Chapter 1303: Interstellar Grand Stage (Ten)_1

Just when Spider Gwen and Peter were intermittently introducing Riley to the various labs, a figure wearing a black trench coat with a revolver at his waist walked in.

"Oh, Shadow Spider-man." Gwen called out his name, and Shadow Spider-man was slightly taken aback when he saw the group of people. He's not much of a talker, doesn't exhibit many body actions, but his obvious pause made Gwen wonder.

"What's up?" Gwen asked.

"What are you doing here?" Shadow Spider-man's voice was deep, quite unlike Peter Parker's. He looked at Gwen under the mask and said, "Dr. Schiller sent me to pick up the newbie, but why are the two of you here?"

"We are responsible for giving the newbie orientation."

"Aren't you guys going to the Air Transport Technology Expo in Queens District?" Shadow Spider-man tilted his head slightly and said, "You only get academic credits if you check in within three hours of the opening of the expo, and it's already been 1 hour and 20 minutes. Are you sure you can make it?"

"What?!!" Gwen exclaimed in surprise, and immediately sprung from the gap in the sofa, looking at Shadow Spider-man, and said, "Checking in gives you points? Since when?!!"

"You didn't turn on the push notifications for the Spider App, did you?" Shadow Spider-man hit right on the spot, Gwen stammered and said, "Well, I find Nick's mass messages a bit annoying. I need a rest,…"

Having said this, she hastily grabbed her phone and began to check the messages in the App. It took her a long time to find the notification of the expo check-in in yesterday's top message.

"Oh my gosh, 20 points?!!" Gwen screamed, she gaped at the content on the screen and said, "Are you serious? This scores almost as much as a day's work for me!!"

Gwen paused for a moment, then quickly put her phone back into her jacket, tied her hair with a hair tie, put her mask and hood back on, made a gesture to Peter, and said as she ran towards the door, "I'll leave the newbie to you, I have to go first!"

When she reached the door, she turned back and clung to the door frame with both hands, poked her head out and said, "Oh yeah, remind Dr. Schiller not to forget to credit the 5 points for hosting the newbie to my account!"

Peter shook his head and said, "I bet she'll lose more than 5 points for bringing you here without permission, even if Dr. Schiller doesn't deduct any, Director Nick will. He never misses an opportunity to deduct points."

Riley opened her mouth slightly, somewhat nervously asking, "Points can be deducted?"

"Absolutely." Shadow Spider-man stepped forward and sat in the place where Gwen was sitting. He took out a bottle of whiskey from his inside pocket, took a sip without asking the others if they'd like some and then said, "Not only can points be deducted, but they can also go negative."

Riley's eyes widened, and Peter nodded, "Indeed, if not for the fact that you're a newbie who doesn't understand the rules yet, your stroll in the Bronx alone would be at least a 50-point deduction."

"When we first came here, we used to get into trouble all the time." Shadow Spider-man admitted candidly, "Every Spider-man has crime fighting and upholding justice etched into their bones. They rush to help when they see a robbery on the street, a cop in trouble, or even help traffic police stop a vehicle."

"But this universe indeed has significant differences from other universes. Sometimes you end up doing more harm than good when you step in to help too much. Numerous Spider-men have committed to justice, delaying the progress of experiments, or even simply abandoning an experiment halfway to go catch criminals, resulting in experimental accidents."

"Both Dr. Connors and Dr. Otto strongly protested, even Tony Stark ran to S.H.I.E.L.D. a few times for bailouts. So afterwards, the point system was modified to include a penalty mechanism. Crime fighting can only be done within specified hours, and each Spider-man is assigned different areas. They must check in with the local police and cannot intervene arbitrarily."

"Of course, if police encounter difficulties they can't handle, they will contact the Spider-man in charge of that area. This also offers points, so your act of upholding justice in the Bronx may have stolen someone else's points."

"But I didn't see the Spider-man responsible for that area intervening?" Riley frowned and said, "Is he just going to ignore all sorts of acts of violence for the sake of trading assistance for points?"

"Of course not, there is no Spider-man like that." Peter interjected, "He didn't intervene because he was observing the situation. What you see as acts of violence may hide bigger problems. It won't lead to any results by jumping into the middle of the street and yelling 'I challenge you' at everyone or punching everyone."

"Oh yeah, who's in charge of that area again?" Peter adjusted his glasses, looking somehow curious.

"It's Peter Parker, but I'm not sure which Peter Parker." Shadow Spider-man mumbled, pulling out his phone from his pocket, but his phone operation was a bit clumsy. He sent a message asking, while saying, "I really don't get used to this high-tech stuff. We didn't even have computers back in our day."

