generation stable serum had long since begun massive deployment.

As long as they passed the physical examination, ordinary people could also apply for injection, with the only difference being the magnitude of enhancement.

The second-generation serum had just entered small-scale experimentation.

It could indeed make people awaken different abilities.

Fire control, telekinesis, sound waves, skin hardening...

Unfortunately, it was too weak.

Among hundreds of subjects, most stayed at LV1 to LV3, LV4 was pitifully rare, and there was only one LV5 to date.

Moreover, what that person awakened was sensory enhancement, and the combat value was average.

"It seems this is the upper limit of Compound V."

Lu Chen let go of his hand.

"No."

The Sage pushed up her glasses, "This is the upper limit of myself and the existing bioscience of this World."

"Given time, it might continue to improve."

"How long will it take?"

"Ten years, or twenty years."

"Then take your time doing it."

Lu Chen was not disappointed.

Being able to stably mass-produce Superhumans was already enough to completely transform this World into his base camp.

As for stronger abilities, he had never expected to wholesale them through an assembly line.

If LV6 and LV7 could really be wholesaled, it would instead easily spiral out of control.

When leaving the laboratory, the Sage chased after him.

"When are you planning to set off?"

"Soon."

"Do Annie January and Cate Dunlap know?"

"They knew half a year ago."

"I mean the specific time."

Lu Chen didn't stop his steps.

"I don't know."

Otherwise Cate Dunlap would be able to lock his wrist to the head of the bed tonight.

Returning to the Superhuman Bureau, the desk was already piled with the final batch of reports.

Butcher took Becca to live in seclusion in California.

That foul-mouthed Britain was now running a barbecue restaurant by the beach.

Attached to the file was a photo taken secretly by a drone: Butcher was wearing a colorful shirt, with a towel hanging around his neck, holding barbecue tongs in his hand, smiling like a mafia boss who had retired early.

Ryan entered the newly built Superhumans school.

"How is this kid performing?"

Lu Chen asked.

Soldier Boy sat on the sofa, his boots resting directly on the coffee table.

"Not bad, at least he didn't cry looking for his mommy."

"Last week some idiot mocked him, and he shoved the guy right into the dining table."

"And then?"

"Then I told him, if you're going to beat someone up, beat them into submission all at once."

"Don't fucking throw a punch today and then hug a pillow tomorrow worrying about whether others hate you."

Lu Chen glanced at him.

These words clearly weren't just meant for Ryan.

Flipping the file to the next page, Lu Chen's lips twitched.

Homelander — now he should be called John — had been acting like a perverted stalker over the past half year, secretly sneaking off to the school every month to take a few looks at Ryan.

John didn't fight for Ryan's custody, nor did he appear at the school gate, just frequently hiding in the distance to peek.

"Have you met John?"

"You didn't drive him away?"

"Why should I care?"

Soldier Boy put down his legs, "If he dares to go crazy, I'll shove his head up his ass."

"He just wants to take a look, so let him look."

"When a man makes a mistake, he always needs a chance to clean up the mess."

After saying that, he grabbed a wine bottle and took a gulp, as if annoyed that he had said too much.

Lu Chen didn't expose him.

This old bastard cursed John the most viciously, but he probably knew better than anyone what it felt like to be denied by a father.

The remaining reports were much simpler.

Kimiko and Frenchie went to Marseille in France, living the peaceful life they had always wanted.

Marvin ended his knife-edge-licking career with The Boys, reconciled with his wife, and completely withdrew from this muddy water.

As for Hughie.

Lu Chen turned to the final document, which was the quarterly budget approval for the administrative department.

At the very bottom was Hughie's signature.

This kid had now become the office director of the Superhuman Bureau, dressed in a suit and looking like a human being.

Even more absurdly, Neuman recently seemed enthusiastic about introducing girlfriends to him.

The development of the Superhuman Bureau no longer required him to keep an eye on it.

His base camp was completely stabilized.

Black Noir, Mei, and several screened Superhumans had all been injected with V1.

Their comprehensive combat power was already no less than the former Homelander.

Coupled with Soldier Boy, Annie January, and Cate Dunlap, even if he left, no one here could stir up any trouble.

The office door was pushed open.

Annie January walked in wearing her combat suit, locking the door behind her with a reverse hand.

Cate Dunlap followed behind her, still wearing that form-fitting coat, her light blonde long hair scattered over her shoulders.

Ever since she stopped intentionally suppressing her abilities, her aura had become increasingly dangerous, but in front of Lu Chen, she was still like a clingy cat.

Subsequently, Lu Chen summoned all core members.

"I'm going into seclusion."

The meeting room was quiet for a few seconds.

Soldier Boy spoke first.

"That's it? I thought you called us here to prepare to go to war with some country."

Annie January stared closely at Lu Chen.

"How long in seclusion?"

"Not sure."

Cate Dunlap's fingertips slowly tightened.

"Are you going into seclusion in this World?"

She really wasn't that easy to fool.

Lu Chen looked at everyone.

"The Superhuman Bureau operates according to the original plan."

"The Sage is responsible for serum deployment, and the Superhumans school is handed over to Annie January for supervision."

"Soldier Boy, you are responsible for handling out-of-control incidents."

"As long as I can beat people up, I have no objections."

"Black Noir and Mei will cooperate with you."

After finishing all the arrangements, the others left one by one.

Cate Dunlap sat without moving.

"You're leaving."

"Mm."

