Chapter 199: The Plot Begins to Gradually Go Off-Track (Part 1)

"Are you sure you're really okay?"

Thor, standing at the door, carefully looked at Eddie. Eddie's condition looked very bad right now. His hair looked like it hadn't been washed for days, already tangled into a bird's nest. The sweater he was wearing inside seemed to be a designer brand, but it was already snagged in many places. Not to mention his coat, which had dirty oil stains on one of the sleeves.

Thor had been wandering in Hell's Kitchen for these past few days and had seen many homeless people. Eddie's image joined the homeless group without any sense of incongruity.

Seeing that his neighbor had fallen to this point, Thor was embarrassed to bring up the issue of him disturbing the peace again. He could only say, "If you need help, I'm right next door..."

"Damn it! I'm not a homeless person!" Eddie clearly saw the sympathy in Thor's eyes. He hammered the door frame and said, "I'm just..."

He had just spat out a syllable when he suddenly swayed backward, hitting the entryway behind him. The water cup on the entryway fell to the ground and shattered. He looked back and cursed, "Damn it, how did it..."

Then he fell heavily to the left, his head hitting the door frame again, and then, like a marionette, he stumbled back a few steps and ran to the sink to vomit.

Thor couldn't stand by and watch this. Even if it wasn't to help him, it was to prevent his hard-found house from being destroyed. He could only walk into Eddie's room, wanting to see what was wrong with him.

Eddie's house was a mess. Piled at the door were several boxes of documents and sundries, clearly packed in a hurry, with large and small items piled together without order, looking like they could collapse at any time.

Thor stepped over these documents and discovered a pile of machines he didn't recognize on his left, some messy brackets, and some that looked like cannons.

Thor had lived in the human world for so many days, and he roughly understood that any machine he didn't recognize must be very expensive. If he broke it, he definitely couldn't afford to pay for it, so he bypassed the left side and came to the sofa on the right.

Piled on the sofa was a pile of clothes, the most conspicuous of which were several suits wrapped in dust covers, looking different from the other clothes. Even if Thor couldn't distinguish what types of human clothes there were, he could see that the workmanship of these suits was much better than the others.

Walking further in, there was a suitcase spread on the ground. Clearly, this man named Eddie had been kicked out. His suitcase was also packed in a mess, and many things hadn't had time to be taken out, just piled in the box like that.

Stepping over the suitcase again and into the kitchen, Thor saw Eddie squatting on the ground, leaning against the cabinet. He seemed to have completely collapsed, his eyes dull, muttering to himself.

Eddie saw a huge shadow appear in front of him. He looked up and saw Thor, with his tall stature, looking at him with concern. He opened his mouth, looking like he wanted to ask for help, but then felt that what he wanted to say was too absurd, so he didn't say anything.

"How about I take you to the hospital." Thor lowered his head and said to Eddie, "You really look like you're not lightly ill."

Saying this, Thor turned and walked out, seemingly wanting to go make a call. Eddie hurriedly climbed up, grabbed him, and said, "No! Don't go! I don't have money to pay for the ambulance fee anymore!"

"But you really look too bad." Thor turned around, pointed at Eddie's face, and said, "You are simply the most haggard human I have ever seen. Don't you have a mirror? Don't you look at yourself?"

Eddie sighed deeply. He walked slowly to the side of the sofa, pushed aside those messy clothes, and then said, "You must be from Texas, right? Sit down. I don't have anything to treat you with either. Bring those two cans of beer next to the box over."

Thor stood where he was and glanced at him. Although he didn't understand Earthlings, he had basic discernment. He could see that this man wasn't a homeless person, but had fallen to this point for some reason. He clearly had a belly full of stories to tell.

Thor looked out the window. It was still early. The warehouse work was in three shifts, and it wasn't his shift time yet. Since he was idle, Thor listened to Eddie, took two cans of beer from beside his suitcase, walked to the opposite side of the sofa, and sat down. He handed one can to Eddie and placed the other in front of himself.

He of course knew what alcohol was. When working at the warehouse, the boss would provide a meal, and Thor was on the night shift. After finishing his shift, his coworkers would treat him to draft beer.

To Thor, Earth's alcohol was a bit too light, but it was better than nothing, so on the first day he moved into his new home, he also went to the surrounding shops to buy a few bottles of beer to stock up.

Eddie pulled open the pop-top can on his own and gulped down two mouthfuls of beer. Thor waved his hand at him and said, "Don't be like this. It can be seen that you don't drink often, right? All you're gulping down is foam, it's very bloating, and you won't be able to drink anymore in a while."

"In a while?" Eddie gave a bitter smile and said, "I only have these two cans of beer. How long do you think I can drink?"

