First Meeting Starlight

At Vought International's shareholders' meeting, Li Wei watched the wrinkled old woman in front of him, easily in her fifties or sixties, speak with great confidence, and couldn't help clicking his tongue in amazement.

What the hell had Homelander been thinking, taking a fancy to something like her?

Even if he liked drinking milk, he could have found some other young beauty who was lactating.

Was it because this old woman named Madelyn Stillwell was Vought's vice president, with a status that made him wary?

Or did Homelander share the same preference as his bargain-bin father, Soldier Boy, who was locked up by the Russians—believing women were like fine wine, growing more fragrant with age?

But once the old woman finished speaking, Li Wei still forced a sincere, dazzling smile onto his face and hurriedly applauded.

At an occasion like this, she might not remember if you applauded, but if you showed absolutely no reaction, this old woman might bear a grudge and find a chance to make things difficult for you later.

He could offend her, but there was no need to. According to the original plot, she would not live much longer anyway.

She had originally built a fairly harmonious relationship with Homelander by nursing him, but once her real child was born, much of her attention was inevitably diverted.

Homelander became deeply jealous, even hateful, toward that child, believing he had taken away most of her love.

On top of that, she was only an ordinary person, while Homelander was the strongest Superhero on Earth—a temperamental maniac who killed at the slightest provocation. It was inevitable that she harbored some fear in her heart.

And she had lied to Homelander, while deception was precisely what he hated most. With all those factors piling up, Homelander ended up using his laser eyes to blast straight through her head.

After the old woman stepped down, The Deep took the stage, wearing a green scaled vest and looking none too bright. He delivered the same sort of lofty, empty speech.

But Li Wei could tell at a glance that the guy had simply memorized his lines.

Still, it was understandable. When Maeve, A-Train, and the others graduated from Godolkin University, they had all ranked first in their overall academy evaluations. They were outstanding in every respect.

Only The Deep had ranked sixth back then because he simply wasn't smart enough.

According to the rule that the government only offered five contracts each year, he should have been helping Vought sell seafood right about now.

The reason he had managed to get into The Seven was, on one hand, because he could communicate with fish. On the other hand, Vought International had been using him to promote marine animals and ocean conservation, clearly intending to make money in that area.

Some might say that because he could withstand underwater pressure, his physical abilities and combat power must also be quite impressive. But fish living in the deep ocean weren't particularly tough-bodied either. Their structures were simply more unusual, allowing them to adapt to that pressure.

Considering that The Deep had fish-like gills, he might possess similar traits.

As for combat ability, Li Wei knew that he had once beaten Starlight badly in hand-to-hand combat, but he only held an advantage in strength and fighting technique. After beating her for ages, Starlight had not even bled, because he had never broken through her defenses in the first place.

Once Starlight caught her breath and grabbed his greatest weakness—his gills—she knocked him out in just a few moves.

Soon, a petite blonde beauty in a white uniform and star-spangled cape appeared amid cheers. She was today's main attraction—Starlight.

Li Wei was also somewhat surprised to find that she was actually rather pretty. She was the quintessential American sweetheart, with a touch of baby fat, and even the few scattered freckles did nothing to diminish her beauty.

Unfortunately, her figure looked just as underdeveloped—thin and flat. Definitely not his type.

Yet Starlight seemed quite interested in him. She secretly glanced in his direction several times, and there seemed to be considerable surprise and delight on her face.

Li Wei found that rather unexpected. No way, could she be one of my fans?

Sure enough, after Starlight gave her speech and Madelyn made a concluding statement to announce the end of the meeting, Starlight hurried over impatiently and extended her hand to him.

"Hi, Angel. I'm your fan. I have several of your posters hanging in my bedroom—just as many as The Deep's. You were absolutely amazing in The Avengers!"

As she spoke, Starlight patted herself down, trying to find some paper and a pen so she could ask Li Wei for an autograph.

Unfortunately, there was nowhere in her uniform to carry such things, so she could only give up regretfully.

Li Wei approached her with a broad smile. "Wow, this is truly the biggest surprise of my day—no, of my year. If you don't mind, you can just call me Li Wei."

Starlight was instantly even more delighted, and Li Wei became certain that she had not been lying. She really was his fan.

"Ah, okay, Li Wei. You can call me Annie. I heard you can create Holy Light yourself, is that true?"

"That's right."

Li Wei pinched his fingers together, first forming a ball of light at his fingertips. Then, within a few seconds, he rapidly shaped it into a tiny figure. Though rather blurry, it vaguely resembled Starlight.

After observing things for some time, he felt that most of the Superheroes in this world were fairly lazy. They did not deeply develop their powers at all. Whatever form their abilities took when they acquired them was how they remained for the rest of their lives. It was far too crude and inefficient.

Of course, it was also possible that their impoverished brains simply did not support that kind of effort.

