Chapter 247

"How do you feel now?" After finishing that glass of wine, Evenson had sprawled directly onto the sofa, where he panted heavily for three minutes without saying a word. Sif finally asked impatiently.

"Feel? Heh…" Evenson’s gaze had begun to drift. "It feels like… um… um… never mind." He hummed and hawed for a long while but still could not think of how to describe how he felt.

"Dizzy, seeing stars, unable to keep your balance, slower thinking, right?" Sif truly was an old hand at drinking. She immediately summed up the feeling of being drunk.

"Right." Evenson weakly raised an arm and pointed at Sif, saying it with exaggerated emphasis.

"Then that’s perfect." A smile appeared on Sif’s face. Unlike her usual open and hearty smile, this one carried a trace of cunning satisfaction. "I happen to have some questions for you."

"Heh heh heh…" Evenson turned his face aside and gave a bitter laugh. The next person who says Asgardians are simple and straightforward, I swear I’ll tear his face apart. Look at this girl in front of me—how twisted can she be?! "Getting someone drunk before questioning him—is that the Asgardian interrogation technique?"

"Interrogation? Of course not." Sif hurriedly denied it. "This merely counts as drunken truth-telling."

"Fine, ask away." Evenson agreed lazily.

"I told you, over the past few days, I watched quite a few of those things your companions sent over, called movies." Sif said, "The plots were deeply moving, and the protagonists were heroes even I found myself envying. So I wanted to ask: are real humans like that as well?"

My head hurts. The moment Evenson heard that question, he knew the movies S.H.I.E.L.D. had sent over had values that were far too upright, making their alien friend feel that something was off.

Why could nearly every story be made into an epic and passed down through the ages? Why were many Asgardian heroes who had been famous for years still slightly inferior to the protagonists in those movies? If all of that were real, it truly would be suspicious.

"Those, of course…" Evenson answered slowly, "aren’t real."

"What?" Sif was utterly shocked. That answer had been far too straightforward. Even if they were not real, she had thought this guy would put up some kind of pretense before revealing the truth. Just like when she had asked who knocked her unconscious—he had denied it in every possible way and had almost fooled her. Could it really be drunken truth-telling?

"Movies are fictional to begin with, made up by humans through imagination." Evenson began explaining. "But they represent a beautiful aspiration. People hope the real world can be like the movies. No matter how dark or unfair the process may be, justice will always prevail in the end. People hope they can be like the protagonists in movies—handsome, graceful, exceptionally skilled, able to defeat evil and protect the innocent. It’s a… beautiful ideal."

"An ideal…" Sif understood now. If the movies she had watched were real, they were indeed rather hard to believe. But if they were ideals, then it made sense. After all, if people were going to daydream, why not dream big?

"Then what are real humans like?" Sif reminded him. Now that they had finished talking about ideals, it was time to discuss reality.

"Then naturally, they aren’t as beautiful as in the movies." Evenson shook his somewhat muddled head, as though trying to clear his thoughts. "There are many unsatisfactory things. Human hearts can be treacherous, you know."

Evenson did not elaborate on those matters, choosing instead to brush past them with a single sentence before moving on. "Human civilization is a very young civilization."

"For humans, five or six thousand years of civilization may not seem short. But after subtracting what was lost, what was forgotten, and the breaks caused by wars, unrest, and natural disasters, what has truly been preserved until today may only amount to two thousand years."

Evenson shook his head with a bitter smile. "It might not even have existed as long as you have."

Sif’s face darkened. "You’re the one who’s two thousand years old! Your whole family is two thousand years old! I’m an eternally nine-hundred-year-old young maiden!"

A nine-hundred-year-old young maiden… This really was a difference in civilization. And as for you saying I’m two thousand years old, I don’t mind at all, as long as it isn’t nine thousand.

"So human civilization truly is young." Evenson brought the topic back on track. "And young, immature civilizations will always take some detours, traveling some distance in the wrong direction. But I believe that we will eventually return to the right path."

"So these movies of yours…" Sif said thoughtfully, "are meant to convey that message to me?"

Human civilization was young and immature, with many things that left much to be desired. But the beauty they aspired to would one day lead them back onto the right path.

"No." Evenson denied it again. "We let you watch movies purely to help you pass the time and experience some of Earth’s culture. There was no other purpose mixed into it. After all, you aren’t an official envoy responsible for cultural exchange. You’re staying on Earth because…"

What did it mean to speak without thinking? What did it mean to court death? Perhaps the alcohol truly had affected Evenson badly. He had been speaking perfectly well before, but for some reason, his mouth suddenly ran away with him and he blurted it out.

"I think we need another drink." Sif smiled sweetly, holding a wineglass in one hand and prying open Evenson’s jaw with the other.

In the end, Evenson was carried back to Nick Fury’s office.

"Just so happens I have a few questions of my own." Nick Fury wore a sinister smile as he looked at the already somewhat incoherent Evenson.

"Huh?" Lying on the sofa in a half-unconscious state, Evenson felt that someone seemed to be talking to him. He instinctively raised his eyes to look, and then…

Evenson expressed his reverence for the supreme Unlucky Person in the most direct manner possible. It was truly like the Yellow River overflowing its banks, impossible to stop; that heartfelt, steaming-hot tribute came pouring out all at once.

"Remember to remind me… never… to drink with Asgardians again." After expressing his reverence, Evenson felt completely refreshed. After mumbling those words, he fell asleep on the spot.

Nick Fury looked at the reverence all over the floor, still giving off the fragrant warmth of enthusiasm. He was so moved that he gritted his teeth, the veins on his forehead throbbing.

Since the founding of S.H.I.E.L.D., Evenson was the first person who had dared to do something like this in the Director’s office! Nick Fury felt that, because of this incident, he too would leave a bold mark in S.H.I.E.L.D.’s history.

Thus, he hesitated over whether to return Evenson’s favor with a firing squad or artillery. If necessary, why not use both?