American Comics: Something's Wrong with This Superhero World

Chapter 108 Daredevil

As an adult with superpowers who can see Pennywise, Xiao Xian was also invited by S.H.I.E.L.D. to participate in the operation to eliminate Pennywise.

If it weren't for his super charm, Xiao Xian would have preferred to lend his anti-psychic helmet to someone else rather than get involved in Pennywise's affair. But now, because of his super charm, Xiao Xian is clearly being targeted by Pennywise.

Being targeted by the evil god Pennywise, there's no point in Xiao Xian running to Mars; it's better to face it than to run away.

According to Xiao Xian's understanding, Pennywise is not actually bloodthirsty. In both the movie and novel versions, Pennywise had countless opportunities to kill the main characters, or even wipe out the entire town of Derry, or even Amelia, but he did not do so.

Of course, Pennywise didn't do that, not because he was kind-hearted, but because, like Xiao Xian, he didn't actually depend on material survival and didn't need to ingest food in the conventional sense.

Pennywise needs something similar to Xiao Xian, except that Xiao Xian devours the hatred others have for him, while Pennywise devours fear.

Rather than killing, Pennywise preferred to torture his prey, driving them to collapse in fear and slowly killing them in extreme terror, provided that the fear tasted delicious to him.

Pennywise will kill his ordinary prey, that is, random NPCs in the movie, relatively decisively, to savor their fear before death.

From this perspective, Pennywise and Xiao Xian should be quite similar, both having a greater influence of quality than quantity.

Another possibility is that, rather than things like increasing strength, Pennywise was actually more concerned with the pleasure derived from devouring fear.

In pursuit of pleasure, Pennywise repeatedly toyed with the main characters but failed to kill them. In the end, he was killed by some of the children in the main characters' group.

Of course, Pennywise is actually immortal, so after being killed, he was resurrected. However, the resurrected Pennywise did not learn his lesson. Instead of immediately going out and killing the protagonist group with a single spider spear, he used various means to intimidate the protagonist group, ultimately leading to another mishap.

From a human perspective, Pennywise's behavior is completely incomprehensible. His pursuit of pleasure backfired, ultimately costing him his life. This is simply too abstract a concept.

But from Pennywise's perspective, he might do the same thing again if given the chance. After all, as an immortal and undying evil god, pleasure and fun are what he pursues more than so-called safety and avoiding disaster.

For Pennywise, who has lived for countless billions of years and has been on Earth for millions of years, an accident would only mean he had been asleep for 27 years. What's the big deal?

If this were applied to a human, it would be equivalent to a person in their twenties or thirties playing a half-hour game of League of Legends, choosing Yasuo, having low health but with his ultimate ready, and the five opposing players standing together being knocked up by Malphite, resulting in five dotted lines appearing.

At this point, should you choose to go home to replenish your health and mana as a precaution, or press the 'r' key without hesitation?

Admittedly, pressing the R key might result in death after using your ultimate, but it could also lead to a pentakill. As a Yasuo player, hesitating for even a second is disrespectful to yourself.

After taking the ultimate skill this time, I killed two people and then died. Half a minute later, the screen went gray, and I logged back in. Five white lines appeared again. Of course, I took the ultimate skill again without hesitation, not even for a second.

Of course, for Pennywise, the second death was a bit serious. The base was destroyed and the game was lost directly, but it was just a matter of starting another game. After all, Pennywise's main body was wiped out, which meant the players were the ones playing the game. In reality, it didn't matter much. If there was a next time, they would just have to take the hit.

"I found the information you were looking for." Natasha handed a document to Xiao Xian, and asked curiously, "Why did you look for such a group of ordinary people?"

"Found it? I have my uses for it. You don't usually get to see S.H.I.E.L.D. files." Xiao Xian took the files. Since Pennywise exists in this world, it makes sense that the Losers' Group from the movies would also exist, right?

If possible, Xiao Xian hoped that the others could replicate their performance in the movie and verbally defeat Pennywise, even if it was just to make Pennywise disappear from the story for 27 years. After 27 years, Xiao Xian might be able to destroy a star with one hand, or even advance to the level of a dimensional demon god. At that time, he might not be afraid of Pennywise.

"Wait? They're dead?" Xiao Xian looked at Bill and the others marked as dead in the data, completely bewildered. Could it be that because this is a superhero universe, the protagonist's halo on these people is no longer effective?

"Yes, it's clearly written in the documents. The night Spider-Man released the supervillains, they were having some kind of party, and then only one of them survived, that girl named Beverly. I heard that those guys, especially Ben's, risked their lives to save her."

Natasha nodded in response. In the past, she would have scoffed and thought that Ben was not very bright, but now Natasha felt that this was love, and if necessary, she would sacrifice her life to save Xiao Xian.

"What's going on here? Let me see which supervillain did this." Xiao Xian opened the file and was stunned when he saw the culprit column. "Tombstone? What kind of third-tier villain is this?"

A third-tier villain killed them all. But they really were just a group of ordinary people, and they couldn't possibly defeat a supervillain with superpowers.

"He's currently locked up in a S.H.I.E.L.D. research lab. Do you want me to help you get him out?" Natasha offered. As S.H.I.E.L.D.'s top agent and one of the most popular female superheroes, Natasha wields considerable influence within the organization.

"Never mind." Xiao Xian pouted. It seemed that he couldn't rely on others and had to rely on himself in the crucial moment.

"Should I contact this Beverly?" Natasha asked. "She's in New York right now."

After thinking it over, Xiao Xian decided to meet her anyway. Maybe she had some information about Pennywise in this world. Even if she didn't, he glanced at Beverly in the file. She was exactly eighteen years old at the time and looked more like Sophie Lilith than Jessica Chastain in the second movie. She looked very youthful, which was quite rare in America's world.

"Call them over," Xiao Xian said to Natasha.

"Okay, also, Stark Industries sent Daredevil, and he seems to have arrived by now. Do you want to go see him later?" Natasha nodded, then said to Xiao Xian, "He debuted earlier than you and also plays the playboy, but I think he's nowhere near as good-looking as you."

"Alright." Xiao Xian nodded and said that Daredevil's super hearing might indeed be useful.

(End of this chapter)