New York, the Osborn family mansion.
A black sedan slowly pulled up in front of the mansion.
"Welcome home!"
A slightly low, hoarse voice came from inside the car. Then two white men got out.
One was a bald, middle-aged man; the other was a young man with short blond hair.
Any New Yorker who paid even a little attention to Oscorp would recognize them.
One was Mendel Stromm, Norman Osborn's closest business partner. The other was Harry Osborn, Norman's son and the future heir to Oscorp.
The two entered the mansion, walked through a dark, winding corridor that looked like it belonged in an abandoned castle, and finally stopped in front of a large door.
"It's a little dark in there, but your eyes will adjust... A little darkness is better..."
Mendel Stromm warned Harry, then slowly pushed the door open.
It was a hospital room.
Cold, dim, and silent. Even the air seemed steeped in the desolation of old age.
"Father!"
Harry stepped inside, drew back the curtains around the bed, then sat silently in a chair beside it. He looked at Norman, whose body had wasted away until he resembled a dried-up corpse, his expression complicated.
"I never thought I'd die like this... Looking at my son as if he were a stranger..."
Lying in bed, his skin mottled like that of someone with albinism and marked with patches like lividity, Norman weakly glanced at his son, then leaned against the pillow and murmured to himself.
"You have potential... Harry."
"You're exceptionally intelligent... but you don't know how to appreciate what you have..."
Norman was no longer hysterical with nowhere left to turn, nor crazed and resentful in the face of repeated despair. All that remained was a deathly calm and a final trace of regret.
"You're