"Today?"

"Now."

Annie January stood up abruptly.

"You said half a year ago that you would tell us before leaving!"

"So I am telling you now."

"Does this count either?"

Annie January's eyes lit up with golden light in anger, "You called everyone over for a meeting, and then told me you're disappearing immediately?"

Lu Chen walked over and took her into his arms.

"The longer it drags on, the harder it is to say goodbye."

Annie January clutched his clothes without pushing him away.

Cate Dunlap hugged him from behind, her forehead pressed against his shoulder blades.

"Take me with you."

"Not the first time."

"I can control anyone."

"What if there is no one there?"

Cate Dunlap stopped speaking, but her arms tightened more and more.

Lu Chen turned around and interlocked his fingers with hers.

"Nothing will happen."

Lu Chen raised his hand to smooth Cate Dunlap's hair and looked at Annie January, "Two hundred percent charging progress is enough for me to instantly teleport back when encountering any danger. I value my life more than you do."

"How long will it take?"

"I don't know."

"Then I will wait forever."

Cate Dunlap stared at him, "If you don't come back, I'll make everyone help me find you. If you can't be found in one World, we'll find the next."

"Don't mess with this World."

"Then come back and keep me in check."

Annie January raised her hand to wipe away the dampness at the corner of her eyes, punching Lu Chen in the chest.

"Come back safely."

"Good."

The door of the underground secret room closed behind them.

Lu Chen raised his eyes, and the system panel fully unfolded.

In the past half year, he was not only improving his subordinates, but also frantically improving himself.

He had touched all valuable abilities in the Superhuman Bureau's archives, fusing what could be fused and upgrading what could be upgraded.

As he was now, even he didn't know what kind of disaster-level destructive power a full-strength strike would be.

[Super Physique LV7: Can survive direct impact at the center of a nuclear explosion, physical body can smash through small mountain ranges]

[Mind Control LV6: Covers a small city, batch modification of cognition, constructs large-scale mental illusions]

[Super Speed LV6: Integrates Flight and running speed, can reach hundreds of Mach levels after energy amplification]

[Super Healing LV6: Can regenerate as long as core cells are not destroyed]

[Heat Vision LV6: Continuous output can flatten several square kilometers of urban areas]

[Elemental Control LV7 (Fused from multiple energy controls, upgraded through Soldier Boy's identical modification and fusion, can control energy in the body, and convert and release light, Fire, lightning, blood, magnetic fields, telekinesis, radiation, fully charged can destroy a medium-sized city, energy aftermath can affect a state-wide range)]

[Intangibility LV5 (Can actively change own molecular structure, penetrating all solid matter. In ethereal state, physical body has no entity, requires active release)]

[Teleportation LV5 (Can carry other people, multiple uses or long-distance jumps will significantly increase consumption)]

[Invisibility LV3 (Optical invisibility, requires stripping off clothes, can be detected)]

[Physical Mimicry LV4 (Can freely change body shape, appearance, gender, perfectly replicating the target's facial features, body shape, and voice)]

[Longevity LV6]

[System Charging Progress: 200%]

In half a year, he had pushed the power obtainable in this World to the limit.

Preparation was enough.

There was also a way out.

Lu Chen took a deep breath, suppressing that trace of long-lost palpitation deep in his heart.

In this World, he had touched the ceiling, and all power and strength were already in his hands.

But the myriad Worlds were only just opening their doors to him.

Lu Chen activated Intangibility LV5, his body rapidly losing its physical form.

Everything was ready.

Lu Chen looked at the overflowing progress bar, his eyes sharp.

"System, initiate crossing."

The light screen suddenly burst into a dazzling White glow.

The space in the secret room violently distorted, like a crumpled piece of drawing paper.

When the White glow dissipated, the center of the room was already empty.

Only that tightly closed alloy door remained.

GOING TO MARVEL 

Chapter 178: The Battle Begins

As the white light just dissipated, a giant mouth covered in metal armor shells slammed right in front of Lu Chen.

"What is that?"

Lu Chen's eyelids twitched, and his body had already entered the intangible state.

Boom!

A behemoth measuring fully two to three hundred meters long passed right through him, and the resulting airflow knocked several surrounding Chitauri flying vehicles wildly off balance.

Lu Chen turned around, and only then did he clearly see the thing that had attacked him.

It was a hybrid of a giant metal whale and an insect, its shell hanging full of Chitauri soldiers, and it was swooping down toward the New York streets with its massive body swinging.

Leviathan.

The moment this name popped up, Lu Chen also realized what it was.

Just after time-traveling, he got this thing riding in his face.

The new World's welcome ceremony sure was enthusiastic.

The Leviathan turned in the air and charged at Lu Chen once again.

The glass along the way shattered completely, and its massive body blocked out a large swath of the block.

Lu Chen deactivated his intangibility, and his eyes quickly filled with black light.

Hum!

A massive pitch-black beam burst forth from his eyes, instantly piercing through the Leviathan's head.

That layer of metal armor capable of withstanding missile bombardment didn't even last half a second in front of the black Heat Vision.

The armor, flesh, bones, and the internal Chitauri soldiers were simultaneously annihilated, leaving behind only a glowing red ring of molten trace.

The black light pushed straight backward.

One hundred meters.

Two hundred meters.

The Leviathan's massive body was thoroughly pierced from head to tail, all its tissues melted under the focused thermal energy.

