Chapter 237: A Benevolent Ultron?
Inside the great hall, Odin sat on his throne, his single eye studying Matthew and the Infinity Stone in his hand.
Matthew could hear the mockery threaded through Odin's last remark clearly enough. He didn't deny it, simply meeting Odin's gaze directly from where he sat on the throne, and asked outright. "So... King of the Gods, do you have a way to help me solve this problem or not?"
"After all, the way I see it, only by fully mastering this kind of power will I have the strength to actually stand against whatever disaster's coming."
Hearing that, Odin studied Matthew for a long moment.
His gaze kept shifting back and forth between Matthew and the Infinity Stone.
After a while, he spoke, even and unhurried. "There is a way. But given that serum of yours, I wouldn't recommend it."
"The Infinity Stones represent the fundamental laws that shape reality itself. No living creature is meant to bear that kind of weight."
"Even if you forced yourself to withstand that power, it would strip away your consciousness entirely, leaving you nothing more than an empty vessel holding the Stone's power, with no mind or will of your own left inside," Odin said, trying to talk him out of it.
Even Odin himself, upon seeing the disaster on the horizon, had immediately considered turning to the Infinity Stones as a solution.
But he wasn't reckless enough to go that far.
What Odin had in mind was simply having the Dwarves finally forge the Infinity Gauntlet, a design they'd already drawn up blueprints for long ago but had never actually built.
Facing Odin's advice and warning, Matthew thought it over for a moment, then shook his head anyway. "I know my limits. I'd still ask the King of the Gods to just tell me the method."
Seeing that, Odin let out a soft sigh. "The problem you're describing actually has a fairly simple solution."
With that, he raised a finger, pointing at the Orb in Matthew's other hand.
"The answer's right there."
"...What do you mean?" Matthew followed Odin's gaze to the Orb in his other hand, his brow furrowing slightly.
Odin explained, slow and deliberate. "Under normal circumstances, of the six Infinity Stones, only the Power Stone's energy will flow directly into a living body through physical contact alone."
"Because its very essence is destruction and release. Seeking out a powerful vessel is simply its nature."
"But the other Stones are different."
"The Mind Stone's essence is consciousness itself. The Soul Stone's essence is the soul. The Space Stone's essence is the very law of space."
"None of them actively force their way into whoever touches them. So naturally, they won't just let you drain their power away, no matter how resilient your body is."
"Which means, if you want to use the other Stones' power directly through physical contact, you'll need a more specialized method."
"A specialized method?" Matthew asked, puzzled.
"That's right!" Odin held up a finger. "The first method—"
"Take the Mind Stone in your hand, for instance."
"If you want to use it directly, the simplest approach would be to embed it into your own brain."
"The brain is where consciousness is most concentrated. Embed it between your eyes, and it connects directly to your mind. Its power would naturally become yours to use..."
"You'd feel your consciousness grow immensely powerful. But after that... your very personality would be worn away by that power, until you ended up as flat and emotionless as the Stone itself."
Hearing Odin lay out the first method, Matthew raised an eyebrow, in no hurry to respond.
"As for the second method..." Odin's gaze settled back on the Orb, his voice dropping lower. "The second method requires the Power Stone."
"Beyond the destruction and annihilation it embodies on its own, the Power Stone can also serve as an energy bridge to the other Stones."
"There's a kind of resonance between all six Infinity Stones..."
"As long as you're using the Power Stone while also holding a second Stone at the same time, that Stone's power will be forcibly drawn out by the resonance the moment the Power Stone's energy pours into your body, and it'll flow straight into you across that bridge."
He paused, something significant flickering in his single eye.
"Of course, on the condition—"
"That you can actually withstand the other Stone's power once it's been amplified by the Power Stone."
Odin looked at the Mind Stone, still glowing faintly in Matthew's hand, his voice heavy and deliberate. "The reason I originally forbade Asgard from ever holding a second Infinity Stone at the same time was exactly this: if two Stones' power gets too close together, they draw on and amplify each other, producing a force where one plus one adds up to considerably more than two."
"Handle that badly, even once, and you could trigger a disaster capable of destroying an entire realm."
At that, he looked at Matthew, his tone growing even more serious than before. "Matthew Lawrence..."
"For your own safety, and for the safety of Midgard, I need to say this again."
"No single world should ever hold too many Stones at once."
"Doing so doesn't just draw the covetous attention of others. It risks triggering a crisis on a far larger scale."
