Chapter Ninety-One: The Marvel Version of the Pacific Bank Robbery

Zhong Shenxiu and Ivan exchanged a glance.

Neither saw the slightest trace of panic in the other’s eyes.

That was only natural. They hardly needed to guess who was using the elevator at this hour.

It could only be the one who swung tirelessly between the walls, the short red-clad figure the gangsters cursed through gritted teeth, and Zhong Shenxiu’s favorite little thug: Spider-Man, Peter Parker.

Sure enough, when the elevator doors opened again, that familiar figure appeared inside. He was not tall, and he wore the red spider suit Zhong Shenxiu knew best from his previous life, though it was somewhat damaged, with a little dark blood still seeping across it.

For Peter lately, injuries had become routine.

His powers were formidable, but his mind was still that of a child, and so while serving as the vigilante Spider-Man, he was easily hurt for all sorts of bizarre and ridiculous reasons.

And at such times, Zhong Shenxiu’s secret base was practically his supply station.

Ivan handled repairs on Peter’s damaged suit, along with maintenance and reloading of the web shooters. When Zhong Shenxiu had time to come by, he would also treat Peter’s wounds and see whether he might be able to acquire those two abilities of his as well.

So after a period of observation, Zhong Shenxiu had even had Ivan issue Peter a pass for entering and leaving the base.

“Shenxiu, you’re here too!”

As soon as Peter stepped out of the elevator and saw Zhong Shenxiu, he said with obvious delight.

When he wore the spider suit, his voice was specially altered, giving it a deeper tone, at least one that made it hard to tell his age.

That was one of Ivan’s custom features.

After all, it was the old familiar issue: Peter was far too young. If he really were to use that slightly immature voice to cow gangsters into submission, it would sound very much like a child playing house. To enhance Peter’s intimidation, Ivan had come up with this solution.

Then, with a swift motion, Peter pulled off his mask, and his voice returned to normal as well.

He said to Ivan, “Uncle Ivan, I’ll need to trouble you again. The spider suit got torn a bit more by the gangsters today, and the web shooters too. The right one malfunctioned once.”

As he spoke, he very deftly removed the spider suit from his body. The movement would surely have pulled at some wounds, yet Peter did not even frown, clearly already accustomed to such pain.

This kid really is growing up without anyone noticing... Zhong Shenxiu thought with emotion.

“Let me see. What sort of malfunction? The webs wouldn’t fire?” Ivan took the web shooter from Peter and casually cleared a small space on his cluttered workbench, where he began examining it.

“No, its toughness suddenly dropped. By about fifty percent, I’d say.” Peter, bare-chested, folded the spider suit neatly and placed it beside the workbench, then leaned in next to Ivan and answered with great concentration.

Peter had always been a rare technological genius, which was precisely why the two of them, despite such an age gap, could get along so well.

Not long after, with Peter’s detailed parameters, Ivan had adjusted the web shooter.

Only then did Zhong Shenxiu, who had waited a long while, finally speak to Peter.

“Come here. I’ll treat your wounds.”

“Okay!” Peter grinned at the words and trotted over obediently.

Following Zhong Shenxiu’s instructions, Peter sat on a small stool. The bare upper half of his body no longer held any trace of baby fat; instead, it was covered in lean, angular muscle.

His injuries were minor. The most obvious were two cuts across his back, neither very deep. Under normal circumstances, Zhong Shenxiu could have healed them in less than a second.

Yet he deliberately slowed the treatment. It took him about five seconds before Peter’s wounds were restored to their original state.

Still no ability triggered...

Zhong Shenxiu’s expression remained unchanged, but inwardly he had already begun to complain.

He truly did not know whether this was because of his abysmal luck or what. The one with a one percent chance, the spider-sense, failing to appear was one thing, but if the fifteen percent chance of bioelectricity still refused to show up, he really felt like cursing.

Over the past month, the time he spent healing Peter’s injuries had long since surpassed one hundred seconds...

Fortunately, Peter was one of his own. He could keep coming back to have his wounds treated, and sooner or later, he would possess both abilities. That was the only thing that brought Zhong Shenxiu a bit of comfort.

“Thanks, Shenxiu. It’s all thanks to you and Uncle Ivan.”

Feeling his wounds fully restored, Peter grinned at Zhong Shenxiu and Ivan.

