My S.P.E.A.R. Bureau's

Inside S.H.I.E.L.D.'s Triskelion Headquarters, Level Five Agents Leo Fitz and Jemma Simmons stood nervously before Nick Fury, reporting on the progress of reverse-engineering the Mechanical Spiders.

Ten full minutes had passed. Seeing that the two junior agents were still talking nonstop, Fury had no choice but to interrupt them.

"So, in other words, replicating these Spider-Bots isn't difficult. The real challenge is the Spider-Sense System they carry?"

Mozi nodded first, then shook his head.

"Director, although replicating the Spider-Bots isn't difficult, their construction is still extremely advanced. Their designer, Wang Khan, is clearly a genius when it comes to machine design and manufacturing."

"Not only in machine design and manufacturing. His achievements in biology are greater than those of many renowned doctors. That Spider-Sense System was created based on highly advanced biological research," Simmons added from the side.

Seeing that the two of them were about to begin another round of scientific debate, Fury quickly cut them off.

"I don't care whether Wang Khan is a genius. I only want to know whether S.H.I.E.L.D. has the ability to manufacture perfect Spider-Bots—and, ideally, upgrade them."

"Well... Director, the hardware shouldn't be a problem, but the software is another matter. The Spider-Sense System contains numerous anti-theft locks. If decryption fails, it will cause the entire system to crash. Umbrella Corporation has assigned every Spider-Bot a DNA verification code. Once the system malfunctions, only they can restore it."

"So the system is still the key, right? Fine. You two can leave."

S.H.I.E.L.D.'s two top technical experts left the office. Soon afterward, Fury's most loyal agent, Coulson, walked in.

"Director, Agent 13 has the latest news. Apparently, in order to obtain the source code for the Spider-Sense System, Hammer Industries has spent a fortune assembling numerous world-famous hackers. They're expected to launch a cyberattack at midnight tonight and break through Umbrella Corporation's firewall in one strike."

Fury's expression darkened as he snorted.

"Director, apparently several of the hackers Hammer hired are members of Rising Tide. It seems they aren't as clean and upright as they claim to be."

"Oh? That bunch of self-righteous cyber Robin Hoods?"

"That's right, them. Several of them are already on our watch list. Director, should we make a move?"

Fury thought for a moment, then waved his hand slightly.

"Let's see how Umbrella Corporation responds first. If someone capable of designing such high-tech products is taken down that easily, it might be a good thing for us."

"Understood. I'll notify Agent 13 and have her hold position."

"That won't be necessary. Have her notify Wang Khan and further gain his trust."

As an old hand at reading people, Coulson understood immediately. He turned to make the arrangements, but Fury called him back.

"What about that girl named Skye from Rising Tide? Are you still watching her?"

"Yes, Director. Should we close the net?"

"Not yet. There's too much going on lately. Keep an eye on Tony as well. We'll deal with that Skye later."

"Understood."

At Umbrella Corporation, Wang Khan was enjoying a rare moment of leisure in his executive office while listening to his assistant, Sharon Carter, give her report.

"President Wang, our Spider-Bots are receiving an extremely positive response. Although they've only been deployed for half a month, the NYPD's case-solving rate has risen by at least twenty percentage points. That's despite the fact that they're still relatively unfamiliar with using the Spider-Bots. Once they become proficient, I believe the case-solving rate could rise by several dozen more percentage points."

"Given that, the FBI, CIA, and even the military are interested in purchasing our Spider-Bots, and their orders will all be substantial. Conservatively, they could reach one billion USD."

Carter swiped her finger across the tablet.

"In addition, European countries such as the United Kingdom, France, and Germany intend to send representatives over for a look. If everything goes smoothly, they'll all become our customers."

Wang Khan burst out laughing.

"They'll definitely become our customers. Not only European countries, but countries in Asia and the Middle East will also gradually send people over. This is an arms race—an arms race started by us. If they don't want to be crushed by other countries, they'll have to buy our products."

When designing the Spider-Bots, Wang Khan had fully considered their applications. If they were only meant to serve the NYPD, there would be no need to make robots at all. A high-end stun gun would do the job. For Wang Khan, who possessed Super Brain and the ability to conduct the Meditation Experiment, that would be no difficult task.

The reason he had designed them in the form of robots was to break into the espionage field.

The current Marvel world had no world war, so spy wars and intelligence battles had become mainstream. The compact Spider-Bots could absolutely shine in the intelligence war.

"Understood, President Wang. But once the orders come in, I'm afraid our production capacity won't be able to keep up. The equipment at those processing plants isn't state-of-the-art. Once production increases, quality will inevitably suffer. If our products develop quality issues, the consequences could be disastrous."

Wang Khan had naturally thought of this problem as well.

"First, acquire as many precision-instrument processing plants as possible and upgrade their equipment. Ideally, we should acquire a world-class factory, but we can't rush this. Otherwise, we might get taken advantage of."

Carter recorded Wang Khan's words.

"I understand, President Wang... Oh, right, President Wang, I recently heard a rumor. It concerns us."

"What rumor?"

"I heard that Hammer Industries holds a grudge after we rejected them and is preparing to attack our servers with hackers to steal the Spider-Bots' core technology."

Upon hearing this, Wang Khan immediately put on a shocked expression and sprang up from his chair.

"Something like that happened?! Is the information reliable?"

"Well... I can't confirm it either, but given Hammer Industries' usual conduct, we have to be on guard."

"Exactly. Justin Hammer has always liked getting something for nothing. He's a business pirate. I need to make a call... All right, that's all. You can leave."

Wang Khan ushered Carter out with a stern expression. Her heart stirred, but she said nothing more and turned to leave.

Soon, S.H.I.E.L.D.'s monitoring center discovered that Wang Khan had made an overseas call to Asia. They tried to track it, but encountered a powerful information counterattack, causing the trace to fail.

When Nick Fury received the report, his dark face grew even darker.

"Asia... Could it be S.P.E.A.R.? Could Wang Khan be an agent of S.P.E.A.R.?"

"Guardian, I've already directed S.H.I.E.L.D.'s attention toward Asia. Now we can let them speculate blindly."

As Red Queen reported this, she also displayed an extremely humanlike expression. Clearly, after all her functions had been unlocked, she was no longer a simple artificial intelligence. She had taken a major step toward becoming an intelligent life-form.

"Let S.H.I.E.L.D. remain suspicious for now. What about Hammer? When will the hacker team he assembled take action?"

"They'll begin the attack at midnight tonight."

"Heh heh. That will be your chance to show off. By the way, do we have the hackers' personal information?"

Eighteen personal files appeared on the computer screen. Wang Khan browsed through them casually and soon spotted a familiar face.

"Isn't this the World Destroyer, Quake—Daisy Johnson? Red Queen, find the exact location of this girl named Skye. I'm going to meet her personally!"