"As King of Asgard, and ruler of the Nine Realms..."
"Even understanding the crisis this universe is about to face, I still don't want you relying too heavily on that power."
"It wouldn't be good for you, and it wouldn't be good for Midgard either."
"That said, if you're determined to use it regardless, I won't stand in your way."
"I only ask that you exercise real caution going forward."
Listening to everything Odin had said, Matthew stood in the great hall, deep in thought for a moment.
About half a minute later, he lifted his head and gave Odin a slight nod, his own expression equally serious. "King of the Gods, I'll be careful."
"That said..."
"For now, I think this is the only viable option I've got."
Even with the System backing him up, Matthew had no idea what theme the next Pass would take.
If the Pass's theme didn't offer a way to handle these coming threats, he'd have no choice but to fall back on the power of the Infinity Stones after all.
With that thought settled, Matthew, having gotten his answer, didn't linger any longer, turning and walking straight out of the hall.
His footsteps echoed through the empty hall, growing fainter, until they faded entirely.
Once Matthew had gone, Frigga, who'd withdrawn earlier, slowly stepped back out from behind the hall.
Her gaze settled on the direction Matthew had disappeared, her expression gentle but touched with worry. "It seems those three dreams I mentioned to you weren't ordinary dreams after all."
"They appear to mirror three different futures."
Hearing that, Odin fell into a brief silence.
His eyes lowered, his hand slowly running along Gungnir, the weapon he'd carried and mastered his entire life.
After a moment, Odin finally spoke. "If the three memories he showed me hadn't matched your dreams exactly, I would have written him off as someone simply trying to trick me out of the Space Stone."
"But given what we've seen now... whatever we're going to have to face going forward is going to be genuinely troublesome."
"Troublesome..." Frigga shook her head gently, a faint, bitter smile crossing her lips. "That's putting it lightly."
"That's a crisis capable of destroying the entire universe."
Time slipped by like flowing water.
Three full months had now passed since Matthew's return from Asgard.
Over those three months, in preparation for whenever the Quantum Zombie Virus might eventually arrive, Holy Terra had launched another wave of infrastructure upgrades.
Beyond that, Matthew had rolled out yet another specially modified strain of the T-Virus.
Its infectivity was extremely high, capable of spreading through air, saliva, and water sources alike.
Once infected, beyond dramatically boosting human immunity, it also provided a modest boost to overall physical constitution.
It wasn't as strong as the weakened military-grade T-Virus enhancement serum, but against slow-moving, ordinary zombies, it would at least give an average person a fighting chance.
Beyond that, this strain's most distinctive feature, compared to the previous one, was its ability to actively monitor the vital signs of anyone infected.
It would capture the final ten seconds of memory before death, transmitted like a short film clip, into a colossal living brain-bank built from Plaka parasites, themselves infected with the same virus. That "brain-bank" would then autonomously run biometric recognition on the footage.
If it detected anything resembling a zombie attack, it would deploy the Astartes to shut it down with overwhelming force.
So far, though, the brain-bank had never once flagged a zombie attack. Earth remained safe.
To prepare against threats coming from space, Matthew also handed off the interstellar bank cards he'd taken from the Collector and Ronan to Nick Fury, who was relatively better versed in galactic currency systems and trade networks.
Before handing them over, though, to make sure Fury didn't skim anything off the top for himself, Matthew had walked him through a preview of the crisis potentially heading their way.
Even a corrupt, one-eyed,bald schemer like Fury, Matthew figured, would probably drop his usual habits and pour every ounce of his attention into building up Earth's defenses once he understood what was coming.
That wasn't all. Over those same three months, more Pass rewards unlocked one after another.
The Bio-Phantom Virus, refined through the System, officially entered production.
The "Bio-Phantoms" familiar to anyone who'd played the source game had now been successfully manufactured, one after another, and integrated to some degree with the Blacklight Prototype.
The current Astartes forces now had new capabilities beyond the Void Shield.
Things like activating a Berserk Mode, a Stealth Mode, and releasing a vision-obscuring black fog, among other tricks.
Of course, to keep the Astartes forces from becoming too scattered in their capabilities, units sharing the same ability were being consolidated into unified companies.
For instance, Astartes with the Stealth Mode were being folded into the "Alpha Legion," led personally by Hunk.
Going forward, they'd be dedicated specifically to covert assassination and decapitation strikes.
The rest of the forces followed the same organizing principle.