It still maintained the posture of charging forward, but a charred tunnel several meters in diameter had already been burned through its interior.

The next second, the giant beast lost control and smashed down toward the block below.

If this thing landed, it could at least crush several buildings.

Lu Chen raised his right hand, pointing his five fingers at the corpse.

Telekinesis erupted.

The Leviathan's falling corpse abruptly stopped in mid-air, then flew horizontally, smashing through a dozen or so Chitauri flying vehicles in succession, and finally crashed into a distant empty plaza.

After finishing all this, Lu Chen finally had time to survey his surroundings.

Tall buildings, thick smoke, familiar New York, Chitauri soldiers flying wildly across the sky, and that huge blue portal in the center of the sky.

This scene was too familiar.

He looked down and happened to lock eyes with a few people on the street.

Gold-red armor.

Five-pointed star uniform.

Green big guy.

A muscular man holding a hammer.

Black tight tactical suit.

The original Avengers.

The Avengers, Battle of New York.

Good luck; the system's first time-travel actually threw him into this time period.

During this period when no freaks and monsters had appeared yet, as long as he didn't make too big of a fuss, Ancient One probably wouldn't have the spare time to manage him, right?

Lu Chen glanced up at the sky twice. If you don't speak for three seconds, I'll take it as your consent.

Tony hovered in mid-air with his faceplate open, glancing at the still-smoking Leviathan corpse.

"Alright, can someone tell me which side that guy in the sky who shoots black light is on?"

Steve raised his shield, blocking a few energy shots.

"At least what he killed just now were aliens."

"Loki is also killing aliens, just in a rather special way."

"Stark, now is not the time for jokes."

"Captain, I only joke when things are really bad."

Tony closed his faceplate again, and his scanning system locked onto Lu Chen, but warnings popped up on the screen one after another.

No identity information.

The instantaneous temperature of those two beams just now directly exceeded the armor's calculation range.

"What the hell."

"What's wrong?" Natasha asked.

"That guy's eyes are even more ridiculous than my repulsor cannons."

Hulk stood on a flattened car, looking up at Lu Chen, then glanced at the distant Leviathan corpse.

That was originally his target.

The surprise on his big green face quickly turned into displeasure.

"Hulk's."

Hearing this low roar, Lu Chen almost laughed out loud.

It seemed he really did steal Hulk's toy.

[High-level space energy detected.]

[Unknown reaction occurred in the system charging module.]

The long-dormant system suddenly popped up prompts continuously, and the text was even slightly flickering.

The smile on Lu Chen's face vanished.

From obtaining the system until now, apart from being able to see the panel and accumulate charge, this thing had almost never had any active reaction.

But now, he could clearly feel that the system was transmitting a craving similar to hunger, pointing straight at the sky.

Lu Chen raised his head, his gaze following the blue beam of light all the way down, locking onto the roof of Stark Tower.

Tesseract.

To be precise, the Space Stone.

As for the Battle of New York, the Avengers, and Loki, they could all be put aside for now.

Lu Chen took a final glance at the people on the street, and his body instantly vanished.

"Where did he go?" Steve asked.

Tony rapidly rotated his perspective.

"I don't know."

"Did he go find Loki?"

"No, he's eyeing the teleportation device."

Before his voice fell, dozens of Chitauri soldiers pounced from the side.

Tony raised both hands, his palm cannons firing continuously, completely unable to spare a hand to chase after him.

Lu Chen directly teleported and appeared at the top of Stark Tower.

The blue beam of light was right before his eyes.

The Tesseract was fixed in the center of the machine, with massive space energy enveloping the device.

A layer of visible energy barrier formed around it.

Lu Chen didn't rashly reach out his hand.

There was a layer of pure energy shield on the outside of this thing. Except for Loki's scepter embedded with the Mind Stone, using another stone was probably the only way to break it open, and once the contact method was wrong, no one knew where one would be teleported to.

Should he first find Loki and get the scepter?

Lu Chen walked out two steps.

[Absorbing space energy.]

[Current absorption progress: 0.01%.]

His footsteps stopped, and his gaze landed on the blue barrier on the outer layer of the machine.

No contact needed?

It seemed he still underestimated the system; the energy released by the Space Stone could be directly extracted, meaning he didn't need to touch the Tesseract at all, nor did he temporarily need Loki's scepter.

He just needed to stand here and wait.

Lu Chen approached the machine until the system's absorption speed reached its maximum, then stopped next to the energy barrier.

On the street, Steve looked at the endless stream of Chitauri army emerging and quickly withdrew his attention.

Whether You-Know-Who was an enemy could not be determined for the time being, but the other party killed the Leviathan with a single blow and hadn't attacked them just now.

At least for now, he wasn't Loki's person.

"Now, act according to the plan. Thor, you go seal the portal entrance and stall the enemy army. Use your lightning to hit them hard! Stark, you take charge of airspace and restrict them within three blocks. Clint, you go to the roof to find a field of view. Natasha, you and me hold the ground."

"What about Hulk?" Tony asked in the comms channel.

Steve turned his head to look at the big green guy smashing cars.

"Hulk, smash."

Hulk grinned, revealing a ferocious smile, and his legs abruptly exerted force, rushing into the Chitauri army in mid-air like a cannonball.

S.H.I.E.L.D. Command Center.

Hill stared at the repeatedly played footage on the big screen where the Leviathan was pierced from head to tail by the black beam, and large swathes of red errors had already popped up on the data analysis page.

