MUP: Chapter 93. Gathering Intelligence

"S.H.I.E.L.D. agent?!"

In the antique shop, Ryan looked at the contents displayed on the data panel and subconsciously raised his eyebrows.

Although he had expected S.H.I.E.L.D. to contact Ip Man, one of the parties involved in the Chinatown incident, he didn't expect them to act so soon.

Moreover, through the Ip Man clone in the martial arts school, he saw the young man who was completely unaware that his identity had been exposed.

Ryan thought to himself.

'Are you sure you're an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. instead of Hydra?'

Well, at this stage, until Hydra was completely exposed, there was nothing wrong with saying he was a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. Moreover, even if S.H.I.E.L.D. had been corrupted and dismantled by Hydra from within over the decades, there would always be some loyal agents, and the one in front of him might be one.

"Master, what's the matter?"

A little unnerved by Ip Man's gaze, the young man then spoke up.

Out of confidence in his disguise, he didn't think it was because he was exposed.

"Nothing." Silently withdrawing his gaze, although the true identity had been exposed in Ryan's eyes, he decided to continue to put on the show. The other party had worked so hard to approach him, kneeling and worshipping. He had to give him some respect for that, right?

With this in mind, Ryan manipulated the clone in the martial arts school, "Although I have promised to teach you martial arts, and I won't go back on my word... But, as the saying goes, practising martial arts begins with the practice of the heart, and to be truly good at Wing Chun, one must first train the foundation. Without it, even the best martial arts skills are just a castle in the sky, worthless ..."

"..."

Ip Man talked a lot, but the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent in front of him clearly wasn't really interested.

After all, he's here to spy, not to really learn martial arts.

However, what he didn't know was that Ip Man, who was in front of him, wasn't really here to teach martial arts either.

If Ryan had thought about teaching his opponent a few moves before, without knowing his identity as a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, Ryan completely gave up on that idea when his identity as a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent was revealed. Anyway, the other party didn't really come to learn martial arts. What would he teach so enthusiastically?

After a simple lecture, Ip Man looked at the young man, "So, what's your name?"

"Mike, Master, you can call me Mike."

Nodding his head, regardless of whether the name was real or not, Ip Man immediately said, "Mike, since you want to learn Wing Chun, you must first have a firm horse stance."

"Horse stance?"

What Ip Man said next involved the core fundamentals of martial arts.

Even as a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, Mike didn't know everything. After all, to put it bluntly, he was just an ordinary Level 5 agent within S.H.I.E.L.D. and was only assigned to contact and gather intelligence rather than anything of greater importance.

"The horse stance is the foundation of all martial arts. As the saying goes, if you don't practice martial arts, you will reach old age with nothing to show for it. This means the fundamental technique, or what I call the horse stance."

As Ip Man said that, he straightened his body, raised his hands to his chest in fists and bent his knees inwards in a strange position, "From today onwards, you will practice this position every day."

　　...

"So that's what you learned from the martial arts school?"

S.H.I.E.L.D., New York Branch.

Nick Fury looked at the strange posture of the agent in his office and couldn't help but raise his eyebrow.

"Accurately speaking, the name of this position is called Two Goat Clamping Horse Stance, which is the basis of practising Wing Chun."

"That's not what I 'm asking." Opening his mouth and interrupting the explanation of the young man, Fury spoke in a deep voice with a stern look on his face, "Agent, remember your mission. I'm not really asking you to go to Chinatown to learn about some sort of martial art called Wing Chun. What I need is information about the man and everything that happened in Chinatown before."

Fury's words quickly brought the agent out of the martial arts practice mood. Putting away his horse stance and looking across at the Director's glaring eye, he then gulped and said, "I understand, Sir."

"So, tell me, Agent, what have you found?"

"After my scouting and enquiries with residents around Chinatown, as well as a sweep of the police network to search for evidence, I have basically concluded that the damage in Chinatown came mainly from a guy named the Beast."

"The Beast?"

A name Fury hadn't heard before caused him to repeat it subconsciously.

"Yes, interestingly, we also found the name in the report within the police's network. It originally came from an Asian man named Ah Xing, who had no identification. From the description of the police report, we finally found the other party's trail in the previous incident in Manhattan. According to the news report at that time, an Asian man kicked away a flying concrete block."

Fury was no stranger to the Manhattan incident described by the agent. The problem was caused by the military, and even the location where that problem was currently hidden was under S.H.I.E.L.D.'s control.

"And after that? Where did this Ah Xing run off to?"

"We don't know." The young man shook his head. The chaotic situation in Hell's Kitchen and the secrecy of the Hand's activities meant that even S.H.I.E.L.D. didn't have all the information at their fingertips.

"However, the other party had briefly appeared in Harlem for a few days and took out a gang leader in Harlem. He mentioned that he was from a place called Peng Lai."

"Peng Lai?"

"We investigated and only found descriptions of a place called Peng Lai Island among some Chinese mythological and legendary sources."

These descriptions from the agent caused Fury to fall into a brief moment of contemplation; unlike ordinary S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, he had lived through various wars and knew a lot of secrets unknown to the vast majority of people in this world, and therefore didn't let the lack of information detract from the clues.

After a brief silence, Fury led the topic to the targeted person again.

"So, what about the guy in the martial arts school?"

"People in Chinatown have always called him Master Ip, but when I asked him, he said his name was Ip Man."

"Ip Man."

With the somewhat tongue-twisting name on his lips, Fury looked up and was about to say something when there was a knock on the office door.

"Come in."

Pushing the door open, Agent Hill came in with some information, "Sir, we found some important information. "