"I'm sorry. Although I don't want to interrupt your research, you know there are things you must do," Ina Sandra hurried into Luke's lab and stood beside him. On her other side lay the old vampire, imprisoned in a cage made of golden gratings, tortured by Luke's experiments for days, almost unrecognizable. The faint rise and fall of his chest and breathing proved he was still alive, but his frozen, ashen face, his eyes staring blankly into the void, clearly indicated a mental breakdown.
Thinking back to the first time she saw him in this lab, the old vampire had tried to cast a mental hypnotic curse on her. Back then, he was still full of energy, even turning his head to seduce her while Luke was conducting experiments on her body. But now, seeing him again, he was oblivious to him, or rather, to any information from the outside world.
"I'm almost there." Luke was a little dissatisfied.
"But Stark Expo," Ina Sandra reminded.
"I thought anyone could go." Luke complained and put a black ring with a faint glow on his right thumb.
"Get ready. It's time to take a break. You need to relax your brain." Ina Sandra put her face down and ignored Luke's complaints.
Watching Ina Sandra leave, Luke informed Queen Bai and connected to Snoke's communication.
"BOSS." Snooker's calm and low voice sounded in the communicator.
"How's it going?" Luke asked.
The old vampire who perpetrated the attack still lay on the lab table. After she'd revealed the mastermind, Ophelia Sarkissian, along with a wealth of information about her, Luke naturally wouldn't forget her. But he wouldn't abandon his research to personally capture her. After all, he'd diligently assembled multiple Heberon security teams. Could he really rely on them for security? How long would it take to recoup Luke's expenses?
Don't be naive.
Perhaps if it were Tony Stark, he would take on all of this himself, personally carrying out his revenge. But Luke had no such idea for the time being. If he had to do everything himself, then what was the purpose of all the money he spent, all the people he hired, and all the equipment he built? Was it just to keep up appearances? Doing everything himself didn't suit him. Tony Stark was an outlier!
For example, to find and bring back the mastermind of the attack, Luke only needed to give Snoke and his men the order to carry out their mission. These tasks and subsequent combat matters would naturally be handled by his men. Compared to him, Snoke and his men were the experts in handling these matters! This wasn't to say that Luke lacked experience and couldn't handle these matters himself, but rather that they didn't necessarily require Luke to waste his time personally.
The experience and combat data of Snooker and the others were stored in the Terra Core. How could he, someone who had never deeply honed his combat skills, be so able to engage the old vampire in such a reciprocal exchange that night? Was he so spiritual? Essentially, through a state of synaesthesia, the Terra Core's stored combat skills of Snooker and the others, along with all the fighting methods it had collected and summarized online, presented them to him without reservation.
"The mission started off smoothly. We conducted a tentative verification based on the information provided by the old vampire, and we did find Ophelia Sarkissian's hiding place. We were chasing her very closely during this period, and she escaped several times." Snooker's tone was rarely filled with admiration. It was obvious that the other party's escape skills had amazed him these days. He could be called the most powerful escape master he had ever seen in his life.
"I saw in Terra's mission record that you seriously injured her." Luke pulled out Terra's mission list and found the mission information and images uploaded by Snoke and others in real time.
"The other party used that mysterious power." Snoke replied. "The same power as the old vampire."
"Didn't you use the special holy light weapon device I prepared for you?" Luke blinked and closed the mission record directly.
"It is obvious that the opponent has undergone corresponding transformation and strengthening of her body. Her subordinates should have undergone similar strengthening. We used those holy light weapons that you specially prepared to seriously injure the opponent to the point of death. But the opponent's burst was somewhat beyond the ordinary." Snooker on the other side was a little dusty, and his battle suit had many signs of corrosion. The unknown energy lingering on the battle suit was still looking for non-existent gaps in the battle suit as if it had life, trying to penetrate into the inside of the battle suit.
"The opponent's energy index has increased to a concentration that would alarm Terra. The injuries we inflicted on her with holy light healed very quickly under the influence of the newly emerged energy, especially that huge amount of energy, which caused us great trouble. If it weren't for the weapons and equipment you prepared for us, the team I lead would probably have suffered casualties." Snoke took the initiative to relay the battle situation without waiting for Luke to ask.
"Did she escape?" Luke asked thoughtfully.
"It shouldn't be said that she escaped. I feel that after using this power, she could hurt us. But she took the initiative to retreat after forcing us back. I feel that she didn't want to escape in the end, but wanted to avoid someone, or that the energy had some sequelae?" Snooker closed his eyes, recalled the scene of Ophelia Sarkissian's escape at the end, opened his eyes and gave his answer cautiously.
"Should we continue tracking her, Boss? I feel like it's going to be hard to track her anytime soon." They had completely lost track of her. The extremely dangerous energy still permeated the scene, severely impacting the effectiveness of various instruments. This made tracking her even more difficult, especially considering she was a master of hiding and escaping.
"You can return with your men." After listening to Snoke's report, Luke decisively ordered him to return. Giving up was impossible, but in this situation, Luke felt it was time to call in the help of a skilled tool. That's right, the diligent and hardworking Director of S.H.I.E.L.D.—Mr. Nick Fury.
As for Ophelia Sarkisian's final outburst, Luke speculated that perhaps she had instantly drawn upon a large amount of power from the Sithon dimension, breaching the cordon set by a certain bald mage. Luke couldn't guarantee that Madame Viper was unaware of the mages' presence.