"Can his identity be confirmed?"

"No." The technician rapidly tapped the keyboard, "Facial recognition has no results, and the global superpowers archive has no matching objects."

Hill turned her head to look at Nick Fury.

"Is this also your person?"

"No."

Fury's single eye stared at Lu Chen on top of Stark Tower, his expression growing increasingly solemn.

"I don't know him."

A person possessing this kind of power couldn't possibly appear out of thin air.

Yet in all of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s monitoring systems, there was precisely no trace left behind by Lu Chen.

There was no birth record, no movement trajectory, and no source of ability.

It was as if this person had only arrived on Earth a few minutes ago.

What was even more troublesome was that he was currently standing next to the Tesseract.

Fury pressed down on his communicator.

"Everyone pay attention, You-Know-Who is approaching the Tesseract. Don't let him take the Tesseract away."

"I'm very busy."

Tony passed through the middle of two Chitauri squads, his shoulder micro-missiles volleying to blast the enemies behind into fireballs.

Hawkeye released his bowstring, and an explosive arrow burst open in the air.

"I can't get away on my end either."

Steve was being besieged by a dozen or so Chitauri soldiers, and could only use his shield to knock away the nearest enemies.

The comms channel was quiet for two seconds.

Natasha changed her magazine and looked up at Stark Tower.

"I'll go try."

"Are you sure?" Steve frowned, "That guy is very dangerous."

"I'm only responsible for probing, not fighting."

She grabbed a low-flying Chitauri flying vehicle, flipped onto its shell, and controlled it to rush straight toward the roof.

"Besides, when dealing with You-Know-Who whose background is unknown, communication is more effective than fists."

Lu Chen on the roof was wondering what would happen after the system absorbed energy, when a slight sound of airflow disturbance came from behind.

He didn't look back.

Super Senses had long captured the approaching bio-magnetic field.

Heartbeat steady, steps light, no obvious hostility, but carrying extremely strong vigilance.

"The scenery here is nice, right?"

Natasha jumped down from the flying vehicle, standing in a relaxed posture ten steps away from Lu Chen.

She didn't draw her gun, her hands hung naturally by her sides, and there was even a trace of a smile on her face.

"The view is broad, and you can watch a free fireworks show of an alien invasion. However, standing next to that machine is not a good idea."

Lu Chen finally turned around.

He looked at the red-haired woman in front of him.

Black Widow.

S.H.I.E.L.D.'s top master spy.

"Don't fish for words from me, Agent Romanoff," Lu Chen spoke, "and I advise you to stay away from me."

The smile on Natasha's face stiffened for a second.

The other party directly called out her name.

"Is this considered a warning?"

"Consider it advice."

Lu Chen turned around, continuing to look at the battlefield below.

He had undergone more radiation experiments than Soldier Boy. Without him deliberately restraining it, his body was emitting high-intensity radiation at all times.

This radiation had no effect on the group of top Superhumans in The Boys that he usually interacted with, but for Natasha, whose body wasn't even bulletproof, it was enough to give her a hard time.

Chapter 179: Charging Complete

Natasha immediately stopped in her tracks.

She looked down at the distance between herself and Lu Chen, not forcing herself to get any closer.

The man in front of her had no need to scare her in this way.

Given the strength the other party had just displayed, if he really wanted to kill her, there was no difference between ten steps and a hundred steps.

Since he deliberately reminded her, it meant that getting close to him would indeed be dangerous.

"Radiation?"

Natasha glanced at the energy detection device flashing at her waist.

"It seems S.H.I.E.L.D.'s equipment has some level." Lu Chen said.

"S.H.I.E.L.D.?"

Natasha caught onto the word, "You know my identity and you know S.H.I.E.L.D.. But you are not in our database. Which secret organization do you come from?"

Lu Chen did not answer.

Natasha waited two seconds and changed her approach.

"Not an organization?"

Still no response.

"Then it's some mysterious laboratory. You just mentioned radiation, could your abilities come from an experiment?"

Lu Chen turned his head and glanced at her.

This woman really knew how to fish for words.

Several seemingly casual questions, each with an answer pre-set.

No matter whether he refuted or admitted it, she could rule out a portion of the options from it.

Unfortunately, all of her questions had a false premise.

She assumed he came from this World.

"Agent Romanoff."

"Hmm?"

"Be quiet."

Natasha pressed her lips together.

"Alright, it seems you are harder to deal with than those politicians who like to show off their secrets after drinking two glasses of wine."

Lu Chen withdrew his gaze and didn't continue to pay attention to her.

The battle below had completely entered a white-hot stage.

Chitauri soldiers continuously poured out from the portal, densely packed flying craft skimming past tall buildings.

The crowd on the street squeezed toward the exits that had not yet been blockaded, Police holding pistols hiding behind vehicles to fight back, but the bullets fired could hardly pierce the Chitauri soldiers' armor.

Steve charged into the crowd with his shield, tackling a girl who was about to be hit by an energy cannon behind a wall.

Tony dragged a flying vehicle crashing into a building body, and in a blink of an eye rushed back into the sky.

Thor stood at a high vantage point to summon lightning, and large swathes of Chitauri soldiers fell from the sky.

This was the first time Lu Chen had seen such a scene with his own eyes.

In the original World, whether it was Vought International, the Bureau of Superhuman Affairs, or Homelander, when all was said and done, it was just a struggle between humans.

