The Patterns on Morgan's Body

Late that night, several attacks occurred.

Some warriors infected with Black-purple veins were in extreme pain. The Black-purple veins seemed to be eating away at their bodies and minds.

Worse still, some of the warriors swelled rapidly as they groaned in pain. Their eyes turned red, and they began attacking anyone nearby.

Meanwhile, reports from around the world poured into Tony's servers.

[Breaking worldwide: People infected with unknown patterns have appeared. A new virus is suspected.]

[Zombie crisis erupts: Pattern carriers attack living creatures indiscriminately.]

[Infected lose control: Attacks reported in multiple locations worldwide.]

The situation was far worse than anyone had imagined.

Overnight, the crisis escalated. The Black-purple veins spread rapidly across the globe.

By seven that morning, rough estimates suggested that more than thirty percent of humanity had been infected with Black-purple veins. A third of those infected had mutated in a very short time, lost their minds, and attacked their own friends and family.

The media, news channels, and nearly every app with access to the outside world were reporting similar incidents nonstop.

Worse, the number of infected was climbing sharply.

Hospitals were overwhelmed. Looting broke out in multiple areas, countless people took to the streets, riots erupted, and conspiracy theories spread across social media on a massive scale.

Overnight, Blue Star descended into chaos.

At noon, after lunch, Lin Yi sat outside the quarantine wall, staring absently at the six glowing gems in his hand.

The Infinity Stones were in his custody for the time being. A few people had objected, but Tony had shut them down with two questions.

[With Lin Yi's abilities, which of you could stop him if he wanted the Infinity Stones?]

[If the Stones were kept somewhere else and someone tried to take them, could you stop them?]

No one had an answer. After seeing Lin Yi fight, not a single person present was confident they could stand against him, even with the power of the Infinity Stones.

Lin Yi tossed the Stones like toys as he ran through everything he could remember about the Marvel Universe from before he had crossed over: its lore, movies, animated shows, and comics.

He came up with almost nothing. The only possibility that struck him was the Zombie Universe.

The Black-purple veins behaved far too much like a zombie infection. They strengthened the body, stripped away reason and the sense of pain, and drove the infected to attack the living.

Aside from the unknown means of transmission, everything matched the description of the Zombie Virus.

His Sixth Sense told Lin Yi his peaceful life was about to be shattered for good.

"If only everything were as simple as punching it apart..."

He hated situations like this...

He sighed. Then he heard footsteps and knew it was Tony without turning around.

"What do you want to punch apart?" Tony walked over and tossed Lin Yi a can of cola.

The cold, sweet drink took a little of the edge off his frustration.

"Nothing. How's the situation?" Lin Yi let out a breath, hoping Tony had good news.

Tony grimaced. "After a whole night, we still haven't made any progress figuring out what these patterns are."

"We can't analyze them effectively at all. Most of our equipment can't even capture an image of them, though we can see them with our own eyes."

"They seem to have some intelligence, as if they're deliberately interfering with our machines. That's only a guess, of course." Tony sounded uncertain.

They were on the back foot. Everything they knew so far was speculation. This thing didn't fit any form of existence that current human science could reasonably explain.

The only thing they could say for certain was that it hadn't come from Earth.

"However..." Tony's tone shifted, and he looked a little more at ease.

"According to Gamora, Thanos didn't have those patterns on him before he entered the Quantum Realm."

"I don't think she was lying, so our preliminary suspicion is that they came from the Quantum Realm."

"If we're right, that would explain things. The rules inside the Quantum Realm differ from those of our universe, so it would make sense that we can't detect them."

"I've already started preparing. If we have no other choice, we'll go into the Quantum Realm."

"Count me in," Lin Yi said. He still had to live here. If they let the patterns keep spreading, this place would become the Zombie Universe sooner or later.

"No, you can't go!"

It wasn't Tony who said that. It was Strange, stepping through a Portal.

Exhaustion showed on Strange's face. He had spent the entire night searching through books at Kamar-Taj, hoping to find some record of the patterns he might have overlooked.

As it turned out, he had found a page tucked between the others.

The illustration on it looked remarkably like the Black-purple veins, and even the symptoms it described matched.

Unfortunately, that was all the record contained. It said nothing about where the patterns came from, what they were, or how to deal with them.

But the final sentence had chilled Strange to the bone.

The appearance of such patterns was usually caused by an unknown variable. They marked the beginning of a universe's destruction.

When Strange finished, Tony and Lin Yi looked at each other, neither knowing what to say.

What Strange had found seemed to point toward the Dark Dimension rather than the Quantum Realm.

"Lin, you need to come with me to see Ancient One," Strange added. "You're one of the variables too. Perhaps she can see something in you."

"The Ancient One? She's still alive?" Lin Yi asked. Then he realized Strange must mean The Ancient One from another timeline.

On second thought, there was no harm in meeting Ancient One. She was a veteran Riddler; perhaps she really did know something.

"When do we leave?"

"The sooner the better. Right now, ideally."

Lin Yi...???

"I'm serious. In a week, we'll have to see whether we need to do The Snap again."

"No... we might not even have a week," Tony cut in.

"Attacks are growing more frequent across the globe. We clearly don't have that much time."

"Honestly, I... wait." Tony's expression changed abruptly.

F.R.I.D.A.Y. had sent a specially flagged message.

[Sir...] F.R.I.D.A.Y. paused for a moment.

[Patterns have been found... on Miss Morgan.]

Tony, who had barely slept all night, went dizzy. He staggered two steps and nearly fell.

Without another word, he activated his MK85 suit, though it had not been fully repaired. After telling F.R.I.D.A.Y. not to tell Pepper, he shot into the sky.

Boom!

A sonic boom rang out. Lin Yi had heard the message too. His heart sank, and he flew after Tony toward the lakeside cabin.

In their panic, both men completely forgot they could have asked Strange to open a Portal...

Tony couldn't match Lin Yi's flying speed. Lin Yi caught up in seconds, grabbed him, and accelerated again with his Bio-field.

Less than a minute later, they reached the lakeside cabin, just in time to see Happy hurrying toward a vehicle with Morgan in his arms.

"Happy!"

Lin Yi and Tony rushed toward him.