Howard's Relics

Tony was thoroughly spooked, and for the remainder of the time, he was clearly not himself. His lingering fear caused his eyes to dart toward Kate, who was squatting to the side playing with a mouse, while the bloody, horrific hallucinations from moments ago flashed through his mind repeatedly.

"Do you understand?"

Yuri waved his hand. Connors, who had been trying his best to listen but remained completely lost, brought over a glass of water like a primary school student. Seeing Yuri take it and gulp it down, he said sheepishly, "I understand, but not entirely. The local application of the Decay Rate Algorithm you mentioned... can current scientific technology really achieve that?"

"Tony?"

Connors nudged Tony, who was wearing a lovestruck expression. "What about you? Do you understand?"

"Huh?"

"Oh!"

Tony cleared his throat and put on a pretentious air, smoothing out his clothes. He met Yuri's scrutinizing gaze without flinching and said with feigned confidence, "Of course, how could I not understand?"

He reached out, intending to pat Yuri on the shoulder, but after sensing a gaze from a certain corner, he sheepishly retracted his hand.

"Well, I just remembered Pepper is still waiting for me upstairs... Yuri, Connors, and this beautiful lady, I'll leave this place to you."

As soon as he finished speaking, he navigated through the dust-covered equipment, specifically choosing a path as far away from Kate as possible. Just as he neared the elevator, he heard Yuri's voice from behind: "Remember to clean out a guest room for me. I'll be staying here for the night once things are finished."

"Sure, no problem!"

Tony tapped the elevator button, watching the numbers above descend. His heart was a mix of urgency and relief. It's just a guest room, right? As long as it gets me away from this terrifying woman, I'd prepare every amenity for you without complaint!

"Ding-dong!"

Tony lunged inside in one stride and immediately began frantically mashing the close button. Only when the elevator doors had narrowed to a gap smaller than a person could pass through did he let out a long breath and finally relax.

"I swear, I won't touch a woman for the next week!"

After making this solemn vow, Tony paused and amended it:

"Except for Pepper."

In the underground laboratory, Yuri did not immediately begin modifying the Lizard Potion. He placed his hand against the steel wall and activated his mechanical-type ability, instantly destroying every camera in the room.

Wiping away the thick dust on a certain machine, a line of English letters was revealed: "Strategic Scientific Reserve Institute."

"What does this do?"

Kate curiously pressed the most prominent green button on the machine. The next second, the "humming" sound of high-power electrical equipment filled the air, and a faint blue light leaked from the gaps in the machine's joints.

Kate shrank her neck and flashed behind Yuri, resting her head on his shoulder. She blinked her large eyes, looking at the increasingly bright blue light with a mix of cowardice and curiosity.

"Clang! Clang! Clang!"

Three crisp sounds echoed from inside the machine. Yuri followed the noise to find a drawer-like component; upon pulling it open, he found three cubes lying quietly inside, glowing with a dazzling blue light.

As the blue light shone on Yuri, he felt a certain power within him begin to stir. Upon closer inspection, it was the Super Speed he had recently acquired from Makkari!

"Kate."

Yuri picked up one of the cubes and gripped it tightly in his left palm. A magnificent, fluorescent blue glow spiraled up along certain patterns, quickly staining his entire arm.

Yuri picked up another and gripped it in his right hand. He closed his eyes, and a second before exerting force to crush the thumb-sized cubes, he commanded, "Guard me. Don't let anyone get close."

"BOOM!"

A violent cluster of blue energy forcibly pushed away the various pieces of equipment in the vicinity. Not far away, the frail Dr. Connors was slammed directly against the steel wall before falling to the ground, his life or death unknown.

Yuri's veins bulged all over his body. Under the immense pain, he involuntarily revealed his true form. The dozens of transmission tubes on his back frantically absorbed the spatial energy drifting in the air, channeling every last drop into his body.

Time seemed to become incredibly slow at this moment. Although only a few seconds had passed, to Yuri, it felt as if a long time had gone by.

The blue light gradually faded from his skin, intertwining with his Super Speed to form mysterious blue-gold patterns. With a single thought, a brilliant blue-gold ribbon of light flashed, and he appeared on the other side of the underground laboratory without warning.

Throughout the entire process, aside from the dazzling light effects, not even a single thin sheet of paper along his path had been disturbed!

Seeing him slowly return to human form, Kate knew that some kind of transformation had concluded. She approached with concern, sniffing lightly at certain spots on Yuri's body with her nose before asking, "Boss, are you okay?"

Yuri clenched his fists slightly, causing faint blue-gold patterns to flicker and vanish. He ruffled the Silly Cat's hair and replied with a smile, "I'm fine. In fact, I've never felt better."

He waved his hand, scattering dozens of Black Spheres. Golden rays of light swept from top to bottom across all the aging machinery in the underground lab.

"Clatter!"

The instantaneous disappearance of the objects caused the air pressure in the lab to drop immediately. A large volume of air rushed into the lab through the elevator shaft, slamming the elevator doors with a massive sound.

Yuri stood unmoved in the gale. He surveyed his surroundings, guessing that this must have been the secret laboratory of Tony's father, Howard Stark. Those items collected into the Black Spheres were likely the production lines for the Cosmic Cube energy weapons that the current S.H.I.E.L.D. was racking their brains to replicate.

Putting away the Black Spheres, he had Kate steady the remaining experimental equipment related to the Lizard Potion, while he himself squatted in front of Connors to check his breathing.

"Dead?"

Yuri curled his lip. Humans were truly a fragile race, but it was precisely because of their high reproductive rate, relatively high intelligence, and ease of destruction that the Gods Group had chosen them to be the fuel needed for the birth of new gods.

"Can I eat him?"

Having finished the task Yuri gave her, Kate swallowed hard while looking at the still-warm corpse. After all, he was a "Doctor"! Eating him should make her smarter than the Silly Bird, right?

You are what you eat, isn't that how it goes?

"NO!"

Yuri hoisted the doctor's corpse onto a chair. His bright golden pupils turned pure white in an instant. The doctor, who had been devoid of any life force, suddenly twitched a few times before snapping his eyelids open, revealing pure white eyeballs beneath.

A bizarre scene unfolded: Yuri and the doctor spoke at the same time. Their expressions were not just similar; they were identical. Yuri and Connors spoke in unison: "I still need to borrow Dr. Connors's more developed brain."

Kate watched the scene before her with curiosity, her large eyes filled with wonder.

This was a new ability Yuri had unlocked through his wild imagination. Its effect could be roughly understood as installing a Linked Processor in his brain, which not only increased his cranial capacity but also significantly boosted his processing speed and comprehension.

He raised his arm, and the corpse of Connors beside him performed the same action in perfect synchronization. Yuri could clearly feel the decay of the nervous system within the corpse, as with the passage of time, he could no longer even sense the body.

"Clang!"

The nerve cells in Dr. Connors's legs finally suffered total necrosis. Deprived of Yuri's control, the joints went limp, and the body slumped back into the chair.

Seeing this, Yuri paid it no further mind. He walked over to the lab bench, used an ultra-fine needle to extract a drop of Lizard Potion, and placed it onto a glass slide.

Wisps of golden life energy overflowed from his fingertips, burrowing into the dark green droplet on the slide.

"Now, the modification begins!"