CH 7: The Thief of Oz

After landing on the Oscorp Tower, Marcus prepared his EMP, he set the radius to cover only ten floors at a time. Marcus couldn't cover the whole building at once because the EMP could only be deployed in a spherical area, if he decided to cover the whole building, many nearby buildings would also be affected and would bring unwanted attention.

So Marcus played it safe and slowly went down the building, deploying EMP after every ten floors.

Sometime After searching, Marcus was able to find and reach the basement door. It was quite well hidden if he didn't perform a deep scan on the ground floor, he wouldn't even know there was a hidden door here.

Although the door was made of 8 inches thick stainless steel, Marcus was able to cut through it like it was butter, by using his high-density laser beams. Yeah, it was the same one Tony Stark used in Iron Man 2 against the drones. Marcus was successful in developing it after many trials and errors, but it was still quite crude, especially in its optimization. Judging from the fact that it used nearly 35% of the reactor's energy reserves.

Marcus entered the basement through the hole and followed the stairs to the Oscorp Project room. There, he saw different equipment such as the Green Goblin's glider and bombs, Rhino's armored suit, Dr. Ock's mechanical arms, and other projects Oscorp was working on. But he wasn't here for these things, after all, given time, he could develop a far better version of this equipment.

Marcus quickly made his way to the computer sitting in the corner, he jabbed his USB drive in the CPU and booted it up. Wasting no time, with the help of No. 2, Marcus found the files he was looking for, the Oz serum.

Marcus downloaded them all and took the equipment blueprints as a bonus. He also decided to take many vials of the serum and destroy the remaining ones he couldn't take.

He also left a backdoor in the system in case he needed anything from here in the future.

After completing the heist with ease, Marcus made his way to the rooftop and flew back towards his mansion. He landed a bit far from his mansion so that it won't alert the guards and he could easily sneak past the security and back into his room again.

Marcus didn't waste any time and instantly started to review the Oz formula, after going through it, again and again, for the whole night. Marcus was still unable to figure out the problem, if it was any other person, he would have already injected the serum, but because of Marcus' past life knowledge, he knows that it isn't anywhere near completion.

The next day, Marcus called the Black Flame Mercenaries and ordered them to secure a base somewhere safe and hidden and he also gave them a list of equipment to collect.

"What about the money, boss? I don't think we have enough to buy all these things." Jude replied.

"Don't worry about the money, I will transfer it to your account, give me your bank details and the money will be sent in a few minutes." Marcus could use No. 3 to transfer the money anonymously into any bank account.

After talking with Jude, Marcus didn't have much left to do, so he decided to practice his skills, especially his telekinesis. Although he used it daily while working in his lab, he didn't use it to do any complex operations, like assembling different things.

Suddenly, an idea popped up in Marcus' mind, what if he could use his telekinesis along with whatever he was doing, it would be like two of him working at the same time. And it could help in battles too.

Marcus got the idea for his next skill, "System search for Parallel Thought skill."

{SEARCHING…. PARALLEL THOUGHT…SKILL FOUND.}

{DOES THE USER WANT TO LEARN THE SKILL?}

"Yes, transfer the information directly to my brain."

Marcus decided to try his skills by doing two things at the same time. He started to draw using his right hand and used his left hand to solve a complex physics problem.

Although it was hard at first, Marcus was able to slowly get the hang of it, which also increased his mastery of the skill.

After a week, Marcus was able to use the Parallel Thought skill comfortably. His skill mastery had reached the 10% mark in just a week, mainly because the skill was supplemented by his intelligence and meditation mastery, which made his proficiency go up faster than normal.

As Marcus was working on the Oz formula while arranging his lab, his phone rang.

"Jude, I guess the arrangements are complete then."

"Yes sir, I will email you the address, also the subjects you asked for, I have got them. They are all here. Some tried to escape but we recaptured them, and they are nicely tied up and unconscious."

