Chapter 4998

When the bonfire rose, the coast was set ablaze. The firelight danced, leaping in their eyes, and every brow and eye was stained with warm light—passionate and moist gazes like the tide of ancient land being etched, making every reflection brighter, finally overlapping into a rain of fire beneath the night curtain.

The aroma of grilled meat spread. Large chunks of chest meat, fall-off-the-bone beef short ribs, oily-glossy meat skewers, and whole roasted suckling pigs piled in red-yellow-green layered vegetables. Sweet peppers, asparagus, cauliflower—the essence of an entire field concentrated here. Egg-milk pancakes, mashed potatoes, beet soup as side dishes dotted among them, like the rings around a giant gourmet planet, and when the whole roasted ox was brought out, it nearly became the sun of this system.

People joined beach tables into one long table, layered with food of striking impact. Teenagers who had played intense competitive sports until their stomachs growled wouldn't bother with order; they nearly threw themselves into the meat pile, eating like the black dragon gnawing the roots of the world tree—or not so leisurely.

Spider-Man always had a big appetite, and his superhuman strength was a great help in eating grilled meat. Peter Parker of the Central Universe held half a rack of beef short ribs in his left hand and a whole pork leg in his right; Gwen Spider-Man shot a web, sticking it to the juiciest roasted chicken. Jeff reached to bite, but Peter simply wrapped the food in web and tore at the chicken leg from the gap, looking exactly like a real spider.

The Speedsters were the absolute stars of this feast. Whoosh—a plate of shredded pork with salsa lost half; whoosh again—a whole chunk of turkey breast gone; a golden shadow flashed, and the tender shoulder of the whole roasted ox vanished; a silver shadow streaked past, and the apple pie filling disappeared too.

Thor had to launch a defense of the whole roasted ox, directly laying a layer of tin foil on its chest and slamming Mjölnir onto it, so no one could think of moving the ox. Sif seized the moment, drew her sword, and chopped off half the ox, finally securing enough meat from among the many gluttonous mouths.

The most refined eater was Shiler—he took a little of each meat, placed it on his plate, and savored it slowly, yet his own holy son still walked off with a prime cut of buttock meat and two skewers.

Meat from the hands of professional barbecue chefs was naturally flawless—most were tender, fragrant, and juicy. Gotham wasn't a place with strong American charm, far from the homeland of American barbecue, and such authentic barbecue was rare there.

Shiler didn't much like smoky flavor; on the contrary, braised meat was softer and juicier, marinated more carefully, allowing him to taste many different spices. Besides the shoulder meat from professional chefs, he actually preferred the turkey Thor made.

Turkey is a difficult ingredient to handle; even at its best, it probably only reaches the level of ordinary beef, but as for why—Asgard has extensive experience dealing with this dry, fibrous meat, and Shiler actually tasted juicy turkey for the first time.

The ample gravy Thor injected into the turkey meat worked perfectly—cut a slice of turkey leg, squeeze it lightly with your hand, and there was juice. Even better, the seasoning of the internal juices and the external honey glaze combined perfectly, with a hint of mysterious wine aroma; aside from a slight dryness at the end of chewing, it was nearly perfect.

"If all turkey could taste like this, I'd be more willing to celebrate Thanksgiving." Shiler said to Sif.

Sif lifted her head from a large platter of grilled meat: "Then you can establish another Thanksgiving, dedicated to thanking those who saved the turkey."

"I think that's a good idea." Shiler nodded.

Sif really had a big appetite—she first gnawed half an ox, then half a roasted suckling pig, followed by two plates of apple pie, then a cup of hot red wine; even so, she asked: "Is tonight only meat? No seafood?"

Shiler paused, also feeling a bit strange—although tonight's bonfire party was American barbecue-themed, there was no need to make everything grilled, or rather, using grilling to cook seafood is itself part of American barbecue, so why wasn't even the most common salmon visible?

Just as the barbecue party reached its midpoint, Carter stepped up to the table, tapped it, and said: "Tonight we want to specially thank someone who brought us tonight's final dish—the seafood feast!"

Suddenly, the sea surface lit up; everyone turned back; seawater, under magic, transformed into one plate after another, each filled with various-shaped seafood, mostly raw but some pre-cooked, drifting with the current above the table, and everyone cheered.

Then Namor and his subordinates surfaced from the sea, he leapt up, landed before the crowd, and revealed a big smile: "Good evening, honored guests. I am Namor, Lord of the Seven Seas. Welcome to the Seven Oceans Brand seafood farming base. Allow me to serve you the freshest seafood!"

