"Then have the Blackwatch soldiers already on site sketch it out. They're all there anyway, so that solves the problem."
After hearing Baymax's report, Killian replied at once. But after saying that, he suddenly remembered something and immediately added, "Oh, right. One at a time only. Anyone going in has to surrender their weapons and wear protective gear. There may be parasite-like organisms inside, so be careful."
After all, Killian had just remembered that there really were parasite-like creatures down there. Any carbon-based lifeform that entered could be controlled and turned into a guardian of that underground awakening city. Aside from the chosen awakened ones, anyone else entering would be attacked.
He had no intention of letting his elite squad suffer any unnecessary losses.
"Understood."
Baymax answered immediately, then relayed the order to Adam, who had already arrived on site via transport with the robots.
Adam did not disappoint him. After receiving the order, he took protective gear from his combat pack and put it on one of the subordinates beside him. Then that man pulled out paper and pen and began sketching the details of the site bit by bit.
It had to be said that Killian had invested heavily in the clones. He had shoved every kind of useful and seemingly useless knowledge into their heads.
And the results proved something. The amount of data the human brain could store was enormous, far beyond what most people ever used.
A normal person only used a tiny fraction of their brain's total capacity in their lifetime, so Killian had simply stuffed all kinds of information into them.
Now, at a critical moment like this, the effect was obvious.
With the memories of a top-tier draft artist loaded into them, the clones reproduced the site with almost perfect accuracy. Sheet after sheet of draft paper piled up until a small mound formed.
They even had to make a supply run midway through. The original stack of blank paper was nowhere near enough, so one of the robots had to bring over an entire box.
Only then did they barely have enough.
By the time all that was done, Daniel had already regained consciousness inside the intelligent fighter where he had been knocked out.
"Who... who are you?"
As soon as he woke up, Daniel glanced around at the unfamiliar surroundings, remembered what had happened before he blacked out, and immediately questioned Killian, who was standing not far away looking at the 3D projected map.
Even though instinctively he knew his situation was bad, he was still a senior HYDRA figure who had survived for more than a century. He recovered quickly, observing the surroundings while quietly looking for an opportunity.
"Daniel Whitehall. One of HYDRA's leaders. A top-tier scientist with cutting-edge knowledge. A specialist in monolith research. And a man obsessed with the study of enhanced individuals."
Hearing Daniel wake up behind him, Killian calmly turned the pilot seat around and looked at the man lying on the floor.
It had to be said that while HYDRA had no shortage of lunatics, most of them were also top-tier talents.
Too bad Daniel had other uses for Killian. Otherwise, he really would have liked to recruit him.
"You're... AIM's CEO, Aldrich Killian!!"
After staring at him for a while, Daniel finally recognized the familiar face in front of him and blurted it out in shock.
"Bingo. Congratulations, you got it right. Unfortunately, this round doesn't come with a prize."
Killian answered with an amused smile.
To him, it was hardly surprising Daniel recognized him. The man was one of HYDRA's regional leaders, and if he'd recited every detail of Killian's background, Killian would not have found that strange either.
"What is this supposed to mean?!"
"I don't remember us having any conflict!"
"And I'm with S.H.I.E.L.D.! Do you understand what what you're doing means?"
"You're provoking the anger of an organization you can't possibly afford to offend."
Daniel frowned and continued talking, even though he knew those words were probably pointless. Still, he wanted a chance, or at least to know why he was going to die.
"S.H.I.E.L.D.?"
"Pfft... hah! Hahahaha!!"
"Sorry. Usually my standards for jokes are pretty high, but that one really was funny."
"I wonder if that bald one-eyed guy would die of a heart attack on the spot if he ever found out his eagle's nest had turned into a snake pit, and the snakes were still swaggering around under his flag."
Hearing Daniel throw around the name of a righteous organization with complete seriousness made Killian burst out laughing.
Marvel really did have a ridiculous sense of irony sometimes.
