Forest Gunshots

After saying that, Alex stopped paying attention to the students. He needed to train as well. Finding a relatively level branch, he sat cross-legged and entered meditation.

The meditation technique Alex practiced now was no longer the same as before. It was the product of constant refinement over the past five months of study. The new technique focused on burning Psionic Power, incinerating the impurities and dregs within it to enhance its strength.

It had to be said that the new meditation technique was quite effective. Alex could already feel that he would soon break through.

After training for a while, Alex was awakened by a commotion. Opening his eyes, he saw that more than a dozen students had been surrounded by a group of powerfully built Ape-men.

Alex was not worried, nor did he intervene. He was merely curious. Why had Ape-men appeared here? This was not their territory.

"Should we fight?" In the forest, the dozen or so students gathered together, their faces grim as they stared at the approaching Ape-men. They still had some reservations. Their education had always taught them not to hurt others lightly. In their eyes, the Ape-men were people too, just like Tarzan.

"Fight!" The male student leading them shouted and charged at the Ape-men first. As he attacked with all his might, he said, "Just don’t kill them. We only need to drive them away."

With someone taking the lead, the others began attacking as well.

Because they did not dare strike to kill, the students fought somewhat restrainedly. Not only did they fail to drive the Ape-men away, they were occasionally hit by them instead. Fortunately, they trained regularly. Otherwise, they would not have been able to withstand the Ape-men’s fists.

"We can’t beat them. Should we run?" Seeing the group about to be scattered by the Ape-men, some of the students began to worry.

The other students remained silent. They endured the Ape-men’s punches while trying to counterattack. The thought of fleeing flashed through their minds only briefly before disappearing.

Alex simply sat down, a faint smile lifting the corners of his mouth. He nodded in satisfaction. "They didn’t run. Good. They still remember what I told them."

Besides teaching the students combat and physical training, Alex had not forgotten to teach them China’s code of chivalry. In Alex’s view, only by restraining mutants through morality could they properly integrate into human society.

But clearly, some moral standards of ordinary humans did not apply to mutants. Mutants were more like the martial artists in wuxia novels who leapt across rooftops and scaled walls. They possessed immense power and likewise "used martial strength to defy the law." Therefore, borrowing the code of chivalry as the supreme principle to restrain mutants was clearly quite suitable.

After spacing out for a moment, Alex turned his gaze back toward the battlefield.

In that short time, the situation had begun to reverse. The students gradually became familiar with the rhythm of battle and started taking the initiative. Bit by bit, they recovered from their disadvantage and began launching targeted counterattacks.

"They really do have good combat instincts!" Seeing this, Alex could not help praising them inwardly. A thought that had long been buried in his heart surfaced on its own. Should I establish the X-Men?

In fact, Alex had wanted to form the X-Men from the very beginning, when Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters was first being built. But after thinking it over, he realized that the mutants had just gone through a major war and might be resistant to the X-Men. At the same time, Alex worried that the mutants were a mixed lot. Forming the X-Men might instead tarnish their reputation.

So he kept putting it off. It was not until Alex came into contact with the students at Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters that the thought resurfaced. Otherwise, he would not have brought out China’s wuxia code of chivalry.

"I can’t delay any longer. I’ll start on it when I get back." The more Alex thought about it, the more excited he became. He could not help gesturing animatedly. "There are quite a few promising candidates among this group of students. If I choose carefully, I should be able to pick out more than a dozen."

Alex forgot about the battle below and began planning the X-Men’s details in his mind. "Recruit a dozen or so people first and focus on training them for a while. Once they have developed some combat power, gradually expand recruitment, with the veterans guiding the newcomers."

"That way, I can take it easy too!" The X-Men had not even been officially established, yet Alex was already considering how to become a hands-off boss. It had to be said, Alex was truly lazy.

Just as he was feeling pleased with himself, a strange sound suddenly came from deep within the forest. Countless birds took flight in alarm, while beasts fled wildly.

"Gunshots!" Alex abruptly rose to his feet. Having spent so long on battlefields, there was no way he could mistake the sound of gunfire. But why were there gunshots in this primeval forest?

His thoughts raced, and Alex came up with one possibility. Could someone have stumbled in here again?

He glanced down at the fight in the forest. After confirming that the students would be fine, Alex left them with a sentence: "Finish the battle and wait here. Your teacher is going to take a look!" Then, without looking back, he sprinted toward where the gunshots had come from.

Using Teleportation repeatedly, Alex rapidly approached his destination. The air grew increasingly damp, carrying a faint scent of seawater.

Before long, Alex saw the azure sea. At the boundary between the green forest and blue ocean, the shadow of a large ship could vaguely be seen.

"They really are outsiders!" Alex was somewhat surprised. Once the surprise faded, worry followed. The outsiders had landed at one of the locations previously used to film Tarzan. If they recognized the place, that would be troublesome.

Filled with concern, Alex used Teleportation to appear directly in the bushes along the shore. When he poked his head out for a look, he found that things were not as he had imagined.

"Descendants of Atlantis?!" The people on the silver-white beach were not the humans Alex had expected, but humanoid creatures from the plains of the Savage Land who called themselves the Descendants of Atlantis. Alex had already encountered these Descendants of Atlantis during Hydra’s earlier probing operation.

Alex swept his gaze over everyone and quickly locked onto one person. Although his appearance was identical to that of the Descendants of Atlantis, Alex still keenly sensed something wrong. This person felt extremely strange and unnatural to him, yet somehow familiar.

As he watched, Alex suddenly recalled that when Hydra had incited Atlantis to attack them before, some Hydra agents had disguised themselves as Descendants of Atlantis. They had felt exactly like this person.

Alex cautiously approached the strange descendant and, catching him off guard, activated telepathy.

The moment he made contact, Alex could not help exclaiming, "Hydra!"

After a careful search, Alex finally confirmed that this person truly was a Hydra agent. However, his rank was relatively low, and he did not know why they had come here.

After searching several more targets in succession, Alex finally discovered something. His expression could not help turning grim. "Strucker, I haven’t even come looking for trouble with you, and you dare come here to provoke me?!"