2 chapters will be uploaded on daily basis i.e. 14 Chapters will be uploaded every week apart from the bonus chapters.
1 Bonus Chapter will be uploaded for every 50 Power Stones or 1000 Collections.
All interested readers can read advanced chapters on:
[email protected]/Heroicverse
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The night sky in Europe is as deep as ink, dotted with sparse stars.
Stark Industries' private jet was like a sharp blade, silently cutting through the clouds and flying steadily towards the heart of the continent.
Inside the cabin, the atmosphere was far less peaceful than the flight itself.
The chair used to restrain Bucky had been cleaned, along with the body that had just been destroyed, as if it had never existed. However, a faint smell of burning and a sense of heaviness still lingered in the air.
Tony wasn't drinking, which was quite unusual for him.
He was dressed in casual clothes, his legs crossed, leaning back on the soft leather sofa, his eyes vacantly staring out the porthole at the rapidly receding sea of clouds. His face, always adorned with confidence and arrogance, was now filled with only calmness.
Henry sat opposite him and also didn't speak.
He crossed his legs, holding a tablet in his hand, his fingers swiping across aimlessly. In fact, the screen had been automatically locked due to a long period of inactivity.
From time to time, he glanced at his brother, who was in autistic mode out of the corner of his eye; his lips moved as if he wanted to say something, but in the end, he swallowed back the complaints that were about to come out of his mouth.
Damn, this silent atmosphere is even more uncomfortable than fighting Thanos.
Finally, after swiping open the lock screen again and finding himself staring at Stark
Industries' latest quarterly financial statements, Henry couldn't bear it anymore.
"I say." He cleared his throat, breaking the suffocating silence.
"Could you please stop looking like you've just been dumped? Do you know that the way you look now could easily lead people who don't understand the situation to think that you have feelings beyond friendship for a one-armed refrigerator keeper?"
Tony's eyes finally moved. He slowly turned his head and looked at Henry as if he were a mentally retarded person.
This damn brother always contradicts him; it's outrageous!
"Refrigerator manager? You're so smart." His voice was a little hoarse.
"I'm just thinking about a very profound philosophical question. When an antique that should have been buried seventy years ago is forcibly thawed and given power that does not belong to him, is his existence itself a continuation of history or a blasphemy against history?"
"Oh, please." Henry rolled his eyes and exposed him mercilessly.
"You call that a philosophical question? You're clearly just wondering if you should slow down that palm cannon shot and play "Highway to Hell" in the background to make it more ceremonial."
The corners of Tony's mouth twitched.
"Vulgar," he commented succinctly.
"That's a disgrace to art. Revenge is a science. Every step, every angle, even the power output, should be calculated with the utmost precision. A primitive person like you who only knows how to smash things with brute force wouldn't understand."
"Really?" Henry raised his eyebrows and put down the tablet in his hand.
"Then, as a primitive man, I'm curious. What did you, a great scientist, feel after personally dismantling your father's legacy into its components? Were you sad that you'd had lost someone to reminisce with? Or were you glad that you no longer had to worry about him suddenly popping up and asking you to borrow money for hairspray?"
"Bang!"
Tony slammed the water cup in his hand onto the table. Although he controlled the strength, the sound still made the atmosphere in the cabin drop to freezing point in an instant.
"Shut up, Henry." Tony's voice lowered, and his eyes were now filled with suppressed anger and pain.
"You don't understand anything."
Henry looked at him, his clenched fists and slightly trembling shoulders, and said nothing more.
He knew that this guy had started his damn self-torture again.
Wrap yourself in a hard shell and pretend that you don't care about anything, but in fact, you care more than anyone else.
"Yes, I don't understand."
Henry sighed, leaning back on the couch, his tone softening.
"I don't understand why someone didn't open champagne to celebrate after finally killing the murderer of his father, but instead sat here alone and played deep. I also don't understand why someone who is obviously upset to death has to pretend that I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm just thinking about the origin of the universe." He paused, looked at Tony's still tense profile, and continued.
"All I know is that you just ended the tragedy of an era with your own hands. If Father and Mother saw you in this half-dead state, I bet they would be so angry that they would run down from heaven, slap you in the face, and call you a useless brat."
Tony's body stiffened suddenly.
Henry looked him in the eye without fear, his eyes calm and composed.
He slowly turned his head and stared at Henry.
The two brothers looked at each other in the silent cabin, and an invisible tension filled the air.
After a long time, so long that Henry thought this guy would rush up to fight with him, Tony's tense shoulders slowly relaxed.
"You're right." He whispered in a tired voice.
"I'm a good-for-nothing brat."
The silver bracelet wrapped around his right hand slipped off silently, revealing the hand underneath that was still trembling slightly.
He pressed the button himself and watched the man turn into ashes before him.
At that moment, he did not feel the slightest pleasure of revenge.
There was only a void, a void that seemed to swallow everything.
"Hey."
Henry frowned at his expression, stood up from his seat, and sat down.
To Tony's side.
He didn't say anything to comfort her, but just followed Tony's example and put his legs on the table in front of him, then took out two cans of iced cola from the car refrigerator next to him.
He snapped it open and handed a can to Tony.
"Have a drink." He said lightly.
"Sugar boosts dopamine, which helps soothe your rusty brain."
Tony didn't take it, but just looked at the can of steaming Coke and smiled self-deprecatingly.
"I thought you were going to give me a whiskey."
"And then let you, a drunkard, get yourself drunk naturally, and then hug my thighs and cry about your miserable childhood?" Henry complained bluntly.
"Oh, spare me. I don't want tomorrow's headlines to be 'Shocking! Iron Man got drunk late at night and did this to his own brother!' Stark Industries' stock price will drop to the limit."
Tony:....
He felt that the sadness that had just been brewing in him was instantly dissipated by this bastard.
He grabbed the Coke, pulled the ring, and took a big gulp.
The cold liquid slid down his throat, stimulating his nerves and clearing his confused brain a little.
"so..."
He put down the Coke and looked at Henry, his eyes regaining some of their usual brilliance.
"What are we playing now? A post-war psychological counselling game? I have to warn you, your dialogue skills are terrible. It won't immerse the guests at all."
"What do you think?" Henry also took a sip of Coke and said lazily.
"You, as a customer, are incredibly uncooperative. Wouldn't a normal person at this moment hug me and cry bitterly, then swear never to waste money again and hand over all their pocket money to me, your wise and powerful brother, for safekeeping?"
"Dream on." Tony sneered.
"My money is invested in inventions that change the world, not in the latest black tights for you. Honestly, your aesthetic is a disaster. Do you think that just changing the colour to black will make everything cool? Why don't you paint your face black too?"
"That's better than some people." Henry immediately counterattacked.
"At least I'm not dressing up like a moving traffic light, afraid people won't know I'm rich. Red and gold? Oh my god, are you cosplaying the McDonald's mascot?"
"That's called a classic colour scheme! It's art! You have a Stone Age aesthetic!"
"Oh? Really? Then explain why your arc reactor design looks like a donut? Are you announcing your love of junk food to the world?"
"That's for stability and energy output efficiency! You..."
The atmosphere in the cabin gradually returned to normal as the two brothers engaged in meaningless bickering.