Whoosh!!!
Heisenberg hurled the phone straight downstairs. In the blink of an eye, it smashed into the area near the intersection, blasting out a crater about half a meter wide and around twenty centimeters deep.
The flying gravel made over a dozen protesters nearby howl in pain, but not only did it fail to stop the demonstration, those bastards shouted even harder!
"Look at him, this is how arrogant he is!"
"He thinks he's a god!"
"He won't let us do drugs!!!"
"Only gun shops under his name can sell guns!"
"He's as evil as that Cui!"
"An alien Hitler!!!"
"We need a savior!"
"America doesn't need an alien spirit!!!"
Listening to those slogans, Heisenberg kept simmering for a while, then gradually calmed down.
No doubt about it. Those bastards were trying to provoke him, to make him lose control and commit violence right in front of countless witnesses!
Then they would seize on that violence and condemn him to hell.
If that happened, Heisenberg might really, in a very short time, go from the "Hulk-killer" and "Guardian of New York" the media kept hyping up…
To an alien murderer, a cosmic Hitler!
But so what!!!
Heisenberg was not the type to swallow insults. And he was never the type to take a loss lying down.
Even if you're deliberately trying to provoke me, I'll still make sure you feel enough pain while your plan succeeds!
He repeated the same old trick, took in a breath of cold air, and blew it straight at the swimming pool.
The entire pool instantly froze into a gigantic slab of ice, and then it came crashing down toward the densest cluster of people below.
Swimming pool: "You always manage to drain me…"
Whoosh!!!
This time, Heisenberg did not use heat vision to shatter the ice.
If that enormous ice mass slammed into the crowd, more than fifty people would turn into paste on the spot.
The protesters were not idiots from TV.
The second they saw the ice falling from the sky, the demonstrators in the center panicked.
They tried to scatter, but all they faced was a wall of bodies from every direction.
Shoving and trampling erupted immediately. More of them simply fell and waited for death.
In just moments, despair descended over their heads.
Unfortunately…
Dozens of streaks of light flashed by. The thick ice slab, at roughly sixty meters above the ground, was precisely hit head-on by dozens of micro missiles.
With the explosions, the crowd dropped to the ground in a wave.
The violent shockwaves made many people's eardrums sting, but nobody complained about the blasts.
Because the ice that would have killed them had already been blown apart into countless tiny shards.
That said, they did not get off easy. First they were knocked down by the shockwave, then they were battered by the raining fragments of ice.
When they struggled back to their feet, almost all of them had blood on their faces.
As for whether they still wanted to protest…
They only became more determined!
Because Iron Man had saved them!
Even if Iron Man was only trying to protect lives, his rescue still boosted the protesters' momentum.
And when Iron Man and Heisenberg clashed, between the two of them, there was bound to be one who was wrong.
If the people of New York did not think Iron Man was wrong, then everyone would know the one in the wrong was Heisenberg!
…
On the rooftop, Heisenberg frowned at the streaking light in the sky.
After hurriedly firing the missiles, Iron Man himself followed right behind them at top speed.
The reason he arrived so quickly was simple. Back when the protest first started gathering, he had already gotten the news through JARVIS.
As for where JARVIS got that news…
Don't ask. The answer is: AI is amazing.
Anyway, Tony Stark absolutely did not hack into New York City's surveillance systems.
Whatever JARVIS did had nothing to do with Tony Stark, okay?
On any other day, if Tony saved "New York citizens" again, Heisenberg would not have cared.
After all, he rather admired Stark as a person.
Especially the Stark who snapped his fingers.
If Heisenberg had been in that situation, he absolutely would not have snapped, cough, he would not even have rushed out to fight Thanos.
He had a wife and a daughter. For those poor souls who vanished to the snap, Heisenberg would have just held his family close and observed a moment of silence.
And because he could not do it, he maintained a certain respect for those who could.
But today…
"Tony Stark…" Heisenberg murmured.
"You're really damn annoying."
Boom!!!
Heisenberg broke the sound barrier in an instant. Under the gaze of countless people looking up, he reached out and seized Tony Stark by the armored throat.
Iron Man and JARVIS could not even capture Heisenberg's movement trajectory.
With Earth's current technology, there was still no analyzer capable of close-range recording and analyzing speeds in the tens of thousands of Mach.
As for those miracle-like suits Iron Man developed later, they were indeed the best proof of Tony's intellect, but it had to be said, he benefited far too much from the Chitauri invasion.
Without that alien tech broadening his horizons, perhaps he still would have built those later suits.
But in terms of development time, he would definitely have been far slower than in the original storyline.
In short, no matter how much Iron Man reinforced his armor right now, it still could not withstand even a single punch from the current Heisenberg!
To endure Heisenberg's fists and kicks, at minimum he would need that nanotech armor set he used against Thanos.
So…
The moment Heisenberg clamped down on the "throat of fate," Tony's eyes rolled back under the helmet.
"H-hello, Heisen… ugh, you're squeezing too hard, are you trying to crush me to death?!"
