After saying goodbye to Harry Osborn, Damian and Peter Parker followed the group of Midtown High School students and officially entered the Columbia University campus under the guidance of Mr. Jackson.
Peter Parker walked at the back of the group, taking in everything around him with wide-eyed curiosity. The shutter of his camera clicked almost nonstop.
He pointed toward a neoclassical building in the distance and excitedly explained to Damian:
"That's Butler Library! It holds over two million books! I heard there's even a rare book room underground—with copies of the Dead Sea Scrolls!"
Damian nodded politely, though he had no idea what the Dead Sea Scrolls were.
He glanced casually at the mix of Gothic architecture and modern research buildings scattered across campus—like a cow chewing on a peony, appreciating the beauty without truly understanding it.
Well… still not as impressive as Harbin Pharmaceutical Factory No. 6!
Sunlight filtered through the leafy canopy onto the stone pathways. On a nearby lawn, clusters of students debated ideas animatedly, their voices blending into a rich, peaceful hum of academic life.
Student advisor Mr. Jackson led the group past several historic classroom buildings and finally stopped in front of a sleek, silver-gray structure: the Columbia University Center for Biological Sciences Research.
"This is today's main attraction," he announced. "Please remain quiet and do not touch any equipment."
He swiped his access card to open the glass door, then turned to address the group of wide-eyed teenagers behind him with mock seriousness.
"Alright, no monkey business."
Crack…
The door slid open, and the students filed in one by one.
As Damian stepped into the lab area, a faint scent of disinfectant greeted him.
Transparent observation windows lined both sides of the corridor, offering views into labs where researchers worked intently at their stations.
The interior was spacious and divided into several functional zones:
To the left was the cell culture area, filled with rows of temperature-controlled incubators.
To the right stood the molecular biology benches, equipped with PCR machines, electrophoresis tanks, and other advanced instruments.
But the centerpiece was the FEI Titan Krios electron microscope in the central zone—its streamlined casing gleaming with a cool, metallic sheen under the lab lights.
Peter Parker pointed to the microscope and whispered excitedly to Damian:
"This is one of the highest-resolution electron microscopes on the East Coast—capable of imaging at 0.14 nanometers!"
Just then, a familiar voice came from behind them.
Everyone turned to see Gwen Stacy standing in the doorway, wearing a crisp white lab coat, her blonde hair tied back in a neat ponytail, a tablet in hand.
Peter's eyes lit up instantly. "Gwen?! What are you doing here?"
Gwen smiled warmly at the sight of Peter and Damian. "I enrolled in Columbia's pre-college program last semester and am now an intern assistant to Professor Connors."
She paused, as if remembering her role, cleared her throat lightly, and gestured for the group to follow. "Today, I'll be showing you our lab's latest project—gene-edited spiders!"
She led them deeper into the facility, to the arthropod research section.
On a specialized workbench sat fifteen temperature-controlled incubators, each housing a vividly colored spider.
"These are Araneus diadematus—European garden spiders—modified using CRISPR-Cas9 gene-editing technology," Gwen explained. "We enhanced the expression of their silk protein genes, making their silk more than three times stronger than standard Kevlar fibers."
She tapped her tablet, and a set of data appeared on the wall-mounted screen.
"In theory, this bioengineered silk could be used to create ultra-lightweight body armor or biodegradable surgical sutures—it naturally breaks down in the human body and doesn't trigger immune rejection."
Peter Parker leaned in to observe the box, nearly pressing his face against the glass. He stared at one of the mutant spiders—its body marked with vivid blue and black patterns—with an almost obsessive intensity and asked:
"What about this blue-and-black one? Is there anything special about it?"
"That's a variant engineered with a fluorescent protein tag," Gwen Stacy explained. "It's mainly used to track the transmission pathways of neurotoxins. But it's highly toxic, so you'd better not get too close."
At that, Peter instantly leapt back several meters and glared at the spider with disgust.
After the explanation, Gwen announced the start of the free tour session.
Hearing this, Peter immediately wiped his face—realizing he'd nearly touched the glass—and hurried over to her, bombarding her with questions:
"How do you solve the mass production problem for spider silk? Could gene editing cause behavioral abnormalities in the spiders? And what would happen if those genes were introduced into mammalian cells?"
Gwen raised her eyebrows, her expression one of genuine surprise—like Boya meeting Ziqi—and smiled.
"It seems… you know a lot~"
As she spoke, she powered on the display of a nearby microscope.
"We're currently trying to express spider silk proteins in the mammary glands of transgenic goats," she said, "but the yield is still too low. Of course, there are other approaches…"
...
Watching the lively exchange between the two, Damian lingered at the back of the group, his eyes fixed on an incubator in the corner.
Inside, a spider—entirely black except for strange blue-purple markings on its abdomen—sat motionless. Its eight compound eyes gleamed with a metallic sheen under the lab lights.
Unlike the docile specimens elsewhere, this one vibrated its web at an unnaturally high frequency, as if seized by a fit.
"It seems… you're the singularity where all the stories begin," Damian murmured, his eyes burning with intensity.
If he hadn't traveled through time and space—if he hadn't acquired that mysterious orb of light embedded in his brain—he would have come here without hesitation and let this mutant spider bite him.
True, thanks to the Spider Totem, there was a high chance he'd die instantly. This was the Marvel universe, after all—ordinary people died easily, no matter what they did.
But rather than perish for no reason, he might as well gamble on fate.
"Hello! Why is there no spider in this box?"
Suddenly, a girl wearing glasses pointed at an empty incubator and called out to Gwen Stacy.
Gwen hurried over, glanced inside, and frowned.
"Hmm… maybe another researcher took it. I'll go check with them right away. In the meantime, feel free to explore the rest of the lab."
With that, she turned and headed toward the lab director's office.
Damian glanced from the empty incubator to the twitching spider before him. A look of disdain crossed his face—as if to say, They're full of energy, but you're just mentally unstable. He whispered under his breath:
"Now that the atmosphere's so awkward… are you satisfied?"