Meanwhile, Ivan, wearing old-fashioned reading glasses and using a needle to patch the spider suit, tilted his head with a somewhat proud air.

At the same time, his needlework grew even faster.

Seeing this, Peter smiled and began putting on his clothes. He did not intend to linger, because it was already very late and he needed to go home. If he stayed any later, Ben Parker would come looking for him at Zhong Shenxiu’s place.

After all, it was only by helping out at Zhong Shenxiu’s clinic that he had managed to earn time each day to be a hero.

But Zhong Shenxiu stopped him.

Looking at Peter’s slightly puzzled eyes, Zhong Shenxiu explained, “No need to rush today. I just sent Ben a message saying I’m taking you out for a big meal tonight, so we’ll be back a little later. He agreed.”

As for why he wanted Peter to stay, of course it was for his own plan.

He needed enough time to give Peter some psychological guidance!

He had no intention of asking Peter what he had done at school this afternoon, or how he had completed that side mission. He intended to go straight to the point and begin brainwashing without any delay.

First, no matter how many words one had, one needed a beginning.

“Peter, you’ve been Spider-Man for almost a month now. How does it feel?” Zhong Shenxiu found a chair and sat down, adopting the posture of someone preparing for a long talk.

Though a little curious why Zhong Shenxiu would suddenly ask such a question, Peter still obediently pulled over a small stool, sat down, and answered earnestly, “Honestly, Shenxiu, it’s very different from what I imagined. At first I thought being a hero would be so cool, that lots of people would love and admire me.”

“But... over this past month, what I’ve felt most deeply is just how tiring it is.”

“Still, with the two of you silently supporting me from behind, whether it was Uncle Ivan fixing my gear or you patiently treating my injuries, I was able to keep going because of you.”

To be able to say such words, Peter had truly grown a great deal... but this answer was somewhat far from what Zhong Shenxiu had been expecting.

So Zhong Shenxiu kept his expression steady and continued to guide him.

“What do you think about those gangsters?”

“The gangsters...” Peter fell silent for a moment before continuing, “Honestly, I’m a bit confused by them now. It feels like they’re as stubborn as glue. No matter what move I use, whether I’m ruthless or patient, trying to persuade them, they never change their ways. Their criminal activity even seemed to drop at first.”

“But lately, I don’t know what happened. One by one, they’ve gone crazy. The moment they see me, they charge at me howling.”

“I just can’t understand it. Have their brains all gone bad or something? Why are they so reckless?”

As he spoke, Peter wore a very frustrated expression.

Zhong Shenxiu awkwardly rubbed his nose, realizing that the whole matter with the gangsters was probably because of him.

Unless Peter was dealing with some utterly vicious and irredeemable criminal, he generally did not strike too hard, much less kill anyone. And with a miracle doctor like Zhong Shenxiu in New York, endlessly harvesting fresh leeks, those gangsters would only suffer injuries.

At worst they would get hurt, but being treated by the miracle doctor would leave no aftereffects, and they would even receive a sick-leave allowance from their superiors. That was why the gangsters had all become so fired up whenever they saw Peter.

Of course, Zhong Shenxiu was not about to say that out loud. Since Peter had brought up the gangsters, Zhong Shenxiu naturally had to continue along the intended path and keep deceiving him.

He said, “Peter, you need to look at things more broadly, more macroscopically. You have to think in terms of the big picture.”

Peter listened quietly. He knew Zhong Shenxiu was smart, far more mature than he was in many matters.

For example, when Zhong Shenxiu taught him that if you’re not afraid, then just go for it, that sentence had already benefited him immensely. Not only had no one at school bullied him anymore, but even in his Spider-Man life, those words had greatly encouraged him.

So when Peter saw Zhong Shenxiu preparing to lecture him again, he immediately listened with great seriousness, like a model student, even more attentively than in class.

Seeing this, Zhong Shenxiu nodded with satisfaction and continued, “In truth, the proliferation of gangsters in Queens is the result of the whole current society. This society is like this: full of violence, with countless weapons manufacturers standing openly in plain sight.”

“Especially Stark Industries, which even publicly sells weapons to terrorists around the world.”

Though he did not know whether Stark Industries had begun selling weapons to terrorists yet, it certainly would in the future. He might as well pin the blame on them first.

