Arrival

"The Hand is practically finished. Who still cares about that? You're dead! You're all dead! Hahaha!"

Bojutsu lay on the ground, laughing maniacally. This was the first time The Hand had suffered such a devastating blow, but no one could defeat The Hand, because they had The Beast! "The person who can kill me hasn't been born yet!"

Wang Bert snorted disdainfully, raised a hand, pointed at Alexandra, and shouted, "Fire!"

The subordinates immediately opened fire on Alexandra on the ground, but to everyone's shock, every bullet was deflected by a red glow.

"It's useless, Blood Clan. Today is the day your entire race is wiped out."

Alexandra climbed to her feet and shouted with terrifying ferocity. The red glow around her had vanished, allowing everyone to clearly see what she now looked like! The previous Alexandra had been an elegant noblewoman, but now she was a demon—a demon nearly three meters tall, covered from head to toe in crimson scales, with eyes full of evil, savagery, and cruelty! "I'll kill all of you!"

The Beast's power was wildly violent, and Alexandra was completely unable to control her emotions. She stomped down with both feet, shattering the concrete beneath her and launching herself high into the air. Like a gorilla, she came crashing down toward Wang Bert!

"Is this some knockoff Red Hulk?"

Wang Bert appeared more than ten meters away as if by Teleportation. Alexandra crashed down with a boom, punching two huge pits directly into the ground!

Having missed Wang Bert, Alexandra grew even angrier. She charged madly toward him, shattering the ground everywhere she passed!

"Fire! Don't let her get near the Blood God!"

Mercury hurriedly shouted. The subordinates opened fire again, but it was no different from before. Every bullet was deflected, doing no real harm to Alexandra and only making her angrier. Her fists swung wildly at Wang Bert like two massive hammers!

Seeing the change below, Frank could no longer spare attention for his fight with Daredevil. He hurriedly grabbed the Barrett M82A1 Sniper Rifle beside him and prepared to take a shot! Daredevil sensed the monster as well and hesitated. Seriously, why had everything tonight been so strange? Nothing had gone according to common sense!

Relying on his speed, Wang Bert dodged Alexandra's attacks again and again. Alexandra became increasingly berserk. Seeing that she couldn't hit Wang Bert, she turned around to target the others instead. Only blood could soothe her fury! This won't do. My subordinates are quite valuable!

Seeing Alexandra switch targets, Wang Bert shook his head and said, "Alexandra, please go die."

"You think you can?"

Alexandra roared, but the next moment, she collapsed to the ground in agony before exploding with a boom. Amid the flames and thick smoke, chunks of flesh and blood rained down everywhere! Under such circumstances, Alexandra was naturally dead beyond doubt! Everyone stared in stunned disbelief. What was going on? How had such a terrifying monster suddenly exploded?

Madame Gao turned and asked in shock, "Blood God, what did you do?"

Wang Bert casually replied, "Nothing. Maybe she suffered a cultivation backlash."

Madame Gao said speechlessly, "This isn't a wuxia novel, and qi cultivation doesn't work like that!"

Wang Bert shrugged and said nothing more. In truth, it was very simple. The dagger Wang Bert had given Madame Gao contained not only blood, but also a special C4 Explosives charge produced by Stark Industries!

What? How could explosives that large fit inside a dagger? Hadn't they heard of something called Pym Particles? Just now, Wang Bert had only done two things: deactivated the Pym Particles and detonated the explosives. The cost was merely a small amount of his own blood!

"No!"

Seeing that even Alexandra, after turning into a monster, had died so miserably, Bojutsu knew The Hand had been utterly defeated today. He fainted on the spot in despair! Wang Bert was about to sneer when a pitch-black fissure suddenly tore open in the sky. An aura of rage, brutality, and evil poured from it, making everyone at the docks feel ice-cold from head to toe. They trembled uncontrollably, like rabbits encountering a savage tiger! Worse still, all kinds of mad thoughts surfaced in everyone's minds—the sort of things they might have imagined before but never dared to do, like kidnapping a beautiful woman and taking her home for some fun. Quite a few people flushed red, their faces twisting as they nearly went mad!

And this was only a single aura! Wang Bert was doing much better than the others. Suppressing the evil urge in his heart to control the entire world, he looked up at the fissure and saw an indescribable creature beyond it, one that filled him with boundless madness, brutality, and evil!

At that moment, the unknown creature was utterly enraged. It wanted to force its way into this world and kill everyone!

