Skills

Coulson arrived on the rooftop with two S.H.I.E.L.D. agents who had only suffered minor injuries. After asking about the frozen Iron Monger, Tony did not mention Meng Zu and took all the responsibility himself. Once the ice was broken open, they opened the Iron Monger and found that Obadiah was already dead.

After speaking with Nick Fury over the phone, Coulson stated that the Iron Monger was one of Obadiah's pieces of criminal evidence and needed to be taken away. Naturally, Tony refused. After a round of arguing, Tony removed the Arc Reactor from the Iron Monger. "Stan stole this from me. Now it's back with its rightful owner."

With that, Tony left first and left Pepper to handle the rest. After returning home, Tony had the chef prepare dinner and waited for Pepper to arrive. Once Coulson and the others had finished dealing with everything, Pepper came to Tony's residence.

As they ate dinner, they discussed what had happened that night. "Tony, why did you treat Evan like that?"

"Pepper, he's an assassin. He's dangerous. He came tonight to kill Stan for money. Maybe one day, he'll come kill you and me for money too. Naturally, we need to stay away from people like him."

Pepper stopped cutting her food and said, "Tony, what nonsense are you talking about? Evan came tonight because Stan sent people to kill him. And if it weren't for him, Stan would have killed me already."

"What happened?"

Pepper explained in detail why Meng Zu had come that night and how he had saved her.

After hearing her out, Tony said, "All right, maybe I got it wrong. But my opinion of him hasn't changed. He's dangerous."

"I think he's a good person."

After seeing Pepper off, Tony sat on the sofa in thought. "JARVIS, look up every piece of information on Evan."

When Meng Zu returned home, the bodies of the seven Ten Rings members had already been cleaned up completely. Looking at the battered walls and debris scattered across the floor, he could not help sighing. "Maybe I should move somewhere else."

Sitting on the sofa, Meng Zu pondered, If the Iron Monger had solved its de-icing problem like the Mark III, I wouldn't have been able to do anything to it. The age of superheroes is about to begin, but I'm still far too weak.

Host: Meng Zu (Human)

Strength: 4.3

Agility: 4.6

Constitution: 4.5

Spirit: 6.7

Health: 225

Energy: 130 (120+10)

Contract Points

After opening the system panel and seeing that he had 4,510 Contract Points, Meng Zu thought it over and decided not to save them. He needed to strengthen himself first.

The Mysterious Shop refreshed once a month and only displayed six items each time. Today happened to be the day it refreshed, so Meng Zu opened it. The moment he saw one of the items, his eyes lit up. "Oh, this is pretty good."

Laser Cannon: Fires a laser from the barrel, consuming 40 Energy per second; (2,400 Contract Points)

"If I'd had this today, I probably could've blasted through the Iron Monger. It's just a little expensive." The price of 2,400 made Meng Zu hesitate, since that was enough for two Advanced Draws.

However, after thinking about it briefly, Meng Zu still bought it. With this thing, his offensive capabilities would become much stronger. He also did not save the remaining 2,110 Contract Points, using them for one Advanced Draw and a ten-pull Normal Draw.

The Advanced Draw gave him an active skill: Bullet Time: Time slowed to one-third speed, while the user was unaffected. (30 Energy per second)

The ten-pull gave him two 0.5 Strength attributes, one 1-point Constitution attribute, three 0.4 Agility attributes, two Red Potions, one Blue Potion, and one final active skill.

Overall, the draw had been quite good, but Meng Zu was not happy at all. He was even somewhat speechless, because the final skill he had received was called Repeated Side-to-Side Jumping.

Repeated Side-to-Side Jumping: Jump back and forth to taunt enemies in front of you into forcibly attacking you, while shouting, "I jumped out again, I jumped back again! So what, so what? Come hit me, idiot!" 50 Energy. (Note: Even non-enemies may be taunted into forcibly attacking you if they are in a bad mood.)

"Fuck! This counts as a skill?" Meng Zu cursed irritably. Wasn't this garbage skill just the line Wong Jing used to taunt Pao Lung-sing in Hail the Judge? He had not expected the system to turn it into a skill.

Looking at the skill, Meng Zu had only one thing to say: Even if I have no skills left, even if I have to run, even if the mission fails, I, Meng Zu, will never use this damn skill.

His good mood had been completely ruined by one stupid skill. He quickly used all the attributes he had obtained from the draws, and Meng Zu's system panel became:

Host: Meng Zu (Human)

Strength: 5.3

Agility: 5.8

Constitution: 5.5

Spirit: 6.7

Health: 225

Energy: 130 (120+10)

Contract Points: 110

Item: Mana-Recovery Ring (+10 Energy, restores 5 Energy per hour)

Resurrection Cross Necklace (Revives the wearer three seconds after death and restores them to normal condition)

Red Potion x4 (slightly restores physical condition), Blue Potion x1 (restores 20 Energy)

PS: I'll list these separately in the relevant section from now on, so no one says I'm padding the word count.

Once he was done, Meng Zu went upstairs to sleep. He still had the hotel bounty to complete tomorrow. As for whether the shooting at his home would attract the police, Meng Zu did not need to worry. A lavish dinner for seven would naturally smooth over that sort of thing.

Early the next morning, after preparing his things, Meng Zu drove toward Brooklyn. He had obtained assassin Leon's current location from a homeless man using gold coins. Leon was a cautious assassin. If Meng Zu arrived too late, Leon might relocate, and then he would have to spend more gold coins to find him again.

Following the address, Meng Zu arrived in front of a five-story apartment building. After circling the area, he found no suitable spot for sniping with a gun. It seemed he would have to deal with Leon at close range. Just then, someone came out of the apartment. Before the door could close, Meng Zu hurried inside. As soon as he entered, he activated Clue Guidance to locate Leon's room.

In the innermost room on the second floor, Leon watched the day's news expressionlessly. Beside him sat a girl of around twelve, carefully assembling the parts of a handgun in front of her.

Suddenly, Leon felt uneasy. He immediately stood, went to the window, lifted a corner of the curtain, and looked outside. Seeing what he was doing, the little girl, Matilda, hurriedly finished assembling the handgun and asked in a tense whisper, "Leon, did Stan find us?"

Leon shook his head. "No. I just suddenly feel danger approaching."

"Huh?"

Although he did not spot anyone suspicious, Leon trusted his instincts. After all, those instincts had saved him countless times over his years as an assassin. He said to Matilda, "Pack up. We're leaving!"

Matilda did not ask why. Since Leon had said so, she immediately began packing the necessities they would need.

Leon had originally chosen this apartment because he liked its location. The surrounding area was connected in every direction and filled with narrow alleys, making it easy to escape through the window if someone blocked the door. Just as the two finished packing and were about to leave, knock, knock, knock—someone knocked on the door.

Leon frowned, set down the case in his right hand, and reached into his coat. He had Matilda move away from the door before cautiously looking through the peephole. Seeing that it was the apartment manager, he put down the luggage.

Leon opened the door halfway, holding his gun in his right hand behind the door. "What is it?"

The manager smiled. "We just received notice that the water will be shut off for half the day this afternoon."

Leon carefully observed the manager's expression but found nothing wrong. "Thanks." With that, he shut the door. Leon had Matilda put the things down first, intending for them to leave after the manager went downstairs.

Meng Zu stood at the stairwell corner and watched the apartment manager knock on each door to deliver the notice. After thinking for a moment, he took out a human-skin mask from his storage space and began applying makeup.