Marvel: Sign-In System – Starting with the Glint-Glint Fruit

"Found it?"

Matthew looked at Neagley's holographic projection in front of him. Beside it was an information map of Sokovia, along with a personnel structure chart. Every marker pointed toward the name at the very top.

Baron Strucker.

"Good. Proceed according to the original plan. Mobilize the Astartes, the Raven, and the Grey Knights. Everyone moves out, including logistics and the management team Karla prepared."

"Clean out Sokovia's parasites in the shortest time possible. Find the rebel army. See who is supporting the rebel leader from behind, and record every piece of transaction information."

"Yes!"

As Matthew's resolute words fell, Neagley lost her usual casual, teasing demeanor. Instead, her expression turned serious.

She knew this operation was unlike any they had undertaken before.

It concerned Matthew, and it would shape the future of everyone involved.

As the holographic projection faded, the operation began.

Under the advance mobilization and positioning of Reacher, the highest wartime commander, together with Neagley, Natasha, Karla, and the other senior leaders, one thousand Astartes, three thousand reserve Astartes, one hundred and fifty Raven, one thousand reserve Raven, and one thousand Grey Knights were deployed.

In addition to them, sixty thousand ordinary armed troops were gathered from all over the world.

This time, they did not use modern transport aircraft or conventional transportation.

Instead, at various locations, the Grey Knights opened gate after gate into the cities of Sokovia.

That night, in the fastest possible way, the entire sky over Sokovia changed completely.

Sokovia stretched roughly 110 kilometers from east to west and 93 kilometers from north to south.

Its population was around two million. The capital, Novi Grad, was home to 1.1 million people. Beyond it lay three secondary cities—Velica, Zagora, and Morava—along with countless towns and villages scattered across the countryside.

This wasn't a battle. It was a one-sided campaign.

The gap between the two sides was simply too great.

It was like using a nuclear weapon against a handful of insects.

Sokovia's official army numbered only seventeen thousand troops.

Its equipment, however, was fairly modern. The same was true of the rebel army.

Both sides had long relied on illegal arms-smuggling networks for supplies. As a result, although the country's economy lagged behind, its armies were surprisingly well equipped.

Unfortunately, faced with overwhelming superiority in both intelligence and military strength, there could be only one outcome.

In less than an hour, all of Sokovia was completely taken over.

The Sokovian government army still had no idea what was happening when groups of Astartes in heavy power armor descended.

When they saw their gunfire fail to even scratch the paint on the power armor, and then watched those monsters casually lift and throw their tanks with one hand, their eyes nearly popped out.

What else was there to say?

Surrender.

The rebels fared no differently.

Their supreme commander, Zara, was still tucked away in a mountain hideout somewhere, reviewing plans for the next strike against the government army, when several Raven soldiers stepped out of sparking circles of light from nowhere.

The moment he drew his gun, one of them appeared in front of him like teleportation and grabbed him by the throat.

At that moment, he understood that he was finished.

Thirty thousand ordinary armed soldiers entered the capital, Novi Grad, while the remaining thirty thousand entered the three secondary cities separately.

The entire process was coordinated by the Astartes, the Raven, and the Grey Knights.

One hour. That was all it took to secure the entire country.

And alongside the territorial takeover, every gangs operating within Sokovia was identified and dismantled in targeted strikes. Gunfire rang out across the country in overlapping waves, waking people from sleep without giving them any clear sense of what was happening around them.

But Reacher, Natasha, and the others hadn't deployed the three warbands to deal with the government troops or the rebels. Their primary objective was HYDRA—the cells and installations hidden throughout the country, embedded in churches, underground bunkers, and mountain facilities.

All three warbands had awakened two types of Haki. With Observation Haki, every hidden HYDRA base was quickly uncovered.

The defense network Baron Strucker had built was meaningless against the three warbands.

More terrifying still, Reacher had already cut off all communication between the city and the outside world.

Whenever they discovered a base, they activated electromagnetic jammers developed by the Technology Department, disrupting and severing every communication signal across the surrounding area.

Because of this, Baron Strucker had no idea what was happening.

He did not even know that the empire he had spent decades painstakingly building had already been reduced to ruins.

…

Northwest Sokovia, in a hidden mountain base.

Snow was still falling from the sky. Beneath the dark night, the sound of wind and snow never ceased.

Inside and outside the base, searchlights on the watchtowers swept back and forth while fully armed guards checked the surroundings.

Within this castle-like base, a man in a black coat over a sweater, with a monocle hanging over his right eye, stood in a corridor and looked through special one-way glass at the girl sitting quietly on the metal bed inside.

The girl was very young, around seventeen or eighteen. She had shoulder-length dark-brown hair.

Her face was pale but delicate, and her body was thin and weak.

"What happened?" Strucker asked, irritated.

This pair of twins were experimental subjects he valued greatly. He had not expected his subordinate supervisor to tell him that the younger sister of the twins had shown an abnormal reaction.

"I'm very sorry, Baron. Ten minutes ago, an extremely faint energy reaction suddenly erupted from inside her body."

"We examined her, but the tests produced no results," the supervisor said helplessly.

"A faint energy reaction?"

Baron Strucker's expression changed.

Not with worry.

With excitement.

He turned to the supervisor and stared at him. "There were no signs beforehand?"

"No signs. The energy was very weak, but a Rubik's Cube toy that had been in her hand disappeared. Judging from the surveillance footage, it vanished into thin air."

The supervisor raised the tablet in his hand and placed it in front of Baron Strucker, opening the paused video.

In the footage was the girl inside the room.

She had originally been lying on the metal bed with her eyes closed. In the dark environment, her body suddenly trembled, and she abruptly opened her eyes.

Then, a clear scarlet energy appeared around her body, rippling outward.

When it enveloped the toy Rubik's Cube on the bedside, the cube vanished without a trace. The girl sat up sharply, her expression full of fear.

"Wonderful. As expected, there is a powerful force hidden inside her body that we do not understand."

"This energy can actually make an object disappear into thin air. Is it spatial ability? Or can it break objects down into an atomic state?"

Baron Strucker became even more excited, guessing to himself.

"Call someone. Immediately call someone and move her to another room. Conduct a full inspection of this room. I want to know—"

But before he could finish speaking.

A thunderous roar came howling in, and in an instant, the entire base shook violently.

Baron Strucker, the supervisor, and the girl inside the room all suddenly raised their heads, instinctively wanting to see what had happened.