Chapter 214 "I Found You!"

Anton appeared to be just an ordinary person, but the forces behind him were not to be underestimated.

Although he had no authority to interfere with the NYPD, the good relationship between the Justice League and George, coupled with Anton being drawn into the incident, made George and the others willing to heed Anton "friendly advice."

Truth be told, without Anton, it would have been difficult for the NYPD and the Continental Hotel to establish a deeper connection.

As Anton had said, this was an opportunity.

An opportunity to completely cleanse New York and establish order.

After pondering for a moment, George led the NYPD to act swiftly.

The news of Kingpin return brought a sense of urgency, as if another storm was about to sweep through New York.

Watching George leave, Anton got into his car and drove away from Wayne Enterprises.

On the road, while driving, he pulled out his phone and made a call to Winston at the Continental Hotel.

"Anton?"

Winston sounded a bit nervous and said, "I just heard you were attacked. I can assure you this has nothing to do with the Continental Hotel."

"I know."

Anton replied, "The reason I'm calling is to inform you that Kingpin is back. You need to cooperate with the NYPD to locate him."

"What?!"

Winston was shocked.

The sudden news left even a seasoned schemer like Winston momentarily speechless.

"Kingpin… How did he escape?"

Winston furrowed his brows. "How could S.H.I.E.L.D. have let him get away?"

"It not that simple."

Anton said, "All you need to do is work with the NYPD to locate Kingpin. Leave the rest to us."

"Understood."

Winston grasped the significance of this call and solemnly promised, "The Continental Hotel will give it our all."

"Good."

After hanging up, Anton arrived at a location in Brooklyn.

This was the safe house mentioned by Electro.

Creak—

Anton pushed the door open and walked inside.

Before entering, he glanced up at the surveillance camera above the doorway. He smirked at the camera, as if to say, I've found you!

This was an empty room, with two monitors hanging on the walls, currently in standby mode.

"I know you're here."

Anton stood in the center of the safe house, looking at the monitors in front of him, and said calmly,

"Since you can hack into the city cameras and deduce my route, you must have figured out my purpose while I was on my way here."

Dr. Zola, as a digital entity, could theoretically connect to any computer.

However, being a digital life form was slightly different from artificial intelligence; he wouldn't necessarily appear recklessly.

Dr. Zola would only show himself in a place he deemed safe.

This safe house was Hydra territory.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, Dr. Zola likely wouldn't miss the chance to communicate with Anton.

[Hello, Anton Jameson.]

Click!

Suddenly, the monitors in front of Anton lit up, and a dialogue window popped up.

"Hello."

Anton was unsurprised at the sight and said, "Targeting me this time wasn't a spur-of-the-moment decision, was it, Dr. Zola?"

After he finished speaking, the figure on the screen—Dr. Zola—remained silent for a long time.

It wasn't until Anton started to grow impatient that another line of text appeared in the dialogue window on the screen.

[You are indeed very well-informed about us.]

Clearly, Dr. Zola was quite astonished.

He hadn't expected Anton to know so much about his identity and call it out so casually.

"Hmph!"

Anton snorted coldly.

"I've long been aware of Hydra secrets. I wasn't planning to meddle in your disputes with S.H.I.E.L.D., but you made the critical mistake of targeting me."

[Hydra has already been exposed. It was Batman who tipped off S.H.I.E.L.D. The one who crossed the line was Batman.]

"If it was Batman doing, then of course, you should be looking for him."

Anton replied, "It seems you couldn't find Batman, so you decided to use me as the scapegoat."

[You...]

[You're stalling for time?!]

[Cyborg! It Cyborg! @#￥%&%￥#@!]

Suddenly, the monitors displayed a large amount of garbled text.

Anton lips curved upward.

"Just figured it out?"

He sneered. "Looks like you, as a digital entity, aren't all that impressive after all."

At this moment, on the rooftop of the Brooklyn apartment building where Anton was located, Cyborg stood against the evening breeze blowing from above.

His expression was calm, his electronic eye flickering faintly, as countless streams of data flashed through his mind.

Cyborg had immersed himself in the digital world, cracked Dr. Zola firewall, and taken control of him.

"Hmm?"

Suddenly, Cyborg frowned. "Replicated code... It a copy! No wonder he survived so long—he extremely cautious."

…

Cyborg findings were shared directly with Anton mind.

Anton immediately understood the results of Cyborg work.

The Dr. Zola he had been conversing with was merely a smart program, a fragment or "avatar" left behind by the real Dr. Zola.

This fragment didn't share data with the main entity. The main entity would periodically retrieve its fragments, review the data, and deploy new ones.

Thus, erasing this fragment wouldn't impact the real Dr. Zola.

From what Anton knew, Dr. Zola main body was likely an old computer from the last century.

All of Dr. Zola brain data resided within that giant computer.

To eliminate Dr. Zola, one would first need to locate his main body and prevent him from transferring his brain data to resurrect himself.

This was, admittedly, a troublesome endeavor.

