SSS

"I'm listening, Agent."

"We are from The Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division, or better known as S.H.I.E.L.D. We are responsible for protecting earth from any possible threats. Our director like to personally meet you."

"I also want to meet him."

Phil was happy to hear that. Usually, mysterious vigilante like the one in front of him would hate it to work for the government. However, it seemed it was too early for him to be happy.

"But not now, Agent. Soon, we'll have the opportunity to meet each other. Until then," with that said, Noah flew away before teleporting back to his home. This way, the secret organization would have no way to track him down.

Since that incident in New Mexico, higher positions on top began to worry about alien invasion as they now knew that they were not alone in the universe anymore. They started to experiment and create weapons that could deal with aliens, which were superior to humanity.

Six months had passed by since then. During this period of time, he mostly was focusing his time on inscribing runes on his symbiote, venom and on his own body.

Everyone and everything had different potential in their capacities of withholding runes on their bodies. Some could and some couldn't. In magician term, someone who was branded with runes, was called a runeknight and someone, who was proficient in inscribing and branding runes was called a runemaster.

Noah himself, as a runemaster as well as a runeknight, found out he possessed a vast capacity to hold a lot of runes. He planned to create a set of runes, which would greatly increase the performance of his runes. He had also inscribed one more rune or tattoo on his forehead. The tattoo manifested in the form of a rhombus-like marking dipped in violet. As Noah's proficiency in rune magic had increased a lot, he was able to make the runes invisible most of the time. Only when it was actively used would it appear on his body. It was the same for tattoos on his both arms. He could hide both of them, but they had been with him for a long time. He hold sentiments for both of them, finding no need to hide them.

This tattoo or rune didn't directly raise his elemental power, physical strength or his other ability. Due to Noah's exceptional control over his mana and chi, he was able to store excess chi and mana into the rune on his forehead over an extended period of time. When the rune was activated, Noah had access to all the accumulated chi and mana. The stored energies were then released into his body, greatly amplifying the power of his techniques.

Moreover, when the rune was activated, the rune would either spread across his face or wrap around his entire body according to the energies accumulated in the rune. If both energies were about ten-times his usual chi and mana levels, the rune would only spread across his face while it would wrap around his entire body if the energies accumulated were about a hundred-times his usual energy levels. The maximum energy the rune could hold was about a hundred-times his usual energy levels. In that state, he would possess extra energies to last longer in his fight and his power would be greatly enhanced. This rune increased his survival substantially. However, it would also take a long time to restore the chi and mana accumulated in the runes back to the maximum level. Hence, once the energy in the rune was empty, he would focus on refilling back the rune during his daily meditation rather than improving the chi and mana in his body and soul.

His symbiote venom seemed to have high affinity with runes, it was able to handle many runes on its body, which had passed his own potential greatly. However, he didn't inscribe many types of runes like he did with his body. Instead, he only branded venom with one type of rune. Hence, all parts of its body which was capable of rune, were inscribed with that type of rune. In the end, it possessed about a hundred runes of the same type.

That rune was an ownership rune which was connected to Noah. The rune would connect venom to Noah's soul and body, fully controlled and owned by Noah. No one else would be able to influence and use his symbiote other than him. This rune would also prevent his venom from ever regaining its consciousness and mind back. In fact, the most important role of the rune was to tremendously enhance the symbiote connection to Noah's mind. Noah and his symbiote were apparently two different kinds of species even though they lived in one body. Before inscribing the rune, there was a gap of time for Noah's thought to be transmitted to his symbiote. This gap was extremely dangerous in a fight, especially a high-paced fight. And the symbiote also couldn't create with its body some of Noah's complex constructs in his mind. With this rune enhancing the synergy between them, the problems were solved.

Gwen also had good news for him that day. In these six months, she could be said to be living her life in the lab trying to replicate or even improve Dr. Abraham Erskine's super soldier serum.

She ran from her lab to Noah. It was as if she was blossoming in happiness with that pretty smile carved on her face. However, her happiness also contained a hint of distress. "Noah, I finally recreated it. "

Noah kissed her as he shared the joy of her success. She then showed him a tube containing special blue liquid in them.

"But, it has a little problem with its administration," Gwen looked a little disappointed by this part of failure.

The original Super Soldier Serum created by Dr. Erskine was supposed to be injected with the help of Vita-Rays treatment. When saturated with vita radiation, the serum worked more successfully by stimulating growth in the body. He had said, "The serum amplifies everything that is inside, so good becomes great; bad becomes worse."

A variation of the original serum created by Howard Stark and used mainly by Hydra to create Winter Soldiers, caused an excruciating transformation without the need of Vita-Rays. However, this serum had a mental side effect. People who were transformed by this serum, saw an increase in aggression.

One of the most powerful derivations from the original serum was created by Bruce Banner. As an expert in gamma radiation, he believed that gamma radiation worked in a similar way as Vita-Rays. Hence, he administered the serum by using gamma radiation. But the result was ultimately a failure and turned him into the raging monster known as Hulk.

If Gwen's serum could enhance about the same as the original, then it was absolutely incredible.

"The serum can't be injected into someone unless he is in a critical condition. Every minute particles of his body need to be in a state of extreme hunger and thirst, in a situation where they're being exhausted and injured yet can't obtain sufficient nourishment. Only in his precise state, he was able to absorb the serum to the fullest extent."

Noah finally understood the reason Gwen was downcast. However, it was impressive considering she managed to replicate the complete effect of the serum in six months even with this little problem.

Naturally, without the Vita-Rays treatment ,Gwen needed to find another way to administer the serum into someone. And her solution was ingenious although the risk of dying would be high.

After all, a person would need to have a strong natural regenerative ability before taking the serum. The serum wouldn't be effective immediately as soon as it was injected into the body. In fact, he needed to recover on his own from the deathbed so that the serum could sipped deep into his body.

"I need more time to perfect the formula," Gwen bit her lips as she was unsatisfied with her result. She felt like she could have done better. However, Noah personally asked her to complete it even with side effects before the end of the year. (2011)

The threat of the Chitauri invasion looming above his head made it extremely uncomfortable for him. Hence, he wished for every power-up he could possibly get to secure his family and his own safety.

In fact, Noah felt like the serum was specifically created for him as he had a strong regeneration ability when he awakened his mutant power. He just needed to convince Gwen about his power as he knew Gwen wouldn't agree to the idea of him injecting the serum into his body.

Title : Super Soldier Serum