Wang Bert couldn't help swallowing. Before he could come up with a countermeasure, a magnificent golden spell formation made of countless patterns appeared out of thin air at the fissure. It firmly blocked the evil aura from the other side, even extending golden threads to repair the crack!

The previously menacing unknown creature instantly withdrew all its aura and fled backward like a mouse seeing a cat. At the same time, it shouted telepathically, "Ancient One, I was just passing through!"

Though he knew he shouldn't laugh, Wang Bert really wanted to. This guy was way too cowardly, wasn't he? "Sorry, but passing through this world requires a toll!"

With those words, a brilliant seven-colored sword light that seemed to fill the entire world flashed into existence. Crossing space, it slammed heavily into the unknown creature, which let out a shrill scream.

Then... then that was it, because the spatial fissure healed under the golden spell formation's repair! Once the fissure closed, many people collapsed straight to the ground, drenched in sweat. Everything that had just happened had been far too intense for them! Wang Bert ignored the others. Gazing at the sky with longing on his face, he said, "A single sword's chill illuminates nineteen realms; its sword qi spans thirty thousand miles! Master Ancient One is truly incredible!"

"Don't think of it in terms of martial arts. That was supreme magic, called Vishanti's Holy Sword!"

Madame Gao was equally awestruck. Then, thinking of something, she asked in surprise, "You actually know the Sorcerer Supreme's name?"

Wang Bert snorted. "Don't you know it too?"

"Kamar-Taj and K'un-Lun are allies. I once received mages from Kamar-Taj!"

Thinking of something else, Madame Gao added, "Right, the Vampire Progenitor Dracula once had a conflict with Kamar-Taj. It's only natural that you know of them!"

"Huh? That happened? Master Ancient One didn't kill Dracula?"

Wang Bert froze, then asked curiously. Madame Gao was speechless. Which side were you even on? After catching her breath, Mercury couldn't help asking Wang Bert, "Blood God, what was that just now?"

Wang Bert said, "That should have been The Beast worshipped by The Hand. We wiped out all its lackeys, so it came over to settle the score!"

Madame Gao complained, "You made it sound so unimpressive, like some gang boss!"

"So that's what it was!"

Everyone suddenly understood. At that moment, Frank's voice came from the distance. "Then who stopped The Beast? That golden spell formation clearly looked man-made, didn't it?"

Wang Bert turned and saw Frank, Natasha, and Xue Ren hurrying over, while Daredevil followed far behind them!

"The one who stopped The Beast was Earth's Guardian, the Sorcerer Supreme Ancient One!"

Wang Bert said respectfully, "With her here, no gods or demons can enter Earth in their true forms. That is why Earth has remained stable for so many years!"

"Earth's Guardian, the Sorcerer Supreme Ancient One?"

Everyone was astonished. Clearly, aside from Madame Gao, none of them had ever heard this somewhat strange name!

And that was precisely what made Ancient One so great!

Wang Bert said longingly, "That's right. Earth's Guardian, and also the most powerful person on Earth. If that sword strike just now had landed on the docks, the docks probably would have been gone."

The others had not seen that sword light, and their expressions were full of confusion. Natasha couldn't help asking, "Blood God, just how powerful is Ancient One?"

"Please address her as the Sorcerer Supreme. She has protected Earth for centuries!"

Wang Bert was somewhat displeased. "If I weren't a vampire, I'd definitely go become her apprentice and learn, uh, magic!"

Madame Gao silently complained, You meant martial arts, didn't you?

Wang Bert continued, "All right, enough about that. The police will be here soon. Mercury, hurry and drive over the truck I specifically prepared. Xue Ren, get ready to burn the bodies. These ninjas were all resurrected, and leaving them around would be troublesome!"

"Yes, Blood God!"

Though everyone still wanted to hear about Ancient One, Wang Bert had no intention of saying more. They could only carry out his orders first.

"Burn the bodies?"

Daredevil frowned deeply at those words and could not help stepping forward to ask, "Who exactly are you people?"

Xue Ren shouted unhappily, "Who gave you permission to speak to the Blood God like that?"

"It's fine!"

Wang Bert raised a hand and said to Daredevil, "We are a partner organization of S.H.I.E.L.D.!"

Natasha could not help glancing at Wang Bert. What was this guy trying to do by using S.H.I.E.L.D.'s name? She had a feeling he was up to no good!

Daredevil looked utterly confused. "S.H.I.E.L.D.?"

Wang Bert smiled. "S.H.I.E.L.D. is a special agency under the World Security Council, responsible for handling strange incidents across the globe! Its predecessor was the Strategic Scientific Reserve—the organization Captain America belonged to!"

