Chapter 224: Expo Farce (Part 2)

On the day the Stark Industrial Expo opened, New York was very sunny. The streets of Midtown were bustling with traffic, and the entire East Street of Grand Central Terminal was blocked tightly.

Work vehicles opened their trunks, and television station staff moved down reflectors and camera tripods. Near the front of the cars, the editor-in-chief was giving instructions to the reporter holding the microphone.

On one side of the road, many luxury car drivers honked their horns impatiently to drive away internet celebrities and bloggers who were occupying the road to film. Even the coffee and hot dog stalls benefited. There was a crowd in front of the stalls, and young men and women in fashionable clothes were holding food and drinks, chatting in twos and threes.

Not long after, the glass door of Stark Tower opened, and everyone was like soldiers gathering after hearing the order. Reporters were the fastest, rushing forward with long guns and short cannons. Luxury car owners maintained their status, opened the car doors slowly, took the coffee bought by the drivers, and leaned on the cars to watch.

The young couples who were there to join in the fun followed and squeezed in. Peter protected Gwen with his arm, and the two followed the crowd into Stark Tower. Gwen said to Peter in a low voice: "You look familiar with the road. It seems you were very serious when you were interning."

Peter looked around and said: "Coincidentally, I brought my work ID today. Let's take the employee passage."

As he said that, he pulled Gwen away from the flow of people and walked toward the other side. Gwen said a bit worriedly: "But we don't know the specific address. Where is the 90th floor written on the invitation?"

"I don't know either, but let's go to the 89th floor first. That must be right."

Others who entered the building didn't have Peter's high subjective initiative. After entering the lobby of Stark Tower, they found that there wasn't even a guide here. Many people were complaining about Stark's neglect, but in the spirit of "since we're here, we're here," most people followed the crowd and squeezed into the elevator.

The carrying capacity of Stark Tower was quite good. Even though so many people poured in at once, they were all transported to the top floor in an orderly manner.

The 79th to 89th floors of Stark Tower belonged to Stark's personal laboratory, which was generally not open to the public, and almost no one had ever entered the 89th floor of Stark Tower. And when the flow of people poured out of the elevator, everyone was stunned.

Technology in the early 21st century was actually quite developed, but it definitely hadn't reached the level of "celestial technology" displayed by Stark Tower. Just as they left the elevator, the lights in the entire corridor lit up, and an electronic synthesized voice sounded: "Hello, I am Jarvis, the butler of Stark Headquarters Building. Welcome everyone. Please follow the light guidance to the designated location to participate in the expo..."

At this time, the lights lit up, and a holographic projection arrow appeared in the corridor.

The flow of people followed the guidance through the corridor full of a sense of technology, and then came to the hall on the side of the 89th floor. The three walls and half of the ceiling here were all glass curtain walls.

The curtain wall was covered with a honeycomb-like structure. As the flow of people poured in, the metal plates opened layer by layer like fish scales, and the bright but not dazzling sunlight shone in through the glass.

Peter, who arrived directly at the hall through the employee passage, brought Gwen in. Peter was used to this, but Gwen said very surprisedly: "With such a large area of glass curtain wall, can the strength really support the building?"

Peter explained to Gwen: "This is a new technology of the Stark Group. It doesn't have an official name yet, but I call it resonance glass. The larger the area of this kind of glass, the greater the strength..."

The crowd poured into the hall in one go, but found that Stark was not here. Just when they were wondering where Stark, the host of this industrial expo, had gone, a fine buzzing sound came from above their heads.

Immediately following, a dense sound of armor friction like a machine gun sounded. Layers of shadows suddenly appeared above their heads. Everyone looked up and then opened their mouths wide.

Accompanied by the sound of whistling wind, hundreds of mecha flew in from the opening at the corner of the glass curtain wall. The sunlight shone on the metal mecha bodies, and it was like a diamond rain falling in the entire hall. The dazzling luster made people unable to open their eyes.

Immediately following, a louder jet sound sounded, and a huge aerial platform fell from the center of the hall. The moment it touched the ground, smoke rose around the platform, and all the mecha landed, guarding the platform. Stark, wearing a suit, rose from the platform.

The dense crowd around didn't move for a while, clearly shocked by his appearance that exceeded imagination. But next, Stark opened his arms and said: "Did you think this was all?"

He shook his head, then slowly raised his head and looked at the sky. Everyone followed his movements and looked up together. Instantly, the mecha covered Stark's body, and he flew up on the spot, flew out from the exit of the glass curtain wall on the ceiling, and then everyone heard him say: "Prepare to unfold!"

As Stark's words fell, the crowd saw shadows gathering above their heads. The other half of the ceiling was also covered by metal. Immediately following, countless metal structures flipped over like waves.

Support pillars rose layer by layer, walls grew like living things, plate armor spread, gears meshed, and structures overlapped. In an instant, a mechanical city like a sky island appeared above everyone's heads.

They watched with their own eyes as Stark, flying in mid-air, released an incomparably huge mechanical city above the 89th floor of Stark Tower.

Next, people saw that the huge mechanical sky island began to descend slowly. The mecha in the hall flew out in all directions, and then stopped under the sky island, as if they were going to catch this huge sky island.

When such a huge giant building overturned, everyone showed a terrified expression. This landing process, like Mount Tai pressing down, carried a suffocating sense of oppression.