"Very well, I will visit at night. Meanwhile, keep an eye on them and I don't mind if you guys use the money to add a gaming console in your rooms. After all, you guys would get bored, sitting here for the whole day."

"Hahaha! Thanks, Boss Marcus, you're the best. I will inform the others about your generosity."

Marcus cut the call and went back to his work.

He had revealed his identity after the seed of loyalty had fully sprouted and the mercenaries had become his loyal underlings. And the subjects that Marcus had asked Jude and others to capture were the scums of society, the criminals who were still roaming free on the streets.

The night came and Marcus sneaked out of the Mansion and made his way to the parked car which was being driven by Michael.

Marcus knocked on the glasses and Michael, who was munching on some Cheetos, hurriedly wiped his hands and came out of the car.

"Umm, Boss! I was waiting for you for quite a while so I decided to eat some snacks while waiting. Here are the ones you ordered, I didn't touch any of them, I swear."

Marcus laughed at Michael's antics, "C'mon Michael I am not going to scold you over some snacks. Alright let's go quickly, I guess you are also missing out on your games."

"Ah, you are right, I am missing out on playing GTA San Andreas, but that damn train mission has pissed me off, "All you had to do was follow the damn train CJ." Fucker, you are the one who can't shoot."

"Alright, let's go, and maybe if I get some free time, I could help you pass that mission."

"Cool, Boss you're the best."

Marcus and Michael drove to the hidden base, after driving for half an hour they finally stopped in front of a dilapidated house.

"Don't worry boss, the real deal's in the basement, the outside makes it the perfect hidden base location."

"I know that much Michael, I am not dumb. Alright, lead the way."

Michael gave an awkward smile and led Marcus to the basement door, he opened it and both went downstairs.

And truly, the scenery downstairs was far different from upstairs, Marcus could see a long hallway with doors on both sides.

"Boss, your lab is at the end of the hallway on the right, that's the biggest room, so we arranged that to be the lab room. Although I don't know if the arrangement of the equipment is up to your standard."

"Alright, tell Jude and others not to interrupt me, By the way, where are the subjects at?"

"Oh, they are in your lab, and the Vats you wanted are also prepared, they are made of heavy bulletproof glass with their frames being made of titanium, just like you asked."

"Very well, I will be on my way then."

After that, Marcus turned around and made his way to the laboratory.

The lab was neatly organized, and the four subjects were tied by a chain in the corner and were unconscious.

Marcus took out the Oz serum from his pocket and safely put it in a container. Next, he prepared the vat by filling it with loads of distilled water. After that, he added the nutrient solution he had prepared after estimating the energy required for the Oz serum to mutate the genes of the user.

Essentially, the user needed to have an enormous amount of nutrition and energy stored in their body to survive the rapid cell division and the mutation of genes. It wasn't possible to just jam a syringe up your arm and get superpowers.

After the nutrient solution was prepared, Marcus used his telekinesis to pick up one of the chained subjects, undress him and submerge him inside the vat. He also put a breathing tube in his mouth, as to not drown him. Different monitoring equipment was also connected to him to keep an eye on his vitals.

Next, he prepared the serum in a syringe and injected it into the subject. The serum glowed green as it made its way through his nerves. And then the subject was submerged back in the solution.

Almost instantly the monitors started to Indicate an exponential increase in heart rate and blood pressure. And the subject started to show more and more physical responses, his body started to jerk and after a few seconds, his eyes flew open.

Marcus didn't waste any time and used his telekinesis to hold down the man. The man had started thrashing around even more violently, but his body was still being held down by Marcus.

Finally, after a few minutes of thrashing around, the man went back to normal, although his blood pressure and heart rate were still higher than normal they were stable.

Marcus extracted the naked man out of the vat and held him mid-air. But the first thing he decided to do was, explore his mind to see whether he had the same problem as Norman Osborne or not.

Marcus focused on the man in front of him and entered his mind. The first thing Marcus saw was absolute darkness and then…he heard a chilling voice, "Well well well, Look who's here…"