Codename: Shadow

Whether it was the original Shadow Spider-Man or Peter, now possessing his body and passively receiving everything, neither could quite believe it.

So Peter went to the Daily Bugle, intending to confront J. Jonah and get to the bottom of it.

Instead, he found "J. Jonah" shot dead in the office!

The police, who had "just happened" to be there, also saw him appear in the office holding a handgun!

After shaking off the police pursuit, Peter went to the police morgue and discovered the suspicious details surrounding the corpse.

When he returned to the small room where he kept his files and tried to find clues among the materials Yuri had left behind, another Peter possessed him!

Peter opened his eyes and blinked, realizing that the pain in his mind had completely vanished.

The merging of those memory fragments left him temporarily unable to tell whether he was Peter, the Shadow Spider-Man, or the Peter who had only just entered high school.

Or perhaps he was both?

Still, it confirmed one thing for him: in this world—no, in some world—there was someone like him!

Someone who had also been bitten by a spider and gained extraordinary powers!

But compared to this Spider-Man codenamed Shadow, his life had been far happier.

Though he had never known his parents either, he had an Aunt May who loved him dearly!

I can still go back, right?

With that thought, Peter tried to communicate with the strange spiderweb in his mind.

He quickly confirmed that he could still return!

As long as he actively severed the glowing strand from that point of light, his consciousness would leave this world and return to the one that belonged to him!

With that in mind, Peter was no longer in such a hurry to go back.

He wanted to see another world, another Spider-Man, and another adventure!

Peter turned his attention to the photographs before him.

They contained detailed profiles of the Green Goblin Gang's members:

Sergei Kravinoff, also known as Kraven the Hunter. Occupation: animal trainer. Nationality: Russia.

Adrian Toomes, also known as Vulture, the Savage. Nationality: unknown.

Dmitri Snegiryakov, also known as Chameleon. Nationality: Russia. Kraven the Hunter's half-brother, with the ability to perfectly mold his face into an imitation of someone else's!

"The Green Goblin Gang's core members were all recruited from circuses and freak shows. It's no surprise that some of them have strange abilities." After merging with Shadow Spider-Man's powers, Peter found that his logical reasoning had also improved tremendously.

"The dead J. Jonah was a fake, so the real one must have been taken by Green Goblin!"

"Why did they take J. Jonah?"

"Yuri!"

"Before he died, he wanted to expose the Green Goblin Group's crimes through J. Jonah, but Green Goblin found out. There must be a Green Goblin informant at the Daily Bugle! Then Green Goblin sent someone to take J. Jonah and had Chameleon disguise himself as J. Jonah. But then someone shot and killed him!"

"Who pulled the trigger?"

"It was probably Felicia Hardy!"

"She said she personally witnessed Thomson shoot Yuri, so she took advantage of the chaos to take away the evidence Yuri had gathered. She had been romantically involved with Yuri, so it made perfect sense for her to avenge him."

"But there were too many coincidences. Chameleon had been disguised as Thomson when Yuri was shot, and they hadn't expected Felicia to act so decisively. So Chameleon died."

"But that also meant Felicia was definitely in danger. Since they took J. Jonah, whom Yuri had contacted, they certainly wouldn't spare Felicia, who had been even closer to him!"

"Wait, no. There's one more person. He's their target too!"

"That's me, Peter Parker!"

"Before Yuri got into trouble, I was his best photography partner, and I clashed with Green Goblin at Felicia's bar!"

"They'll definitely go to my home to find me. Oh no, Aunt May!"

Peter abruptly rose to his feet.

Although this Aunt May was not his Aunt May, having merged with part of Shadow Spider-Man's memories, he still felt a deep familial affection for her.

The thought that Aunt May might be in danger because of him made it impossible for him to sit still.

The Parker home.

Knock, knock, knock.

Aunt May stood outside the room and knocked on the door.

"Peter, are you home?"

After waiting a while with no response from inside, Aunt May pushed the door open and entered.

She had thought she heard something moving in the room just now, so she had come in to take a look.

Whoosh—

A gust of wind rushed toward her.

Aunt May noticed that the room's window had been left open.

She relaxed slightly and complained, "That child. How many times have I told him? If he goes out, he needs to close the window properly. Honestly."

As she spoke, she walked toward the window.

Before she had taken two steps, an enormous black shadow suddenly pounced down from behind her.

Sensing the movement, Aunt May instinctively turned around. "Peter?"

"It's Toomes!" The black shadow knocked Aunt May to the ground and laughed sinisterly.

Only then did Aunt May realize that this was someone she had never seen before.

He wore a loose black robe, his head was completely bald, and his mouth was full of sharp fangs. He did not look entirely human.

Even more terrifying were his eyes. Savage and horrifying, when he looked at her, it did not feel as though he were looking at a person, but at food.

Vulture looked Aunt May's body over and said disdainfully, "Hisss—just a bag of old bones. Your husband had more meat on him. And he was tastier too, hisss—"

Aunt May shuddered violently and suddenly widened her eyes, unable to believe what this man had just said.

Ben's flesh. Tastier?

What... did that mean?

A terrifying thought appeared in her mind.

Could it be that Ben had not been torn apart by wild dogs, but by the man in front of her...

"Let her go, Toomes!" A figure dressed in black appeared in the doorway, breaking the room's tense atmosphere.

Vulture gripped Aunt May's throat with one hand and turned his head. "Spi-spi-Spider-Man, you can move, right? With that strange web of yours? But how fast can you move, Spi-spi-Spider-Man? Fast enough to stop me from tearing, tearing, tearing her neck apart?"

"No..." Peter faltered for a moment. After all, he was only a teenager.

But then, the part of him that belonged to Shadow Spider-Man gained the upper hand.

Almost beyond his control, he pulled a revolver from the pocket of his black trench coat and aimed it at Vulture's head.

"I can!"

Bang!

Along with his resolute declaration came a gunshot.

The revolver's cylinder rotated once. With Spider-Man's powerful physique, the recoil was almost negligible, and the bullet struck Vulture squarely between the eyebrows, piercing straight into his skull.

The immense kinetic force instantly turned Vulture's brain into mush, sending him crashing to the floor!