The energy rifles did not fire ordinary energy beams, but dark-red plasma crackling with electric arcs—something Tony had never seen before.
Twelve dark-red beams shot at Tony, Steve, and Natasha from all directions.
They were not random shots, but precisely targeted at the vital points of all three: their heads, hearts, and spines.
Steve raised his shield.
The shield blocked the three beams aimed at him, but the Vibranium Shield's performance against the dark-red plasma made his eyes widen.
The shield's surface was not pierced, but the plasma generated intense heat the instant it struck, heating the shield until it glowed red.
The heat traveled through the shield into his arm. His skin burned, and the air filled with the smell of scorched flesh.
Natasha had no shield. She relied on movement.
With twelve energy rifles locked onto her, her body moved through the barrage with unimaginable speed and precision.
Every roll, every leap, every sidestep perfectly avoided the beams aimed at her, as though she already knew the path of every trajectory.
But her left arm was fractured.
The injury to her left arm severely affected her balance and speed.
As she avoided the seventh beam, pain prevented her left arm from completing its full swing, shifting her center of gravity by several centimeters.
That slight deviation allowed a streak of dark-red plasma to graze her right thigh.
It was not a direct hit, merely a graze.
But a ten-centimeter-long blackened wound immediately appeared on Natasha's thigh. Her skin and muscle were scorched by the heat, hissing audibly.
She clenched her teeth and made no sound, but her body trembled slightly from the pain. When she landed, her right leg gave out, and she dropped to one knee.
The instant Natasha was hit, Tony had already taken to the