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

According to standard legal process, the first consequence would be enormous administrative fines.

Based on the profits Obadiah had earned each year, the penalty would roughly be two to three times the total transaction amount. Added together, it would be at least tens of billions of dollars.

And administrative fines were still the lighter part. There would also be compliance supervision and external audits.

Stark Industries could lose eligibility for top-secret projects, and might even be barred from touching any high-end military work for several years.

That alone would be an extremely terrifying loss.

If things went badly, Stark Industries could fall into a slump for years.

Beyond that, there would be federal felonies.

Once convicted, it would basically mean never leaving prison.

With its core business collapsing, the federal government could use the opportunity to intervene, force a breakup, and acquire parts of Stark Industries.

And this would not be Obadiah's personal ending alone. It would also involve every board member who had received dividends—including Tony himself.

Even if Tony could clear his own name, how much time would that process take?

During that period, the Stark Industries brand would likely rot completely. Even if Tony was a genius, he would still need years afterward to slowly revive it.

Tony had always been full of confidence in himself.

Even arrogance.

But arrogance did not mean he would blindly lose his reason. Over the years, the labels attached to him had always been playboy and genius scientist, but his business intelligence was also top-tier.

Tony simply hated trouble.

"I should be thanking those people too, right, Jarvis?"

While thinking, Tony suddenly said something out of nowhere.

"I believe so, sir. If you had not been continuously tracking and paying attention to those two mysterious, powerful forces, you would not have noticed Sokovia because of them."

"Heh..." Tony let out a self-deprecating laugh, then took a sip from his glass.

What a massive coincidence.

If that huge incident had not happened in Sokovia, Tony would never have turned his attention to this small country he had never cared about before.

At first, Tony had been especially curious. Why would those people make such a grand show over such a tiny country?

After Jarvis conducted a background investigation into Sokovia, he gave Tony a huge surprise.

As it turned out, Sokovia had been ravaged by war all these years.

And Tony had actually been one of the beneficiaries.

This wasn't Tony trying to whitewash himself. He had never claimed to be a saint. He was a businessman.

A successful businessman.

He developed weapons and ate from the bowl of war.

The difference between him and other arms dealers was that other arms dealers begged on their knees, while Tony begged standing upright.

His orders came from the U.S. Department of Defense. What he ate were those high-end profits.

As for who the Department of Defense used those weapons to attack, or who they sold them to afterward, Tony did not care.

The so-called suffering of the people—in Tony's eyes, that was because the governments of those countries were rotten to the core.

To put it plainly, Tony himself had always been far, far away from the bottom.

If he had not personally experienced it, if he had not seen it with his own eyes, he could not truly empathize.

Environment shaped everything. That was not an empty phrase.

This time, Tony spent an entire night watching the video files Jarvis had found through investigation.

He saw rebel fighters using weapons he had developed to bombard Sokovian cities. Countless Sokovian civilians died because of it, and the ruins were filled with confused, desperate people crying out in grief.

A husband holding his wife, who had only one arm left. A father or mother desperately digging through the ruins, trying to pull their child out from beneath the rubble.

That direct visual impact shook Tony to the core.

If Tony had truly been a capitalist who cared only about money, then none of this would have mattered.

What was guilt? Ten thousand dead was just a number. A million dead was still just a number. He could have faced it all with cold indifference.

But, by sheer coincidence, Tony possessed something a capitalist wasn't supposed to have.

A conscience.

That was why Tony was angry—angry at Obadiah for hiding this from him and betraying him, and guilty that those innocent civilians had died because of weapons he had personally developed.

More importantly, from all of this, he saw a motive he least wanted to see—ambition.

In Tony's own mind, Stark Industries belonged to him. From his father to himself, this was his family's enterprise.

Obadiah was his uncle, his father's close friend, and someone who had been by his side since childhood, replacing the role of a father to a certain extent. Because of that, Obadiah was also one of the masters of Stark Industries in Tony's eyes.

That was why Tony had trusted him enough to let him serve as CEO for so many years. Many company affairs were things Tony never bothered asking about, precisely because he believed this.

Unfortunately, from these records, Tony read Obadiah's ambition.

The man had never treated him as family.

Only as a tool to expand Stark Industries.

Perhaps one day, when Tony no longer had value, Obadiah would remove him from the game without the slightest mercy.

At its core, this was also one of the most classic routines in business.

Such things happened endlessly in the corporate world.

Since that was the case, Tony had no intention of showing mercy either.

"Jarvis, put Obadiah under full surveillance. Simulate a virtual authority system and gradually strip away his access to the database. I want every file he retrieves to be under your supervision."

"Finally, erase the dividend data related to me, and include the other board members as well. Conduct background investigations on each of them and identify everyone connected to Obadiah's group inside the company."

"Also, contact Rhodey for me."

"Of course, sir."

After Jarvis responded, he fell silent.

Only Tony remained in the living room, drinking alone. Under the lights, his unwavering gaze was reflected in the glass, rippling faintly.

You want to kick me out and seize power for yourself?

Then go dream about it in prison.

Then he thought of the plan he had already been considering developing.

After noticing Obadiah's ambition, Tony had begun to worry about his own safety.

Security personnel? None of them were reliable.

Relying on others was not as good as relying on himself.

With that thought, Tony stood up, casually waved his hand to shut off the holographic projection, and walked toward the underground laboratory with his glass in hand.

…

Sokovia, now officially renamed Terra, had entered an era of great development.

But that did not affect Matthew much.

What affected Matthew instead was another dark big shot, one who was raging helplessly—Dormammu.

At first, Dormammu had used dark power to tempt Kaecilius into joining him, hoping to use the opportunity to divide Kamar-Taj and send his old opponent, the Ancient One, to her grave a little earlier.

But because of Matthew's appearance, Kaecilius had barely jumped around a few times before he was gone.

That infuriated Dormammu.

So he did not hesitate to expend power, frantically increasing the pressure on the Ancient One. Unfortunately, it had no effect at all.

That was why it was called helpless rage.

But Dormammu was, after all, one of the most powerful beings in the universe. He wasn't willing to give up just like that.

And so, he began thinking crooked thoughts again.

...

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