Capítulo 44: Chapter: 44
Chapter: 44
I took the moment of reprieve from the Winter Soldiers' failed sneak attack to go after two more soldiers. Iron Man was in a fierce one-on-one against Aldrich, but these guys kept trying to interfere by constantly hurling fireballs at him. They didn't seem to be doing much damage to his armor, but the metal was starting to give off a worryingly hot glow. I didn't know what the melting point of his armor was, but I didn't want them reaching it while he was inside.
I flapped my wings hard and rapidly dove down towards the two soldiers. Their situational awareness was pretty good because they both ducked out of the way before I stabbed them from behind. One of them rapidly snapped their arm forward and made a grab for my Lightspear. I could have pulled it away in time, but I wanted to see what he was planning. He wrapped his hand around it and yanked hard, 'dislodging' it from my grip.
"Fuck yeah, Mark! Stab this winged freak with her own weapon!" The other soldier cheered as 'Mark' went to do just that. He had a smirk on his face as he ran forward while yelling triumphantly. He aimed my own Lightspear right at my torso and lunged forward for a stab. The instant before it reached me, I willed the spear in his hand to vanish. Not expecting that to happen, he stumbled forward now weaponless and I fatally impaled him.
"Mark! You bitch, you killed him! How dare you. He was my brother!" The other soldier seemed to lose all reason as he blindly charged forward next. With a shrug, I threw my spear right at him and put him down as well. His momentum was carrying him too fast to dodge out of the way. Did I just wipe out a family? I honestly felt bad about that… except they were fighting for evil, so not really. Upon seeing even more of their brethren slain, the remaining soldiers turned and started to flee.
"Cowards!" Aldrich yelled out. Now he was truly facing Iron Man one-on-one, and the burning man wasn't looking so hot anymore…
[That joke was cringe, Host. Also, your opponent is back for another round.]
I heard shuffling of rubble as the Winter Soldier emerged from the debris. With a grunt, he started charging me next, far faster than the other soldiers could. I hurled another light spear at him, hoping the same strategy would work. With some crazy athleticism, the Winter Soldier contorted his torso to dodge the weapon, all while barely losing any momentum.
"I guess we're doing this the hard way," I muttered as I formed a small Lightspear in each hand. If anything, they were closer to Light daggers. The Winter Soldier swung back his right arm and threw a powerful punch at my torso. I decided to take the hit as I simultaneously thrust both my weapons forward.
[-50HP]
I grunted in pain as we simultaneously struck each other. I definitely came out ahead of the exchange. Both my daggers were buried in each of his shoulders. Taking a hit to deliver your own is a bullshit strategy only a Gamer could pull off.
[Or literally anyone else with regeneration powers…]
I ignored the system trying to rain on my parade as I conjured two more daggers and leapt forward to try and take this guy down. His shoulder was currently healing, so he couldn't use his arm to defend. He lashed out with a lightning-fast kick. I threw one of my blades in its path, thinking he would pull back to not get impaled again. He did not.
[-100HP]
"Argh." "Ughh"
My dagger simultaneously burrowed into his leg as his kick broke my wrist and arm – well, it would have if I didn't have a gamer's body. Instead, all I lost was HP I could afford to spare. If there was one stat I wasn't lacking, it was Vigor. The next few moments got pretty crazy. Neither of us could back down as we engaged each other in a close-quarters death match. He was delivering powerful body blows against me with fists and feet while I was continuously stabbing him. From an outside perspective, this must have looked like a pointless bout of two immortals going at it.
"C'mon, just run out of energy already and go down!" I yelled at him in irritation as I slammed another dagger into his sternum. In return, he cracked me over the head with a punch that had me seeing stars for a second.
[-50HP! Warning! HP at 1000/3100]
That notification made me a bit nervous, but finally, to my pleasant surprise, he let out a cough of pain. His burning orange skin receded, and he coughed out blood from his mouth. He stumbled forward for a moment and tried to make a final grab at me. I punched him right in the face with my full strength, and he collapsed backward to the floor. I beat him! Now I had to figure out what to actually do with him…
"Hey, good work there, Layla. I filmed that whole fight, and it was awesome. It's probably gonna rack up a ton of views on YouTube. The whole world always thought the Winter Soldier was a myth. Now they'll know he was actually real and was finally taken down," Iron Man said as he walked up to me. His fight had ended before mine did, and instead of stepping in to help, he sat back and watched… I gave him a mild glare that expressed my feelings about that.
