Chapter 4873

Pepper's career path was not smooth. She was born in New Haven, Connecticut, from a working-class family, but she excelled academically, got into the local prestigious Yale University, and with outstanding grades entered Stark Industries as an intern.

This already seemed much better than many people's situations. However, even if Pepper was a piece of gold, Stark Industries was extravagantly opulent. To work at such a large corporation, everyone was a genius graduating from top schools, and Pepper was not particularly noticeable among them.

Her family could not provide her with more support, nor had they ever taught her workplace survival rules. When she first arrived at Stark Industries, she kept hitting walls everywhere, bumping around like a headless fly, thus missing the best opportunities for promotion and advancement.

As Stark Industries' operations improved more and more, the talented young people around her gradually rose up, while Pepper continued to linger in the peripheral office. Even when Howard was still the leader of the group, she had already joined the company, and by the time Tony took over, she only managed an office, and in the company she was not considered high-ranking.

Pepper had lingered too long in an ordinary employee's position, with originally little room for advancement. But opportunities always favor the prepared. Her extensive time at the grassroots level gave her a deep understanding of Stark Industries' routine operations. During one inspection of grassroots work by Obadiah, Pepper pointed out an accounting error, saving the group from a significant loss. Her familiarity with the business also made Obadiah think she could handle the tedious business matters Tony disliked, so he promoted her to become Stark's personal assistant.

But Stark was not someone with only one assistant. He had an entire assistant team, and Pepper was initially just the most ordinary new assistant in that team, and moreover older than any other new assistant, with no one thinking she could handle the role.

However, Pepper stood out from the assistant team through her rich experience and strong sense of responsibility, walked up to Stark, successfully gained his trust, became his most important senior assistant, and then completely mastered the assistant team, even all of Stark's business affairs.

Stark said this, actually meaning that if he had met Pepper earlier, she would not have had to linger so long at the grassroots level. And Stark indeed thought this way: if Pepper had risen earlier, Stark Industries' business level might have improved even further.

But unexpectedly, when Pepper heard this, she pressed her hand lightly on his face, pushed his face to one side, and said: "I have never been the kind of little girl who believes upper-level people will favor her because of love. If you had approached me then, I would have sued you for workplace harassment."

Stark then hugged her again, pressing his cheek against her hair: "You also think I have a bad reputation, right?"

"It's not about reputation." Pepper gently patted his shoulder and said, "Your wealth, ability, and beauty do not belong to me at that time. If I had trusted you, I would never have possessed them."

Stark then released her, gazing at her intently, his eyes almost devout, until interrupted by a sound from nearby. He turned his head to look.

"It's fine, you guys continue." Chris was guiding Eddie in adjusting the camera. Eddie took his eyes off the camera, tilted his head, and said, "We just need some evidence to refute the gossip tabloids; you don't need to pay attention to us."

The two deflated. Especially Stark, he swallowed all the words he wanted to say, almost suffocating himself, only able to cover his mouth with his hand and cough violently to one side.

Pepper patted his arm and then said: "How's the filming going? Still smooth?"

"Pretty smooth, I guess." Stark recalled, automatically erased some unpleasant details, nodded and said, "The basic shooting of the climax plot is done."

"Who is the killer?" Pepper asked curiously.

"You really want to know?" Stark asked, "But suspense films most dread spoilers; I still want to wait for the movie's release and watch it together with you."

"Alright, then I won't ask. By the way, I'm preparing to arrange for Helen to take the exam at Moseley Elite High School..."

They chatted about everyday matters. Although just trivial small talk, they talked for a long time. This finally let Stark escape the murderous atmosphere, and also improved his mental state considerably.

Then, of course, the next morning came another blow. As soon as he entered the set, he saw Shiler and Chris researching which part of the prop for the second form of the corpse was poorly made.

And precisely because Stark could not see what was wrong with this prop—this thing was horrifyingly lifelike—he again felt his head as if punched.

Seeing Strange writing medical records on his laptop nearby, he rushed over like seeing a lifeline and said: "Are those two crazy?"

"Probably," Strange said without looking up, "People who play with corpses are crazy."

Stark turned his head again, then said: "Why don't you stop them?"

"I'm not interested in corpses," Strange said impatiently, "Does it disappoint you that every patient I send out still has breath?"

Stark then realized Strange's lack of interest was academic, not common-sense, or rather his common sense was overly academic. He said the corpse was closer to a human relic than a symbol with specific frightening meaning.

