NOVEL WEB Chapter 20: Ambush
Chapter 20: Ambush
[Robert “Bobby” Drake - Iceman. Affiliated with the X-Men]
Hooh, an X-Men huh?
Benjamin raised a brow at that.
Captain Holt looked at his resume and asked.
“It says here you can turn into and control Ice. Can you demonstrate?”
“Sure thing pops.”
“...Pops?”
Captain Holt’s face slightly twitched at that.
Robert ignored him and activated his ability.
All of a sudden, the temperature in the room dropped by several degrees.
The next moment, Robert’s skin, hair, and clothes became a hue of whitish blue like an ice sculpture.
“Tada!”
“...Alright, that’s good enough. Power down.”
“Roger!”
Robert did an exaggerated salute and powered down.
Benjamin turned to Captain Holt.
“Well, I suppose he’s in. Though he needs some behavioral training.”
“I’ll leave it to you then.”
Benjamin chuckled as he thought this was probably what that Professor X wanted him to do…what a bother…
Still, he’ll definitely make great use of this guy in the meantime…
An evil smile slowly formed in his mind but he still kept a straight face.
Robert suddenly felt an unknown chill even though he wasn’t supposed to feel cold…
“Alright, thanks Robert, we will contact you later.”
“You can call me Bobby too.”
“Bobby then. Call the next one in.”
What followed next was a bunch of…nobodies.
It seems these guys are just here for the fun and didn’t actually have powers…
Benjamin and Captain Holt shooed them away and even detained some of the ridiculous ones for disrupting police work.
Suddenly, the room lights went off for a second.
Immediately after, four people stood in front of them as soon as the lights went on.
Seeing these four, Benjamin stared at one of them with half-closed eyes.
“...You do know there’s a door right there right? Was it really necessary to shut the lights, go in, then turn on the lights again for the drama? Daredevil.”
“See, I told you we can just go in.”
An African American bald man with robust body wearing a yellow shirt said in exasperation.
[Luke Cage - Power Man.]
“Daredevil said it’s necessary to enter with style.”
A blonde-haired man wearing a yellow mask and a green suit that shows his dragon tattoo-ed chest said.
[Daniel Rand - Iron Fist.]
“Ugh, boys, can you stop being so embarrassing?”
A black-haired beauty wearing…well, normal clothes and a black scarf said while her palm touched her face.
[Jessica Jones - Jewel.]
“...I cut the lights since I didn’t want to get seen entering the building.”
The familiar man in a devil suit sighed.
[Matthew Murdock - Daredevil.]
Benjamin didn’t continue bantering with them and asked.
“Since you’re all here, I assume that you guys want to join the EPD?”
“That’s right. I simply do not want to waste my time trying to run from the cops every single time I needed to catch a criminal.”
Daredevil nodded.
Well, as expected of the EPD, the ‘legal’ way for vigilantes to work.
Benjamin had already expected this and didn’t have a problem with it as long as they exercise restraint and caution.
“I’m sure you already know this but once you join, even if you don’t want your identities to be known, you must still exercise restraint. This means no killing and no torture. If there’s intel that you need, bring the guy to me and I can find it out for you without needing to break them.”
“How?”
Luke asked.
“Well, let’s just say that I have my ways.”
If HUD Contacts fails, he can always turn to magic. It should be easy to gain intel without the need for torture.
Daredevil and the rest looked at each other.
After some time, Daredevil turned back to Benjamin and asked.
“Can we trust you?”
“No one else knows who you are right? Listen to my heartbeat and you can tell if I’m lying.”
“But what if the higher-ups decide to restrain us or force us to do their dirty work?”
Hearing this, Captain Holt frowned and was about to say something but Benjamin shook his head.
“That won’t happen.”
“Are you sure?”
“Even if they do so, I’d know. And once I do know…well, let’s just say that if they want to bend the laws to work for them, then they would also find out that the laws can be bent by others to work against them.”
It was a very roundabout way of saying he can blackmail the higher-ups himself if they try to do the same to them.
After all…Benjamin holds their secrets just by his HUD Contacts.
It sure is convenient to have a system that can hack into anything.
[Now you know how powerful this System is!]
In a manner of speaking, this could be considered a sort of technomancy.
Benjamin chuckled in his mind and stopped stroking the System’s large ego any further, lest it gets full of itself.
[...]
Daredevil didn’t expect such an answer.
He listened very closely to Benjamin’s heart and knew he wasn’t lying.
“...In that case, I’ll take your word for it.”
“Pleasure to work with you.”
“Likewise.”
Benjamin and Daredevil shook hands.
He knew that Daredevil would normally not consider joining if it were anyone else even with the benefits. However, they had already met before without the masks and based on his few interactions with Benjamin, Matt knew what kind of person he was and decided to take this leap of faith.
The others looked at each other and just shrugged.
They also agreed and shook hands with Benjamin.
When Benjamin shook hands with Jessica, she leaned closer and ask.
“I remember I still owe you dinner. Do you have time later?”
“Sure.”
“See you later then.”
After that, Benjamin continued with the interview and met a few more interesting people.
Then…
“Hey there. I’m Deadpool.”
“...What are you doing here? Don’t tell me you want to join the EPD?”
