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Arthur was completely speechless after Riot's brutal mocking outburst.
In the end, he looked resentfully at Venom, 'This was all his fault!'
'What the hell did he mean by "in chaos" earlier? Did he just take his own weakness and project it onto all Symbiotes?'
'And worst of all, Arthur actually believed him!'
'Damn it, he really must've had a brain fart!'
At this point, Arthur felt like a frustrated old granny who had lost control of her grandkid. One wrong step, and you regret it for a lifetime.
"Uh... Don't look at me like that. I didn't say any of that." Brock waved his hands frantically as he saw Arthur's eyes locked straight onto his face.
"What about him?" Arthur asked darkly.
"He said he doesn't want to talk to you." Brock looked completely helpless.
Arthur felt like vomiting blood. Were these Symbiotes sent by the heavens just to mess with him?
Taking a deep breath, he turned to Riot inside the lab and said: "Fine then. Whether you take my kind warning seriously or not, it seems we'll be stuck together for a while. So let's leave it at that…"
Then, glancing at the people around him, Arthur said: "You can begin. Use whatever means you want, I don't care if he dies. Honestly, he's not that important anymore."
Finally, his gaze landed on Brock: "You, come with me!"
Once they'd stepped out of the lab, Brock still had that innocent look on his face.
"Seriously, I didn't say any of that. You can't take your frustration out on me."
"..." Arthur was speechless.
What the hell is this "in chaos" crap, anyway?
He took another deep breath, then looked at Brock and said: "From this point forward, things might seem unfair to you. But at the very least, I can offer you this much. I'll tell you what this place really is, what its true purpose is… And then, I'll need your choice."
Brock blinked a few times before speaking. "To be honest, I already had a feeling. But the fact that you haven't treated me like just another lab rat, I really appreciate that. I can promise you this: no matter what I see from here on out, I won't report any of it recklessly."
"Good." Arthur smiled in satisfaction. "Though to be honest, even if you refused, you wouldn't remember anything that happened today. In fact… not even your little friend inside would remember."
"You're gonna brainwash me?"
"Trust me, I have far more advanced ways to help you gracefully forget everything…"
As he led Brock through the base, Arthur continued: "About a year ago, the Battle of New York. You've heard of it, right?"
"Heard of it. Wasn't it supposed to be some massive entertainment stunt?" Brock replied. "Of course, now I know better. But back then, every media outlet suddenly changed its tune at the same time. Really caught everyone off guard."
"It wasn't a stunt." Arthur said seriously: "It was a war waged by an alien race against Earth. Their goal wasn't just to conquer the planet, they were also after a Powerful Artifact. The Tesseract."
"Powerful Artifact? Am I listening to a fantasy myth now?" Brock raised an eyebrow, expression skeptical.
Arthur chuckled.
"Then treat it like a myth if you want. But among the people working with them was someone from a divine race, the Asgardians. You probably only know one of them: Thor, from the Avengers."
"I always thought he dressed like that for theatrical effect. Are you trying to tell me now… he's actually a god?"
"Not just any god," Arthur said. "He's a prince of the Asgardian gods, the son of King Odin. And during the Battle of New York, the one who joined forces with the alien invaders... was his younger brother, Loki."
"Alright… so what's next?" Brock asked. "Are you going to tell me another mythical bedtime story?"
"Them…" Arthur pointed to a nearby laboratory where a group of researchers were working busily around a device labeled Mark.
"I know that one." Brock looked up and gestured. "See? They're all around us."
"That's one of Tony's masterpieces," Arthur said. "It uses the weapons system from a spaceship, combined with a level of artificial intelligence, what you're looking at is an ultra-advanced combat machine. When thousands of them are deployed simultaneously, the resulting power is… unimaginable."
"Unimaginable," Brock echoed. Just the two hovering above them were already hard enough to believe.
As they talked, a tall Black man approached them from the front.
His gait was steady, regal, even kingly.
"Prince T'Challa," Arthur greeted him with a smile.
"Arthur," Prince T'Challa replied with a smile. "Hard to believe, really."
"Oh?" Arthur paused, curious. "What did you see inside Camp Lehigh?"
"A lot." T'Challa's eyes flickered with memory. "I even saw… that massive thing from the Dark World! It's hard to believe it nearly made it to Earth!"
"Yeah," Arthur shrugged. "The Nine Realms Convergence is a terrifying cosmic phenomenon. It connects all nine realms, warping the laws of space and time... But in the end, we managed to stop it. We brought it back for study. Unfortunately, the Dark Elves, they've vanished. That entire race may be gone forever."
T'Challa nodded thoughtfully, then turned to look at Brock. "And this is?"
"Potentially our newest member," Arthur replied. "And actually… there are two of them."
He gestured at Brock. "Standing before you is Eddie Brock. Inside him… lives something called Venom."
This introduction left T'Challa stunned for a moment.
Then he stepped forward and shook Brock's hand. "Pleasure to meet you… and the other one as well… Venom, was it?"
"Hello, hello! Very nice to meet you too, by the way, Venom says he thinks your head probably tastes amazing."
Brock added helplessly, "He said if I didn't say that out loud, he'd eat my kidney. And trust me, I really, really need my kidney."
T'Challa turned to Arthur with a classic 'Black guy confusion face.'
Arthur sighed. "Yeah… some of the entities inside him aren't exactly friendly. We're working on building… a functional relationship. I'll explain the details to you later.
Right now, I need to properly brief some people about our purpose here, and what may happen in the future."
"Of course," T'Challa nodded. "You should go check out the big one. Its power is… beyond imagination."
"Great idea!"
After all, words alone are never enough, but showing them a warship from the Dark World? That might convince people faster than any speech Arthur could give.