Mister Fantastic’s Research

Dealing with Li Qianhuan turned out to be countless times simpler than expected. The child wasn’t rebellious at all. All she wanted was a father and an apology. That was it!

However, the more things were like this, the guiltier Li Congxin felt toward her.

After a long conversation, Li Congxin gained a general understanding of Li Qianhuan’s life before adulthood. In simple terms, apart from lacking paternal and maternal love, her life had been fairly good.

In that world, Earth was protected by the Avengers, so her life had been relatively peaceful. And from childhood until she grew up, she had been raised and cared for by Li Congxin’s aunt, Monica Rambeau.

Although Monica didn’t know who Li Congxin was on that timeline, she knew Captain Marvel. For Captain Marvel’s sake, Monica had helped raise Li Qianhuan until she reached adulthood, at which point she had bid farewell to Li Qianhuan and resumed her own interstellar travels.

That was why Li Qianhuan had always called Monica "Auntie." The seniority was a little confusing, but it could still be sorted out…

The reason Li Qianhuan had come here wasn’t because she couldn’t survive on that timeline. She had simply come here to find her father.

She was absolutely his own daughter!

As for how to raise this child, Li Congxin had already made up his mind.

He had to spoil her. He absolutely had to spoil her!

She liked cars, did she?

Very well. Li Congxin directly transferred all the limited-edition sports cars under his name to her. As long as she didn’t go street racing, she could have as much fun as she wanted.

Drive one and smash one. Don’t worry about saving my money!

He had even given the Thanos-branded floating chair he had obtained incidentally while capturing Sanctum Sanctorum III to his precious daughter as a toy.

When it came to money, Li Congxin took his talent for spoiling children to the extreme. He gave Li Qianhuan two unlimited credit cards—the kind that could never be maxed out.

One worked worldwide, while the other worked throughout the entire universe.

"I’m sorry, Qianhuan." After handing the two credit cards to his precious daughter, Li Congxin apologized to her again. "Originally, after you came home, Dad should have made time to spend some quality time with you. But you heard what that fellow called Galactus said earlier. The entire universe is about to face a huge crisis. To keep our home from being destroyed, I have to find a way to investigate the source of the matter and resolve it. So…"

"It’s all right." Li Qianhuan spoke sensibly. "As long as you aren’t like Mom, always off being a hero in different parts of the universe and completely ignoring me, I can understand that you’re fighting to protect our home. I can even do my part. You don’t really think I’m as thoughtless as I acted before, do you?"

Li Congxin nodded and smiled in relief. "For the next few days, go ahead and have as much fun as you want. I’ve already spoken with Mindy. She’ll show you around and help you get familiar with the place. The things on this timeline may not be as advanced as they were in 2040, but if they have something here and you want it, it’s yours. Even if you want the moon in the sky, I can shrink it with Pym Particles and give it to you as a ball."

Li Qianhuan was silent for two seconds. "According to Auntie Monica, that’s called spoiling me."

"Haha…" Li Congxin laughed when he heard that. "What can I say? You’ve already grown up. You already have mature values, so all I need to do is be your strongest support. Also, in the universe, if you mention my name, not many people may know it. They usually only remember my nickname: Prince."

The father and daughter chatted for a while longer. Mindy had already ridden the Eight-legged Divine Horse to the villa’s entrance. After handing Li Qianhuan over to her, Li Congxin flashed away and arrived on the villa’s rooftop.

He had sensed someone arriving here while he was having that heart-to-heart talk with Li Qianhuan. But for Li Congxin now, nothing in heaven or earth was more important than his daughter. Even if the Living Tribunal had come, it would have to wait!

What was more, the person on the rooftop at this moment should also sacrifice a little time for Li Qianhuan. After all, the visitor was none other than Captain Marvel, Carol Danvers!

New York, the Baxter Building.

This was the headquarters of the Fantastic Four, a family team of superheroes, as well as one of the few fixed assets under Mister Fantastic Reed’s name.

As a superhero with a genius mind, living in a setting like the Marvel Universe where black technology ruled the world, the fact that he had managed to end up with nothing but a single building to his name was quite something.

Yet even now, this super-scientist had no intention of using his genius brain to escape poverty and ensure that his family and companions lived better lives.