“No no no! I’m not here to join your boy band group. I’m here to look for Francis! Have you seen him?”
Benjamin sighed and used his HUD Contacts.
[Wade Wilson - Deadpool. Affiliated with himself.]
…Of course he’s affiliated with himself…
Benjamin shook his mind and continued to look through his data and also pulled up data on Francis.
After figuring out his location, Benjamin pulled out his sling ring.
“I’ll send you to him then. Now shoo.”
“Oh wow! I didn’t think you’d really know! Wait, did you watch my movie!? As expected of a Transmigrat- HOLY BENEDICT CUMBERBA-”
Benjamin didn’t bother with him anymore and directly sent him away through the portal and closed it.
Captain Holt was shocked.
“What was that?”
“Oh. That’s magic.”
“Magic?”
“Yeah. I learned it last night.”
“...I’m not even going to be surprised anymore.”
Captain Holt shook his head and stopped bothering about it.
Meanwhile, in a certain location.
“-TCH!”
Deadpool just reappeared through a portal and stretched.
“Phew. My line’s done right? Woah wait, the focus is on me again!? Was there another scene after that? What’s my line again?”
AN: You don’t have a line yet after that. You’re supposed to wait for Francis to speak to you.
“Oh, right right. Let’s go again. I’ll start from my previous line then?”
AN: …Start!
“HOLY RYAN REYNOLDS!”
AN: That’s not…you know what, forget it.
Suddenly, Deadpool heard a familiar voice.
“Wade fucking Wilson. I see you found a way to hide that testicle face of yours.”
Deadpool turned and saw Francis. The man responsible for turning him into a mutant and damaging his handsome face.
DP: You mean extremely handsome face.
AN: …
“Well well well. If it isn’t Hugh fucking Jackman’s evil twin brother.”
“...I don’t look like Hugh Jackman though? But thanks for the compliment.”
“What do you mean? You’re both annoying to look at! Enough talking! More fighting!”
AN: Aaand cut! Next scene!
DP: Hey! We’re just about to get to the fight scene!
AN: Everyone can watch the movie Deadpool. Let’s move on to the story.
DP: But this wasn’t in the movie!?
AN: Back to the novel!
Time passed and soon, work hours were over.
When Benjamin left the precinct, he saw Jessica’s familiar figure leaning on the side.
“Hey Capt. You good to go?”
“...It feels weird to get called Captain…”
Jessica laughed at that.
“Haha! You better get used to it!”
“Ugh, at least don’t call me that outside of work…”
“Alright. Ben it is then.”
“Shall I call you Jess then?”
“Sure.”
The two of them talked as they walked and found a small hidden ramen shop in a nearby alley to eat dinner.
Benjamin knew Jessica wasn’t that well off in money so he didn’t force her to go to a big restaurant.
What’s important is the ambiance.
It was these types of hidden stalls that often have the most delicious and cheap food after all.
They both laughed and chat through the whole time and even drank some soju to liven the mood.
Just as they were about to sink into a very ambiguous mood, Benjamin frowned as he started to notice something.
The customers…were slowly getting cleared out!
Even the cook and other employees were leaving…
Jessica also sobered up when she saw Benjamin’s serious look and noticed the surroundings getting quiet.
Benjamin didn’t say anything and waited for the civilians to leave before downing another shot.
“Are you going to show yourself or what?”
“Heh. Should I say, as expected of the currently renowned Captain Freed? You noticed us so soon.”
From the shadows, a figure of a woman slowly walked out.
She wore a tight sleeveless and backless green suit with a sort of scaly texture to it like a snake’s. Her long dark green hair covered one of her eyes as it fell onto her shoulders.
At her waist was a whip and gun attached.
Benjamin frowned when he read her details.
[Ophelia Sarkissian - Viper. Affiliated with HYDRA.]
Viper. A master of the whip and poison.
What a troublesome enemy…is what anyone would normally think.
This time, Benjamin no longer hesitated and quickly bought the Poison Immunity in the Store.
[Bought Poison Immunity x1]
Instantly using it, Benjamin sighed in relief in his mind.
Although he wasn’t afraid of getting poisoned as he can still heal, he didn’t want to risk being so sure that it would absolutely have no effect.
At the very least, he won’t feel pain or any other effect on him once the poison is applied unlike simply relying on his super healing where he would still feel every bit of it.
It was a pain to lose 20k worth of MP but…
[Main Quest: HYDRA Ambush!]
[HYDRA has been made aware of your existence and wishes to nip you while you’re still developing. Even if Zola’s algorithm says you won’t be a threat, Viper thinks it’s best to kill you to be absolutely sure. Defeat Viper and escape from the ambush!]
[Rewards: 50000 MP, 10 Free Gacha Draw, Unknown Ability]
[This quest has no penalty as there is no point if host fails. Failure means the host will die in the hands of HYDRA.]
Benjamin grinned.
There’s actually an additional reward aside from MC and Free Gacha Draw!
He was looking forward to it.
As for there being no failure condition…well, this is obvious. Failing means that he dies and there won’t be a point in still sending failure penalties to him.
Still…Benjamin wasn’t worried.
He was confident that he won’t fail.