Qin Xiao rolled his eyes helplessly and drawled.
"Hello, Mr. Director. I wanted to ask you something. When we came in just now, you were standing in front of the floor-to-ceiling window like this."
Qin Xiao imitated Nick Fury's earlier pose, with his back to everyone and his hands clasped behind him.
"Were you standing here holding that pose the whole time while you waited for us, or do you have some hidden surveillance system here, and only struck that cold, aloof pose when we reached the door?"
Nick Fury: "..."
All in all, the meeting with Nick Fury could still be called pleasant.
As for having Qin Xiao join S.H.I.E.L.D., Nick Fury had never intended for him to enter the organization through normal channels.
Instead, he used a set of credentials to bind Qin Xiao first, ensuring that he would give the Avengers Initiative priority when it began.
As for Dr. Banner, after an initial discussion with Nick Fury...
Fury used his own private resources to settle him in a mountain forest in northern Canada.
It was uninhabited and beautiful, and even if he transformed into Hulk, there was plenty of space for him to go out and run wild from time to time.
Nick Fury provided a laboratory there for Dr. Banner to continue his research.
He also stationed large numbers of S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel around the perimeter to ensure that no one disturbed Dr. Banner.
Or rather, to ensure that Hulk did not go out and disturb anyone else.
Having resolved his entanglement with S.H.I.E.L.D., Qin Xiao did not return to Los Angeles to find Tony.
Instead, he found a hotel in New York and checked in.
He planned to take the Hulk Serum first.
He had consulted the system earlier, and it said taking the serum would cause only mild pain.
However, the modifications might cause his body to expel large amounts of impurities, blood, and even bone marrow.
Sitting stark naked in the circular bathtub, Qin Xiao picked up a small bottle of fluorescent green liquid beside him.
Hulk Super-Soldier Serum. Why does this color look like a biological weapon from a movie?
After a few inward mutters, Qin Xiao opened the bottle, tilted his head back, and drained it.
"Huh? Doesn't seem like anything's happening! Ah, ah!!!!!!"
Before he could finish speaking, Qin Xiao suddenly let out an utterly agonized scream.
It felt as though a C4 charge had detonated inside his body.
It also felt as though a hydraulic press had crushed him, instantly pulverizing every muscle, bone, and internal organ in his body.
That instant of excruciating pain exceeded what Qin Xiao could bear.
But the pain left as quickly as it came.
In just two or three seconds, all the pain in his body vanished.
Qin Xiao, now lying at the bottom of the bathtub, could not move a muscle.
Yet every nerve in his body spontaneously began twitching wildly.
Every part of him began convulsing nonstop, making him look as though he were having an epileptic seizure.
After the convulsions, his body began to itch.
Qin Xiao could feel himself slowly regaining control of his body.
His bone marrow, muscles, and internal organs were all being recombined, rearranged, and remade.
Itching-the itch of countless bugs crawling inside his body, through his blood vessels, and between his bones.
It was even harder to endure than that instant of pain earlier.
"Ah!"
Qin Xiao opened his mouth and let out a meaningless cry.
His body writhed erratically as he slammed his head frantically against the ceramic bathtub.
Bang! Bang!
How could an ordinary bathtub withstand that punishment? In just a few blows, he had all but demolished it.
Fortunately, the hotel was high-end enough that its soundproofing was unbelievably good.
Otherwise, with the noises Qin Xiao was making, someone would have called the police long ago.
The intense itching lasted a little over five full minutes.
Qin Xiao lay amid a pile of ceramic shards and the filth that had poured out of his body, looking as though he had nothing left to live for.
During that final minute or so, almost all the blood and bone marrow in his body had been expelled.
In their place were the bone marrow and blood his body had newly produced after taking the Hulk Serum.
Just as the system had said, his body looked unchanged on the surface.
But the explosive power contained in his muscles had already far exceeded the limits of humanity.
He casually picked up a ceramic shard beside him.
Qin Xiao drew a breath and slashed it hard across his arm.
It felt like an ordinary person being lightly scratched by a fingernail filed perfectly smooth.
There was an extremely faint stinging sensation on his skin.
Apart from that, it had not even left a white mark.
Instead, Qin Xiao had used too much force and crushed the ceramic in his hand.
"Looks pretty good!!!"
Qin Xiao muttered, then began shouting furiously in his mind.
System, get out here! This is what you called mild pain?
"For a true iron-blooded man, yes!"
The system's unhurried voice sounded in Qin Xiao's mind.
"I..."
Those words nearly choked Qin Xiao to death.
"Fine! I can't afford to mess with you. I won't stoop to arguing with something that isn't human!"
After that bitter complaint, Qin Xiao looked at the mess covering his body and gently reached out to turn on the water, intending to wash off the filth.
Although he touched the tap as gently as he could...
He still knocked the metal tap clean off.
"Does it have to be this ridiculous?"
Qin Xiao gave a wry laugh and braced himself against a relatively intact section of the bathtub to stand up.
Before he could even exert any force, that last intact section of ceramic shattered.
"Ugh! Looks like I'll have to be very careful while I spend some time getting used to this."
Since things had already come to this, Qin Xiao simply twisted off the pipes at the tap by brute force.
He let the two streams of hot and cold water wash over him.
He did discover an additional benefit, though.
The cold water was nothing remarkable, since autumn had only just begun.
But the hot water was boiling hot, a full one hundred degrees.
Even with it spraying onto his body like that, Qin Xiao did not feel the slightest scalding sensation.
He felt only a faint warmth.
It seemed that not only his defense, but also his resistance to high and low temperatures had improved considerably.
Invulnerable to blades and bullets, impervious to water and fire-this had to be what that meant.
Qin Xiao happily washed his body.
He hid away in the hotel for several full days.
Even his meals had to be delivered by hotel staff who opened the door themselves.
There was no helping it. Whatever he touched broke!
After every meal, he looked at the tableware, most of it damaged beyond recognition.
If Qin Xiao had not simply had someone take his credit card and charge a substantial deposit...
The hotel probably would have thrown him out.
It took Qin Xiao five full days to learn to control the vastly increased strength in his body.
Ignoring the hotel staff's looks as though they had seen a ghost, he paid for the damage, checked out, and boarded a plane to Los Angeles.
Obadiah was still under secret surveillance by S.H.I.E.L.D., and he had yet to properly discuss the whole affair with Tony.
This was Qin Xiao's mission, and points were involved, so he had to handle it himself.