So, Why Are Speedsters Always One Step Too Late?

Ben pulled out an arm shaped like a gun.

Iron Man visibly twitched. A brief burst of electricity crackled from within the armor, while the helmet's light flickered and dimmed.

"Thud!"

The heavy armor crashed to the ground. A small notch had appeared in the glowing blue Arc Reactor, as though it had been struck by a pickaxe.

"Sir, the Arc Reactor has been damaged. Energy is leaking."

Through the armor, Ben could hear Jarvis's voice.

Jarvis did not need to tell him; Tony knew better than anyone how serious this was!

After all, this Arc Reactor was no longer merely the armor's power source—it was the source of his life!

Embedded in Tony's chest, it supplied the energy that kept the electromagnet holding the tiny shrapnel fragments inside his body in place, preventing them from flowing through his bloodstream into his heart.

Ben's savage blow had shattered the Arc Reactor's casing. It had struck Iron Man's fatal weakness.

Though the damage was only superficial cracks, not enough to drain all the energy or even stop the Arc Reactor from functioning, the Palladium leakage under these circumstances would be extremely severe!

In just a few seconds, Tony's Palladium poisoning symptoms had worsened dramatically!

Seeing this, Jarvis immediately lowered the Arc Reactor's operating rate, leaving it only enough power to sustain Tony's normal vital functions in an attempt to slow the Palladium poisoning.

"Calling Potts for you."

"Don't!"

Suppressing the nausea and dizziness brought on by Palladium poisoning, Tony cut off Jarvis's call without hesitation.

He still had no idea what the hell Ben was, nor did he know what his opponent wanted. How could he allow Pepper to be put in danger!

"Now let's see how much time you have left, Tony Stark." Ben returned the words in kind. Of course, at this point, he did not intend to keep attacking.

Killing Iron Man would not benefit him. But—his gaze fell on the Mark 3, and he sized up the Iron Armor for several seconds—this thing was worth researching.

"Maybe Grey Matter can figure something out."

With that thought, Ben immediately got to work. He planned to dismantle Tony's suit into parts, package them up, and take them away!

Most transmigrators who arrived in Marvel always had to steal something after gaining their abilities. Usually, the unlucky victims were pitiful street thugs and their thin wallets, but Ben's victim was Iron Man.

Still, he had brought this upon himself.

After all, the guy had wanted to capture Ben and take him back for dissection and research!

Ben was only taking one suit of armor. It was no big deal.

He acted at once. His hands moved so quickly they left afterimages, and in an instant, he had removed one of Iron Man's arms.

"What exactly do you want?" Tony shouted anxiously.

With the armor powered down, his field of vision was actually very limited. Like someone inside a mascot suit, he could only see through a narrow slit. Yet he could feel that one of his arms had lost the armor's protection and was exposed to the air.

That made him deeply nervous and afraid. He felt like a can waiting to be opened...

"Time is money, Tony. You wasted several minutes of mine, so I have to make up for my losses." Ben violently dismantled the armor and soon pried open Tony's faceplate.

At once, a revolting sour stench hit him in the face.

"Oh!" Ben felt as if the air before his eyes had turned a different color. Half his body leaned backward as he tried to avoid the bizarre smell. "Did you throw up inside the armor? That's disgusting!"

A can was still a can. He just had not expected it to be a can of fermented herring.

Looking at the Iron Man mask he had removed, he felt like he had opened a jar of chili oil and gotten grease all over his hands. He wanted to throw it away, but could not quite bear to.

After all, this was a giant action figure, and one that could move!

So he gave it a hard shake and flung the disgusting vomit back onto Tony's face.

Tony took a deep breath, his face livid. Even his hair was dripping wet now.

"Who do you think caused this?"

"Obviously you. Remember? I warned you not to meddle in other people's business!" Ben said, speeding up his dismantling of the armor. "I'll have to wash this thing a hundred times and use an entire bottle of dish soap!"

"I have a better suggestion. Don't touch it."

"Shut up!"

Ben took the opportunity to punch him.

In less than half a minute, he had completely removed the armor. Carrying a pile of parts nearly as tall as himself, he cheerfully said goodbye to Tony.

"I'd advise you to call your little girlfriend. Otherwise, you'll have to walk back to Stark Tower," Ben kindly reminded him. "And tomorrow, the way you look right now will be on the front page of every news outlet."

After saying that, Ben directly left with the disassembled suit.

Strangely enough, XLR8 seemed to possess some kind of force-field-like ability. Even though there were countless parts and he was moving at absurd speed, not a single screw fell behind because of wind resistance or inertia.

"Wait, XLR8 really does have a force-field-like ability. Otherwise, everyone he rescued would be sliced in half by his speed. But it shouldn't be this powerful yet!"

Ben quickly realized it.

"Unless XLR8 gained some of Spider-Man's abilities and used bioelectricity to hold those tiny parts together!"

The moment he thought of that, Ben grew excited.

Could transforming into Alien Hero actually stack Spider-Man's abilities?

That was way too cool!

But for now, it was only Ben's guess. At least during his fight with Tony just now, his Spider-Sense had never been triggered.

Ben also quickly checked whether there was a Positioning Device inside the armor.

XLR8 could try millions of password combinations within dozens of seconds. Thoroughly inspecting the armor would not even take a second.

Sure enough, he found a small tracker.

After destroying the tracker, he hid the armor.

There was no rush to research the Mark armor. No matter how fast he was, he would have to wait until he transformed into Grey Matter.

Right now, the most important thing was getting back to school.

He spent another ten seconds casually returning to school, dodging every camera that might spot him. He spent a long few dozen seconds in the bathroom, then finally transformed back into his original form amid a burst of red light.

At that very moment, the school bell rang. Ben raced into the classroom at full speed, arriving just before the deadline.

"Very good, right on time!"

"Not good at all, Ben Parker!" The Class Teacher's face had already turned green. Standing at the podium and glaring sideways at him, he expressionlessly raised an arm. "You're late!"

So why were speedsters always late?

During the new-book period, follows and favorites were extremely important. This humble author begged everyone not to let the book pile up unread. Thank you very much.