"So it's the organization Captain America was in!"

Daredevil's expression turned solemn with respect. In this world, America's children had all grown up watching documentaries about Captain America, and many of them revered him deeply!

"The Hand is an evil organization that worships an Evil God. Our mission this time is to wipe them out completely!"

Wang Bert continued, "You may not believe this, but these ninjas actually died and came back to life. That's why we have to burn them, or a plague might break out!

"That was also why we showed them no mercy earlier. They can barely even be considered human anymore!"

"They died and came back to life?"

Daredevil was startled. After thinking for a moment, he said, "It's hard to believe, but an Evil God appeared just now, so I suppose it isn't impossible!"

"I hope you won't tell anyone about what happened tonight. The public can't be allowed to know about things like this!"

Wang Bert added, "By the way, Daredevil, do you want to join S.H.I.E.L.D.? Director Nick Fury likes muscular tough guys like you best!"

"Huh?"

Daredevil got chills down his spine. He hurriedly waved his hands. "I don't want to join any organization. I misunderstood what was going on this time, so I'll take my leave."

With that, Daredevil turned and left. Too much had happened tonight; he needed to go back and think things over properly.

"Daredevil, if you ever need help, you can come find us anytime!"

Wang Bert called after Daredevil. He had said so much partly for fun, and partly to establish a connection in advance. Daredevil was the leader of the Defenders—the Defenders were basically a watered-down version of the Avengers! Daredevil did not reply, and his figure soon vanished from sight. Frank asked from the side, "Aren't you afraid S.H.I.E.L.D. will come after you for casually using their name like that?"

"How was I using it casually? We really are working with S.H.I.E.L.D. now!"

Wang Bert shrugged, then said, "Besides, I doubt Director Fury would care. He'd probably take the chance to claim some of the credit, then apply to the council for funding to guard against Evil Gods!"

Frank and Natasha were both speechless, because they knew Nick Fury was absolutely capable of doing something like that.

In fact, Nick Fury did exactly that afterward. Once the World Security Council learned that Evil Gods existed in this world, they approved a huge amount of funding for S.H.I.E.L.D. to strengthen its defenses in that area!

Then Nick Fury directly took a third of it to build his bases. In his view, the more bases he had, the safer the world would be!

Incidentally, Hydra agents embedded within S.H.I.E.L.D. also quietly siphoned off a third of the funds. In other words, only one-third of the project's funding would actually be put to use!

S.H.I.E.L.D. was doomed sooner or later! Setting such distant matters aside for now, Mercury drove the large truck over. Xue Ren led some people aboard and opened the rear doors, revealing five things that looked like Sleep Pods.

Frank took a look and asked, "What are those?"

Wang Bert said, "Cryo Pods. Put someone inside and freeze them, then thaw them out decades later, and they'll still be alive!"

Frank was astonished. "Isn't that something only found in science fiction movies? Current technology can do that? And how did you get these?"

"This world is full of black tech!"

Wang Bert smiled. "As for how I got them, it's simple. I paid Fifty Million US Dollars for them on the black market. In this country, there are very few things money can't accomplish!"

In truth, Wang Bert strongly suspected that Hydra had sold these to him, because their Soviet-style design was far too obvious! Hydra was made up of people too, and people needed money!

Frank asked in disbelief, "Fifty Million US Dollars? What did you spend that much money on these for?"

Wang Bert said, "The Hand's Five Fingers can revive after they die. I plan to freeze them all, then bury them somewhere. That way, no matter whom they worship, they'll never be able to resurrect! Because they won't actually be dead! Hmph, trying to threaten me? I'll crush you into despair with money!"

Wang Bert said this to Madame Gao. She wore a bitter smile. She had never expected the Hand's resurrection to be countered this way! "No wonder you wouldn't let us kill them."

Everyone suddenly understood. Frank reminded him, "Bert, it seems their leader died!"

"There was nothing we could do about that. Fortunately, it was only one of them, and resurrection takes quite a while."

Wang Bert said, "With the Hand leaderless during this time, if we spread the news, plenty of people will surely want to cause them trouble!"

"The Hand has made countless enemies. This time, they really are in for it."

Madame Gao sighed. "But the Hand will not be destroyed so easily. Once Alexandra resurrects and finds the Black Sky, she will definitely come to seek revenge on you!"

"I'll be waiting for her!"

Wang Bert sneered. Then, thinking of something, he said to Madame Gao, "Madame Gao, I'll have to trouble you to lead us in taking over the Hand's assets next. Especially the Dragon Bone—that is something I am determined to obtain!"