Peter also took out his phone to look at the screen. As a revolver icon in the group chat asked a question, messages began to flood the screen. Peter, with his superior dynamic vision, swiftly caught the answer in the flurry of rushing messages.

"Oh man, that's some tough luck, it's that Peter." Peter raised an eyebrow, looking at Shadow Spider-man said, "The one who's still confined in the nursing home."

Shadow Spider-Man was also somewhat surprised. He put away the wine pot in his hand, shook his head, and said, "That's really a bit troublesome. His wounds are quite serious, and he won't recover in a short period of time. Moreover, his spirit seems somewhat low, I'm afraid he can't start work on security so quickly."

"Then let me go." Riley immediately raised his hand, "I've been living there ever since I came to this universe, and I'm quite familiar with the place, I really want to help."

Shadow Spider-Man and Peter exchanged glances, and Peter said hesitantly, "I'm sorry, Mr. Riley, I can empathize with your feelings. Each Peter Parker wants to help, but if I may be so bold, your means of assisting are somewhat..."

"We should not help the police to fight against the protesters, or assist the protesters in fighting against the police, either way is wrong. It's like helping the puppet master behind the scenes to intensify their conflicts, we're just being used."

Peter, sitting on the opposite couch, frowned. He had inherited all of the memories and experiences of this universe's Peter Parker, who evidently had exceptional talent in web creation.

This universe's Peter Parker was not the rash youngster directing the fight with his fists. Or rather, it was quite the opposite. Because he was close to Shiller, he also inherited the wise aura from this psychologist, possessing a methodical ability in devising tactics and even schemes.

"I suspect that the puppet master has long been aware of a Peter Parker residing within this jurisdiction, and it's clear that he found out that this Peter Parker is new here and doesn't understand the situation."

"He's frequently instigating protests there, continuously escalating conflicts, even orchestrating violent clashes, solely to provoke Peter Parker into action."

"If my guess is correct, it wasn't only the New Warriors Team present that day. There must have been journalists or photographers lurking in the shadows, they want to drag Peter Parker into this."

"But people don't know that Peter Parker is Spider-Man." Riley countered.

"Exactly, in this world, Peter Parker is a lot more important than Spider-Man," Shadow Spider-Man explained. "Actually, the reputation of the third-generation Spider-Man isn't very good, people have quite a lot of objections to him. While his supporters are not few, his reputation is not as good as the first-generation Spider-Man."

"On the contrary, Peter Parker is a renowned talented youth. Everyone knows that he's the darling of Stark and Osborne. Dragging him into this naturally involves the two big companies."

"If the talented Peter Parker, who develops shuttle and space transportation technology, appears at the protest scene and helps the police beat the protesters, how do you think people will view him? How will they view Stark and Osborne? And how will they view space transportation technology?"

Riley felt his heart beating faster, cold sweat started to seep out of his back. He licked his somewhat dry lips, saying, "I almost caused a big trouble, didn't I?"

"My guess is, in the first few days when you just arrived and couldn't figure out the situation, you also wore the fact that you're an inexperienced outsider on your face, so they knew they could manipulate you, but it's not your fault."

"Now that the Peter who's in charge of that jurisdiction is injured and temporarily unable to maintain order, I'm afraid we have to deal with it together."

Peter stood up and said, "The other me, that is, the real Peter Parker from this world, has gone to other universes to test out new technologies and won't return for a while. I have to go to Stark Laboratory later. Mr. Stark has been very busy lately, with many projects overseen by me."

"Therefore, I'm afraid I don't have time to accompany you personally. But I will call Jarvis later to provide you with technical support. The first priority is to prepare a new battle suit for you."

Right when Riley was about to say that he had a battle suit, Shadow Spider-Man interrupted him, "Every Spider-Man who comes here has to make some adjustments to his own suit, otherwise, you will see dozens of identical-looking Spider-Men swinging around in the air. We must have our own unique identifiers, otherwise, Nick will deduct points."

Peter shrugged, jokingly saying, "We are all his little lambs, needing to be tagged in the ear. Whoever dares to make trouble will be cast out."

Riley pursed his lips, feeling awkward. He didn't want to give up his old uniform, felt there was nothing wrong with his old uniform, and didn't like being labeled.

This awkward mood only lasted a few minutes. A suit shimmering with light was delivered to him by an Iron Armor.

Riley stared dumbfounded at the Spider-Man suit on the Iron Armor. He opened his mouth and blinked. Peter walked over and patted his shoulder, "Come on, try it on."

"No...but it..."

Riley was so shocked that he couldn't speak. Shadow Spider-Man shook his head and said, "Don't be so surprised. After all, this is a high-tech world. It's normal to have some miniature weapons and armor on a suit, right?"

"I know, but...what's with the magical brilliance??!!!"