A world-famous intelligence agency, supposedly the ultimate spy network, had been parasitized by HYDRA to the point that most of it had already been assimilated.
That was a joke of the highest order.
"Bald one-eyed guy?"
"What do you mean?"
"I'm sorry, but I have no idea what HYDRA is. That has nothing to do with me."
"I'm the head of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s San Juan regional base. Level 6 S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. I suggest you let me go immediately."
The first part of Killian's words made sense to Daniel, but the "bald one-eyed guy" bit left him genuinely confused for a second. Then he quickly figured it out. Killian meant Nick Fury.
And after realizing that, Daniel's heart sank even further.
Even so, he kept playing dumb.
"Fine. If you insist."
"It doesn't matter. Whether you're S.H.I.E.L.D. or HYDRA makes no difference to me. All I want is you."
Watching Daniel continue to act stupid, Killian lost interest in playing along, especially when he saw Adam being brought back by the robots from the villa below.
With a casual wave of his hand, one of the combat robots already behind him stepped forward, seized Daniel by the head in its steel grip, and tossed him into the prepared holding cage nearby.
"Let's go back."
Seeing that everything on site was nearly wrapped up, Killian gave the order calmly.
At once, the king-class intelligent fighter cut through the air and vanished.
The Phantom Unit soldiers left behind swept through the villa one last time, making sure nothing that could expose them remained, then boarded the stealth transport helicopter and returned to base.
...
"Boss!"
Back at the biological research facility on Miami Island, Samuel came forward to greet him. And the moment he saw yet another person being dragged into the lab behind Killian, his expression grew even more respectful.
He knew his boss's habits well enough by now. If Killian came personally, it almost always meant there was something special.
And ninety-nine times out of a hundred, it meant a surprise.
As for bad news, Samuel had not experienced any yet.
"Mm. That man behind me is the best research material I could've brought you."
"The organs inside him were transplanted from an enhanced individual. That person had super-regeneration and could also absorb the life force of others to restore themselves."
"And he's used that to survive for over a decade. He even went from the brink of death and old age back to a much younger state. Do you understand what I'm saying?"
After they reached the biological research area on the fortieth floor, Killian had Daniel's unconscious body thrown onto an operating bed. Once his limbs were locked down with metal restraints, Killian turned to Samuel and explained.
"!!!!"
"Boss, having you around really is my greatest blessing."
"It's like these things are arriving in batches now."
"Did you raid a superhuman nest or something?"
After hearing Killian's explanation, Samuel stood there stunned for quite a while before finally regaining his composure and speaking with total admiration.
In less than a year since joining AIM, Killian had already brought back one extraordinary ancient organism, then a reinforced female soldier with biological enhancements beyond normal human limits.
Then came two genuine superhumans, one woman with near-Superman physical ability, one man with the power to dominate sentient life.
Just when Samuel was finally starting to digest all of that, Killian brought him an alien whose DNA could disguise itself as anything it had seen.
And now, after he'd only just begun properly studying that one, here came what looked like a borderline immortal enhanced subject.
At this point, even Samuel, a man fully devoted to science, was starting to wonder whether Killian had some kind of protagonist's halo over his head, or whether he was secretly the son of some ancient god abandoned on Earth.
Maybe the goddess of luck.
Because otherwise, none of this made any sense.
For decades before Killian appeared, the whole world had barely seen even a handful of suspicious enhanced incidents.
But after his boss showed up, in less than a year Samuel had already seen enhanced super-soldiers, man-made monsters, superhumans, telepaths, and aliens.
At this point he could not even imagine what kind of surprise Killian would bring him next.
Maybe a prehistoric crocodile?
"Hahaha, it just happened to work out that way."
"You could say they had bad luck and I happened to run into them."
"How's your progress on the alien?"
Killian laughed at Samuel's words.
If he remembered right, the S.H.I.E.L.D. files on superhumans alone ran into thousands of pages, with about a hundred entries per page. Conservatively speaking, there were hundreds of thousands of enhanced individuals in the world.
