Kidnapping

"What else do you need?" Seeing Banner staring blankly at him, Bai Jing asked, "Is there anything else you need?"

"This might be a great idea!" Banner scratched his head. "But I don't have a lab yet. Building phones from scratch with empty hands is asking too much!"

"Uh..." Bai Jing was speechless. "Well, we're just getting started, aren't we? As for money, wait a bit. Give me two or three days at most—I guarantee I'll bring it to you!"

It's just spatial magic. With my talent, learning it in two days isn't unreasonable, right?

If worse comes to worst, I'll sell Black Hole Metal.

Why did that unlucky Fourth Kazekage kid suddenly come to mind?

"Also, I can feel the Hulk energy in my body continuously increasing. I'll probably recover to my original level in about three days, so do you..." Banner continued.

"Minor issue!" Bai Jing lightly waved his hand. The nearly two-meter range of the Gravity Field gave him plenty of room to work.

"Ah, it looks like you've gotten a lot stronger!" Banner was a little envious at how effortless Bai Jing made it look. Although he was a scientist, he wouldn't mind having a stronger body.

But preferably while still looking human. Turning green was a little hard to accept.

"If there's nothing else, I'll be leaving!" Bai Jing waved, turned around, went downstairs, and headed out.

He had not even walked fifty steps before stopping again.

He had heard a car pull up beneath Banner's building.

It had not stopped on the main road, but next door instead, deliberately avoiding Bai Jing's line of sight.

Then two people got out of the car, went upstairs, and found Banner.

"Dr. Keanu Reeves!" the leader said. "We're with the FBI..."

"Ah, I'm so sick of this!" Bai Jing roared. "You people keep coming to bother me for no reason! When you can't beat me, you go after the people under me! Am I really that easy to bully?"

The entire street fell silent in an instant. The people heading to work early in the morning quietly glanced at the young man who seemed crushed by pressure, silently sighed, and went back to their own business.

People's joys and sorrows were never shared. Most people could only look after themselves.

Bai Jing carried the White Queen and Black Emperor straight up to the second floor, kicked through the window, and stormed in.

The two FBI agents were still chatting with Banner. Hearing the noise, they hurriedly turned around and saw guns already pressed to their mouths!

Bang! Bang!

"Ah, well..." Banner jumped in fright and hurriedly said, "It seemed they didn't recognize me. They came looking for me because of something else!"

"They came for me!" Bai Jing asked, "Do you have a phone?"

"Ah, yes, yes, yes." Banner took out a black-and-white Nokia and handed it to Bai Jing.

Bai Jing casually wiped away the blood on the floor and called out, "Someone come clean this up!"

Then he dialed a number.

Even though it was early morning, the call was answered instantly. "What is it, little brother? Got time to discuss the art of makeup with me?"

"Put that Hard-boiled Egg on the phone!" Bai Jing said.

"Hard-boiled Egg?"

"Your bald director!"

Natasha pictured a hard-boiled egg, then thought of her director.

That comparison was incredibly accurate!

"But how do you know what our Hard-boiled Egg—ah, no, our director—looks like?" Natasha's voice turned wary. "I clearly never told you!"

"Stop wasting time. I'm in a hurry. If you delay me any longer, you'll only be able to see me on the news—and every media outlet in America will be reporting it!"

Natasha's smile faded. Even now, they did not know what Bai Jing's abilities were, but there was no doubt that he had the power to make a huge scene!

This year was different from usual. It was an election year. Although the current president had already served two terms, they still wanted someone from the same party to take office!

So stability took precedence over everything. If Bai Jing really made a huge scene, she, an agent who had defected from the Soviet Union, could not bear that responsibility.

"Please wait!" After saying that, Natasha made some arrangements. Less than twenty seconds later, Bai Jing heard a man's voice from the other end.

"I'm Nick Fury!" Hard-boiled Egg said. "Mr. Bai, should I call you Bai Letian, or Bai Kunlun? Or are both names fake?"

"A name is just a label. If you want, you can call me Grandpa Bai!" Bai Jing's voice held no emotion. "How long are you going to keep targeting me? Isn't the strength I've displayed enough? Is America so vast that it can't even accommodate one desk for me?"

"We haven't been targeting you. Other domestic organizations have been targeting you!" Nick Fury did not care about Bai Jing's Zuanese at all and immediately shifted the blame. "We even invited you to join us. With your abilities, becoming a Level Seven, Eight, or Nine agent would be no problem at all.

"You know Natasha's past. Even with her background, she became a Level Ten agent. I'm African American, yet I'm now the director of the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division. That proves S.H.I.E.L.D. has no racial discrimination. We look entirely at ability: the capable rise, the mediocre fall!"

