"Stay here! Protect the colonel! I'll go after him!"
Luke leaped out of the metal apparatus, glanced around, and immediately understood what had happened.
He casually threw on his coat and told Rogers to stay behind at the base. The latter nodded instinctively.
Everyone watched as Luke bent his knees slightly and sprang into the air.
With the Superman Template loaded, his body had been completely transformed.
Like a cannonball charged to full power, he shot straight from the bottom floor of the control room to the second floor.
He grabbed the railing with one hand, flipped over it in one clean, graceful motion, and landed steadily on the ground.
Fortunately, the character panel's data-based abilities allowed him to quickly adapt to physical capabilities far beyond those of an ordinary person.
He would not have to suffer the same trouble Clark had as a child, constantly worrying about losing control of his abilities!
Luke pushed off the ground, and immense strength surged through his body. Spiderweb-like cracks spread across the concrete beneath his feet.
He became a gust of wind sweeping past, kicking up a violent rush of air.
With a boom, the ground itself seemed to tremble.
His entire body shot forward like a sword, leaving behind an afterimage!
In just two breaths, that tall figure had already reached the corridor.
The assassin Hydra had sent was quite clever.
Even while fleeing, he had not forgotten to destroy the button-controlled door, trapping the pursuers behind it to buy himself time.
"Too bad it looks as thin as paper to me!"
Luke did not stop, nor did he slow down.
The figure charging straight ahead suddenly accelerated and smashed through the thick metal door.
With a bang, a clear human-shaped outline appeared on the door!
"All right! I take that back. I could still feel that a little!"
Luke shook his head. He admitted that the metal door was not as fragile as paper; it was more like a thick wooden board.
He rushed out of the secret base and into the partitioned storefront.
Luke came to an abrupt stop, raising a blast of wind that made the bookshelves sway violently.
As he stepped outside, he saw the elderly antique shop owner who served as their contact lying on the ground with two bullet wounds.
Outside the door, a black sedan had already started up.
The assassin Hydra had sent was wildly firing a Thompson submachine gun.
Rat-a-tat-tat!
A hail of bullets shattered car windows and struck several plainclothes agents stationed outside.
The sudden outbreak of fierce gunfire threw the pedestrians into panic.
Afraid of being caught in the crossfire, they fled with their heads covered, screaming at the tops of their lungs.
Luke took only a few strides out of the antique shop. Just as he was about to give chase, the sedan parked at the entrance exploded.
Amid the roiling flames and shocking blast wave, his tall figure stood firm without wavering in the slightest.
He watched the sedan carrying the Hydra assassin turn a corner and disappear at the end of the street.
Luke gave a cold smile and broke into a sprint!
"How did you make such a huge mess?"
The Hydra member who had come to pick him up asked in a complaining tone.
Their mission had been to assassinate Abraham Erskine and sabotage the Super Soldier program, not stage a terrorist attack in New York!
Once things got out of hand, escaping would come at an enormous cost!
"There are two Super Soldiers! Someone's chasing us... Drive! Hurry!"
The assassin panted heavily. Cold sweat ran down his back, as though some ferocious beast had its eyes fixed on him.
Even after getting into the getaway car and shaking off those plainclothes agents, he still did not feel as though he had escaped.
Hydra had spent a great deal of time and effort planting him within the military committee.
If Berlin had not issued an order demanding Abraham Erskine's elimination, he never would have exposed himself voluntarily!
On the front lines between the Allied Nations and the Axis Powers, victory depended on soldiers, guns, artillery, and the abilities of commanders.
But in the battle of intelligence, it came down to deciphering encrypted radio messages and the duration and depth of a spy's infiltration.
This assassin named Gregg could be called Hydra's longest-serving spy in New York, with access to the highest level of intelligence.
He could have served a far more important purpose, but now he had no chance.
"When we get back to Berlin, the Fuhrer will definitely award you a medal in person!"
The Hydra member driving the car said enviously.
"If we can get back to Berlin, then I... Wait! Someone's behind us!"
Just as the assassin Gregg was about to say that he would return home and get married after completing this mission, he caught sight of a tall figure racing after them in the rearview mirror!
The Hydra member who thought they had escaped safely stared wide-eyed, his face full of disbelief!
"I've had the accelerator floored the whole time..."
He muttered to himself.
Was there really someone in this world who could catch up to a four-wheeled sedan with just two legs?
The assassin Gregg hurriedly raised his gun and stuck his head out the window, intending to return fire.