Fortunately, Dr. Zola was merely a digital life form, not true artificial intelligence.

Given Dr. Zola limitations, he could never evolve into something like "Ultron."

With Cyborg assistance, completely sealing off Dr. Zola wasn't out of the realm of possibility.

"The old man and the others are already on the plane, escorted by the military. Their safety isn't a concern for now.

Hydra primary target is me they wouldn't waste time provoking the military for no reason…

Waging battles on multiple fronts would be a significant burden for them as well. Hydra isn't that foolish!"

In the room, through Cyborg perspective, Anton observed the real-time status of the old man and the others.

After a moment of contemplation, he left the safe house and drove home.

On the way, his brow furrowed slightly.

Although the overall situation had become clear, there was still one critical question Anton hadn't answered.

The ultimate target of Hydra wasn't really Anton, but Batman—hidden in the shadows and impossible to find.

Anton had successfully separated his public identity from that of Batman.

Using his decoy abilities, he had largely cleared himself of suspicion as Batman.

Batman had fully retreated into mystery.

Evidently, Hydra had been searching everywhere and expending tremendous effort to locate Batman, only to come up empty-handed.

As a result, they shifted focus to Anton, who was perceived as Batman proxy, in hopes of drawing out the real Batman.

Unexpectedly, their plan backfired, and they ended up provoking Wonder Woman instead.

The question remained: given Batman formidable track record, how could Hydra be so confident they could defeat and kill him?

Where did Hydra confidence come from?

…

On the rooftop, Cyborg was surfing the internet, diving into various internal channels, and even silently infiltrating the databases of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the military.

Soon, Cyborg ceased his needle-in-a-haystack search.

He directly hacked into S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters, taking control of Alexander Pierce computer.

Alexander Pierce—the former director of S.H.I.E.L.D. and now its Secretary-General—was a high-ranking figure second only to the founding members of the agency.

His current authority rivaled that of Nick Fury, and it was widely believed that Nick Fury was a mere front, a facade to conceal Pierce true identity.

Most of the time, even Nick Fury communications with the World Security Council were facilitated through Pierce.

No one would have suspected that Pierce was, in fact, a leader of Hydra.

After a few minutes, Cyborg found an interesting classified document on Pierce computer.

Nano-worm technology!

The classified document described nano-worms as a medical innovation originally designed to dismantle the structure of all viruses within the human body.

Later, someone had a sudden inspiration to repurpose the technology for weapon development. They persuaded the military to invest over ten billion dollars, eventually producing four nano-worm warheads.

These four nano-worm warheads held a status equivalent to high-yield nuclear warheads and were stored in the world most secure weapon storage facility.

Of course, besides the dangerous nano-worm warheads, someone also developed nano-worm bullets.

These bullets were extremely expensive to produce, so their quantity was limited.

In test footage, a single small nano-worm bullet could easily devour a tank, completely breaking it down.

For technological civilizations, these bullets posed a lethal threat.

Batman was a man in armor!

Hydra evidently believed that nano-worm bullets were Batman nemesis, the most likely means to defeat and kill him.

According to military intelligence, the nano-worm warheads and bullets were stolen by a group of terrorists about three days ago.

The military investigation uncovered some information about this terrorist faction.

They called themselves "Cobra."

…

"So this is your confidence... Nano-worm bullets, nano-worm warheads, and the Cobra organization!"

After returning home, Anton reflected on this information.

Cobra!

Hydra!

"Who would've thought these two scumbags would end up working together!"

Anton wasn't surprised, just a bit intrigued.

This was clearly reminiscent of the G.I. Joe movie plot, where the Cobra organization sought to use nano-worm warheads for terrorist attacks against major nations.

But in this world, the so-called Cobra organization seemed to have been absorbed by Hydra, becoming one of Hydra many heads.

As a result, the plan to use nano-worm warheads to attack global capitals had shifted to targeting Batman instead.

"Things are much simpler than I thought!"

Anton eyes turned icy. "In that case, let start by cutting off one of your heads and see what other tricks you've got up your sleeve."

Washington, S.H.I.E.L.D. Headquarters.

Creaaak—

The door to Alexander Pierce office was suddenly pushed open.

The man who walked into the room was, of course, Pierce himself.

He had just received news from New York, along with a secret communication from Dr. Zola, informing him that the safe house in New York had been discovered and that the enemy had made new moves. Pierce frowned slightly.

The plan to use Anton to draw out Batman had failed!

It was stuck at the very first step!

Pierce, however, wasn't too concerned. He had anticipated this outcome and had already prepared follow-up plans.

In any case, Batman had to be eliminated.

No one knew exactly how much Batman knew about Hydra.

As a superhero, Batman behavioral analysis had led Hydra leadership to a consensus: he was impossible to recruit. That left only one option—elimination.

Tap, tap, tap!

As Pierce pondered, he walked to his computer. Glancing absentmindedly at the screen, his face suddenly darkened, and he instinctively clenched his fist.

On his computer screen was the Batman logo.

Accompanied by a single sentence:

[I found you!]