Hearing about such a global problem, Peter grew solemn. He felt that his own strength was still too small to address an issue like this, even if he had mutated and gained great power.

“So what should I do?” he asked. “Shenxiu.”

And Zhong Shenxiu took the opportunity to say, “I’ve got a plan lately. I want to empty out the weapons development department of Stark Industries.”

“Especially the thing at its core, called the Arc Reactor. That’s the very culprit providing the energy to manufacture Stark’s weapons.”

“I want to solve the problem at its source, destroy it directly, and then, to prevent them from rebuilding it so easily, haul away all its materials as well.”

Peter hesitated when he heard this and asked, “Wouldn’t that just be robbery?”

Of course it is robbery... Zhong Shenxiu’s face remained unchanged as he answered with utter self-contradiction, “Of course not. We’re making a contribution to the whole world!”

“Think about it: if Stark Industries, the world’s largest arms dealer, can no longer produce weapons, it may not solve the problem at its root, but at the very least there will be far less war and turmoil in the world.”

That was a somewhat naive statement, and Zhong Shenxiu knew it. Wars would not simply disappear because of this.

In Iron Man 2, the situation was quite realistic. When Stark Industries stopped producing weapons, the military immediately turned to a second company, Hammer Industries. And if Hammer Industries later stopped producing weapons too, the military would simply seek out the next “Hammer” Industries.

As long as humanity existed on this planet for a single day, war would never cease completely; it would only occasionally pause for a time.

But of course Zhong Shenxiu would not tell Peter that. What one says depends on what one wants to achieve; that had always been one of Zhong Shenxiu’s principles.

And when Peter heard all this from Zhong Shenxiu, his face immediately shone with a kind of heroic radiance. The blood of youth surged hot in him.

He suddenly felt that, under Zhong Shenxiu’s guidance, his own strength could truly make a difference in the world, and so he agreed at once.

Only then did Zhong Shenxiu curl the corner of his mouth. Good, the deception... scratched out, the guidance had succeeded.

But then Peter asked, “Still, didn’t Tony Stark return today and say he was going to shut down the entire weapons division of Stark Industries?”

Zhong Shenxiu had long anticipated this question and answered without delay.

“Peter, you need to understand that capital is, by nature, bloodsucking. It exists for profit. Do you really think such a huge company as Stark Industries would so easily shut down the weapons division it depends on for survival?”

And indeed, during the period when Obadiah was in charge, Stark’s weapons division had in fact never closed. It had even begun dealing with terrorists. Only later, after Tony killed Obadiah and took control of Stark Industries himself, was the weapons division truly shut down.

Peter nodded thoughtfully.

“There’s no need to hesitate. If they truly intend to close the weapons division, then our action this time is helping them. And if they go back on their word, then our action is punishment. They would deserve it.”

Zhong Shenxiu’s bandit logic left Peter dazed.

When Peter, full of joy and expectation, once again nodded hard in agreement, Zhong Shenxiu finally muttered inwardly:

At last, I’ve talked him around. In that case, for a kind and justice-minded kid like Peter, asking him to do something like robbery really isn’t easy.

But Zhong Shenxiu had skillfully shifted the concept, turning the robbery of Stark Industries into a means of carrying out justice.

Only then had he succeeded in making Peter willingly help him rob Stark Industries.

With Peter on board, everything was clear.

The division of labor for this robbery of Stark Industries was as follows: Zhong Shenxiu would draw the fire, Ivan would be the driver, and Peter would be the porter.

As for Wanda, who currently had little combat ability, Zhong Shenxiu arranged for her to use chaos magic to create his alibi.

For some reason, it felt a bit like robbing Pacific Bank.

Recruiting suitable people for each key position, and then splitting the reward according to work done in the end.

Zhong Shenxiu would naturally pay Peter and the others. Of course, it would not be split into tens of percent after tens of percent all at once like in that game.

Conservatively speaking, the materials in all of Stark Industries were worth close to a hundred million dollars.

In that case, he could afford to be generous.

Give Peter, the most exhausted one, three hundred dollars. As for Ivan, buy his father thirty bottles of Jiang Xiaobai. Wanda... she was still in her internship period, so no money for her.

Tsk tsk, I really am a conscientious boss... Zhong Shenxiu sighed inwardly.