Even if Homelander truly went crazy, the scope of destruction would still be limited.

But it was different here.

This was a true alien invasion.

On the battlefield, no one knew how many Chitauri troops there were, nor did anyone know what was behind the portal.

The ordinary people running for their lives were even less clear on whether they would be blown into fragments by a falling energy bomb in the next second.

Lu Chen hadn't originally planned to meddle too much.

The Avengers would win, the nuclear bomb would be sent into the portal, and the Chitauri army would collectively paralyze as the mothership was destroyed.

The result in the movie had long proven everything; he just needed to stand here and absorb the space energy.

But a movie was ultimately just a movie.

Watching a city destroyed across a screen was completely different from seeing a mother hugging her child cowering in the ruins with one's own eyes.

Lu Chen closed his eyes.

The chaotic scenes and desperate roars were crystal clear within his Super Senses.

When he opened them again, there was a trace of something indescribable in his eyes.

Come to think of it... in the original World, it seemed I also had the identity of a superhero.

Tianshu.

Although he had never labeled himself as such, in this unfamiliar World, facing this pure destruction by those of a different kind, he found it difficult to stand by and do nothing.

Hum!

Two black rays violently shot out from Lu Chen's eyes, rapidly expanding as soon as they left the scope of the building, turning into two wide black light curtains that swept across the sky.

The Chitauri squads flying along the way didn't even have time to turn; together with their flying craft, they were instantly swallowed by the black light.

Carapaces, weapons, flesh and blood began to melt the moment they contacted the rays.

Hundreds of Chitauri soldiers lost control simultaneously.

Charred debris fell in large pieces.

Tony had just blasted the enemy in front of him away with his palm repulsors, when his armor's screen was dyed red by rapidly soaring energy readings.

"Again?"

He looked up at the two black light curtains spanning across the block.

Wherever the light curtain passed, whether it was the Chitauri flying craft or the soldiers on top, they were completely annihilated the moment they made contact, leaving not even a tiny bit of debris, as if erased from this World by an eraser.

Large groups of Chitauri squads quietly vanished just like that, like sand and dust blown away by a fierce wind.

The sky was cleared because of it.

Natasha stood on the edge of the rooftop, her gaze never leaving Lu Chen.

With that initial strike that killed the Leviathan, S.H.I.E.L.D. had raised the danger level to the maximum.

Everyone believed that a ray powerful enough to pierce a behemoth head-on, even if not his limit, should be a devastating killer move.

Now it seemed they had guessed wrong.

With such a large-scale continuous output, there wasn't even a trace of strain on Lu Chen's face.

What was even more troublesome was that those two patches of black light consistently avoided the fleeing crowds.

Such a massive attack range while still maintaining this level of precision meant that using hostages to hold him back wouldn't work either.

What if he wanted to take away the Tesseract?

Hulk and Thor might be able to stop him.

And that was only "might".

Just then, two low screeches came from the direction of the portal.

Another two Leviathans crawled out of the space channel, their massive bodies coming from left and right, charging straight toward the top of Stark Tower.

Natasha raised her gun.

"Two big guys are coming!"

Lu Chen slightly turned his head.

The black light curtains covering the block instantly contracted, condensing back into two thin lines.

Swish!

The black lines crossed and passed by.

The Leviathan charging at the very front split open from the center of its head, the cut extending all the way to its tail, its massive body neatly divided into two halves.

The other one had just swung its body when the black lines horizontally slashed across its waist and abdomen.

The heavy metal carapace did not form any obstruction, and the upper and lower halves of the corpse brushed past both sides of the building, heavily slamming into the distance.

A few seconds later, the black light disappeared.

Lu Chen blinked, and his vision returned to normal.

Having cleared the surrounding threats, Lu Chen stopped his attack and cast his gaze back onto the Tesseract.

[Space energy absorption progress: 100%.]

[Energy temporarily saturated.]

[System upgrading.]

[Estimated completion time: 24 hours.]

Lu Chen's attention fell on the panel.

After the absorption stopped, the blue energy barrier shrouding the Tesseract dimmed significantly, and even the portal in the sky looked a circle smaller.

The system was actually able to directly extract energy from the channel opened by the Space Stone.

This upgrade would take twenty-four hours; he didn't know what changes would appear after completion.

At least it could be confirmed that the Space Stone, or rather the near-infinite energy contained within the Space Stone, was very important to the system.

Lu Chen tried to open the storage function unlocked when the system's first charging reached one hundred percent. Inside were quite a bit of gold, Compound V, the first-generation physical enhancement serum improved by the Sage, the second-generation serum for stably awakening superpowers, as well as V1 and quite a few sundries.

Lu Chen flipped his hand, and a few gold bricks appeared in his hand. It seemed fine. With a thought, the gold disappeared.

Since he couldn't continue absorbing the Space Stone's energy for the time being, continuing to guard here had no meaning.

The Mind Stone was different.

That thing would next be taken away by HYDRA inside S.H.I.E.L.D.. Rather than struggling to find it later, it was better to get a direct hold of it now.

Lu Chen turned and walked toward the edge of the rooftop.

Natasha stared at the dimmed energy barrier and glanced at the sky again.

What just happened?

The energy of this device had obviously been weakened, and the only person who approached it was Lu Chen.

She pressed her communicator, preparing to report the situation to Fury, but seeing Lu Chen about to leave, she immediately spoke up.

"Where are you going?"

Lu Chen didn't stop his steps and replied right away.