But obviously Stark disagreed with his view; he completely could not accept playing with corpses. However, these two were not playing with real corpses—it was indeed just a prop—so he even had nothing to say.

Chris frowned, seemingly dissatisfied. He had the prop crew repeatedly move it several times, made some adjustments, adjusted the lighting, trying to capture the feeling he wanted, but all failed.

"This won't do." Chris anxiously paced back and forth, "This is supposed to be placed at the film's end to create the biggest twist; if it's not stunning enough, it's meaningless."

"Forget it," Chris waved his hand, "Tear it down and reinstall."

The following scenes became even more horrifying to watch. Stark could no longer bear it, he rushed out the door like flying, wanting to get some fresh air outside.

This scene was filmed at the Rodriguez estate, and Stark wandered aimlessly here. Just as he was preparing to go to the poolside to look, Chris sent someone to call him.

"Tony, come over." Chris shouted at him, "Try performing terror in front of this corpse..."

"I don't need to perform," Stark stared at the corpse, "I am already terrified now; can you get this thing away from me?"

Chris kept frowning, saying: "No, your state is wrong. This is not terror at all; you're just a bit disgusted."

Stark opened his mouth. He thought carefully, he actually was not very afraid, just felt nauseous.

When he was kidnapped before, he had also seen those people execute traitors; that scene was extremely bloody. Moreover, to intimidate him, they even locked him together with a corpse. That place was hot, and the corpse became terrifying quickly, with a strong stench. But at that time, Stark was more worried about his own safety, and felt little toward the corpse.

This might be because he is a firm materialist, not believing corpses can rise to attack him. Or perhaps the living are more terrifying. Stark's remaining trace of fear in this scene should all come from these two people playing with the corpse.

Stark performed several times, Chris remained dissatisfied. He became furious, even started cursing. Stark's temper was also not good, but he dared not talk back, after all, it was his own failure to perform well.

For the whole following day, Chris kept having Stark circle around that corpse prop—sometimes letting him look from this side, sometimes from that side, sometimes letting him approach, sometimes letting him stay away, nearly driving Stark mad.

Finally, he could no longer bear it, ran upstairs to the bedroom to hide and rest, but was soon found by Chris. Chris, gradually approaching madness from failing to achieve the desired effect, even wanted to let this corpse directly smash onto Stark.

Stark firmly refused. Although it was just a prop, the blood plasma and such used were real, really too dirty and nauseating. Moreover, he knew even if it smashed onto him, he would feel more disgust than fear, and could not produce the desired effect.

To avoid trouble, Stark decided to run out first and then talk. Running openly outside would definitely not work, and calling in the mech suit was also difficult. He thought back, remembered when Hampton was locked down, those neighbors who came to attend the banquet had gone from the cellar to the dock, rowing away. Stark also decided to take this route.

Of course, he knew there were monsters in the sea. But he had not planned to row on the sea; after going down, he would just call a mech suit to sneakily fly away, so the monster could not hit him.

Thinking this, Stark seized the moment, directly slipped into the cellar. After going down, the light was a bit dim, he could vaguely see the refrigerator, and some condiments and such greedily piled here.

Turning past a shelf, Stark saw the passage leading to the dock. He walked toward it, but as soon as he walked past, he felt something on top of his head. He thought it was a hanging bag of miscellaneous items, afraid to bump his head, so he instinctively glanced upward.

What stopped before his eyes was a hand.

"Ah Ah Ah!!!!!"

When Chris arrived, he saw Stark sitting collapsed on the ground, staring blankly at the diagonal upward direction. Due to the shelf blocking the view, Chris could not see what was in Stark's diagonal upward direction, but he knew Stark had finally gotten into character—this was exactly the effect he wanted.

He hurriedly called for Eddie to bring the camera over. But the cellar entrance was a bit small, not easy to carry the camera down in a normal posture. Venom simply used tentacles to hang from the ceiling, Eddie held the camera, and the two came over via the ceiling.

However, Venom is a typical example of lacking restraint; as they came over, it was a reckless charge. Result: one tentacle hit the shelf in front of Chris, the shelf wobbled and fell forward.

With a clatter, things on the shelf scattered all over the floor. The upper left of the shelf hit something, only hearing a bang, and falling together with the shelf was a ring-shaped object that encircled the three of them.

"Ah Ah Ah!!!!!"