Chapter Sixteen: The Second Phase

Immersed in the process of unraveling the spell, Artanis was indeed aware of Tony’s movements, but since he sensed no threat, the shield generator did not activate.

The incantation at hand was unlike any temple magic Artanis had encountered, nor did it resemble Rune Magic—it was an unknown art to him. Even so, as a master of psionics, Artanis could perceive that the one who cast the spell was inferior to him in skill; only because of this did he have any hope of success in breaking it. Otherwise, he would have been groping in utter darkness.

Meanwhile, Tony, having delegated all the repetitive and tedious tasks to Jarvis and finished his own work, returned to stand before Artanis. His earlier poking had not been so simple—he had discovered that Artanis’s skin was completely immune to such tests, which fueled his curiosity further.

However, Tony was not the kind of mad scientist who would conduct experiments on people. He was simply intrigued by individuals like Thor—were they humans, or gods? And what could possibly break through their defenses?

He recalled his previous sparring with Thor, when his armor had been dented by Thor’s headbutt. Tony could only shake his head and abandon the thought for now, instead turning to Jarvis for answers.

“Jarvis, what’s the scan show? Any energy fluctuations detected?” Tony was greatly interested in Artanis’s ability to levitate unaided; if he could figure out the principle, it might significantly reduce the energy consumption of his own thrusters.

“Sir, there’s a kind of magnetic interference around Lord Artanis. My equipment is unable to probe further,” Jarvis reported, and Tony raised his eyebrows.

“Magnetic interference? Can you tell if it’s caused by his own energy or by technology?” Tony’s interest deepened as he began manually manipulating the screens.

“No results yet, sir. I believe we’ll need more advanced equipment to get any answers,” Jarvis continued.

“All right, seems it’s just like that hammer. I’m not even surprised anymore.” Tony shrugged. The existence of Thor’s hammer was documented in SHIELD’s files, though he found it hard to believe the claim that no one else could lift it—if that were true, how was this ship still flying?

Dr. Banner chuckled beside him. “Well, he’s from the Protoss, after all. Seems he’s quite close with Thor and the others.”

“Let’s leave the gods out of this for now. Dr. Banner, what do you think SHIELD is really trying to hide?” Tony, seeing no way to obtain data for the moment, moved aside. After all, this wasn’t his own territory; he’d have time to investigate later.

“I don’t know, Tony,” Banner replied, puzzled. “But it’s definitely not just about energy. Are they trying to build a spaceship?”

Tony rolled his eyes. “The world itself isn’t even fully explored and they want to venture into space? Aren’t they worried about running into aliens or something?”

As they bantered, the two finished coding the automatic program. Now all that remained was to wait for the decryption to finish or for Artanis to awaken.

Meanwhile, after leaving the lab, Steve quietly made his way to SHIELD’s secret warehouse. Since SHIELD didn’t guard against him much, and with the help of a few admirers, he easily obtained the location.

Steve entered the secret warehouse without a hitch. As this was a classified area, SHIELD had not installed surveillance—sometimes, cameras only compromised secrecy further.

Inside, seeing the warehouse stacked full of crates, Steve couldn’t help but frown. He opened one crate and found a full set of weaponry, some even bearing the Hydra insignia.

His heart sank as he opened each crate, but the contents proved disappointing—every box held much the same: weapons. The files within detailed the so-called Phase Two.

At the same time, Tony’s decryption program was finally detected by SHIELD’s firewall. Fury’s brows knitted as he strode toward the lab.

Natasha, meanwhile, had managed to extract part of Loki’s plan through verbal traps. She concluded that Loki intended to use the Hulk to destroy SHIELD’s Helicarrier, and rushed to the lab.

“What are you doing, Mr. Stark?” Fury entered the lab and demanded of Tony.

“I could ask you the same question,” Tony replied, sitting with Banner as they waited for the data transfer.

“You should be investigating the whereabouts of the Tesseract, not snooping into SHIELD’s secrets,” Fury said irritably. The firewall had been breached far too easily.

“That’s right. We’ve written the program—it’s searching for a matching signal. If all goes well, we can pinpoint the target’s location to within half a kilometer,” Banner indicated, nodding toward the progress bar displayed on the rear screen.

“Soon we’ll have the Tesseract back. No need to be impatient.” Tony’s lazy tone halted abruptly as the decryption finished transferring the data.

“What is Phase Two?” Tony asked, looking grimly at the screen.

“Phase Two is SHIELD using the Tesseract to build weapons,” Steve said, placing one of the weapons he’d found in the secret warehouse on the table.

“Sorry, the computer couldn’t keep up with me,” Steve glanced around at everyone, fixing his gaze on Fury.

“Rogers, we collected all the data on the Tesseract, but that doesn’t mean we’re manufacturing—” Fury’s protest was cut off by Tony.

“I’m sorry, Nick.” Tony turned the screen, revealing the material he’d found to everyone. “Care to explain?” The screen displayed a new type of missile.

“So that’s how it is, Director.” Steve looked at Fury with a solemn face. “The world hasn’t changed at all.”

At that moment, Natasha arrived in the lab with Thor in tow. Dr. Banner was the first to address her. “You knew about this too?”

“You need to leave here at once, Doctor.” Natasha’s gaze was fixed on the enormous threat before her.

“I wanted to leave when I was in Calcutta,” Banner replied. He saw the hostility in Natasha’s manner but struggled to keep his temper.

“Loki is using you,” Natasha stepped forward, and Banner stepped back.

“What’s the difference between you and him?” Banner slowly approached the monitor.

“You didn’t come here because of me.” Natasha pressed her point. “And I won’t leave because of you, either.” Banner turned the monitor, pointing to the image displayed.

“I just want to know—why does SHIELD want to use the Tesseract to make weapons of mass destruction?” Banner’s gaze shifted back and forth between Fury and Natasha.