"Woah, you looked like you had him handled. Besides, if you really wanted me to step in, you would have called out for help… which you didn't," he said to me. I supposed he was right. Getting into a slug match like that was surprisingly fun.
"He's famous?" I asked. I didn't think a lot of people knew about him.
"Oh yeah, a whole bunch of conspiracy theorists think he's the boogeyman of the world. And I guess they're right?" He said questioningly. "They believe a whole bunch of the world's craziest assassinations were pulled off by this guy. They always claim he was the one who really killed Kennedy." He said with a laugh.
"...Huh… You know, he probably did."
XXX
Capítulo 45: Chapter: 45
Chapter: 45
[You have completed your mission! You have leveled up! You have received the reward: Perfected Extremis Formula! The Perfected formula is a combination of the super-soldier serum and AIM's Extremis formula.]
Nice! I could either take the formula myself or save it for someone else. I was considering the latter because I didn't exactly need the formula. With Gamer's Body and Twilight Healing, I could already heal from any injury, and the boost to strength wasn't anything groundbreaking for me. If I gave this to someone like Natasha, though, she'd be a force to be reckoned with.
[Congratulations! Angelic Mastery has reached level 3! Light Manipulation has reached level 4! You now have access to Angelic Teleportation and can survive in a vacuum environment indefinitely. Light Magic now costs even less MP to cast!]
That would be incredibly useful for me in the future! Especially for when I'd start venturing out into space! Light Magic being even cheaper was also a big powerup. I was hoping Lightshields cost a lot less now. They were what really drained my MP the most. It made sense though, considering an average Lightshield was basically the size of 25 to 30 Lightspears lined up together.
I checked my current stats to see where I was sitting. One thing I'd figured out was that I grew an extra pair of wings whenever my total MP doubled. For example, I started with 100 MP, but as soon as it hit 200, I became a four-winged Fallen. At 400 MP, I gained another pair of wings. From that, I deduced that at 800 MP, I would gain another pair.
[Name: Layla of the Fallen]
[Title: Angel of Hope]
[Level: 5]
[HP: 3100]
[MP: 560]
[Vigor: 110]
[Strength: 20]
[Intelligence: 56]
[Luck: 20]
[Skills: Observe 1, Angelic Mastery 3, Acting 2, Light Manipulation 4, HP→MP Conversion]
[Perks: Never Tell Me the Odds, Mana Siphoner]
[Drawbacks: Sin of Lust]
[Available Free Stat Points: 10]
Even if I dumped my 10 free stat points into Intelligence, I'd still be only at 660, which was a ways off. Ever since figuring out that Strength also included things like agility and speed, I'd decided not to neglect that stat either. The Winter Soldier's strength stat was at least at 40. He was almost twice as fast as me. I decided to split my free stat points between the two, bringing Strength up to 25 and Intelligence up to 61.
'Hey, System. How exactly do I go about using angelic teleportation?' I asked in my head. The advantage of Angelic Teleportation over the sling ring was that, like apparating, it was instantaneous and could be used mid-combat. Even the best masters of the mystic arts still required a few seconds of concentration to use their sling rings. Doctor Strange had sort of used them in his fights, but it was borderline gimmicky and really only worked because of the plot.
[You simply think about where you want to go and will yourself there. Keep in mind, the further the distance, the more MP will be required. If you use all your MP, you will draw on your HP due to your HP→MP Conversion skill. Don't teleport too far and accidentally give yourself a game over.]
I chuckled at the system's warning. I'd be sure to practice my jumps and make sure to figure out the distance to MP ratio.
"Hey, Layla. You done spacing out over there? What do you want to do with these guys?" Tony asked me as he pointed to the downed Winter Soldier and Aldrich Killian. Everyone else was either dead or had run off. "Also, just so you know... a whole bunch of police are coming to storm this building." Iron Man's faceplate lifted up to reveal Tony's face. He looked a bit worried.
"What's the problem with that?" I asked.
"We kind of just had a full-on battle that involved the deaths of multiple war veterans." Tony explained. "It's not going to be a good publicity look for us. We killed US war heroes… on US soil. Even if they were joining Hydra they hadn't joined yet. The police are absolutely going to try and take us into custody and throw the book at us. Well mostly me actually. You–they'll probably have no idea how to deal with." Tony explained to me. "They might use this as an excuse to try and take my suit from me though." He looked a bit worried.