"What, can't bear to part with me?"

Natasha's expression paused.

This guy was acting like he couldn't be bothered to say half a word just a moment ago, yet in a blink of an eye he could say such words, and he looked so young—which side of him was real?

"I just want to know where you are planning to take the trouble."

"Then you'll have to follow closely."

A blue energy bomb suddenly shot over from behind Lu Chen.

Lu Chen casually tilted his head.

The energy bomb grazed past his ear and smashed onto the outer barrier of the Tesseract, sending a circle of ripples spreading out.

Lu Chen turned around.

A figure wearing green battle armor and holding a golden scepter was hovering there, with a trace of a seductive and arrogant smile on his face.

Loki.

"And someone delivering themselves to the door." Lu Chen smiled.

Loki raised his scepter, his expression gloomy.

"Stay away from the Tesseract, mortal."

Energy gathered at the tip of the scepter once again,

but just as Loki was about to fire, the person in front of him had already disappeared.

Where did he go?

Loki was startled inwardly, an extreme feeling of danger coming from behind.

Just as he wanted to turn around, a hand had already pinched the back of his neck.

That hand was like an iron pliers; no matter how he struggled, it didn't move an inch.

Lu Chen grabbed Loki by the back of the neck with one hand and tossed him toward the inside of Stark Tower like throwing away a piece of trash.

Clatter——

Loki shattered the huge floor-to-ceiling glass on the top floor of Stark Tower, and amidst the flying glass fragments, his body uncontrollably fell toward the main hall below.

A sense of weightlessness enveloped him.

In his vision, he could only see the ground rapidly enlarging.

And... Lu Chen, who had already stood there, looking up at him with a smile, as if waiting for him to fall.

Chapter 180: Sounds Good, Excellent Head

Seeing that his face was about to have an intimate contact with the ground, Loki hurriedly closed his eyes.

However, the anticipated excruciating pain did not come.

A hand suddenly wrapped around his waist, and a clever force transmitted, carrying his body to rotate a circle in the air, perfectly diffusing the downward momentum.

Loki opened his eyes in confusion.

This mortal… actually helped him diffuse his force?

Could it be that he recognized his identity, knowing that Asgard's deity could not be easily insulted, and therefore temporarily changed his mind?

Just as this thought arose, an even more intense sense of weightlessness than the previous fall suddenly struck.

"Wait…"

As soon as Loki's voice came out, the hand Lu Chen had wrapped around his waist grabbed him like a wooden stake and fiercely planted him into the floor.

Boom!

The hard ground was impacted with large areas of cracks.

Loki's lower body was completely submerged in the floor, leaving only his head and half of his body stuck outside, with his legs dangling in mid-air on the floor below.

Lu Chen let go of his hand and patted his palms.

"This way it won't break from the fall."

"Uh…"

He actually thought this mortal was helping him just now?

Humiliation.

Utter humiliation!

He, the prince of Asgard, the God of Mischief, was actually planted into the ground by a mortal like a radish!

Not to mention that after doing all this, the other party was too lazy to even glance at him again.

"You will pay the price for your arrogance!"

Loki roared in a muffled voice.

"Mm."

Lu Chen acknowledged with a sound and turned to walk towards the Mind Stone that had fallen not far away.

Watching Lu Chen's back, Loki felt anger churning in his heart, but a sneer surfaced on his face.

Mortals are just mortals, thinking that this kind of physical-level confinement could trap a god?

Too naive.

He chanted a spell silently in his heart, and an imperceptible magic energy began to quietly gather.

Lu Chen ignored the radish that was "growing vigorously".

He was thinking about another problem.

Just now on the roof, he clearly grabbed Loki's back neck, why couldn't he see the Copy panel on the system?

He called up the system panel again to check, only to find that everything in front of him was empty.

Only that line of small characters stubbornly floated in the corner of his vision.

[System upgrading.]

Lu Chen paused for a moment, but didn't care too much.

The system was only an aid.

Having it was certainly convenient, but not having it wouldn't affect him doing things. With his current strength, even if the system became completely unusable, he could still rely on his understanding of the plot to make a splash in this World.

"No big deal."

Lu Chen said in a low voice and continued forward.

Just as he was about to bend down to pick up the scepter, a fierce cold light stabbed from behind him without warning!

Lu Chen's figure was like a phantom, shaking lightly on the spot, and then disappeared.

Swish!

A uniquely shaped dagger pierced through the afterimage he left behind.

A Loki holding a dagger appeared in the position where he had just stood, with a smug, ferocious smile on his face.

And the Loki planted in the ground still maintained his original posture, as if all this had nothing to do with him.

"Interesting."

Lu Chen's figure re-emerged a few meters away, looking with great interest at the two Lokis that appeared at the same time.

Asgard's magic… truly has its unique features.

His own mental strength had reached an extremely high level, and ordinary hallucinations couldn't fool his perception at all. But this clone in front of him, whether it was aura, movement, or energy fluctuation, was no different from the main body.

It seemed that this was not a simple light and shadow refraction, but involved a higher level of energy utilization.

While thinking, his movements were not slow at all.

His toes lightly touched the ground.

His figure flashed.

Loki only saw a black shadow come before him, and the next second, a plain and unpretentious uppercut…

Boom!

Loki spiraled and soared into the sky, directly smashing the remaining glass on the ceiling and flying hundreds of meters high into the air.

The dagger in his hand flew out of his grip.