"I Have a Scroll of Ghosts and Gods"

In the center of the hall, Stark descended from the light-curtain elevator. When the elevator landed, his faceplate opened, and his voice echoed in the hall:

"Welcome to—the Stark Industrial Expo!"

When the words fell, the mecha that had flown out supported the sky island, and then quickly deformed, becoming pillars. Accompanied by the buzzing of machinery and the sound of jetting, the mechanical sky island landed steadily on top of Stark Tower.

I don't know who let out the first cheer, but a few seconds later, boiling shouts resounded throughout the hall.

The crowd was completely boiling. No matter what purpose they came here with, there was no doubt that they witnessed a miracle of human technology.

At this time, Schiller's satisfied voice came into Stark's ear: "Not in vain for me to twist the lightbulb for so long."

Stark held his headset and replied to him: "Clearly, the least important thing in here is your process of twisting the lightbulb."

In the monitoring room of Stark Tower, everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Steve looked at the surprised expressions of Peter and Gwen on the monitoring screen and said: "If Peter knew we didn't bring him, I'm afraid he would be very sad."

"He said himself he wanted to wait for his girlfriend and couldn't come early." Schiller put down his coffee cup and said: "Let's go, the work is done, it's time to go shopping at the expo."

"You guys go first." Rhode, who was behind them, said: "Stark told me that someone might come to make trouble. I'll go check the evacuation routes again to prevent ordinary people from being affected."

Natasha tidied her hair and said to Schiller: "Stark knows someone wants to make trouble, yet he still makes such a high-profile appearance?"

"What you should be worried about now is not Stark's safety, but the safety of the group of people who want to make trouble."

The two walked into the hall. Schiller said while walking: "The security facilities of the entire Stark Tower have been fully upgraded. I really doubt whether those people can..."

After Peter pulled Gwen onto the sky island, the two became ruthless "exclamation machines." Throughout the whole process, except for the exclamation of "Wow," no other sound could come out.

The entire mechanical sky island was not just for show. After boarding the sky island, various new technologies and new machines developed by the Stark Group were displayed on it in an orderly manner. Various mechanical creations that shouldn't have appeared in this era were dazzling.

Generally speaking, industrial expos should be comprehensive. Even if Stark is the organizer, he should invite other industrial groups to exhibit together. After the organizer provides the venue, he will divide the venue for other exhibitors. Previous Stark Industrial Expos were also in this form.

However, this Stark Industrial Expo held by Stark didn't have any room for others at all. It was a very pure "Stark Industrial" expo.

This has to start from the moment Stark used the magic reactor to ascend dimensions. At that time, in addition to obtaining high-dimensional sensory experience, the combat style of the Iron Demon mechanical army also gave him quite a bit of inspiration.

The original Stark, although not an extreme technological conservative, felt disgusted by some uncontrollable things due to his lack of security.

But the upgrade of Jarvis's emotions allowed him to take the first step. The subsequent vampire war made him realize the importance of quantity and functionality. Later, the perspective of the Iron Demon made him realize that so-called risks and uncontrollability were actually just a lack of technological level. As long as one could reach the realm of "I am the machine swarm," then there was no risk of a "machine crisis" at all.

Stark, who had experienced this feeling, began to break through the barriers in his heart. He no longer stuck to the path of single-soldier mecha and studied it to death. Clearly, he also felt that compared to becoming a perfect mechanical individual, the master of machines and the steel torrent were more practical.

Having figured this out, Stark's recent inspiration had been overflowing. Before, his skills were only a single line. Once he encountered a technological bottleneck, the research progress would be shelved. But now, Stark had developed a dense skill tree on the basis of that line. When a bottleneck appeared in a certain research, he would take a detour and click on another route, which greatly increased his research efficiency.

The biggest difference between Stark and other geniuses was his rich creativity. After upgrading his route to a skill tree, the exhibits at the Stark Industrial Expo were incomparably rich. He didn't need any cooperation from friendly merchants. Just Stark's own inventions and creations supported an entire large-scale industrial expo.

Even if Schiller hadn't been so annoyed by twisting lightbulbs, and the scale of the mechanical sky island hadn't shrunk by one-third of what was expected, Stark could still have stuffed more things into it.

Even the most critical critics had to admit that this was an unprecedented expo. Not only because of its shocking opening, rich products, and advanced technological level, but most importantly, this was an expo completed independently by the Stark Group, fully reflecting the heart-shaking financial resources of the Stark Industrial Group and Stark's own amazing creativity.

"How about it? I said this would be a surprise." Stark, who squeezed out from among the reporters, said to Schiller, who had just boarded the sky island: "Those reporters were all stunned. Can you imagine? Among so many reporters, not one asked me about those tawdry scandals. They were all marveling at how I managed to do it..."

"Compared to this..." Schiller turned his head and looked around, saying: "Don't you think this play is missing something?"

"Missing something?" Stark was stunned for a moment and said: "My exhibits are all here. What's missing?"

"Your opponent?" Schiller looked at Stark helplessly and said.

Stark opened his mouth, "I forgot about them. That's right, what about Hammer Industries and that guy named Ivan Vanko? Shouldn't they have appeared at my industrial expo to make trouble?" ===== CHAPTER 225 =====