Tony's Ambition

"Don't believe it?"

"How do you expect me to believe this?"

"Then let me show you."

The freezer that originally held the corpse transformed into a portal once opened again. On the other side of the door appeared to be a cabinet beneath a bar counter; by tilting one's head slightly, one could see the liquor bottles arranged on the shelves.

Under the encouraging gaze of Duncan, a bewildered Alice leaned over and crawled into the portal.

Just as she was halfway through, her raised hips outlined a stunning curve, reminding Duncan of a widely circulated classic line.

"Can you help me? stepbrother!"

Just as Alice was about to crawl all the way through, she suddenly stopped.

In the other world, Tony had just arrived at the liquor shelf, intending to pour himself a drink. As he walked into the bar area, he happened to see Alice, who had crawled halfway through and turned her head to lock eyes with him.

The air turned awkward instantly, though fortunately, the playboy Stark was a well-known social butterfly.

"Are you serious? Since when did my cabinet become a portal? Forget it, get up first, and have that guy Duncan come over too."

Tony's gaze swept over Alice, who was wearing a dress, and he couldn't help but comment in his mind, nodding secretly—she was beautiful.

He then casually took four glasses from the cabinet, added ice, poured drinks into two of them, and asked Alice, who had just stood up beside him, "Would you like a drink, or are you going to have a Coke?"

On the sofa in the hall, Pepper Potts saw a beautiful woman suddenly crawl out from under the bar and the smile on her face slowly faded.

"Uh... either is fine." Alice was also dumbfounded. She had really crawled from a cabinet holding a corpse into another world!

This shattered her worldview even more than discovering she was a clone. At least being a clone could barely be considered science, but traveling between worlds seemed to exceed the heights that science could currently reach.

It was simply incredible!

Suddenly, a hand grabbed Alice's ankle, scaring her so much she almost stepped on it.

Fortunately, she pulled her foot back in time, crouched down, and pulled Duncan up.

"Phew!" Duncan let out a long breath, scanned his surroundings, and upon seeing the scene, said enthusiastically, "Hi Tony, hi Pepper! I really envy Tony for having such a thoughtful girlfriend; work has been driving me crazy these past few days!"

He was being sincere; he envied Tony's feeling of being willful and wealthy, able to do whatever he wanted.

Having an entire Stark Industries to squander—there was nothing more powerful on the surface of the earth than that.

"Thank you, you're too kind."

Seeing Duncan stand up from behind the bar, Pepper, who had already seen his ability to travel between worlds, immediately understood what was going on and greeted him with a smile.

Tony pushed a glass with ice and a can of Coke toward Duncan, then distributed the other three drinks, taking the opportunity to complain, "Next time, use the elevator. Imagine coming to get a drink alone at night and seeing a figure crawling out of your liquor cabinet!"

"Next time for sure!" Duncan poured the Coke into the glass with ice, laughing off the minor awkwardness.

Tony, who had sat back down beside Pepper, seemed to recall something. He pulled out a proposal document placed on the small table and said, "You've come at just the right time; come take a look at this plan."

"What plan?" Duncan leaned over with his Coke, pulling Alice, who was still observing her surroundings, along with him.

Once the two were seated, Tony immediately set the document down and tapped the air twice. A holographic screen dominated by blue light popped up.

It was unclear how he operated it, but a folder appeared on the holographic screen with the words "Proposal" written on it.

The marvelous holographic projection technology left Alice stunned. She looked around the projection, trying to find the light source from above, below, left, or right. But no matter how hard she looked, she couldn't find it.

Tony opened the proposal, and many small files appeared, stretching on endlessly.

Looking from top to bottom, they were: Medical Equipment, Clean Energy, Network Information, Construction Engineering, Biotechnology, Aerospace, Deep Space Exploration, Deep Sea Exploration, Satellites, Chip Technology...

He put the major categories at the front, and the minor categories—or projects he had suddenly thought of that he could collaborate on with Umbrella—were all dumped in there.

Although he had returned a step earlier than Steve and Natasha, his understanding of Umbrella had already been gleaned from the internet in the Resident Evil world.

Beyond its exceptionally prominent biotechnology sector, Umbrella's technology in other fields was equally powerful, and its capabilities and influence were far greater than those of Stark Industries.

Many things that couldn't be done in the Marvel world could be accomplished once moved to the Resident Evil world.

He had already bought land in the suburbs of New York, just waiting for Umbrella's genius architects to come over, make plans, provide designs, and finally build an industrial park.

Stark Industries had been constrained by antitrust laws for a long time, but he had established a connection with Umbrella Corporation; the antitrust laws of this world couldn't touch the Umbrella of that world.

He could bring many technologies over there to earn foreign exchange, then convert that exchange into materials to feed back into Stark Industries.

By then, money would truly just be a number. All his armor materials would be the most expensive ones!

Build one, blow one up, and set them off like fireworks when he was bored!

With the cooperation of two giant enterprises, their vision could be set directly on the vast universe.

Since the end of the Battle of New York, Tony had been plagued by anxiety. Because at that time, facing the sudden alien attack, Earth had been beaten with no power to fight back, and those panicked politicians had even attempted to strike Manhattan Island with nuclear missiles.

That war hadn't been as easy as it appeared in the movies. The infantry combat power of the Chitauri was indeed just so-so, but the surface armor of those massive war beasts couldn't be penetrated even by armor-piercing shells.

The National Guard had driven their infantry fighting vehicles in, but they could only fight the Chitauri infantry.

The Chitauri's individual flight vehicles had extremely high movement speeds, and their high-powered energy blasts hit the ground with power no less than a 122mm artillery piece. The lethality was similar to the movie, relying mainly on the heat and shockwave generated by the explosion, rather than shrapnel from metal rounds.

The damage caused to ordinary soldiers by those high-speed vehicles weaving through the city was immeasurable, and ordinary soldiers couldn't shoot them down with standard bullets.

The high-speed Chitauri flight vehicles were like a swarm of locusts occupying the sky. The helicopters launched by the National Guard were shot down before they could even enter the battlefield because of their slow flight speed and thin armor.

They were also the Chitauri unit that caused the most casualties during the Battle of New York, and together with the heavily armored Leviathan, they became Tony's nightmare for six years.

Even now, Tony would still fall into deep contemplation.

If one day the Chitauri did not rely on portals but came directly to Earth to wage an invasion war, what would humanity do?

Rely on whom?

The pot-bellied politicians? Weapons that were several levels behind cosmic civilizations? Meaningless racial conflicts?

Or them, the superheroes?

How many superheroes could they have to win a group war?

Steve was a super soldier, but if he were in an open field, ten gunmen surrounding him could kill him.

Thor was very powerful, but he was only one person.

Hulk was uncontrollable and had no meaning in calculations.

The rest of the people went without saying.

Then, the appearance of Duncan let him see how fragile humans were, and how powerful humans could be.

The formidable Umbrella Corporation could influence the situation of the world single-handedly. Weak humans could be wiped out by a tiny virus.

The few days spent in the Resident Evil world allowed Tony to see a vague path. He grasped that glimmer of inspiration, locked himself in the laboratory for a day and a night, watched the footage of the Battle of New York repeatedly, and finally figured it out.

The development of Earth was too slow; they could no longer slack off. Humanity could not rely on Asgard, as there would be a day when they could not protect Earth.

Since some deadweight teammates in the global village loved to hold them back, then he would emulate Umbrella and let Stark Industries serve as the chain driving the operation of society, pushing the bloated Earth forward!