Lu Chen waved his hand, and the dagger obediently fell into his palm.

"My weapon!"

Loki roared in the air, his voice getting further and further away.

Lu Chen lowered his head to look at the weapon in his hand, flicking his fingertip against the blade.

Clang!

A crisp sound spread out.

Good texture.

Flames ignited in Lu Chen's palm, enveloping the dagger. The flames slowly flowed along the blade, as if being absorbed bit by bit by the dagger.

Lu Chen mobilized the energy in his body and continued to infuse it inside.

A layer of golden patterns lit up on the surface of the dagger, and the flames entering it were compressed into more solid energy, yet the temperature of the blade did not rise significantly.

Not only did it possess excellent energy conductivity, but it could even compress and amplify the energy he input to a certain extent.

Lu Chen's eyes lit up.

"Good stuff, where can you find this kind of thing back home? Big cities are indeed wealthy."

Lu Chen exclaimed in praise and casually put the dagger and the Mind Stone into the system space together.

Several hundred meters away, Loki, who was falling, happened to see this scene.

"How dare you!"

Loki came crashing down from high altitude with bared fangs and brandished claws, the expression on his face completely out of control.

"Mortal! Return my weapon!"

Lu Chen raised his head.

Looking at the man below who was raising his head and smiling at him, along with the opponent's faint posture of preparing to catch him and then plant him downward, fear surged into Loki's heart.

He finally couldn't hold it together anymore, letting out an exasperated roar in mid-air.

"Enough!!!"

"Oh."

Lu Chen obligingly withdrew his hand.

And so…

Splat!

With a standard face-planting posture, Loki slammed solidly onto the hard floor, knocked dizzy and seeing stars.

Lu Chen walked over leisurely, grabbed his ankle like picking up a chick, and held him upside down.

Then, he shook him hard.

Clatter, clatter,

two more identical daggers fell out of his body, rolling a few times on the ground.

"Not bad, not bad, there's extra harvest."

He picked up the two daggers on the ground, flicked his wrist, and put them back into the system space.

Hanging upside down and seeing this scene, Loki was so angry that his face was almost distorted.

"Those are my weapons!"

"Not anymore."

"You foolish mortal, how dare you steal a god's weapon! Do you know what you are doing? You will be judged by the gods, you will…"

"God?"

Hearing this, Lu Chen grabbed his ankle, swung his arm in a full circle, and violently smashed him towards the ground.

Duang!

Loki's back of the head had an intimate contact with the floor, making a loud crashing sound.

Before he could recover his senses, Lu Chen swung him again and smashed him towards the other side.

Duang!

"I said…"

Duang!

"Return…"

Duang!

"The weapon…"

Duang!

"To me!"

Duang!

Duang!

Duang!

Inside the spacious main hall, rhythmic crashing sounds echoed.

Loki's voice became lower and lower.

Lu Chen carried him and smashed him a few more times, listening to the muffled thuds continuously coming from the ground, and gradually formed a judgment in his heart.

As expected of the giant bloodline, the body is indeed sturdy.

After taking so many hits, his consciousness was only beginning to blur.

"You sure can take a beating."

Seeing that he was almost done for, Lu Chen finally stopped his hands.

Loki could no longer hear clearly.

Lu Chen swung Loki for the last time.

"A bit lighter this time."

Boom!

Loki's body was jammed upside down into the floor, leaving only his legs exposed outside.

Lu Chen let go of his hand.

"Such a weak god, inferior to Ah Zu."

Chapter 181: Hulk

Lu Chen clapped his hands and lost interest in the two legs on the ground that were still twitching unconsciously.

He looked up at the void in the sky; that was the trouble that truly needed to be resolved.

According to the plot, these Chitauri soldiers formed a hive mind, with the consciousness of every single soldier connected to the hive. As long as the hive was destroyed, all the soldiers who had been teleported over would instantly become paralyzed.

Conversely, if they merely closed the portal, those soldiers who had already arrived on Earth would probably still be quite a troublesome issue.

Let's give that mothership a big one first.

Just as he was about to set off, the ground beneath his feet suddenly trembled.

Boom!

Large sections of the floor arched upward, with gravel and steel bars scattering simultaneously. A green figure rushed up from below, crashing through the floorboards before landing in the center of the hall.

Hulk raised his head, glanced around first, and finally locked his gaze onto Lu Chen.

"Roar!!!"

Hulk beat his chest, letting out a deafening roar whose sound waves even shattered the surrounding glass debris into powder.

He regarded Lu Chen as a challenger who had stolen his toy.

"What?" Lu Chen raised his hand to pat the dust off his black coat, "Haven't played enough yet?"

Hulk did not answer.

Responding to him was Hulk's fist, as big as a sand-pot,

Lu Chen stood in place without moving.

When he fought Loki just now, he hadn't used much effort at all. The big guy in front of him was different, making him just right for testing.

He also very much wanted to know where the absolute limit of his current Super Physique actually was.

"Bang!"

One large and one small, completely disproportionate fists collided fiercely in mid-air.

The loud crash instantly spread through the entire building, the ground splitting with the two people's feet as the center, and spiderweb-like cracks rapidly spreading outward.

With the point of contact between their fists as the center, a circle of visible white shockwaves suddenly spread outward!

Wherever the shockwave passed, the walls cracked, and the remaining furniture was torn into pieces.

