Time seemed to stand still at that moment.
Above the ruins of Sokovia, all the clamor had faded away.
Lynn lay in Wanda's arms, keenly aware of the violent trembling of her body.
Warm tears dripped onto his cheeks, mingling with the blood that kept pouring from him.
A gaping hole ran straight through his chest, its edges still blackened by the laser's scorching heat.
The rest of his body was riddled with bullet holes, like a broken rag doll.
Life was draining from his body by the second.
"Wh... why..."
Wanda's voice was hoarse and broken, thick with pain and bewilderment.
She didn't know this man.
She didn't even know his name.
Yet this complete stranger had traded his own life for her brother's at their most desperate moment.
That unhesitating resolve, that calm smile in the face of death, had seared itself deep into her soul like a red-hot branding iron.
"Cough... cough, cough..."
Lynn parted his lips, blood and fragments of his organs spilling from his mouth with every breath.
He wanted to say something.
At a moment like this, a heartfelt confession or some philosophical last words would undoubtedly maximize the "dramatic effect" of this death.
But he could no longer manage it.
His vocal cords and lungs had been completely destroyed.
He could only muster his last shred of strength to lift his bloodstained hand and gently touch Wanda's cheek.
He wanted to wipe away her tears.
Yet that simple gesture exhausted the last of his life.
Lynn's hand slipped limply down, and the light in his eyes went out completely.
He was dead.
He had breathed his last in the Scarlet Witch's arms.
[Simulation mission complete.] [Evaluating ending...] [Calculating evaluation...] [Depth of impression on target's psyche: extremely profound.] [Manner of death: supremely tragic and heroic.] [Dramatic effect: perfect.] [Overall evaluation: SSS rank-until death do us part!] [Congratulations, host, on earning the epic achievement: a mortal body, the equal of gods.]
Within Lynn's consciousness, a barrage of system notifications flooded past.
But in Wanda's world, only deathly silence remained.
She held Lynn's gradually cooling corpse in a daze, like a sculpture without a soul.
One second.
Two seconds.
Three seconds.
"No..."
A murmur like sleep talk escaped her lips.
"No!!!"
The next instant, a scream filled with endless grief and fury rang through heaven and earth!
"Aaaaaaah-!!!"
BOOM!!!!
An indescribable surge of scarlet energy, tens of millions of times stronger than before, erupted with her at its center!
That wasn't magic.
It was the rules themselves.
It was the universe's most fundamental power, called "chaos"!
The scarlet energy storm shot skyward, instantly tearing through the clouds.
Before this power, the entire floating city of Sokovia was like a fragile sand sculpture.
Countless Ultron Robots still running rampant, along with their indestructible vibranium bodies, were erased at the molecular level the instant they touched the scarlet energy, annihilated into the most basic particles.
The earth groaned, and space twisted.
Scarlet fissures visible to the naked eye spread through the air.
Reality was being forcibly rewritten!
"My God... what is that?!"
On the distant battlefield, Tony Stark cried out in disbelief as the energy readings on his armor's display instantly shot off the charts.
"Thor! Hulk! Everyone! Evacuate that area immediately!" Captain America, Steve Rogers, called urgently over the comms. "That power... it's breaking everything down!"
Quicksilver, Pietro, climbed up from the ground and stared blankly at his sister at the center of the storm.
He could feel the sorrow and destruction contained within that power.
And all of it had stemmed from nothing more than that stranger's death.
At the center of the storm, Wanda's eyes were scarlet, her tears long since evaporated.
Holding Lynn's corpse, she slowly rose into the air.
"No one... is going to take you... away from me."
She muttered feverishly as scarlet Chaos Magic began pouring madly into Lynn's body, trying to reshape his shattered flesh and reverse his death.
Yet Lynn's soul had long since dissipated.
Everything she did was doomed to be futile.
That futility drove her further into madness.
[Congratulations, host. You have earned SSS-rank evaluation rewards!] [Reward one: extract the target's core ability-Chaos Magic (beginner)!] [Reward two: extract the target's constitution-chaos energy affinity (capable of growth)!] [Reward three: extract the special item-Wanda's Protection (when you face a lethal threat, there is a 30% chance of triggering protection from a cross-dimensional projection of Wanda, lasting 10 seconds).] [Simulation complete. Consciousness will return shortly.]
Amid the system's notifications, Lynn's consciousness gradually withdrew from the simulated spacetime that had descended into madness because of him.
The real world.
Aboard a S.H.I.E.L.D. Quinjet.
Lynn's eyes snapped open, and he gasped violently for breath.
He looked down at his hands, then felt his chest.
Completely unharmed.
But inside his body, there was now a warm, violent power flowing through his veins like surging magma.
This was Chaos Magic!
He had succeeded!
He was no longer cannon fodder at everyone else's mercy!
Suppressing his wild joy, Lynn swept his gaze around the cabin.
Crossbones and his special operations soldiers were leaning against the cabin walls, resting with their eyes closed. No one had noticed anything unusual about him.
The aircraft was speeding through the clouds, bound for Sokovia.
Everything was exactly as it had been before he entered the simulation.
But just then-
"Alert! Alert! Unknown higher-dimensional energy signature detected!"
"The energy source... is above headquarters!"
A pilot's terrified scream suddenly came from the cockpit.
Something stirred within Lynn, and he lunged toward a window and looked down.
Above S.H.I.E.L.D.'s Triskelion headquarters in Washington, D.C., an enormous scarlet storm vortex was forming out of thin air!
The storm's color, its shape, even the destructive aura within it were identical to the Chaos Energy he had seen erupt from Wanda when she lost control in the simulated spacetime!
System... didn't you say only the target would inherit the memories? Lynn roared inwardly.
[Yes, host.] [But you seem to have underestimated just how terrifying the obsession and fury of someone with Skyfather-level potential can be after witnessing the horrific death of the person she loves.] [The real world's Wanda Maximoff was already on the verge of a mental breakdown the instant she received the simulated memories.]
Lynn's face instantly turned deathly pale.
As he stared at the scarlet storm enveloping the entire headquarters, a terrifying thought rose in his mind.
That unhinged witch who had just held his corpse in the simulated world and sworn to destroy everything...
She had come looking for him!
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