bsaa (Part 2)

"Yeah, I'm a billionaire too." After Happy dropped him off at his own place, the moment Shen Fei stepped inside, he couldn't help but pump his fist in the air with excitement.

Overnight wealth—just like that. Though his net worth was worlds apart from the Stark Group's, compared to the vast majority of people, he was definitely rich now. Of course, he'd have to wait a month for it all to materialize.

Launching a new product, especially something like health supplements that also fall under the category of medicine, is incredibly complicated. In the early stages, it has to go through multiple rounds of human testing to prove it's harmless—that's just being responsible to the public.

Getting around this kind of testing is impossible without extremely strong backing. Even then, you'd still need at least one or two short-term trials.

In the U.S., there's no shortage of cases where pharmaceutical companies have pushed untested drugs onto the market. But those are always the work of people chasing quick profits. If a drug has problems, it'll eventually blow up in your face—unless you're planning to take the money and run, sooner or later you'll have to pay the price.

Norman Osborn of Oscorp is the best example of this. He injected himself with an untested, immature human enhancement serum, which ended up splitting his personality and creating the Green Goblin.

Chasing quick results is a common flaw among many scientists. Doctor Octopus wanted to create an artificial sun, and Umbrella Corporation's virus research—all the problems that cropped up stemmed from this same mindset.

The reason Umbrella's virus leaked wasn't just because of Marcus's unexpected resurrection; the bigger cause was Spencer constantly pushing his subordinates to finish the virus research as fast as possible. It wasn't that Spencer didn't know it was wrong—it was that he was already too old and didn't have much time left to wait.

Drug testing in the U.S. has even spawned a whole profession: professional drug testers. These people rotate through various pharmaceutical companies, specifically testing new drugs.

No matter what kind of drug it is, testing always carries unpredictable risks, so the pay for drug testers is very high.

Of course, that's for companies with a proper bottom line. For less scrupulous or ulterior-motivated companies, these testers are in serious danger—let alone those that claim to be testing drugs but are actually testing biochemical weapons.

A lot of these companies have military backing. Dr. Banner's research institute was working for the military on the Super Soldier Serum, trying to stabilize it with Gamma Rays, and ended up creating the Hulk.

In a world held in check by nuclear stalemate, large-scale wars are hard to start. Under those circumstances, the focus for every nation is how to win local wars with minimal cost.

There are really only two options: one is to create enhanced soldiers, and the other is to build external armor—like the Iron Man Suit, simple flight devices such as Rocket Packs, Gliders, and so on.

The Iron Man Suit wasn't the first thing Tony Stark thought up and built. In fact, there are already weapons companies researching it, like Exploration Aerospace Company, Oscorp's biggest competitor.

Exploration Aerospace and Oscorp are both backed behind the scenes by the U.S. military. But the military isn't united—different individuals have different preferences. Some favor enhanced soldiers, others favor enhanced armor.

Whichever faction gains the upper hand, the company they support gets more military backing and more research funding.

Originally, Oscorp and Exploration Aerospace were evenly matched, with neither having absolute superiority over the other. But the incident in Raccoon City caused a lot of High Command members who supported enhanced soldiers to fall from power. The result was obvious: Oscorp was about to be abandoned by the military.

Except for a few lunatics, no one likes biochemical viruses that turn people into zombies—including Hydra. Seriously, if everyone's dead, who would Hydra rule over even if they took over the world?

Under these circumstances, it probably won't be long before New Yorkers see Green Goblins flying all over the place. Too bad Spider-Man is still nowhere to be found.

Shen Fei wasn't worried about the Green Goblin at all. Reality isn't like a movie—it's not like Spider-Man has to be the one to deal with him. The police, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and S.H.I.E.L.D. aren't just decorations.

"No wonder Pepper Potts earned Stark's trust." Back at Stark's villa, after they agreed to cooperate, Shen Fei barely spoke to Stark for the rest of the time—he mostly talked with Pepper.

From the series of plans Pepper laid out, using the bottle of serum Shen Fei had developed as a foundation, they could easily build a business empire. Focusing only on women's health supplements was too narrow-minded.

They could easily break into the beverage market, alcohol industry, cosmetics, and more.

The Pepper now wasn't the CEO who would later run the entire Stark Group. At this point, the Stark Group was managed by Tony's uncle, and Pepper was just Tony's secretary.

Once this company was established, Pepper would become its lifelong CEO. Shen Fei's decision made Stark think even more highly of him.

Tony hadn't yet realized his own feelings for Pepper, but the fact that she was the only woman who had stayed by his side for years said everything about what was in his heart.

Other women never lasted more than a week around Tony.

From then on, Shen Fei stopped caring about the company's affairs—Pepper handled everything. His willingness to let go surprised both Pepper and Stark. In the world of capital, anyone who dared to do that would probably end up with nothing left. To that, Shen Fei just repeated himself: he trusted Stark and Pepper's character.

There was no better compliment than that.

"Looks like I can shut down my online store." With his own company, Shen Fei obviously didn't need to keep selling figurines online anymore. He had to admit, America really had all kinds of people. Through the figurines, he'd gotten to know some people who were probably mentally... off—fans of serial killers.

Because the figurines Shen Fei made were very detailed and customizable, a lot of serial killer fans wanted to order custom pieces from him. He turned them all down. He was speechless—did they think they'd still be fans if the serial killer murdered their own family?

"Wakanda, Vibranium, Heart-Shaped Herb." Looking at the online introduction to Wakanda, Shen Fei shook his head with a smile. It was like that time at the UN when someone said, "What can an agricultural country contribute to the world?" In this world, maybe only the Ancient One knew Wakanda's true situation.

Vibranium and the Heart-Shaped Herb—Shen Fei wanted both. Think about how many scientists had failed at enhancement serums, while the Heart-Shaped Herb just needed to be ground into juice and drunk to grant enhancement. If those scientists ever found out, they'd probably cough up blood and die from the shock.

As for Vibranium, on the black market, it went for ten thousand dollars a gram—and that was with no supply available.

"Wakanda seems to have a Force Field. I don't know if it can block a Portal, but their technology is very advanced. I'd better get fully prepared before going. I'll need to build an Ant-Man Suit first. Looks like I'll have to borrow some things from those Hydra guys again. Don't blame me."

Thinking about all those Heart-Shaped Herbs that had been burned, Shen Fei felt a deep sense of regret.