"The Avengers?" he said.
"Long time no see, Frank, say hi to Matt and Deadpool for me." Greed stepped forward and looked at him, "This is no longer Dracula's estate. He immigrated a few days ago and sold the house to me."
Upon seeing Greed, the man referred to as Frank slightly relaxed his expression. He silently put the gun back in the holster and then said, "Dracula immigrated? Where did he go?"
"Shi'ar Empire." After a pause, Greed continued, "You should also know he won't last long."
"He told me he had a solution," Frank's expression darkened again, "I didn't expect his solution was to bring you all here. But you haven't resolved any problems."
"So you just shot at us without a word and barged into someone else's home, solving what problem exactly?" Steve didn't coddle him at all. He took the shield from Bucky's hand, walked around the sofa and went straight to Frank, asking, "Captain Cassel? Are you from the Marine Corps?"
"Captain America?" Frank looked Steve up and down. This certainly wasn't their first meeting, but they were indeed not very familiar with each other.
"You better give me an explanation." Steve tapped a few times on the shield; his patience was really running out. And he was even the most good-tempered Captain America across the Multiverse. If it were others, a shield would have been swung over by now.
"Someone told me there was trouble again in Hampton, so I came over to find trouble with Dracula because he told me he could solve it."
"So the person maintaining order in Hampton is you?" Stark narrowed his eyes and said, "What relationship do you have with here?"
"Does Hampton's anomaly have anything to do with you?" Frank didn't respond to Stark's question but looked at Greed instead.
"You should know, Hampton's anomaly has nothing to do with outsiders. If Dracula promised you a solution, then we might really be his solution."
"So how do you plan to solve it?"
"You are our solution."
Frank took a deep breath: "If I could solve it, then I wouldn't need to count on Dracula anymore."
"I'm more curious, how you got involved in this." Arrogant suddenly spoke, "What's your connection to Hampton?"
Frank slowly turned his head, because he heard a voice similar to Greed's but with a completely different tone, so he wanted to see who was speaking. But at the moment he saw Arrogant, his hand on the gun tightened again.
"Who are you?" Frank asked him.
"Shiller," Arrogant replied.
Frank's gaze lingered a little between Greed and Arrogant, but finally settled on Arrogant: "You look a lot like some of them, but you're much more dangerous."
Greed knew Frank was referring to the upper-class people in Hampton. The temperament of Hampton indeed somewhat resembled Gotham, so it was normal that Arrogant had some similarities with the upper-class people here.
With a "whoosh" sound, the red-and-blue shield flew past Frank's ear and embedded directly into the wall. Frank turned back to dodge Captain America's punch and retaliated with a sweeping kick. Steve skillfully dodged, while Bucky provided support from the side and kicked Frank to the ground.
Falling to the ground, Frank drew his gun and aimed, and as the bullet shot out, a figure flashed in front of the bullet and stretched out a hand, catching the bullet. The magic flame glimmered, and ashes dissipated like smoke through his fingers.
"Enough." Strange looked at them indifferently and said, "If you keep fighting, I'll throw you all out."
Clearly, neither Steve nor Frank were people who could deal with magic. They temporarily ceased fighting, but the atmosphere was still extremely tense.
"For the sake of Murdoch the lawyer." Greed had to step in to mediate, "Let's all talk about what's really going on here."
Steve took a glance at Greed's expression and immediately understood that bringing this guy out wasn't in Greed's plan. Or rather, no one would have thought that Frank Castle also had ties to Hampton.
However, upon reconsideration, if not for the heavy and sharp guillotine of maintaining order hanging over Hampton, the upper-class people wouldn't be so restrained. Frank's kind of unreasonable and extreme violent means, if directed towards weaker individuals, would indeed seem excessive; but if targeted at these lawless, bottom-lined immoral wealthy folk, it would seem less radical.
Thinking of this, Steve's expression relaxed. He gently sighed and proactively walked over, extending a hand saying, "I've heard a lot about you, Punisher."
Frank looked him up and down, and although his expression was still tense, he reached out and shook hands with him: "Not bad, Captain America."
They finally sat down for a chat. Natasha still lay on the sofa. She had woken up long ago but was too lazy to get involved, glanced back at the Punisher, and sat up to give him space.
The group all sat on the sofa, and Greed went to grab a few cans of cold beer. Frank took a can, opened it, and gulped down a big mouthful, then said, "I do have a concern about Hampton's affairs, but it's only for revenge."
The Punisher and Night Devil are good friends, and Greed and Night Devil also have a good relationship, so his relationship with the Punisher is decent as well. However, Frank has a bad temperament, so the two of them can merely talk to each other.
