Chapter Eighty-Six: Darkness Approaches!

The Mind Stone was cheering, leaping with delight, feeling that in Roald’s hands it had at last realized its greatest worth.

How wonderful.

The helicarrier began to climb. Maria Hill cut every link between the ship and the outside world, ensuring that no information would be transmitted beyond it.

With the exception of the personnel required to operate the carrier, who were kept under the watch of Barton and the mind-controlled Hydra agents.

Everyone aboard had gathered on the landing platform before the bridge.

Hill stood on the bridge of the carrier, with Roald behind her, leaning on his sword.

Hill, who had always carried herself with cool rationality and steel, was now dressed as the Death Siren. Her figure was outlined by a tightly fitted suit, and in her hand she held the bow and arrows she had “borrowed” from Barton, as she began her new plan and her speech.

The agents were also curious about Roald, standing there with a sword in hand, but more than that they felt confusion and a measure of fear.

Of course, a few were exceptions.

Through the power of the Mind Stone, these Hydra fanatics quickly came to believe Hill’s identity. Once they were certain that Hill was also one of them, they began shouting the slogan of "Hail Hydra," and these remarkably courteous and agreeable Hydra agents grew feverishly zealous.

The remaining twenty percent were speechless.

They had no power to change their situation, and even less courage to believe that so many Hydra operatives had been hiding among them.

Partners who had once shared the same cramped bunk, comrades who had carried out missions together for years, all the old bonds seemed like illusions now, unreal beyond belief.

Having become the Death Siren, Maria Hill naturally understood the nature of her own transformation and the power she now wielded. With the Mind Stone’s seduction and the effect of Death Cultivation, no agent aboard the carrier could now resist her will.

At the same time, she understood all the more clearly what Roald standing behind her represented.

The name Hydra was very useful. Hill felt she still needed to make full use of it.

"Cut off one head, and two more shall rise to take its place!"

Maria Hill shouted the slogan, black energy blooming in her hands. The dead wraiths surged from her cloak, circling overhead with shrill howls.

"Hail Hydra!"

"Hail Hydra!"

"..."

The fanatical Hydra agents shouted at the top of their lungs, their voices perfectly unified, as if they had rehearsed this countless times.

Maria Hill’s gaze swept across them. Through their souls, she discovered that many of them held multiple identities, were on more than one side, and served as spies in more than one camp.

The CIA, the FBI, the military, the government, the Security Council, and more—there were no fewer than ten organizations among them.

Keeping these double- and triple-faced operatives would still be of some use; as for the others, too pure in loyalty, they naturally had another destination awaiting them.

Before anyone could react, Maria Hill activated Death Cultivation.

She clenched her hand fiercely, and the black wraiths circling overhead hurled themselves at the people on the landing platform. Those with multiple identities received special attention and were forcibly subdued.

As for the ordinary agents, they did not receive such considerate treatment.

The wraiths simply opened their arms and forcibly occupied their bodies.

That horrifying sight plunged the bridge into chaos at once. Black wraiths darted everywhere, and the guns and hand-to-hand skills in the agents’ hands brought them no sense of safety. Screams and cries rang out as people fled in panic.

The wraiths passed mercilessly through one living body after another. Dark energy rolled and lapped like thick fog around everyone’s nerves. One fresh life after another first became a cold corpse, only to be staggered upright again under the control of the wraiths that had burrowed inside them.

In less than fifteen minutes, the inner soul core of everyone aboard the helicarrier had been altered. Their souls were replaced by wraiths, and the soul energy repaired their wounds as well.

Those still standing on the bridge now, aside from being a little pale, looked no different from before.

"We are the Forgotten!"

"We are the Scourge as well, and a force of rebirth. This place has already been replaced by us."

"And now..." Maria Hill thought for a moment, then turned and looked at Roald.

"We pledge our loyalty to you."

"Skyhammer."

Roald looked at Hill and said, "This new organization shall be named Skyhammer."

---

Everything that happened aboard the helicarrier remained unknown to the outside world.

But Nick Fury sensed that something was wrong.

His instincts had always been unnervingly accurate when it came to bad news.

During the period when Hill served as acting director, Fury had adopted a defensive posture, apparently searching everywhere for recruitable allies, when in truth he was testing the composition of his own ranks.

There was something fishy about Pierce’s scrutiny of Hill. After Hill had been appointed acting director by the Security Council, and with the military also stepping in, Fury had begun to infer certain things.

Was Hill Hydra? What was Alexander Pierce’s relationship to her?

Was Alexander Hydra? What did he have to do with the military?

Who in the military was Hydra? Could he be connected to the Security Council as well?

The more he thought about it, the more terrifying it became, and Fury began an investigation.

But both the process and the result left him deeply humiliated.

Very unfortunately, most of the elite agents he had personally selected were Hydra. Every time he uncovered a lead, some small accident would occur.

Either the target would be moved away, or the trail would be abruptly severed. In the end, with Matt’s help, after discovering that the agents around him were all Hydra members, Fury suddenly realized the matter had become far more serious than he had imagined.

At that moment, he suddenly discovered that the only usable people left around him seemed to be Coulson and Rogers.

He began frantically seeking outside help.

Whether they were people he had once dismissed or those with whom he simply did not get along, he began wildly expanding his manpower.

And with the director having gone so long without receiving any response from the helicarrier, he realized that things had gone beyond his expectations.

Fury thought of his tireless workhorse, Coulson.

Coulson and Jessica reluctantly gave up on recruiting Ghost Rider and turned their attention to the other heroes and antiheroes they had contacts with.

Because of Roald’s interference, Tony Stark, who had originally been an Avengers member, had now clearly refused Fury’s recruitment.

Natasha had been controlled into betrayal, and Bruce Banner was currently being chased across the world by Grommash.

Because the Cosmic Cube had been stolen by Natasha, and due to a series of coincidences, Thor had also not clearly stated that he would join Fury’s alliance.

Now Barton had been controlled as well, and with Maria Hill having become the Death Siren, to some extent Fury’s Avengers had already existed in name only.

Or rather, S.H.I.E.L.D. had changed in nature. In Fury’s absence, Roald had stolen the house.

Unless he could find better replacements.

Clearly, Fury was planning exactly that, and already had a scheme in mind.

Beneath Stark Tower, Steve Rogers walked into an SUV parked by the roadside, shield in hand.

He had just gone to see Stark.

But he had not been granted an audience, or rather, Stark had no wish to speak with him.

Bucky was not dead, but had become the Winter Soldier, and that made it hard for Rogers to accept. Added to that were the news about Tony’s parents, and he did not know how to end this conflict.

Clearly, under the present circumstances, he did not want to clash with Stark.

Because he had no one by his side, no powerful teammates at all, while Stark had two, along with military support.

That made Rogers, a man who had come out of the military, feel even worse.

"What did Stark say to make you look so at a loss?" Fury asked from the back seat. In the darkness, only his gleaming white teeth were visible.

"Captain, I have a plan, though it’s a little mad," Fury said, looking at the signal device from the helicarrier in his hand.