Temporarily Demoted Again

The day after the office farce, Jack was temporarily demoted once again. But this time, what awaited him was not a trip to Antarctica, but a position as a low-level clerk...

Yes, Hill had kicked Jack into a clerk position, and he was specifically assigned to handle Hell's Kitchen.

This unexpected delight suited Jack perfectly. As a desk agent, he had to sit in an office every day and only had free time after work.

As for going to Hell's Kitchen, he needed a reason, didn't he?

He couldn't exactly say that Hell's Kitchen's donuts were delicious, so he went there every day to buy them.

Now, as punishment, Hill had put him in charge of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s affairs in Hell's Kitchen. This gave him the perfect excuse to spend more than ten hours a day there, carrying out his Evil Point harvesting plan.

Besides Jack's temporary demotion, Garrett was also temporarily demoted. He had originally been the big brother among Hydra's field agents, with only a few senior field agents like Hawkeye above him.

But now, he had been reduced to Rumlow's equal.

As Jack's good brother, Rumlow naturally had no fondness for Garrett. Besides, Rumlow was in the S.H.I.E.L.D. Strike Team. You field agents couldn't order them around. So in just one morning, he gave Garrett three clear displays of dominance.

Ward, who learned of the news, was so furious that he nearly started fighting Rumlow on the spot.

This required an explanation of the long-standing grudge between the S.H.I.E.L.D. Strike Team and S.H.I.E.L.D.'s field agents.

In the beginning, S.H.I.E.L.D. had only two kinds of agents: field agents and desk agents.

It could even be said that their respective authority had barely been separated at all.

Sometimes, someone would be typing up documents in the office one second, then rushing off to a scene the next.

This chaos continued until Alexander Pierce took office. This big brother of Hydra saw what a mess S.H.I.E.L.D. had become after World War II, showing faint signs of turning into a second- or third-rate department.

How could all the Nazi Hydra members, himself included, tolerate that?

We wanted to rise from the dead, yet after you bastards took us down, you planned to collapse yourselves?!

How could that possibly work!

Hydra: "S.H.I.E.L.D., rise up!!!"

So after Pierce took office, he carried out sweeping reforms and, incidentally, completely separated the responsibilities of field agents and desk agents.

In the end, when Director Fury took office, this man whom even Pierce praised to the skies had a habit of never putting all his eggs in one basket.

That led to the creation of the S.H.I.E.L.D. Strike Team.

And conflict arose along with it.

The field agents believed the Strike Team was entirely the product of distrust toward them.

Wouldn't it be far better to concentrate their strength into one fist rather than scatter it around?

But who could persuade Fury?

So, seeing that the newly established Strike Team was still fairly respectful toward its seniors, the field agents endured it for the time being.

But as more and more Hydra members like Rumlow joined the Strike Team, the natural opposition between the two sides caused the relationship between S.H.I.E.L.D.'s two armed forces to grow tense.

On top of that, Hydra itself was divided into numerous factions. Sitwell led Hydra's desk agents, while Garrett led Hydra's field agents. The two sides had clashed many times over succeeding Pierce.

Although the Strike Team had yet to produce a leader, even if you were a Hydra field agent, don't expect any friendly faces from the Hydra members in the Strike Team.

For example, Garrett had been temporarily demoted for less than a day before Rumlow hit him with three consecutive displays of dominance.

Rumlow was both venting on behalf of his good friend and having his ambitions stirred by Jack's recent string of performances.

Since the Strike Team had never had a big brother, why not let him take the position?

As for why an oddball like Jack could get along with both the field agents and the Strike Team...

The secret was...

To carefully "look after" the Strike Team members, make them think he was taking care of them, while secretly stealing their credit.

So Jack felt he hadn't lost out by being kicked over to Hell's Kitchen.

Garrett, on the other hand, had been sent to serve as liaison between the field agents and the Strike Team. From now on, he would be stuck between the two factions and feel miserable all over.

Of course, the most important thing was still the Evil Points!

"Caused a minor disturbance within S.H.I.E.L.D. Evil Points +100,000."

"Due to the host, Garrett was temporarily demoted and became the coordinating leader between the field agents and the Strike Team. However, as a member of the field agent leadership, he was unable to properly handle the relationship between the two factions, worsening their conflict. Evil Points +200,000."

"The host's rabid smear campaign yesterday lowered many people's opinion of the host. The host was viewed as an irrational mad dog. Evil Points +200,000."

"The host used Jenny Pierce's special identity to slander a colleague, provoking Pierce's disgust and causing him to seriously reconsider whether the host could succeed Hydra. Evil Points -2,000."

"The host used Jenny Pierce's special identity to slander a colleague, provoking Nick Fury's disgust and causing him to reject Coulson's proposal to add the host to the director candidate list. Evil Points +2,000."

"Damn, five notifications. Aside from those two that canceled each other out, I just gained five hundred thousand Evil Points in one go!"

Seeing the Evil Points come in, Jack knew his long-standing guess had been correct. Since he could make Pierce and Fury develop mutual admiration over the hammer incident, thereby losing Evil Points...

Then there was no reason why creating chaos within S.H.I.E.L.D. couldn't earn him Evil Points!

Now that the Evil Points had arrived, Jack felt that he had found a way to earn them without physically harming anyone else.

Jack did not feel cheated in the slightest.

After all, Jack constantly bragged about doing whatever he wanted, but he truly could not bring himself to hurt innocent people. Likewise, he did not want to cross that final line and become a complete Homelander.

"People have boundaries."

"Only monsters have no boundaries."

After repeating those two sentences in his heart, Jack stepped out of the car. Looking at the NYPD officers ahead cleaning up the battlefield, he grinned and put on his sunglasses.

Ever since he had arrested several thousand gang members in Hell's Kitchen and wiped out hundreds of criminal dens a few days ago, the balance that had long existed in Hell's Kitchen had been shattered.

Now, everyone was fighting over the territory left vacant.

Romanians, Russian gangs, Colombian drug dealers, the Jamaican Salvation Army—every kind of monster was brawling in Hell's Kitchen.

For the sake of a single building or storefront, these people madly poured firepower onto their enemies.

As a result, the emergency lines at the NYPD's Hell's Kitchen Precinct had not stopped ringing for quite some time.

The nearby funeral homes were transporting corpses day and night.

As for why the system's Evil Point notifications had not yet arrived, it was because this chaos had not ended. Only once it was over would the massive payout of Evil Points arrive.

"Today is the twenty-third. I have eight days left to end this chaos. If it drags into next month, my only four skills will be gone."