Humanity’s Response

Alex slowly descended to the ground. After glancing at Charles and the others and confirming that none of them had suffered any serious injuries, he turned to look at the Brotherhood mutants. His gaze settled mainly on Riptide. With Sebastian Shaw captured, the Brotherhood mutants had vaguely begun to regard Riptide as their leader.

"Are you still planning to fight?" Alex chuckled softly. His right foot shifted slightly, and the beach beside him suddenly began to tremble.

To everyone’s stunned disbelief, the soft sand seemed to be sucked into the earth. In an instant, all the sand beyond where they stood vanished, replaced by a bottomless abyss.

The Brotherhood mutants looked at one another, their eyes filled with terror. The abilities Alex had displayed left them without the slightest will to fight. The mutant with Teleportation stood dazed for a moment before suddenly coming to his senses and trying to flee without a second thought. Unfortunately, he had barely vanished when a powerful force forcibly dragged him back out of space.

"Without my permission, no one is leaving!" Alex stared expressionlessly at the terrified Teleporter. His deep eyes were calm and unruffled, while beneath his clear voice lay incomparable dominance.

Before the Brotherhood mutants could react, Alex’s expression suddenly changed. He turned toward the distant sea, where the US and Soviet fleets were stationed.

"What is it?" Alex’s sudden change piqued Charles’s curiosity. He turned to look as well and casually used telepathy to investigate for himself. The moment he did, Charles’s expression changed too. The smile that had not yet faded froze on his face, and when he spoke, his voice was full of disbelief. "They’re going to fire on us?!"

At Charles’s words, everyone froze, then turned toward the Beautiful Liaison Officer, their anger completely undisguised.

The Beautiful Liaison Officer was stunned as well, but she quickly snapped out of it and hurried toward the plane wreckage to contact the US fleet. Unfortunately, no matter how long she tried, there was no response over the radio, as though her messages had vanished without a trace.

"Don’t waste your effort!" Alex glanced at the anxious Beautiful Liaison Officer and spoke with a faint smile. Then he looked toward the US and Soviet fleets waiting in formation on the sea and sneered. "Humanity still harbors hostility toward us!"

The moment Alex finished speaking, Sebastian Shaw, trapped within Tin Man, suddenly shouted. His hoarse voice carried a harsh, cynical edge. "Humans and mutants can never coexist! Only by eliminating them can mutants achieve true freedom!"

"Shut up!" Alex’s expression turned cold. He raised a finger, and just as Sebastian Shaw was about to continue, Alex sealed his mouth with a sheet of metal.

After teaching Sebastian Shaw a lesson, Alex turned his gaze back to Riptide and the other Brotherhood mutants and issued his final ultimatum. "I’ll ask one last time. Surrender, or…"

Before Alex could finish, a fierce glint flashed across his face. He spun around, his bright eyes faintly reddening as fury surged within him.

Humanity truly could not wait even a moment longer. They had begun their bombardment already, and shells rained down from the sky.

Sometimes, Alex truly hated humanity. Why could humans not tolerate mutants? Mutants were clearly helping humanity, yet humans were like venomous snakes, determined to kill the farmer who had saved them!

But after the resentment came, Alex could only let out a bitter sigh. If it truly came to killing humans, he could not do it.

Though thoughts raced through his mind, Alex’s hands never stopped moving. He extended his right hand, and the shells filling the sky seemed to strike an invisible barrier, all of them halted in midair.

"I don’t want to hurt a single human." Alex looked expressionlessly at the Beautiful Liaison Officer. Beneath his calm voice lay overwhelming power, and the warning was unmistakable. "But I also do not want any human to hurt us."

The moment Alex finished speaking, the shells in the sky turned around and flew back toward the US and Soviet fleets along their original paths.

Charles’s face showed reluctance. He took a step forward and opened his mouth to persuade Alex, but then he remembered what humanity had just done and withdrew that step. Charles had always hoped mutants and humans could coexist peacefully, but humanity’s actions had truly chilled his heart. Of course, that was only one reason. The other was that Charles believed Alex was not the impulsive sort.

Sure enough, under Alex’s control, the shells filling the sky swiftly returned to hover above the US and Soviet fleets. But at that moment, they stopped in midair once more.

On the US and Soviet fleets, the soldiers who had been in despair felt as though they had been granted a new life. They watched the shells hanging over their heads anxiously, their emotions rising and falling wildly. Some could not even stop themselves from bursting into tears.

Suddenly, one of them cried out and pointed at the shells in the sky as though he had seen a ghost.

"Dane, what’s wrong?" A familiar companion was startled. He grabbed Dane and looked at him with concern.

The shells suspended outside had left everyone aboard with their nerves stretched taut. The slightest disturbance could trigger widespread panic. Dane’s cry had alarmed far more than just the people beside him; nearly everyone on the ship looked over.

Yet Dane did not notice their stares. He turned to the person beside him, pointed at the shells in the sky, and shouted incoherently, "They’re talking!"

Most people thought Dane had been scared senseless by his bizarre words, but quite a few still looked toward the shells in the sky. As they watched, cries of shock rose one after another.

The shells in the sky had actually formed a sentence: "If others do not offend me, I will not offend them."

The news quickly reached Washington. Faced with such a threat, the US Government was utterly stunned. Naturally, the Soviet government was in much the same situation. To prepare for a possible war, both the United States and the Soviet Union had deployed their most elite fleets. If those fleets were destroyed for nothing, no one could accept it. Yet choosing to "surrender" just like that was equally intolerable to both the United States and the Soviet Union.

After confirming that humanity understood his warning, Alex did not wait for the US and Soviet sides to work out a response. He detonated every shell in midair, then used Teleportation to leave the island with Charles and the others. Along the way, he dropped the Beautiful Liaison Officer off on the US fleet.

Alex had acted out of goodwill and to warn humanity, but he had clearly overestimated humanity’s capacity for acceptance. His actions instead further hardened the US and Soviet governments’ resolve to crack down on mutants.

Of course, that was a matter for later. For now, Alex had returned to the Floating Temple with Charles and the others, along with Riptide and the Brotherhood mutants.

Scorpion wishes everyone a happy Dragon Boat Festival, plenty of rice dumplings, and plenty of money!