Nick's vacation was over and he was back on the job to supposedly to search for anomalies, of course he had no plan on actually doing that.
He was glad that he spent time with his family, due to that demon encounter he planned on hanging out with them at least once a month. That run-in with the devil all but confirms Nick's theory, being around his family really does draw their dangers to himself.
That demon had been scoping out his family's house, it probably has to do with them finding out that Holly was the head of the new branch of government responsible for finding supernatural anomalies.
Everyone in the family had already been outfitted with either an amulet or tattoo that prevented demon possession, they made sure to wear them at all times outside of the house. They also reinforced their house by inlaying the outside with silver, iron, and salt blocks.
The hardest part of reinforcing the house wasn't actually putting up the protection but making it look natural, they managed to find a decorator to make the salt blocks look like a normal part of the home.
Due to Nick showing up, he smelled the demon and exorcised it before it became a problem. He needed to routinely check up on his family to draw their bad luck to him. It sucked that Holly was such a high-profile person, but all he could do is make sure she and the family are safe.
Nick managed to increase his ability to manipulate his Chi but had only learned the basics thanks to his Telekinesis. He could speed it up to heal and coalesce it into his limbs for stronger attacks, but that was it.
He didn't know how to pour it into weapons or turn the Chi into supernatural abilities like Lightning or Forcefields.
Nick felt like it was possible for him to learn how to channel Chi into weapons on his own, but he'd needed an actual teacher to learn the advanced stuff.
With his vacation over Nick was now driving on a lonely stretch of highway, he was on his way to Maine in search of a wraith, or so he reported. Nick knew that there wasn't a wraith, but he refused to continue hunting anomalies and attract the attention of SHIELD/Hydra.
He figured he'd rent a motel in Maine to relax, plan, and train his Chi for a month. He knew Tony Stark should be revealing himself as Iron Man soon and decided to wait for it until he quit.
"After Stark Enterprises stock raises to its peak, I'll take out enough to pay my debts and then leave the rest in there until I start building my company up!"
Nick planned on creating things for his company after he absorbed someone smart, it was because of this reason that he had planned to quit his NIA job. He couldn't invent things while constantly traveling, he'd need to be stationary.
Thanks to being from an alternate timeline in the future, Nick knew very well what would become popular and planned on making them before another company could. He'd recreated things he knew for a fact would become popular and funnel the money into his actual goal, weapons!
His absorption ability is incredibly powerful, once actually strong beings began popping up in the future, Nick could absorb them and become ungodly powerful. That being said, technology was one of the most powerful things in the Marvel universe, and he'd be a complete idiot relying entirely on his absorption ability, knowing how powerful tech could be.
Nick planned on using every avenue possible to gain strength via ways besides his absorption ability. He was doing this because his absorption slots will eventually be changed out, and his abilities will change with it, but not technology.
He wanted a stable power that he could rely on. Chi was a big surprise, but Nick always planned on focusing on tech.
At this current point the NIA had lost most of its usefulness, the average monster he'd find wouldn't pose a threat to him, let alone boost his strength much further.
Anything actually strong would make major splashes, at that point Special Agents like Nick wouldn't be allowed to participate, and instead Shield/Hydra would directly show up. It was only the low-level Anomalies that created small rumors that Special Agents investigated, these low-level Anomalies began losing their luster to Nick.
The reason he specifically chose Maine was because it was one of the quietest and safest states in America, he figured it'd be the best place to relax and plan out his future. He knew his plan would change after absorbing a genius person, but he still had to wait for one of the geniuses he planned to absorb to show up.
If what Nick remember was true, it'll take about two years but eventually the tech Genius, Whiplash, will show up and attack Tony Stark at a Grand Prix race! This russian genius managed to create a miniature arc reactor from just a blueprint of the large one, Nick needed to absorb him!
With that goal still years away, Nick continued his drive into Maine. He just passed a sign named Bridgton.
***
Smiling so hard his cheeks hurt, Nick was looking at his laptop with a face of pure excitement. He was sitting in an old motel in Bridgton, Maine, the wind outside whipped around fiercely as faint thunder strikes could be heard off in the distance.
The reason he was smiling was because Stark stock hit $612.49! He bought it at just $1.59 and had over 450,000 shares! By his calculations, Nick had over $280,000,000 worth of Stark stocks, and they are still rising!
