Restart, Spider-Man! [44]

On Titan.

Xia Luo and his companions strolled down an exotic street, taking in the sights and sounds of the alien world.

Perhaps it was because of Lizard Parker, but they could feel the curious gazes of the passersby.

However, Lizard Parker didn’t mind these looks at all, as they didn’t carry any disgust or fear—only pure curiosity. On Titan, a humanoid lizard wasn’t considered that scary. In fact, much uglier creatures were commonplace.

This helped him relax.

Surrounded by towering skyscrapers, Xia Luo tilted his head back, gazing up at the various geometric structures, his fingers itching with excitement.

“You look like you want to do something,” Carter suddenly observed.

Xia Luo took a deep breath. “I’ve never swung through an alien city before, and those skyscrapers with what looks like gemstone exteriors—can you imagine how it would feel to climb them?”

He instinctively scratched his wrist, struggling to suppress his Spider-Man urges.

Carter raised an eyebrow. “Just hold back a little. If you do that, you’ll get arrested for illegally using a mode of transportation and miss the mission.”

“I know.”

Xia Luo reluctantly let go of the idea.

They wandered past several shops, with colorful neon signs lighting up the streets. The aesthetic wasn’t too far removed from Earth, but the various products displayed were things Xia Luo had never seen before.

“What’s this?”

Finally, he stopped in front of a transparent window, staring curiously at some irregularly shaped crystal stones inside.

“That’s a Stoneheart. Wearing it reduces the chances of heart disease,” the octopus-faced shopkeeper eagerly explained, his tentacles twitching with enthusiasm.

“You have heart disease here too?” Xia Luo asked, perplexed.

The shopkeeper seemed equally baffled, though it was hard to read his expression through his tentacles.

As Xia Luo pondered this, Lizard Parker grew impatient.

“Imposter! Let’s go already, we’ve got work to do!”

Xia Luo ignored Lizard Parker, continuing his conversation with the shopkeeper.

“How much for the Stoneheart?”

Seeing Xia Luo inquire about the price, the shopkeeper’s enthusiasm only grew.

“You’ve got great taste, my friend! It’s normally ten gold coins, but we’re having a sale—just seven coins, and it’s yours!” He began to retrieve the item from the display for Xia Luo to inspect.

Xia Luo didn’t refuse and took the item, all the while extending his hand toward Infinite Tony.

“Give me some money.”

“You’re buying this?” Infinite Tony frowned. “Buying stuff here is a waste. We can’t take it with us anyway.”

“You don’t get it—this is called ‘investing to gather information.’”

“Fine, I sold off some nanotech gear and made this much. Just don’t blow it all at once.”

With that, Tony handed Xia Luo a small pouch of gold coins.

Gold, being a non-renewable resource, was still considered valuable on Titan.

Seeing the coins in Xia Luo’s hand, the shopkeeper’s eyes gleamed with greed, and his tentacles wriggled even more.

Another sucker, today’s a good day, he thought to himself.

“Ever heard of Thanos?” Xia Luo asked casually.

The shopkeeper froze for a moment before nodding. “Of course! That terrifying guy was arrested recently. Tomorrow, he’s being exiled to Planet M78.”

“Planet M78?” Xia Luo twitched—sounded like they’d wandered into the wrong universe.

The shopkeeper, still eyeing the gold coins, replied absentmindedly, “Yes, Planet M78. It’s a very dangerous place. Once Thanos is exiled, he’ll have a hard time surviving.”

“Alright, and where is Thanos being held?”

“I don’t know,” the shopkeeper responded, snapping out of his daze and now eyeing Xia Luo and the others more warily. “Are you here to ask about Thanos?”

Xia Luo toyed with the gold coins in his hand, wearing an indifferent expression. “What do you think?”

Eyeing the coins, the shopkeeper relented and invited the group into his shop.

“I know Thanos’ case has drawn a lot of attention. You must be here to witness the exile ceremony. After all, Titan hasn’t had an event like this in many years.”

The shopkeeper poured each of them a glass of green liquid before continuing.

“Thanos is one of the purest-blooded Titans. If nothing had gone wrong, he’d be the future ruler of Titan—the youngest planetary leader in history. But on the day of his coming-of-age ceremony, for some reason, he fell unconscious, and when he woke up, he was a completely different person.”

He paused for dramatic effect.

“First, he had a huge fallout with the Titan Council, and then he started rampaging across the planet, slaughtering villages and cities. Every time, he killed exactly half the population—brutal, right? They labeled him a Dark Titan, a traitor to his people. When the Titan Guard finally caught him, the charge was treason. Too bad there’s no death penalty on Titan, or they would’ve executed him by now.”

The shopkeeper sounded indignant, but Xia Luo was puzzled.

“If Thanos is that powerful, how did the Titan Guard manage to catch him? Was it because of this?” He raised his wrist, indicating the ID chip implanted there.

The shopkeeper looked surprised. “You guys don’t know? These chips only work if you’re within ten meters of a Titan Guard. Beyond that range, they can’t control you.”

He continued, “It seems Thanos was betrayed by the Chitauri—his allies from another planet. That’s how the Titan Guard managed to capture him.”

Infinite Tony, deep in thought, added, “No wonder those fake Avengers weren’t zapped right away when they started killing—they weren’t close enough to the guards.”

The Titan network likely filtered out certain “common knowledge,” which explained why they were just now learning that the control range for the ID chips was limited to ten meters.

As for Thanos’ exact location, that was still unknown.

Xia Luo thought for a moment, then asked, “So, where exactly is Thanos being held?”

“I told you, I don’t know,” the shopkeeper replied, shaking his head. “He’s the first person in nearly a century to be exiled. There’s no way they’d reveal his location.”

Xia Luo handed over a few more coins and asked his final question, “What are the requirements for exile? Do you have to kill as many people as Thanos did?”

The shopkeeper’s expression grew even more curious, but the allure of gold coins kept him talking.

“If you’re an off-world visitor, even if you blew up all of Titan, you’d just be deported and imprisoned on your own planet for life. But if you hold a Titan citizenship card, you’d have to kill at least one thousand and one people to qualify for exile.”

Hearing this, Xia Luo and the others exchanged puzzled glances.

One thousand and one?

The laws on Titan were indeed bizarre.

But for Xia Luo, this wasn’t a big issue.