The Perfect Product

"Sorry... sorry." Jessica lowered her head, her face red as a tomato. "I... I got distracted."

"It's fine." Azu magnanimously patted her shoulder. "I know my charm can be distracting sometimes."

"Again."

Azu moved in close once more.

"This time, we'll practice 'pushing hands.'"

They faced each other.

Their palms pressed together.

"Feel my force... here it comes."

Azu's palm rotated and coiled within hers.

It was an extremely suggestive movement.

Less than ten centimeters separated them.

Their breaths intertwined.

Jessica could even count Wu Yanzu's long eyelashes.

As she looked at this man, the hard line of defense in her heart began to crumble bit by bit.

So this was what it felt like... to be surrounded by the presence of a powerful man?

So this was... the so-called sense of security?

She no longer resisted. She even instinctively followed Wu Yanzu's movements.

At that moment, the training ground became a dance floor.

Beep—!

The training ground's electronic door slid open at a very inopportune moment.

"Sir! There's something from the laboratory..."

Ashley rushed in on high heels, full of urgency.

Then she froze.

She looked at Jessica, whose face was flushed and whose body glistened with fragrant sweat, then at Azu, who was holding her wrist with his face barely ten centimeters from hers. Her expression immediately became colorful.

"Uh... did I come at a bad time?" Ashley adjusted her glasses awkwardly. "I can come back in ten minutes."

"No, you came at exactly the right time." Azu released Jessica and picked up a towel to wipe his completely sweatless forehead. "Special training is over. Jessica, go take a shower. You smell like a homeless person."

"Fuck you, Starr." Jessica grabbed the towel and glared fiercely at him, though her tone had lost some of its usual sharpness.

"Same... same time tomorrow!" she tossed over her shoulder from the doorway, not daring to look back.

"Ding! Special Popularity Points +3000!"

Hearing the pleasant system notification, Azu smiled in satisfaction.

After watching Jessica disappear through the locker room door, he turned to Ashley.

"Go on. What is it?"

Ashley immediately returned to her professional demeanor, lowering her voice with a grave expression.

"Sir, it's Dr. Connor. The laboratory... has results."

Azu stopped wiping his sweat.

It was the Compound V he had drawn from the blind box, which he had sent to the Starr Group laboratory.

Azu tossed the towel aside. "To the lab."

Starr Group, Life Sciences Division, underground core zone.

This was the Starr Group's most confidential location, with security exceeding even Vought Headquarters.

Without four layers of verification—fingerprints, iris scans, gait recognition, and DNA—not even a fly could get in.

Azu changed into a white lab coat and entered the temperature-controlled laboratory.

An elderly man with graying hair and thick glasses sat before a cluster of complex instruments, looking both fanatical and exhausted.

Dr. John Connor.

He was one of the Starr Group's old guard and Anthony's father's university classmate. Not only was he a top biologist and genetic engineer, he was also an elder who had watched Anthony grow up.

"Anthony, you're here."

"Doctor." Azu stepped forward, with rare respect in his voice. "Looks like you pulled an all-nighter."

"It was worth it, child. More than worth it."

Dr. Connor pointed at the blue liquid beneath the microscope. It was the original "blind box" solution Wu Yanzu had given him.

"This thing... this is practically God's handiwork." Connor's voice trembled. "This molecular structure... this energy density... it completely defies everything we know about biology. It can rewrite DNA and grant cells nearly limitless energy."

"Can you reproduce it?" Azu got straight to the point.

Connor's eyes dimmed for a moment.

"No."

He shook his head and sighed.

"It's too perfect. Its synthesis process exceeds our current technological understanding. Several of its catalytic elements simply do not exist on Earth... I even suspect it wasn't made under this universe's physical laws."

As expected.

If something from the system could be cracked so easily by Earth's technology, that would be the real bug.

Azu was not disappointed. He merely asked blandly, "So it's bad news?"

"No, that's just the reality." Dr. Connor abruptly changed his tone, and a gleam flashed in his eyes. "Although we can't reproduce the perfect 'original,' through reverse engineering, we've deciphered part of its activation mechanism."

He pressed a button.

A robotic arm in the laboratory moved over with a metal tray.

Glass test tubes were neatly arranged on it.

The liquid inside was no longer pure azure blue, but fluorescent emerald green.

"What is this?" Azu picked one up.

"We call it... T-Vex," Dr. Connor explained.

"We can't stabilize that permanent genetic rewriting. The original's energy is too powerful. If we tried to replicate it by force, the test subject would explode within three seconds."

"So we diluted it and added an inhibitor, turning it into a 'temporary' state."

Azu looked at the green solution in his hand, his gaze shifting slightly.

"The effects?"

"Very impressive." Dr. Connor pulled up a set of data. "After injection, an ordinary person can gain superhuman physical abilities within ten seconds. Strength increases by roughly twenty to fifty times, skin hardness can withstand 9mm bullets, pain perception is reduced, and adrenaline surges. Some individuals may even awaken extremely weak special abilities, such as... producing a few sparks from their hands or releasing high-voltage electricity."

"Duration?"

"Twenty minutes." Connor spread his hands. "After ten minutes, the effects rapidly decline, and the user will experience extreme fatigue and hunger."

"What about side effects?" Azu asked the critical question.

Dr. Connor's expression turned serious.

"That's the biggest problem, Anthony."

"This energy is toxic to the human body. The inhibitor can only delay it, not eliminate it. It can only be metabolized by the body itself."

"Using one dose within twenty-four hours will have no real impact. If two doses are used consecutively, the enhancement effect will be halved, and it will put considerable strain on the internal organs."

"If three doses are used consecutively..." Connor adjusted his glasses. "The immune system will develop permanent antibody tolerance. In other words... using it again afterward will be like drinking plain water, with no effect at all. In severe cases, it could even cause genetic chain collapse."

"And production is extremely difficult. We need to purify specific isotopes. Even with the confidential production line running at full capacity, daily output is only... one hundred doses."

"One hundred doses..."

Azu toyed with the green test tube.

A twenty-minute Hulk experience card.

Low output, drug resistance, and side effects.

It sounded like a defective product.

But in Azu's eyes, nothing was useless. From another angle, this was... the perfect product.