"Well, shit..." I said. I had forgotten about this point in time. We were still technically in the middle of Iron Man 2 timewise. The US government was trying to take his suit so they could weaponize it. The only reason they didn't in the movies was because their lead man, Justin Hammer, harbored a terrorist that ended up siccing a bunch of murder bots on New York City. Now that Whiplash was dead, Tony wouldn't be able to beat him and 'save the day.'
"Can't we just call SHIELD to tell the police to back off?" I asked.
"SHIELD's kind of in the dog house in the US right now. They've lost a lot of their sway after Alexander Pierce ended up being a confirmed traitor. You know the guy was friends with Peggy Carter and my old man for decades... I never actually knew what SHIELD was, but I still saw the man from time to time at upper echelon social galas." Tony trailed off with a grimace. I wondered if Tony would ever make the connection that Pierce was probably the one to off his parents? It's possible Pierce even tried to subtly have Howard Stark join Hydra and was turned down. That would have led to Howard being 'silenced.'
"We'll just have to sneak out of here then," I said. 'This is where I really could use a stealth skill...' I thought with some expectation.
[I can't just give you a skill unless you're doing something involving it. If you want a stealth skill, go try and steal some things without getting caught.]
'Fine.' I supposed it couldn't be that convenient.
"Yeah. I guess we could try and sneak out of here. I can have Jarvis delete all the security footage." Tony suggested. "I can actually hear the sirens now though. We better leave fast." Tony was correct, the police sirens did sound close. And it sounded like there were a lot of them. There were a whole lot of explosions coming from this building a few minutes ago to be fair…
I had an idea. I pulled out my sling ring and hoped that with my intelligence now over 60, I could get that damn thing to work. "I'm going to try opening a portal a few blocks away from here," I explained. "I don't know how long I'll be able to hold it open for you, so run through with the soldier and Aldrich. I'll follow after."
Tony nodded and slung the two of them over his shoulders. I started going through the circular hand motions that had failed me numerous times in training. Thankfully though, they weren't failing me now. The portal was forming slowly and shakily, but it was forming. It took about 20 seconds, but I eventually made it large enough for him to pass through.
"Go now!" I shouted, and Tony bolted through with the pair. I jumped through the portal right after him. A split second later, the shaky thing collapsed. "Whoo! Teleportation! That's what I'm talking about!" I cheered out loud. We exited in a back alley a few blocks away from AIM's headquarters. I could still hear the sirens in the distance, but we were well out of their current police cordon perimeter.
Tony just gave me a deadpan look. "You're gonna have to work on that. You were barely able to open a portal a few blocks away and were supposed to be going to other planets at some point."
I pouted in response. "Now that I've gotten it to work in the first place, it shouldn't take long before I can start opening portals all over the world. Just you wait; pretty soon I'll have this ability mastered."
Tony nodded. "I'll hold you to it then. Happy is on his way with the limo. I'll throw the two Nazis in the trunk and make our inconspicuous getaway. I already have Jarvis establishing an alibi for us as we speak."
A few minutes later, Happy showed up with the limo. I healed the Winter Soldier up a bit before we tossed him in the back with Aldrich. I didn't want him dying from the final stab I hit him with. He was completely out of stamina to heal it.
"All right then," Tony said as he and I hopped in. "Next stop... huh? Where should we go?" He turned and asked me.
I took a second to ponder. "I guess we can head to the Sanctum. The Sorceress Supreme should be able to help the Winter Soldier break Hydra's mind control."
"The Winter Soldier is under mind control?" Tony asked.
"Yep, allow me to introduce you to Sergeant Bucky Barnes." I exclaimed and laughed at Tony's shocked look. As we drove to Bleeker Street I started explaining Bucky and Steve's story to Tony. I tried to make it as compelling and tragic as possible. In the event that Tony ever found out Bucky killed his parent's, maybe he'd hesitate and not immediately try to get revenge on the man. Was I being a bit manipulative here with my friend? Yes, but I knew if I didn't do this we'd end up in Civil War which was the last thing any of us needed.
[Acting has Leveled up to 3!]
XXX
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