"It doesn't matter, I have a few more bottles there, I'll bring them to you in a while." Thor didn't care at all. Long-term battlefield tempering had forged his bold temperament. Eddie looked at his actions and said, "You should be retired from the military, right? I can tell, you should have fought in wars."

Thor raised his eyebrows. It was the first time someone had said that to him. He said to Eddie, "You shouldn't be an ordinary person either. No one could tell my identity before."

Hearing him admit it, Eddie observed him carefully again and said, "Looking at your physical fitness, you should be an elite in the special forces. Which unit are you from? Why didn't you become an instructor?"

Thor waved his hand, not intending to continue. For so many days, he had also discovered that bragging about his battle achievements on Earth would only get him treated as a mental patient and then lose his job.

Thor didn't put ordinary humans in his eyes in his bones, so he didn't need them to affirm his battle achievements, so whenever someone asked later, he would just wave his hand and remain silent.

"Fine, I know you have confidentiality regulations, so I won't ask either," Eddie took another sip of alcohol and said, "Since that's the case, your mouth should be tight. Perhaps it's nothing to tell you."

"How exactly did you get yourself like this?"

Thor looked around the room and said, "You have quite a few valuable things in this room. You should have been quite rich before, right? How did you end up like this?"

Mentioning this, Eddie sighed deeply again. With the help of the alcohol, he opened his chatterbox.

"The things I'm about to say might be very shocking. Perhaps you'll think I'm crazy, but that's the fact."

Eddie gulped down a mouthful of beer, his fingers tightly pinching the beer can, the blue veins on the back of his hand protruding.

"I was originally a reporter, and the top-notch kind. I've won many awards, interviewed many celebrities, and many well-known reports came from me. When I was doing my best, even the editor-in-chief had to look at my face."

Eddie "slapped" the beer can onto the coffee table and continued, "But just a month ago, everything was changed."

His hand pinching the beer can tightened more and more, and the foam on the surface of the beer surged out from the pop-top, flashing with iridescent luster under the dim light. Eddie's eyes stared at that kind of luster, and his thoughts began to drift back to a month ago.

"Morning, Eddie."

"Morning, what's wrong? You seem to have something to say?" Eddie looked at his colleague. The colleague who greeted him walked over, lowered his voice, and said, "The editor-in-chief is looking for you. He seems quite angry. You'd better be careful."

After saying this, the colleague patted his shoulder and left. Eddie held the documents, with a camera hanging on his chest, and pushed open the glass door of the editor-in-chief's office.

The editor-in-chief was on the phone. Seeing Eddie come in, he scanned him with his eyes, then hung up the phone, tapped the table, signaled Eddie to come over, and said, "Eddie, did you read the Daily Bugle yesterday?"

"Uh, no, what's wrong with them?"

"Their new issue of the newspaper sold out. The magazine did too. They launched a newspaper counting the freaks in New York, with high-definition photos of Spider-Man and Iron Man, as well as photos of them doing good deeds on the scene. A reporter even talked to Spider-Man and confirmed that Spider-Man is really just a high school student."

"Conversely, our previous issue of the newspaper had dismal sales. People aren't interested in what river construction project is starting at all."

"Eddie, I know you're a well-known reporter, but your path has been too biased recently. People don't care about what projects those rich old men are starting; that has nothing to do with them. They just want to see those high-definition handsome photos of New York vigilantes, as well as their shocking gossip..."

"I know..." The editor-in-chief stretched out his hand to soothe Eddie and said, "I know this kind of news isn't your strength, but we have to bow to sales. If we can't come up with some big news, the performance of this season will be too ugly, and I'm afraid we'll have to cut wages."

Eddie heard the threat in the editor-in-chief's tone and said somewhat helplessly, "The previous vampire incident, didn't we have the upper hand?"

"That was several months ago. For our line of work, it's longer than several centuries. We must find a new explosive point!"

"By the way, you know about the recently hot Immortality Factor, right?"

"I've heard of it, but I don't know much about it."

"That doesn't matter. Tomorrow I have an appointment with Drake, the boss of the Life Foundation. You are responsible for interviewing him and talking to him about things related to the Immortality Factor."

"The Life Foundation claims that they have found a better way to extract the Immortality Factor, and it takes effect faster and the effect is more significant. They also invited many testers, and the feedback is very good. Drake has been red-hot recently."

The editor-in-chief waved his fist and said, "We must seize this opportunity. If this interview becomes explosive, not only will we be able to suppress the Daily Bugle, but maybe we will also have the opportunity to test that kind of magical Immortality Factor potion?"

"Go quickly, Eddie, your career will reach new heights." ===== CHAPTER 200 =====