"Bullshit!" Bai Jing retorted. "Your agency holds the highest strategic position in all of America. You know how strong I am. With a word, you could notify the other organizations to abandon their operations against me. Yet now all these random groups are targeting me, and you say you aren't targeting me? Do you think playing good cop and bad cop will work on me? Where do you think I came from? Do you think I'm some brain-dead kid raised on your happy education? Your little political tricks are far too childish for me!"

Nick Fury fell silent for a moment. First, his strategy had been exposed, and he did not know how to respond. Second...

He had never been cursed at over the phone before.

"Bai Letian, using murder to display force is not the way to seek peace. That is coercion!" Realizing this was not someone he could fool with a few casual words, Nick Fury's tone gradually darkened.

"America does not accept coercion!"

"I made it so obvious, and only now you realized it was coercion?" Bai Jing chuckled. "I did consider fighting for peace peacefully, but the Vibranium bullets pointed at my forehead had a different opinion!"

"..." Nick Fury rubbed his forehead. Why had those bullets failed?

"I'm telling you, nigga, immediately make every organization stop all operations against me. Aside from police forces maintaining public order, every other faction can get the hell out of Hell's Kitchen, or I'm going to lose my temper!" Bai Jing turned his head. "America's dignity is less than fifty kilometers away from me!"

Nick Fury froze. "Map!"

An unnamed agent nearby hurriedly handed him a map.

"Forty-sixth Street, fifty kilometers! Fuck!" Nick Fury looked at the Statue of Liberty in New York Bay, and his face immediately darkened.

Oh, right. His face had already been dark to begin with.

"The last time America was humiliated was 9/11. Although many people died in the World Trade Center, the World Trade Center and the Statue of Liberty held completely different statuses!"

In movies, the Statue of Liberty could fall and that would be that. But if it were really blown up in reality, his career as director would probably be over.

Their previous conflict with Bai Jing had remained within the Dark World. Whether it was the assassination at Columbia's library or the Brotherhood being slaughtered at Lin's Precision, none of it had actually made the news.

But if the Statue of Liberty fell, the whole world would laugh at them to death. They would not just laugh today—every year on this day afterward, they would drag it out and mock them all over again!

Bai Jing was essentially holding the Statue of Liberty hostage to force Nick Fury into submission.

Bai Jing was different from ordinary terrorists. If an ordinary terrorist claimed he was going to blow up the Statue of Liberty, Nick Fury would not take it seriously at all. It was made entirely of copper, difficult to destroy, guarded by police and military forces, with warships patrolling nearby.

But Bai Jing was a superpowered individual! His methods were impossible to guard against!

And Nick Fury could not blow up the Statue of Liberty himself first, like the Russian military!

But agreeing just like that was impossible too!

As the Six Kingdoms said: Today, cede five cities; tomorrow, cede ten more. Only then could one sleep peacefully for a night. But upon waking and looking in every direction, Qin's soldiers would be there again!

Today, Bai Jing was using the Statue of Liberty to threaten him into making the major organizations retreat. Would he demand something even more excessive tomorrow?

And after tomorrow's demands were met, what about the day after?

What about the day after that?

"Superpowered individuals are such a headache once they turn to crime!" Nick Fury rubbed his forehead. The key was that ordinary superpowered individuals were limited by their knowledge and education. They usually just caused small-scale trouble that had no impact on the bigger picture.

But someone from China...

Sigh!

It was precisely because they understood China so well that they desperately promoted the China threat theory. China was genuinely threatening—the more you understood it, the more terrifying it became!

Should I organize some superpowered individuals specifically to deal with criminals like Bai Letian? Nick Fury suddenly thought of a solution.

But that solution could not resolve the current predicament.

"I agree!" After hesitating for a long time, Nick Fury finally nodded. "I'll immediately notify the other organizations to stop targeting the Order Society. But you must also promise that the Order Society will only expand within Hell's Kitchen and must not cross the boundary. Otherwise, even if I have to watch the Statue of Liberty collapse, I'll still kill you!"

"Fine!" Bai Jing chuckled, then hung up before him.

Nick Fury's face darkened. He instinctively pulled out his interstellar pager, ready to summon the big guns.

But after hesitating for a moment, he decided against it.

The target was only an Earthling who was a little smarter and a little stronger. If he could not handle even that, Captain Marvel would probably think he was an idiot.

"Keep him under constant watch with the Star Ring!" Nick Fury thought for a moment, then shouted, "I refuse to believe he'll never be alone!"

When that time came, I'll just hit him with a nuclear bomb!