Luke suddenly leaped high into the air, dodging the submachine gun's barrage and landing squarely atop the speeding sedan.
Then he exerted force with both hands and tore the metal roof open as though ripping paper!
Sitting in the front passenger seat, Gregg threw away the submachine gun with its empty magazine and pulled out a pistol, aiming it at Luke as he tried to pull the trigger.
Expressionless, Luke reached out with his right hand and grabbed the PPK automatic pistol.
With a bang, the 7.65-millimeter bullet struck his open palm, yet it sounded as though it had hit a steel plate, producing a sharp metallic clang.
Luke raised an eyebrow and clenched his hand, crushing the pistol into a lump of scrap metal.
"Monster!"
The terrified driver screamed.
Luke found him too noisy, so he grabbed him with one hand and flung him away like garbage.
Crash!
The man smashed through the display window of a roadside shop and collapsed onto the ground, his fate unknown.
"Cut off one head, two more shall take its place! Hail Hydra..."
Seeing Luke's terrifying strength, Gregg could not help but fall into despair.
After shouting Hydra's slogan, he prepared to bite down on the Potassium cyanide poison hidden in his teeth.
He was prepared to sacrifice himself for the organization and did not fear death!
"I already knew you were Hydra. How could I not have anticipated that?"
Luke curled his lip. As though he had expected it all along, he reached out and dislocated the man's jaw.
To him, Gregg's movements were far too slow. As long as he focused, it was like watching one frozen frame after another.
Hydra was a vast organization with strict management. To prevent capture or exposure from leading to intelligence leaks, every spy and agent sent out on missions smeared poison on their collars or hid it inside hollow false teeth.
The Strategic Scientific Reserve knew that much.
Ignoring Gregg's terrified gaze, Luke hauled him out of the car as though picking up a chick.
A few minutes later, Rogers and Carter arrived in a car.
They took the captured assassin and the driver back to the antique shop in Brooklyn.
"Well done, Luke!"
Back at the secret base, Colonel Phillips praised him.
He had seen the human-shaped outline Luke left in the wall and heard about how Luke had outrun a car on foot and blocked bullets with his palm.
Looking at Luke, who had grown taller and stronger than before, the colonel seemed to make a decision inwardly.
"You all get out first. I have something to discuss with Cahill."
Colonel Phillips called out as he looked at the bustling medical room.
He sent all the doctors and nurses away, then turned a grave look toward Luke.
"Is something wrong, Colonel?"
Luke put on his coat. As one of only two Super Soldiers,
he, like Rogers, could not avoid having blood drawn.
Dr. Erskine had been shot and killed, and all the samples had been used up—it should not have been this way.
Under the original plan, there was supposed to be only one Super Soldier, but Luke's addition had used up the remaining serum samples as well.
Even with a vast amount of research material as support, reverse-engineering Dr. Erskine's serum formula
was, for the moment, still an exceedingly difficult task.
The only hope now lay in Luke and Rogers's blood—the hope of replicating the serum was hidden within their genetic codes!
However, the military's fantasy was ultimately nothing more than a fragile bubble.
First of all, Luke did not count as a true Super Soldier at all.
The energy provided by the serum had all been used to activate his cheat and open the gift pack. It had not transformed his body in the slightest.
That was why Luke had felt almost no pain after the injection.
Besides, he had loaded the Superman Template.
Trying to extract anything from his blood was nothing but a fool's dream.
Even decades later, the products the military created through so-called reverse engineering would be nothing more than inferior versions with severe side effects.
"Have you thought about the road ahead, Luke?"
Colonel Phillips looked solemn as he said in a low voice, "Replicating the serum formula and creating new Super Soldiers won't be possible in the short term. Once the plan falls through, those politicians will do everything they can to shake off responsibility!"
"As another Super Soldier, I think more highly of you—Rogers is a good man! But you outperform him in every respect! I can tell, Luke, that you are a born warrior! You will never show mercy to an enemy!"
"Rogers is far too lacking in that regard. He still clings to some naive idealism! That will do nothing to help us win the war!"
"The essence of war is plunder! It is violence! It is a means of seizing benefits! We may call this a just war! A war for freedom! But war itself has no good or evil!"
"Rogers does not understand that. I hope you do!"
Hearing those words, Luke was greatly surprised. He had not expected the colonel to see things so clearly.
In the story, Colonel Phillips had seemed like nothing more than a typical stubborn, rigid military man.
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