"What is this?" Clark glanced at the phone after taking it from Banner and saw that the screen displayed a report sent to him by Banner's friend. The report stated that traces of nuclear radiation had been detected on the seafloor of Tokyo Bay, Japan. However, the radiation zone was unusually large—almost half the size of Tokyo.
"Could it be a nuclear leak?" Tony, looking at the report on Banner's phone, immediately thought of a nuclear accident.
"Probably not," Banner replied. He had looked into it—no foreign nuclear submarine had the capability to dive deep into Tokyo Bay, and there were no records or signs of any incidents involving their own nuclear submarines. Also, the seabed in that area lies along a low-depth shipping route, ruling out the presence of any special buildings or mineral deposits.
"But according to my friend's analysis, the radioactive elements he found don't match any known radioactive elements."
"Are you sure he's not joking?" Tony asked. His first instinct was disbelief. In his search for a cure to his palladium poisoning, he had already experimented with every known elemental combination on Earth—without success. The new element he currently used in his arc reactor had come from a discovery his father, Howard Stark, made using the Tesseract.
So when Banner's friend suddenly claimed to have found a new element, Tony's initial reaction was that it had to be a scam.
"I don't think so," Banner replied. "He's a Japanese doctor I met at an academic conference. He's pretty meticulous—doesn't seem like the type to pull a prank like this."
After that academic exchange, they had barely stayed in touch—hardly the kind of relationship where someone would send a fake scientific lead just for laughs.
While Banner was speaking with Clark and Tony, his phone buzzed again. He opened it to find a new message: his friend was asking for help analyzing the mysterious radioactive element, which did not appear on the periodic table.
After all, Banner was a world-renowned expert in nuclear physics—so much so that his portrait hung next to Einstein's in many American schools. His academic standing was beyond question.
"Tony, can I borrow your lab for a bit? He said he'll be sending over some samples—I told him to ship them directly to your company." Banner looked at the data and made his request.
"Sure. Use it however you want," Tony replied with a wave of his hand, agreeing without hesitation.
Clark glanced at Banner and Tony but didn't think much of it. As far as he knew, nothing major was going on in the Marvel universe during this time. Neither Tony nor Banner had mentioned anything about searching for new elements. So unless something unexpected happened, Clark doubted it would lead to anything significant.
Either Banner's friend was misleading him, or he had simply made an error in analysis and mistakenly believed he had made a breakthrough. That kind of thing wasn't uncommon in the scientific world.
But five days later, Clark realized he might have been wrong. That day, Banner called him to say that, after extensive testing with Tony, they had indeed discovered a brand-new element in the samples.
"Clark, I hope you can come with me to Japan. I want to conduct a field investigation," Banner said over the phone, pausing briefly after sharing the discovery before making his request.
"If you want me to come, I should tell you—I don't speak Japanese. I won't be much help," Clark replied, surprised by the invitation. He wasn't fluent in Japanese and knew nothing about nuclear physics. Even if he went, he felt he wouldn't be of much assistance.
**"My friend recently used scanning equipment and found a massive lifeform beneath the area where the new radioactive element was detected. And I also detected traces of blood in his sample.
After detecting the blood, I ran it through a biological database. The results showed that the blood didn't come from any known lifeform. In fact, the radiation we initially detected came from diluted blood of this unknown creature.
That's why I want you to come. It's safer with you there."** While Banner wasn't afraid of the mysterious sea creature himself, he definitely didn't want to wake up underwater if something went wrong.
Banner also suspected that, like this unknown creature, his own blood was infused with radiation—only his was gamma radiation. He wondered if studying this creature could help him understand or even control the Hulk.
"How big is this 'giant lifeform' exactly?" Clark asked. Though Banner seemed unsure, Clark's mind leapt to a surprising possibility. Combining the ideas of Japan and massive creatures immediately made him think of Ultraman.
Though he quickly dismissed that thought, Clark was still intrigued. What other mysterious titanic lifeforms could exist in the Marvel universe that hadn't been featured in any films yet?
"I don't know. But based on what my friend said, it's enormous," Banner admitted. He really had no idea how big the creature was.
"Alright. You've piqued my curiosity. I'll go with you." Since receiving 30% of the shares in Tony's new company, Clark had closed down his flower shop and had been mostly idle. This trip to Japan seemed like a good way to break the monotony.
Besides, he'd never been to Japan—neither in his past life nor this one—so he figured he might as well treat it like a vacation.
"Great. When should we leave? Also, do you know what Tony's been up to lately? I haven't seen him in a few days." With no shop to run, Clark had plenty of free time. But he realized he hadn't run into Tony recently.
"I'm not sure either. I haven't seen him in days. I think he's busy updating his suits. But Clark, have you noticed that Tony's been a little... off? Anxious, maybe. Yeah, kind of anxious," Banner said. Tony seemed to be locking himself in his workshop more than usual lately.
"Probably because of the Battle of New York. After all, once Tony takes off the Iron Man suit, he's still just a regular guy. It's normal for a battle like that to leave an impression." Clark understood what was really going on—Tony was suffering from PTSD.
Facing the Chitauri—a civilization far more technologically advanced than Earth—had deeply shaken him. Had it not been for their central command flaw, the war could have been far worse. After the battle, Tony was likely haunted by the thought: What if we had lost?
That fear left him feeling unsafe—and drove his obsession with constantly upgrading his armor.
Clark knew all of this because it was covered in Iron Man 3. Tony had been under so much pressure that within half a year, he had created over 30 new suits, upgrading from the Mark 7 (seen in Avengers) to the Mark 42 (Iron Man 3). This was impressive considering it had taken him over two years just to develop Marks 1 through 7.
Meanwhile, as Banner was on the phone with Clark, his friend in Japan, Dr. Makimoto, recovered a stone tablet from the sea. Although he couldn't determine how old it was, Makimoto could clearly make out carvings of people worshipping an enormous creature.
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