After witnessing Li Congxin and the others kill the Tyrant, exile Stardust, and repel Galactus, Reed had seen for the first time what the true powerhouses of the universe were like. To gain strength that could be of help before the cosmic crisis Galactus had mentioned arrived, he had immediately accelerated his previous research project as soon as he returned home.

At this moment, a special machine resembling a luxury sports car sat in front of him.

This object had originally belonged to Solus, the ancestor of the Inheritor Family. It was a high-tech device capable of traversing Parallel Universes. Later, Solus had been dragged into space by Li Congxin and beaten to death, turning the time-traveling equipment into an ownerless object. After seeing Solus’s abilities, Li Congxin had naturally assumed that he had traveled over using his own power and never imagined that Solus’s high-tech equipment would be left behind in this world.

As a result, this sports car capable of crossing Parallel Universes had been found first by the Fantastic Four and taken into their possession.

"Thank you, darling." Reed took the coffee Invisible Woman had brought him and took a sip. Then he pointed at a machine not far from the spatial sports car, one that was still only a framework, and began explaining. "That sports car from an unknown origin gave me a lot of inspiration. By studying it, I finally found some directions for guiding Parallel Universe energy."

"If my experiment succeeds, no matter what troubles Earth and the universe encounter, we’ll be able to contribute to protecting our home instead of only providing some insignificant assistance as support staff like before. We won’t have to be mere spectators during the great battle, either."

"Actually, being able to be a spectator was already pretty good." As he spoke, Human Torch and The Thing walked in as well. The former continued, "When Galactus threatened us, the three of us didn’t even qualify to board the Congxin One and watch from a distance. Besides, in other stories, someone as handsome as me is usually the protagonist!"

The Thing couldn’t help teasing him. "Like Captain America?"

Invisible Woman calmly asked, "Reed, how far along is your research?"

"It’s still only in the initial stage, but we can first perform a simple scan of the nearby Parallel Universes…" As he spoke, he activated the unfinished machine without hesitation.

Searching the Parallel Universes itself required a tremendous amount of energy. As the machine started up, the power supply to the entire Baxter Building was immediately cut off, and all its energy was absorbed into the machine that was pretending to be mature.

At the same time, Reed continued introducing his research to the companions beside him. "Actually, my research wasn’t progressing this quickly at first. I have to say, Tony Stark, Hank Pym, and Bruce Banner are all geniuses. I found a great deal of inspiration from them, and even many problems that had stumped me before found possible breakthroughs in their databases…"

"Bzzzt, bzzzt, bzzzt…"

As a series of electric arcs flashed, one of the indicator lights on the machine lit up.

Mister Fantastic was overjoyed. He hurriedly pushed an operating lever beside him forward, and a Spatial Vortex suddenly opened.

Seeing this, all four members of the Fantastic Four wore excited expressions.

This thing that looked like a Spatial Vortex might not have a known function yet, but its appearance at least proved that Mister Fantastic’s research had achieved initial success!

For them, this was undoubtedly fantastic news.

However, before anyone could take another step, an invisible energy suddenly surged out of the transmission passage. Before anyone could react, it directly burrowed into Invisible Woman’s body.

Struck by the energy from a Parallel Universe, the latter was sent flying backward. Mister Fantastic and Human Torch tried to save her, but how could they make it in time?

Her back was about to hit the sharp corner of a metal rack in the laboratory. The tragedy seemed unavoidable, and Mister Fantastic and Human Torch were practically beside themselves with panic.

Yet at that critical moment, Invisible Woman Susan suddenly unleashed her own energy, raising an invisible protective shield around her body and protecting herself completely.

Bang!

Under the forceful impact, the metal rack behind Invisible Woman was crushed and twisted. The transfer of force caused it to absorb most of the momentum from her body, after which it smashed through the wall behind it and crashed into the center of the warehouse next door, taking Invisible Woman with it.

After landing, Invisible Woman hadn’t even had time to figure out why she had become the target of that unknown energy attack—or how she had activated her energy field without any warning—when her mind suddenly went blank. Her eyes rolled back, and she fell unconscious.

"Susan!"

Never had Reed expected such a small experiment to cause an accident like this. He hurriedly shut off the machine’s power, then ran over with the others to check on Invisible Woman.

Thanks to book friend Jiangsu Li Titan for the 600 Qidian coins!