Heisenberg did not even bother responding to the greeting. He simply increased the pressure with his right hand, crushing the neck segment of the armor inward.
The sealed tightness around his throat grew stronger and stronger. Fear flooded Tony in an instant, but the reason he was a hero was precisely because…
"Stop! Ngh, I can't breathe. I'm just saying you don't need to start a massacre. There are so many ways to make them leave…"
"You talk too much, Tony!"
Heisenberg cut him off and yanked Tony closer.
Then Heisenberg raised his free left hand to Tony's faceplate.
Pinch. Pull.
Tony's face was exposed.
And that mask, worth tens of millions, used to control the entire suit and JARVIS, was tossed far into the distance.
Staring at the man struggling in front of him, Heisenberg snorted in disdain.
"Tony Stark. An arrogant, self-important playboy. You think just because you're some domineering CEO, you can do whatever you feel like?"
Slap!
With one brutal strike, Heisenberg cleanly shattered the armor.
He even activated his bio-field, turning Iron Man's suit into fragments that fell away from Tony's body.
With the armor gone, Tony was nothing more than a pitiful man with his throat locked in Heisenberg's grip.
He thrashed desperately, legs kicking in the air like a fish flopping on land.
And Heisenberg kept going.
"You think you saved them, but I guarantee you, the ones you saved are criminals crawling around Hell's Kitchen stirring up chaos.
You should know what I've been doing lately. The reason they're protesting is because my demand for peace and order has crushed their room to survive!
Yes, you saved a few lives, dozens, even more.
But you've woven the strongest protection net for those damned demons. You'll make them believe what they're doing works!
Look at us, you and me. We're like baboons being watched, performing for their amusement!
Do you think they'll pity you for failing?
They'll only feel regret if you die, regret that you, the superhero, couldn't stop me, then they'll go looking for the next you.
If the people standing under my building were a bunch of five or six year old kids,
then of course I wouldn't hurt them. I'd only wipe out the bastards organizing them.
But what's under my building isn't children. It's a pack of scum not worth you dying for!
You like being a superhero, I get it. But I'm also warning you, don't pay for people who aren't worth it, and don't sacrifice yourself for people who don't deserve that sacrifice!
Get lost!!!"
When Heisenberg roared the last words, he simply grabbed Tony by the throat and flew forward, dragging him along.
They smashed through more than thirteen buildings, back and forth, until finally Heisenberg pinned Tony against the wall of one particular building.
Throughout the entire process, Heisenberg used his bio-field to protect Tony. Otherwise, Tony would have died so thoroughly there would not even be a corpse to bury.
As for why he did not kill Iron Man.
No special reason. He just did not feel like it.
Heisenberg was not a true devil. He had his own likes and dislikes.
He did what he wanted to do, and he did not want to kill Tony Stark. Simple as that.
But even if he did not kill him, he was not going to let Tony have an easy time!
"Aaaaaah!"
Right as Heisenberg stopped, a piercing scream exploded into their ears.
The sound felt painfully familiar to Tony. When he forced himself to turn his head toward it…
The one screaming was Pepper Potts.
After the initial scream of shock, Pepper quickly grasped the situation.
She choked it back, then rushed toward Heisenberg and the Tony in his grip as if flying.
"Oh my God, why, Mr. Heisenberg, what happened between you two? Please let him go, please, I'm begging you, sob…"
In moments, Pepper was already at Heisenberg's side. Crying, she grabbed at Heisenberg's right arm, trying to pry his hand off Tony's throat.
Heisenberg released him with a bored expression. Tony immediately slid down the wall.
The instant Heisenberg stepped back, Pepper threw her arms around Tony, holding him tightly.
Then she turned her head back through tears, asking Heisenberg carefully, "Mr. Heisenberg, I'm willing to pay any price on his behalf. What do we have to do for you to be satisfied?"
"Satisfied?!"
Pepper's question made Heisenberg press his lips together in frustration.
He looked left and right, irritated, then walked to the fridge and took out a bottle of whiskey and three glasses.
He strode over and sat down on the reception sofa in Pepper's office. After setting the glasses on the coffee table, he opened the bottle and filled all three.
Before the shaken couple could even sit, Heisenberg lifted his own glass and took a sip.
Setting it down, he spoke softly to Pepper.
"In your eyes, I'm that terrifying? So terrifying that you think I need to demand a price from you?"
After speaking, Heisenberg waved at the two of them.
"Stop hugging and crying and showing off your love over there. Your Tony hasn't even lost a patch of skin. I was shielding him with my field the whole time!"
"I… is that so…?"
Hearing that, Pepper finally relaxed a little.
She quickly checked Tony over. After confirming he was completely uninjured, she finally let out a shaky breath.
And then Heisenberg continued.
"Relax and come sit. Have a drink to steady yourselves.
What makes me angry isn't you two. It's that crowd of protesters, and the one pulling strings behind them. I know what matters, and what doesn't!"
/-\
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