With numbers like that, Killian felt his own luck did not seem all that unbelievable.
Even on his old Earth, which had no overt superpower system, there had still been all kinds of unusual people. People who could attract metal like mini Magnetos, people who could withstand extreme cold and sit in ice for absurd lengths of time, people struck by lightning who ended up completely unharmed by household voltage.
There were even people who could eat and digest almost anything, metal, glass, toxic material.
So moving that probability into the Marvel universe made it seem perfectly normal.
The only real difference here was that people were much better at hiding what they were.
Outside the Inhumans, there were also enhanced humans who were pure-blooded humans but had awakened powers on their own.
With humanity's total population base, a small fraction undergoing genetic variation really was not strange at all.
"Boss, research is progressing, but we've found that the alien's DNA contains a complete and highly complex genetic structure different from anything in humans."
"It'll still take some time to fully crack it."
"But don't worry, Boss. I've already started seeing a path. It won't be long before you see a truly new clone unit."
Samuel answered immediately.
"Mm. By the way, Boss, this is the Ts-1 formula I developed based on the T-2 Tyrant test subject."
"It can comprehensively enhance the user's mental capacity. Based on current experiments, there's a certain probability it can grant the injector psychic ability."
"And more importantly, it stacks. So far, the experiments show that three injections produce the best result."
Before Killian could say anything further, Samuel had already handed him a prepared item from a cryogenic container and spoke respectfully.
"Ts-1?"
"A Tyrant-series mental enhancement formula?"
"Interesting."
After hearing the explanation, Killian took the pale blue serum vial from the low-temperature box and examined it.
"You used it yet?"
After watching it for a few moments, he closed the case and looked at Samuel.
"Not yet. This is the first official Ts enhancement serum we developed after repeated successful testing."
"I wanted to present it to you first, Boss."
Feeling Killian's gaze on him, Samuel lowered his head even farther and answered respectfully.
As more and more new people entered the company, he had begun to notice that the number of times Killian personally came to his lab had started decreasing.
That was not a good sign.
The bigger the company became, the more competition there would be. And when it came time for rewards or recognition, the people closest to the boss would always have the advantage.
So before Killian slowly grew more distant as his status continued rising, Samuel wanted to strengthen his own place in the boss's mind.
At the very least, he needed to plant his own flag there.
That was his goal.
Especially because just recently, he had seen another scientific genius enter the company's headquarters. The other one had not shown much yet, but the fact that Killian had personally invited him was already enough to make Samuel feel threatened.
Because his boss's eye for talent had never been wrong.
And that meant Samuel needed to prove his value more urgently than ever.
"You did well."
"But there's too much here. I only need three. The rest are yours."
"Think of it as a reward for all your hard work."
Looking at the six pale blue serum vials arranged neatly inside, Killian smiled in satisfaction and spoke with clear approval.
"Thank you for the reward, Boss."
Samuel immediately broke into a delighted smile.
Then he picked up one of the vials, attached the injector, and stabbed it straight into his own arm.
As the liquid slowly entered his bloodstream, the entire Ts serum flowed into his body.
Not long after, the veins at Samuel's temples began to bulge, and the enhancement process started.
Unlike the T-virus, however, Ts enhancement was somewhat gentler. At least from Killian's perspective, Samuel did not seem to be in obvious agony. His veins swelled, and his pupils began to glow with an eerie blue light.
Several minutes later, Samuel finally recovered, his face somewhat pale.
But something about him had changed.
His eyes now held a sharper edge, revealing a stronger hunger to understand and dissect the world.
After the enhancement, Samuel found that he now possessed more acute perception and sharper thinking, to the point that he could consciously regulate the speed of his own thoughts.
He had not gained telekinetic power like the T-2 test subject, but for him, enhanced intelligence and mental processing were already the most important prize.
And before Killian even had to say anything, Samuel took the remaining two Ts vials and injected them into himself as well.
(End of Chapter)
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