In any case, whether in television shows, movies, or Vought International's publicity materials, he had never heard of more than a few Superheroes whose strength or abilities had undergone major changes.

The only exception was probably the Black female lead from the spinoff Gen V.

Her original power had been to control her own blood, turning it into blades, arrows, and so on. Later, she learned to manipulate the blood inside other people's bodies, making their heads and crotches explode, as well as using blood from the ground or corpses to form blades, arrows, and so on.

Well, that little bit of progress already made her a once-in-a-thousand super genius among Superheroes.

The only reason it was not once in ten thousand was because Vought International had not produced ten thousand Superheroes in all these years.

According to the timeline, she probably had not even started school yet, much less learned that move.

But at least he was different. In just a few days, he had already developed new uses for his own superpower.

The power of light could become energy armor to protect his body, so naturally, it could also become a shield. His next goal was to project it outward to protect others.

Likewise, light bullets could be transformed into light arrows with greater piercing power, and they could be shaped into other forms as well, like this.

Starlight was immediately delighted. "Is that me? God, I never thought you could do something like this. I've never even seen it in movies before!"

"Heh, Annie, movies are just movies. They're different from reality."

"Sometimes The Deep even brags that he's second-in-command in The Seven and can control everyone in The Seven except Homelander. But in reality, his position is far more lowly than most people imagine."

Li Wei said pointedly.

If he had put it that way and Starlight still let The Deep sweet-talk her into getting a nucleic acid test, then she could only blame herself for being too stupid.

Though with The Deep's little toothpick, he could probably delay her for less than three minutes, right?

Before The Deep left just now, Li Wei had deliberately taken a few extra looks. There had been no bulge at all below The Deep's waist.

Unlike him—no matter what pants he wore, there would always be a huge lump down there. Sometimes, he even had to briefly ponder whether to position it on the left or the right.

No wonder The Deep liked Little Octopus. He probably couldn't get any satisfaction or sense of conquest from human women.

Starlight blinked. If anyone else had said something like that, she would definitely have assumed they were jealous, and her impression of them would have plummeted.

But this was Li Wei—Angel, her favorite Superhero—and she actually felt a faint trace of secret delight.

Seriously, only now that she was standing so close did she realize that he was even more handsome than he looked on-screen. His skin was so good too that it made her feel a little self-conscious.

When she had the chance, she really ought to ask Li Wei what cosmetics he used!

As she thought that, she deliberately changed the subject. The Deep was going to be her teammate from now on, after all. Speaking ill of him behind his back was not a good thing, even if he was not currently present.

She said with a hint of frustration, "It's a pity I can't naturally gather light like you can. I need to absorb electricity first before I can convert it into light."

Li Wei spread his hands. "Can't be helped. Blame it on the fact that you're not a farm girl from Kansas. But if you changed your name to Kraken Kent, maybe you'd become stronger too~"

Starlight immediately burst into giggles. "Yeah, unfortunately, I'm from Des Moines, Iowa, and my family doesn't have a farm either."

Of course she had read Superman comics and all that, okay?

Since it was Starlight's first day joining The Seven and she still had plenty to do, the two did not talk for long. After exchanging contact information, Starlight left with a cheerful spring in her step.

Even in the end, Li Wei did not ask that question. Starlight was not Blue Hawk or Firecracker; asking something like that upon their first meeting would have seemed very strange.

He did not see that old hag Madelyn either, so he merely greeted Ashley before leaving.

Toward people who had no real conflict with him, he was usually quite friendly.

Old Black was not included among them. What he hated most in this life was racism and Old Black.

Well, those two things did not conflict.

There was still some time before nightfall. Next, he planned to find a bar to kill some time, then begin his usual The Boys time.

Perhaps because the disturbances caused by The Boys helped create opportunities for Superheroes to perform, Vought International's subsidiaries had indeed been sparing no effort in promoting it.

There were now more than thirty million registered users. America only had a population of a little over three hundred million, after all.

As a developer and original shareholder, Li Wei earned a huge amount of money every month from this app alone—possibly even more than he earned as a Superhero.

Fuck, it pissed him off just thinking about it. New Jersey's annual signing fee for him was calculated in hundreds of millions.

Yet more than half of it went into Vought International's pockets, and another portion had to be used to grease the palms of countless government officials. In the end, only a few million actually made it into his hands.

It was already a lot of money for ordinary people, but compared to the original amount, he had basically become a beggar on his knees!

It was not that he particularly needed money. What he cared about was Vought International's attitude and the way they treated him.

Although Li Wei knew perfectly well that without Vought International, there would be no superpowers, no contract slots, nor any of the movies, amusement parks, endorsements, and so on, he still could not help feeling indignant.

Once his abilities reached or surpassed Homelander's, he would settle the score with them properly!