Everyone had just eaten meat until they felt a bit greasy, having consumed too much fat, and subconsciously craved something savory—the timing of the seafood arrival was perfect, and the quality looked excellent, so what more could be said? Feast achieved!

But Shiler didn't rush for knife and fork; he looked at the tuna sashimi, greedy and loving raw fish slices, so he could recall nearly all data on raw fish consumption from memory.

What Namor prepared was high-quality bluefin tuna belly, but the problem was, this belly was too large.

The so-called "belly" is the Japanese term for the best part of the bluefin tuna's abdomen, also hailed as "sea gold"; in fact, high-quality belly meat is worth more than its weight in gold, and a key factor affecting its price is the rarity of bluefin tuna belly—a 200-plus-pound fish yielding six or seven pounds of belly is already good, and the most balanced, best-textured portion might be only a small plate.

Yet Shiler keenly noticed that the meat in different plates all came from the same fish, discernible by observing the direction of fat marbling, and if calculated by weight, this bluefin tuna might weigh over a ton.

Even if it were the largest Atlantic bluefin tuna, freshly wintered and fat, it could absolutely not reach this weight—this already exceeds biological evolution's limits; if tuna could have such a head, whales might not even dominate the ocean.

Although human-caught tuna aren't necessarily the largest, this sea clan could fish deeper and farther, possibly hauling up the tuna ancestor, but Shiler observed that not only bluefin tuna, but also salmon, octopus, bass, and other fish slices were abnormally large.

Although Carter had said before that the sea clan had special means to raise deep-sea fish humans couldn't, and make them fat and large, the previous series of seafood-related incidents made Shiler raise his guard.

Seeing Sif bring over a plate of belly, about to dig in, Shiler hurriedly stopped her: "Wait, don't eat yet, ma'am."

Sif paused her action, then said: "You think the seafood has a problem?"

"Can't be sure." Shiler said, "So the best approach is not to eat."

Sif hesitated, then put down her knife and fork. Humans in poisoning are still quite professional, and the Aesir aren't immune to all poisons, so caution is indeed wise.

Thor wanted to eat, but Sif stopped him, and likewise the mutants didn't touch their forks—likely Professor X had specifically instructed them recently not to eat seafood. Shiler also reminded Peter, so Peter didn't eat either.

This made the scene a bit awkward—half the people were ready to feast, half looked at each other, no one moving.

Namor's face also changed a bit—he wasn't in a good mood to begin with, and this time he prepared all this just to promote his seafood products, never expecting no one to show up, and he was about to erupt on the spot.

"Sir, I have a few questions." Shiler stood up and looked at him, saying, "I believe everyone can see these seafood are abnormally large—do you know what's going on?"

"This is our special breeding method." Namor emphasized, "What you humans can't do doesn't mean we can't. Those deep-sea fish don't eat feed; we can force-feed them, and the fish we raise naturally become large and good."

"What are you feeding them?" Shiler asked again, "Or has the feed formula recently been improved?"

"What do you mean?" Namor glared at Shiler, saying, "You won't suspect I poisoned you, will you? What's in it for me? Would poisoning you make the Revival Alliance let me go?"

Others also hesitated—after all, no one could see any benefit for Namor in poisoning the multiversal guests; they had no grudge, and even if someone died here, it wouldn't affect the sea clan, let alone such named poisoning—could it even go undetected?

"I'm not suspecting you of poisoning." Shiler said, "You have no need to do this, and if something happened, you couldn't escape, but aren't you worried about being used?"

"What nonsense are you spouting?" Namor said, "The fish we raise have been large for days, not just one or two—Seven Oceans Brand supplies half of New York, and no one has had problems..."

"I need to explain this." Carter reached out and said, "Actually, problems have recently arisen."

She simply told Namor about the compound found in the fish they'd caught during night fishing earlier, and the incident on the bar street.

Namor stared wide-eyed in shock: "Someone poisoned the fish? Who would be so vicious?"

Everyone's gaze fell on him; Namor felt he had a hundred mouths but couldn't defend himself, saying: "I didn't! Why would I do that?"

"I heard you have a competitive relationship with Atlantis Aquatics Company." Shiler continued.

"Then I'd be even less likely to poison them—if discovered, I'd never sell anything again!" Namor defended, "Such a thing would be exposed after just one person gets sick—I wouldn't be that stupid. And why don't you suspect that Arthur?"

"Our earlier investigation pointed to Long Island, which happens to be your farm, and the seafood you served tonight does look abnormally large—we're willing to believe you might have been deceived, so, have you recently changed feed?"

"I…… you wait, I'll ask." Namor said, then turned and jumped back into the sea.