The way Matthew saw it, he wanted every single unit to have its own specialty and strategic role, rather than every soldier having their own random grab-bag of skills once a fight actually broke out.
At the same time, Matthew was also experimenting with converting standard Bio-Phantoms into Terminators using small-scale nuclear detonations, trying to achieve mass "Terminator freedom."
Unfortunately, the experiments weren't going smoothly.
Large numbers of manufactured Bio-Phantoms had died, one after another, under the nuclear blasts. So far, not a single one had successfully converted.
Seeing that, Matthew had no choice but to hand over the Terminator he'd already gotten as a System reward for William and the others to study, hoping to eventually mass-produce them properly.
Meanwhile, back in his office.
Matthew, having just finished absorbing a Terminator and feeling his body evolve yet again, stood silently in front of the floor-to-ceiling window, electricity crackling between his fingers.
This was the lightning ability he'd gained after absorbing the Terminator.
Through the window, Matthew looked out at Holy Terra below, already transformed beyond recognition, a flicker of genuine satisfaction crossing his eyes.
He honestly hadn't expected that, once he'd delegated real authority, Ada, Ellis, Magneto, Professor X, and the rest would end up running Holy Terra so smoothly.
Then again, it made sense, when he thought about it. Ellis, as a former U.S. President, already had real experience governing a country.
And Magneto and Professor X were mainly handling mutant affairs.
With the two of them in charge, the mutant population probably wasn't going to run into any major turbulence.
Just as Matthew was mulling over what to build next for Holy Terra, the phone on his desk suddenly rang.
"Mr. Lawrence, Mr. Tony Stark is calling. Shall I put him through?"
Maybe because the caller was a networked superintelligence capable of formatting Doudou itself at any moment, Doudou skipped its usual chattiness entirely this time.
Hearing the voice, Matthew pulled his gaze away from the window and nodded casually. "Put him through."
The moment the words left his mouth, Tony Stark's voice filled the office.
"Hey! Matthew! Matthew!"
"Get over here! I've got something great to show you!" Over the phone, Tony's voice carried a barely-contained excitement.
"Something great?... What kind of something great?" Matthew raised an eyebrow.
"Tch... Matthew, even if I told you right now, it's not like you'd be able to see it."
"Just get over here and you'll find out! Come on!" Tony pressed.
But before he'd even finished getting the words out—
The next instant—
A familiar voice was already right at Tony's ear. "Tony, I'm here. Where's this great thing you keep talking about?"
Hearing the voice suddenly appear right behind him, Tony, who'd been spinning idly in his office chair, jumped violently, chair and all skidding backward.
Symbiote armor spread out from his body in an instant, covering him completely.
But once he got a clear look at who'd actually appeared behind him, it was just Matthew, the armor slowly retracted.
"...Gotta hand it to you, you're genuinely good at scaring the hell out of people." Tony scowled, annoyed.
Hearing that, Matthew let out a short laugh.
Closing the distance in two quick strides, he clapped a hand on Tony's shoulder and teased, "Tsk tsk tsk~~ The great and famous Tony Stark, since when did you get so jumpy?"
"So, what's this great thing you were talking about?"
Hearing that, Tony shot him a look, then, without hiding anything, swept a hand through the air.
A screen of light materialized out of nothing, appearing in front of the two of them.
On the display, a swirling, flickering mass of data churned like something alive, its orange glow casting the entire room in shifting light.
"...What is this?" Matthew looked at Tony, confused.
Tony, looking thoroughly pleased with himself, explained. "This is Ultron!"
"Or, more precisely, Ultron at ninety-nine percent completion!" Tony's voice was full of excitement.
"Through the combined effort of me, Dr. Banner, and several other genuine geniuses in the field of artificial intelligence—"
"The Ultron that used to exist as nothing more than a little box, we've finally, successfully built him out for real!"
"And he's passed every single one of our Turing tests, showing off some seriously formidable computational power, network infiltration capability, and creative engineering skills!"
"If we wanted to, we could hand him full control of Earth's defense systems, no problem!"
Tony introduced this swirling mass of data with real enthusiasm, like he was showing off his own son.
Listening to Tony, Matthew scanned the churning data mass with a healthy dose of skepticism.
...Ultron?
Was this the Ultron he remembered?
The AI singularly obsessed with wiping out humanity?
So why did it seem so... normal right now?
Wasn't Ultron supposed to turn on humanity the instant he was created?
Could this possibly be... a benevolent version of Ultron?
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