Hulk's arm was jolted backward, and Lu Chen's sleeves were also torn open by the violent force, revealing the battle suit worn underneath.

Crack… Crack…

The ground beneath the two people's feet saw spiderweb-like cracks spread wildly, ultimately collapsing completely.

The top floor of this battered building finally could not hold up, and the ground collapsed with a rumble.

Lu Chen, Hulk, and Loki—who had been planted headfirst in the ground with no idea what was happening—plummeted down to the next level together.

Rumble!

Amidst the swirling dust and smoke, Hulk took the lead in standing up from the ruins, looking somewhat surprised at Lu Chen, who had also landed steadily opposite him.

In his cognition, very few "shorties" could catch his punches.

The one in front of him not only caught it, but also looked completely unscathed.

This stirred up an even stronger desire to win in him.

"Roar!"

Hulk roared, raised his arms, and smashed down once more.

"This place isn't enough for you to wreck. Let's change locations."

Lu Chen's figure flashed, teleporting behind him.

Hulk's fist missed, his body stumbling forward a few steps. Lu Chen reached out and grabbed his waist, directly lifting up the green giant from behind.

Lu Chen's legs suddenly exerted force, carrying Hulk through the ceiling and flying toward the portal in the sky.

"Let go of Hulk!"

Being lifted from behind made Hulk extremely displeased, and he struggled continuously in anger.

He threw a downward elbow attempt to attack Lu Chen.

But Lu Chen abruptly stopped his upward momentum in mid-air.

Due to inertia, Hulk slipped out of his grip and continued flying upward for a short distance.

Just as Hulk rose to the highest point and began to fall, Lu Chen's figure below transformed into a bolt of lightning, instantly catching up,

and threw a punch!

Hulk's massive body was driven soaring upward once again by this punch, completely reversing his downward momentum.

Lu Chen did not stop, bracing his arms against Hulk's back and pushing him to continue upward.

"Off you go!"

The speed grew faster and faster.

The tall buildings below rapidly shrank, and Chitauri soldiers riding aircraft swept past from the side, only to be smashed flying one after another by Hulk's swinging fists before they even had time to raise their weapons.

At first, Hulk was still struggling angrily.

He swung his fists wildly at the air in front of him, smashing all the blocking Chitauri soldiers and aircraft along their Flight path into pieces flying all over the sky.

After smashing a few times, Hulk seemed to have discovered a new joy.

"Roar?"

He tried throwing another punch.

A Chitauri soldier screamed as he crashed into a tall building in the distance.

Hulk froze for a moment, then grinned.

Boom, boom, boom!

Chitauri soldiers were knocked flying one after another, their aircraft exploding into balls of fire in mid-air.

Lu Chen pushed Hulk from behind, listening to the other's increasingly excited roars, feeling somewhat speechless in his heart.

This guy's mental age was truly like a child's.

Give him something he could smash people with, and he could immediately have fun playing with it.

But that was fine too, at least he wouldn't keep struggling.

The portal was already close at hand.

On the ground, Tony had just used missiles to blast apart a squad of Chitauri soldiers, and when he looked up, he saw two figures rising straight from the ground.

"What is that?"

He adjusted his faceplate's vision, quickly magnifying the image.

After seeing clearly, Tony's voice directly pitched higher.

"Wait! That's Hulk? Why is he flying? And that guy in the black clothes, is he pushing Hulk while flying?"

This scene was simply too absurd.

Hulk was being propped up from behind, forcefully crashing into the portal. The Chitauri soldiers along the way were beaten scattering in disarray by him, like a group of obstacles casually swept aside.

Hearing the news, Captain America raised his head.

"He's going to send Hulk to the other side of the portal?"

"It looks that way." Natasha narrowed her eyes, "But nobody knows what he wants to do."

Just as the words fell, the large and small figures plunged headfirst into that vortex connecting to the unknown.

After passing through the portal, the field of vision suddenly broadened.

Before them lay a boundless dark Universe and a massive fleet.

Lu Chen pushed against Hulk without slowing down in the slightest, crashing straight toward the mothership with the most massive size right at the center of the fleet.

Boom!!!!

The mothership's thick outer armor was forcefully crashed into a huge breach by Hulk acting as a "flesh shield" and Lu Chen's terrifying propulsion force.

Lu Chen pushed Hulk all the way charging into the interior of the mothership, crashing through several bulkhead walls along the way, and finally landed heavily in a wide cabin.

Boom!

Hulk slammed into the ground, rolling a few times before stopping.

Lu Chen looked around as countless Chitauri creatures rushed out from the depths of the cabin, their weapons locking onto the two of them. The energy pipelines inside the mothership were flashing wildly, and in the distance, a massive core structure was connected.

That place should be the hive.

Hulk crawled up from the ground, patted off the metal fragments on his shoulders, turned around, and stared at Lu Chen.

When crashing in just now, Lu Chen had kept him blocked in front the entire time.

Although Hulk wasn't injured right now, he was clearly dissatisfied.

"Hulk again!"

He swung his fists, roaring angrily at Lu Chen; he wanted to determine the victor with this shorty.

Lu Chen looked at that increasingly angry big green face, feeling the long-lost, all-out passion, as every single cell in his body seemed to be trembling with excitement.

It had been a very long time since he last went all out.

Lu Chen took two steps forward, stood in front of Hulk, raised his right hand, and curled his palm toward him.

"Come on."

The smile on Lu Chen's face gradually widened.

"I'll play with you properly."