Lord of Cinder in American Comics

"Five to ten years is needed for the delicate operation of the brain's control system, and it requires a series of clinical trials..."

Melina explained the process to Constantine, who did not object. After all, it involved clinical trials, and Constantine, with his knowledge and experience, understood the risks involved.

How many people here need to be released from control?

Constantine confirmed the number of Black Widows in the Red Room, while Melina operated the table, showing Constantine the current personnel distribution and structural composition of the Red Room.

Looking at the hundreds of Black Widows and the thousands of combatants involved, as well as the small country that had already been brought under control.

The involvement of millions of people completely shattered Constantine's original plan to work for two days while Melina developed an antidote.

Staring at Melina, Constantine could tell that Melina was hiding some things, but on a spiritual level she wasn't lying.

Rubbing his head, Constantine relented and said, "Let me make a call and ask; maybe there's a solution."

"Hey, I need some to heal my tears. Okay, I got it. I'll open the door for you right away."

After saying that, Constantine opened a portal, and Ash walked over from the other side.

Natasha then questioned Constantine's portal, asking, "Didn't you say it couldn't be opened?"

“I said we must be synchronized and stationary. Right now, I’m one with this platform, while Ash is in a fixed position. Why can’t we be?”

After explaining to Natasha, Constantine went to Ash's side.

With Melina, Alexei, Natasha, and others watching, the soliloquy had to continue.

"Where is he? Is this the one?"

After looking around, Ash quickly focused her attention on Taskmaster, who was standing still.

"Uh...she's one of them?"

Hearing this, Ash looked puzzled and asked, "Then gather everyone together so I can cast a spell to remove the control..."

Upon hearing this, Melina and Natasha both turned their faces away, as if it had nothing to do with them and they made no attempt to explain.

Seeing this, Constantine could only offer a plausible explanation. He glanced at the display screen and said, "There are 412 people now. The rest will be counted gradually..."

This number made Ash grab Constantine by the collar and say excitedly, "What did you say? Do you dare say it again?"

Constantine, who was being held by the collar, pointed his finger at the numbers on the display screen.

The two stopped moving, and in the end, Ash put Constantine down.

"Now you owe me a favor..."

Ash, his face dark, paced around the office before finally snatching a bottle of vodka from Alexei's hand.

"Hey! That's mine..."

No one cared about Alexei's opinions; everyone's attention was on Ash.

Ash shook the holy bell, and blue droplets of water scattered from beneath it, merging into the vodka.

As the spell continued, the vodka slowly turned into a sky-blue liquid.

The entire spellcasting lasted a full half hour. Ash wiped the sweat from her forehead and reluctantly handed the half-bottle of Healing Tears to Constantine.

"An average person only needs one drop. This half-bottle contains about 600 milliliters, which should be enough for you!"

Taking the bottle, Constantine smiled and opened a new portal for Ash, bowing slightly towards it.

Ash gritted her teeth and forced out the words, "Remember, you owe me a favor..."

As Melina watched Ash pass through the portal until it disappeared, she couldn't believe that things had been resolved just like that.

Melina felt she had incurred a huge favor, and this favor was owed to Ash, the angelic priest. The supernatural world made her wonder if her probing had gone too far.

But when the bottle of blue liquid was handed to Melina, she instantly banished that thought from her mind. She could worry about the rest later; at worst, she could pay for Ash's life.

Finally, the matter came to an end, and the first person to be released from control was Antonia, Drekoff's daughter.

After being released from control, Antonia still vividly remembered what Natasha had done, but compared to her father's cruel methods, the explosion Natasha had caused seemed rather childish.

However, Antonia did not choose to completely forgive Natasha. Although she lacked free will, she also saw who was behind the whole thing.

Antonia then put her mask back on and stood behind Constantine.

Constantine said nothing about this approach; after all, in dire straits, everyone wants to grasp at a straw. To reject Antonia now would be to extinguish her hope and send her sinking.

Like a scumbag, Constantine adhered to the principle of neither refusing nor taking the initiative, and resumed his smoking and waiting-to-die attitude, putting his legs up on the desk and smoking one cigarette after another.

Antonia was like a diligent assistant, constantly emptying the ashtray next to Constantine.

Until the rest of the Black Widows found Constantine.

"Thank you, sir."

Ever since the first Black Widow appeared to express her gratitude, such thanks have been continuous, leaving Constantine helplessly to cover his head with a newspaper, leaving only a hole for smoking.

This led to the scene of the Black Widows lining up, expressing their gratitude as if saying goodbye to a corpse, except for the somewhat rough shroud covering the body and the constantly being smoked cigarettes.

---------

After Ash returned to the Control Bureau, he looked at the situation on Constantine's side and his lips twitched involuntarily.

Even though I'm still experiencing this myself, as long as it's not 'myself', I always feel a sense of relief.

The Americas were now shrouded in darkness. Having finished her chores while taking a break, Ash stretched and prepared to return to the sacrificial site to begin her pleasant week.

But Murphy's Law was designed for this very moment. Ash's phone started ringing. It was Kassel calling.

"Ash, help! A teddy bear is chasing me!"

Teddy bear? Ash immediately thought of the teddy bear, that lewd and dissolute character who lived a life of debauchery.

“It’s okay, Cassel. Just tell him you have tickets to a strip club, and he’ll be happy to share his treasured tobacco collection with you…”

“But how am I supposed to share this with him? He’s five hundred feet tall! Oh, Beckett, I’ve never been to any strip club, you have to believe me…”

Just as Kassel was explaining to Beckett next to him, his phone was snatched away by someone else.