Nick immediately had taken out a million dollars to pay off all his debts and gave over $500,000 to Holly as a thanks for loaning him money. She tried to deny the money, but Nick knew her bank account info so he just accepted the money for her.
He now just had to wait for his second monetary adventure to come, and it'll secure his future even if his company scheme somehow failed. Nick was going to buy Bitcoin!
Nick had made multiple contingency plans for his future, Bitcoin would be his sure fire fallback in case all of his money-making ideas failed. At the very least with Bitcoin secured, he could make any risky business venture knowing he'd still live a life of luxury.
The best part about Bitcoin is that because Nick will get on early, they'll be insanely cheap. They were worth about 1/10 of a penny when they first came out next year in 2009 and about .39¢ in 2010.
Nick thought about buying up a bunch of computers to mine Bitcoin but decided it was easier and probably more efficient to just buy Bitcoin from those who mined it.
He planned to buy at least 1,000,000 Bitcoin, any more might impact the market and reduce the price of them. Unlike stocks that netted Nick hundreds of millions, Bitcoins could easily get him over a hundred billion if he waited long enough!
That was the only problem with Bitcoin, it would take time. He'd eventually become insanely rich, but that'll be in years. He calculated at least five years to crack one billion dollars and about a decade and a half for over one hundred billion dollars.
Nick wasn't greedy, but if the difference between having one billion dollars versus one hundred billion dollars was only 10 years, he'd wait the 10 years! Especially if he already had hundreds of millions of dollars already!
Nick was about to search up other avenues to secure more money when suddenly a large gust of wind sent a tree branch straight through his window. It was at this moment that power to the motel shut off as well as Nick's internet.
Unperturbed at the storm going on outside and the wind now howling through his broken window, Nick picked up his laptop before going into the windowless bathroom and lying down in the tub.
"That storm is brutal tonight, I guess I can only brainstorm money-making plans without the internet." Nick had no real use for money; he was a simple man who didn't indulge in anything fancy.
He only needed the money for tech that'll make surviving much easier, he'd also use the money to directly people since he knew donating to charities were a scam.
If possible, he'd prefer to use his money to create his own tools and weapons instead of just buying, it'd be cheaper, and he'd have a better understanding of them.
Of course, that all depended on who he'd absorb. Nick was slightly above average in intelligence, he had been one of the youngest NIA agents in the world, but he had no idea how to build something like a propulsion cannon or jet pack.
Theres a bunch of supervillains with insanely high IQ, Nick just needed to kill one and absorb them. He knew that extraordinary geniuses like Hank Pym were still alive and he could easily get to but he wouldn't kill the innocent no matter what.
The reason he'd aborbed that innocent human on the plan was because he was fatally poisoned and suffering tremendously, Nick put him out of his misery and needed to absorb him to survive all of those damn snakes.
So without any internet, Nick tried to think up ways to make money and actually thought up a few, the problem was the effort it would require to do them. He knew of the future and could make some money by recreating simple things like Ring cameras or games like Among Us.
He could also do things like triathlon challenges; he'd surely win those and get tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars. The problem with them is that it takes on average 30 days to complete for the challenges that actually pay that amount of money. Nick could complete them in a few days if he went all out, but of course, he wouldn't expose himself like that.
He knew that creating a tech company was the smartest approach available for him. He had two advantages: his absorption ability and knowing the future. The longer he waited to build his company, the less useful knowing the future became.
"After I leave Maine, I'll formally retire and start the company. I won't be able to actually build things, but I can at least get all of the paperwork done until I absorb a genius.
Nick had big plans, but they seemed obtainable to him. He could easily buy the majority stock of a small game company and force them to recreate a game from the future. The technology creation aspect of his company was harder to pull off, but even if Nick himself couldn't create the things, he knew others who could!
Pushing all that planning to the side, Nick began writing a list of games that he remembered from his past life. A couple of the stories he remembered actually had characters that mashed into this world, so he'd change the names in those stories.
What Nick was doing was very similar to what Chuck, the God in the Supernatural TV show, did to Sam and Dean. He was writing down the real-life accounts of what was happening to people, but they were so fantastical that people had to assume they were fictional!
With the inspiration flowing, Nick's fingers danced across his keyboard writing down the games he remembered. He couldn't have known about the approaching Eldritch horrors right around the corner when the mist rolled in!