Frank Castle became the Punisher because he witnessed mob lynchings in the past and his family was brutally murdered, prompting him to vow revenge for his family and eliminate crime by the strictest means.
Unexpectedly, his journey of vengeance brought him to Hampton. Hampton doesn't have any mobsters; its residents have long since freed themselves from the era of remote mob exploitation for primitive capital accumulation, with some families gaining wealth as early as the Civil War era. It hardly seems related to the Punisher's family vendetta.
"Back then, the Chief Justice of the Federal Court who acquitted the mob was from the Heli family, and their estate is located in East Hampton."
Stark paused in his action: "No wonder in the past twenty years, seven or eight of their family members died in accidents. Those were your doing, right?"
"If I wanted to kill them, it wouldn't be an accident," Frank said. "I would nail them to the pillar of shame, then execute them, so they understand what a grave mistake they made back then."
"So you came to Hampton because you were targeting the Heli family?"
"That's right," Frank said. "Initially, I did want to kill them, but it's not easy and requires years of surveillance and meticulous planning. I spent over half a year investigating everything here and then realized this place is more complicated than I thought."
"Did you discover the ghosts?" Stark asked.
"Sort of," Frank took a sip of cold beer. "To investigate here, you need a base. The forest at the back of this house is the only undeveloped wild area. I pitched a tent there and spent my time surveilling the family aside from eating and sleeping."
"But soon, I started seeing shadows in the forest. Initially, I didn't believe they were ghosts and just thought I was too tired, but soon I realized something was really off about this place. The second youngest daughter of the Heli family flew six stories high right in front of me and fell to her death."
"At the time, I suspected a superpower user committing the crime, perhaps a mutant or something. But what truly made me realize this place was off was Dracula taking away a child from another family present at the scene. I broke into his estate when he was about to drain the child's blood."
"The Heli family is my enemy, but that child was not. I attacked Dracula, but he subdued me. He told me he was saving Hampton by doing so. I didn't believe him at first, but Dracula released the child... and within a month, the child's family died one by one. His parents drowned, and the child was impaled by rebar at a construction site. These accidents were highly abnormal and didn't seem like the work of superpower users."
"I began to seriously consider whether Dracula was merely deflecting blame for his crimes. I conducted a lot of research and started experiments. It turned out this was a cursed land."
"During my investigation, many local people recognized me, albeit in a rather unfriendly manner. Dracula seemed to believe I could serve as a threat to reduce his workload, so he agreed to help me take revenge on the Heli family, while I occasionally assisted him in handling those who went too far."
"Two months ago, during my last patrol, I noticed something wrong with the atmosphere here. I went to find Dracula, but he said he could handle it. The next news I received about Hampton was a message from an informant at the police station, telling me Hampton was completely done."
"How did he contact you?" Steve frowned and asked, "There shouldn't be any phone signal here."
"I don't know, he called me," the Punisher said, "just moments ago, about a dozen minutes ago."
Greed looked at Steve and said, "The police station must have already released the news of Augustus' confession, which indeed helps people resist illusions. Possibly due to this seesaw effect, the ghost blockade weakened."
Coulson also took out his phone and found that communication had indeed resumed, incoming calls were normal. But this wasn't actually good news, because if these people start calling for reinforcements, contact the military or the Federal Bureau of Investigation, or mobilize the media, this matter will certainly blow up, making the aftermath uncontrollable.
"Did you see anything when you came?" Stark asked.
"Several planes from the Federal Bureau of Investigation were flying here," Frank paused before saying, "but they seem unable to enter. The anomalies here only affect those who know part of the truth."
Greed understood, like Peter before, who knew nothing about this place and couldn't breach the blockade to enter Hampton. Frank could come in because he knew many things.
These wealthy people wanting to seek help from the outside definitely wouldn't use the real reason. They also fear the social death if things blow up. They might use excuses like power outages to call people, but those called in wouldn't be able to enter.
Even if they're desperate enough to talk about the haunting, they would absolutely never tell people why the place is haunted or what guilty deeds they've done. Without this knowledge, support will always be locked outside the door.
"Serves them right." Bucky remarked.
"To be honest, Frank, our plan is like this..." Greed briefly explained his plan, then said, "The problem now is these people are too weak, afraid they'll be killed by ghosts before they emotionally collapse. We need a leader to organize them, providing emotional reliance and support, at least until the banquet starts."
"I won't help these heartless bastards." Frank, evidently knowing quite a bit, coldly refused.
"Don't rush. Perhaps you've heard about the concept of killing minds before bodies. First give them hope, then let them fall into deeper despair, it's the best revenge for them, right?"
Seeing Frank's expression soften somewhat, Greed pushed further: "I assure you, after this banquet, there will be no more Heli in the world."
"I want to do it myself."
"Deal."