“I am George Stacy, the Commissioner of the NYPD, and I need to take control of the department. This is a matter for the department to handle! There’s a 500-foot-tall teddy bear causing trouble on Fifth Avenue!”

As George Stacy spoke, the Bureau of Control's alarms went off. Anderson burst through the door, only relaxing when he saw Ash.

"Sir, there's..."

"A 500-foot-tall teddy bear, I know..."

Chapter 206: A Drama with a Clear Division of Labor

Before taking over Moses and his CIA team, the Bureau of Control did not have its own intelligence sources. All information about supernatural events was first screened by the police before being transferred to the Bureau of Control.

This avoids conflict with local police forces and prevents individuals from making false police reports in an attempt to cover their tracks.

But this situation left Ash completely baffled. Five hundred feet is equivalent to one hundred and fifty meters in the metric unit. Could something that tall have appeared in New York? Godzilla?

But Godzilla was only 50 meters tall in the Showa era. Since it's the modern world, the only monster that can appear is Godzilla, the King of Monsters, which is only 119 meters tall.

As far as I can remember, only the eleventh generation Godzilla Earth Hollow broke the 300-meter limit, becoming the largest Godzilla in history.

If a Godzilla like that were to appear, Ash would say Earth is probably out of the question. Let's find another planet or timeline to start over. This Godzilla could withstand two thousand nuclear missiles and use Crimson Dragon to penetrate the 30km asteroid, the Demon Star Glass. Even now, there's not much chance on Earth.

The Bureau of Control assembled very quickly. Before Lord Doom left, he redesigned the exoskeleton for the Bureau of Control, as Ash had requested.

Even the most basic exoskeletons, which have no power system whatsoever, now integrate weapon subsystems, integrated helmet subsystems, wireless electronic systems, protective clothing, and individual soldier equipment subsystems.

Furthermore, it does not affect the flexibility of combat operations, and even exceeds the original model in terms of the weight of items it can carry.

However, its high cost is in stark contrast to its performance. When the wealthy Ross heard that Ash had new equipment, he turned around and left after hearing the price.

The basic model costs three times as much as the Land Warrior system that Ami is still hesitating about, not to mention the more advanced products. The most powerful AST exoskeleton even costs more than two M1 Abrams tanks.

For large-scale, clustered combat units like the military, thick armor and large-caliber weapons are their primary targets. Compared to tanks, the ATS armor only offers a minor advantage in terms of maneuverability; it can't even withstand the Abrams' smoothbore cannon. This expensive toy is better suited for specialized units like the Control Bureau.

Even Ash only equipped the front-line combat troops with the basic version, and then equipped the commanders and elites with the advanced version with powered backpacks and reinforcement devices. The most powerful AST exoskeleton was only given to platoon-level combat units.

But this money was definitely well spent. In the most chaotic area, Ghost led 141's elite troops and jumped directly from the rear cabin of the Osprey aircraft without parachuting or rappelling.

After a freefall of hundreds of meters, the power backpack ignites intermittently in the last few dozen meters to provide cushioning and ensure a safe landing.

"Targets have been sent to the head-up display: rescue targets: Cassel, Beckett, and NY Police Chief George Stacy."

The ghosts entered the most chaotic place, while Ash found the enormous teddy bear in a helicopter among the high-rise buildings.

The pilot of the plane uttered Ash's inner thoughts: "Holy Swiftness, that really is a teddy bear!"

Its entire body is brownish-yellow, and it wears a black top hat. If you ignore its deep-set eyes, its malicious smile, and its height of 150 meters, it is exactly the kind of toy you would see most often in a toy store.

Furthermore, its furry arms would even dent the surrounding tall buildings when they touched them, as if its body were filled with cotton.

The teddy bear was trying to put its paws on a car parked on the side of the road. Its soft paws pressed down on the car, causing it to sink in. With its bent-over effort, the car finally caught fire and made a series of popping sounds.

Seeing this, the teddy bear nodded in satisfaction and lifted its foot toward the next car.

The helicopter attack group launched the first attack, with the Sea Serpent-70 rocket launchers and AGM-114 Hellfire missiles carried by the AH-64 attack helicopters causing a series of explosions on the teddy bear.

However, such an attack was insignificant. The teddy bear wiped the splatter from its body, waved at the armed helicopter as if shooing away flies, and continued playing.

Missiles and rockets were useless; the attack helicopters could only use their ineffective machine guns to cause a negligible disturbance to the giant teddy bear.

"Your savior, Stark, has arrived!"

In an instant, Stark, clad in his armor, sped past Ash's helicopter and launched a barrage of bombs at the teddy bear.

These bombs, which would have destroyed an entire city block or an armed convoy in a normal war, only scratched the paint on this obviously unusual teddy bear.

"Damn it! This is a high-explosive armor-piercing dual-purpose round, how come it's completely unharmed! Ash! Ash! Use your brain, think of something!"

Stark's voice on the channel was harassing the ears of everyone listening to the public channel.

Ash quickly offered her advice: "There's no other way!"

"What did you say?"

Upon hearing Ash's words, Stark stopped flying in disbelief and hovered in the air. He was then grabbed and held in the hand of a teddy bear.

"I got caught by it, and oh my god, its hand was actually soft! I could even see the loose threads from its patching. Is this thing really made of cotton?!"

The teddy bear grabbed Stark like a child grabbing a beetle and held it up to its eyes to look at it.

Stark seized the opportunity, slipped out from between the teddy bear's fingers, and quickly circled around to the other side of the nearest building.

"This thing isn't very powerful; we might be able to trap it!"