Chapter 77: Chapter 77: Decoding
[Third Person's PoV]
Tony and Melissa were back in his limo, Tony sniffing the air as he looked around, causing Melissa to eye him curiously. "What the heck are you doing?"
"Don't you smell that?" Tony asked, puzzled.
"Smell what?" Melissa replied, still confused.
"Not a hint of poverty in the air…" Tony said, letting out a relieved and contented sigh.
"God, you're annoying," Melissa scoffed, rolling her eyes.
Tony just grinned and suddenly pulled her onto his lap, causing her to shriek in surprise. "What are you doing?" she demanded.
"Celebrating, obviously."
Melissa wrapped an arm around his shoulders and began to play with his hair. "You're being weird…"
"Sorry, I just love seeing those numbers go up, you know?"
"I kinda get it," Melissa said with a small smile. "But aren't they just going to drop back down to the billions once you start building the materials for the suits?"
"That's why I'm glad we've got Momo on our side," Tony said smugly.
Melissa playfully whacked him on the head. "Please, leave that poor girl alone. I saw how exhausted she looked earlier."
"Oh, relax. I compensated her well."
"I wouldn't be surprised if you gave her the serum so her quirk would evolve and be more useful to you," Melissa said, her expression serious.
Tony placed a hand on his chest, giving her a mock-hurt look. "Do you really think I'd do something like that?"
Melissa raised an eyebrow, staring at him. "Do you want me to answer that honestly?"
"I plead the fifth," Tony responded immediately. "But seriously, I gave it to her because she's someone I trust and have been friends with for more than five years. I wouldn't have done it otherwise."
Melissa smiled softly. "Tony… I was just kidding."
…
They soon arrived back at their home. Melissa grabbed the briefcase from earlier and said, "I'll need to make some calls to Stark Industries to finalize everything. After that, I'm going to get back to studying," she informed Tony.
"I'll be down in my lab, experimenting with a few things," Tony replied.
When Tony got down to his lab, he found Momo seated at a desk, studying with a serious expression.
"What are you doing here?" Tony asked, surprised to see her.
Momo jumped slightly, startled by his sudden appearance. "Ah, you're back already?"
"Already? We've been gone for four hours. It's 5 o'clock," Tony replied, raising an eyebrow.
"Sorry, I got distracted. Did you know I got smarter too, thanks to the serum you gave me? I can build complex things much quicker and more effectively now. For example, if I build a gun, I can create a better, stronger version of it. But I still need to study a lot to refine and upgrade what I create."
"I mean, that's only natural," Tony said, a bit confused. He had already explained the effects of the serum to her.
"It's one thing to be told I'm smarter; it's another to experience it firsthand," Momo explained.
"Wait, why did you ask why I'm still here? Didn't you tell me you were going to kidnap me if I left?" Momo suddenly asked.
"Oh, that. I was only joking. You were free to leave whenever you wanted. If I kept you here against your will, that would be kidnapping. I do have a reputation to uphold, after all," Tony said with a smirk.
Momo's eyebrows twitched as she stared at him. "So, you're telling me I could have left at any moment?"
"Yeah," Tony shrugged, then grinned. "But since you're already here, you might as well stay and help me with something."
Momo's shoulders slumped in resignation. "You're so mean."
"Thank you," Tony said, smiling at what he took as a compliment.
As Tony began to work, Momo's curiosity got the better of her. "So, what are you making?"
"A Quirk factor…" Tony replied.
"What?" Momo asked, taken aback.
"I'm working on something that will act and react like a Quirk factor. The Dark Forger's quirk was incredibly fascinating. Initially, it just allowed him to see what needed fixing, but then it awakened and let him see how things could be upgraded. He upgraded my solar battery, which I thought was already perfect, into an even more powerful energy source. Now imagine what that quirk could do in my hands."
"I see," Momo said, intrigued but still puzzled. "But how are you going to make a Quirk factor or build something that replicates one? That part doesn't make sense to me."
"You know what genetic code is, right?" Tony asked.
"Yeah, it's the instructions contained in a gene that tell it how to behave and what to produce," Momo explained.
"Well, I'm going to translate the genetic coding of this Quirk factor into actual computer code. Just like how an AI is designed to replicate human consciousness, I'm going to decode the genetic information of this Quirk factor and convert it into 1s and 0s…"
Momo stared at him, her mouth agape. "Is that even possible? You're talking about it like you're translating Spanish to English, but what you're actually doing is like translating an unknown alien language into another alien language."
Tony smirked, looking at her confidently. "Momo, do you know who you're talking to? You're talking to Tony Stark, the man who turns mere dreams and imagination into reality. There's no such thing as possible or impossible, only can and cannot. And just because everyone else falls into the 'cannot' category doesn't mean I will."
Tony began spinning in his chair, looking at Momo with unbridled confidence. "Want to know why that is, Momo?"
Seeing Tony's pure self-assurance, Momo's cheeks turned slightly pink as she smiled. "Because you're Tony Stark," she said, teasing him.
Tony snapped his fingers, pointing upward. "Atta girl! See, you get it. So trust me when I say, this is totally possible. Everyone else is just too dumb to do it."
Tony spun back to his desk and began typing furiously, his fingers flying across the keyboard as he scanned the screen. His expression gradually became serious. "Okay, wow, this is going to take me longer than I initially expected…"
Momo couldn't help but laugh. "Where's that confidence from before? So how long will it take you?"
"Half a day," Tony said with a sigh. "I thought I could finish it in about an hour, but that was only if I didn't want to upgrade the coding to make it stronger than the original Quirk. Seems I underestimated how complex this really is."
Momo gave him a look that clearly said, *Are you serious?* But Tony was so engrossed in his work that he didn't notice.
"You can leave if you want, Momo. I didn't realize it would take this long," Tony offered.
"I'll stay," Momo replied, settling into a chair. "I'm too invested in what you're doing to just leave. I want to see if you can actually pull this off. So don't worry about me; I'll be over here studying."
"Whatever suits you," Tony said, his eyes never leaving the screen as information streamed past.
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