The talkative raven in the world of American comics

Chapter 22: The Long Minute

Compared to all the lizard monsters we've faced today, Dr. Dara's transformed lizardman far surpasses any of them in size, strength, and speed.

From the moment they first met until now, Spider-Man and Dr. Dara have never actually fought each other.

Only during the one minute that Dr. Connors spent researching the serum antidote could he truly engage in combat with his opponent.

Pfft pfft—

Spider-Man stood high above the glass window, his hands firing webs like a machine gun, trying to stop the figure below, which charged forward like a ferocious beast.

"Good heavens, how could this be?!"

Spider-Man discovered that none of the webs he shot out had effectively restrained his opponent.

Or rather, they were all easily deflected by the other party.

The opponent's thick tail resembled a giant python, swinging flexibly and bending freely, blocking all the spider silk that tried to restrict it.

"Doctor, is he really just a lizard? Why does he seem like a scorpion to me!"

Spider-Man couldn't help but turn around and look at Connors, the Lizard, who was still making the serum antidote.

"Keep stopping him, kid. Stop with your silly jokes!"

"oh oh."

The moment Spider-Man turned around, his spider-sensors, which had been alerting him, suddenly went off like a morning alarm clock.

In an instant, he saw a huge green creature block out all the light from the window and occupy his field of vision.

The monster's image was reflected in the sunglasses on the spider mask.

It was as if everything around us had entered bullet time, and all movements became extremely slow, like a video playing at double speed, only this time it was slow speed.

Right in front of Spider-Man, the Lizard Man twisted his body in mid-air, his thick tail swaying with it.

Snapped!

The bullet time ended, and everything returned to normal!

Spider-Man was instantly sent flying by a tail lash!

"No way, not again!"

As he was thrown backward, Spider-Man quickly shot out webs, which formed in all directions in the laboratory, stabilizing Spider-Man's tumbling body and finally stopping him just before he crashed into Connors.

"Seriously, what were you doing just now?" Oz's voice rang in my ears.

"What? What am I doing?" Spider-Man lay on the ground, shaking his groggy head.

"Dude, you just stood there in front of it and got tailed! You had a chance to dodge, but you just watched!"

Oz stood in front of Spider-Man and mimicked the move the Lizard had made when it lashed out at Spider-Man with its tail, except that it was smaller and looked rather comical.

Regarding Peter's performance just now, Oz could only say that he hadn't yet become familiar with his spider-sense.

That was a perfect opportunity to dodge.

Just like the time-limited blocking feature unique to fighting games, once the move's color changes from yellow to red, and you haven't performed a blocking move.

Congratulations, you've successfully received a slap from the tail.

And the technique to make half of your health bar disappear.

Of course, Spider-Man has a lot of health.

Dr. Dara's tail attack only had a brief, almost instantaneous, effect on Spider-Man, lasting only a few seconds.

"Okay, I'll take this lesson."

Spider-Man stood up, recalling the scene from just now, when everything around him had been slowed down.

He actually thought it was cool, until a tail lashed out at him...

"Kurt, what are you doing?"

Dara walked step by step toward Connors's location, completely ignoring the Spider-Man figure in front of him.

Seeing that he was being ignored, the latter became slightly annoyed and immediately lunged forward.

In the blink of an eye, Dara grabbed his head with one hand.

Spider-Man, whose head was grabbed, began to punch and kick, but it posed no threat to Dara.

"I've already told you, you're nothing but an inferior genetically modified being."

Dara felt as if he were holding a hard walnut that he couldn't crush at all.

"That sounds nice, but why am I still human while you're a monster?" Spider-Man still had the mind to joke.

As if he had been struck on the spot, Dara roared and, like a pitcher on a baseball field, grabbed Spider-Man's head and swung it around!

boom!

Spider-Man's body flew backward again, but fortunately he shot out a web in mid-air to barely change direction and crashed about a meter away from Dr. Connors.

Spider-Man!

Connors hissed, as if accusing him of not doing his job properly.

"I know, I know, I know."

Spider-Man sprang to his feet quickly, then, like a martial arts star from an action movie, stood on tiptoe.

"I'm terrible."

"No, I mean I have half a minute left!"

Connors wanted to say that he would do it himself if necessary, but considering the operation of switching people midway through the serum antidote, the remaining time would be more than half a minute.

Although he knew the boy behind the mask was intelligent and had created the serum antidote on his own, Peter would definitely need some time to understand it after his own modifications.

This is undoubtedly an action that does more harm than good.

"I think you're going in the wrong direction." Just as Connors finished speaking, Spider-Man heard Oz's voice.

"Really?" Spider-Man couldn't help but retort, "Then what good advice do you have? After all, I'm the one who's going to get beaten up!"

"If you want me to do it, that's fine, but the price is that all the effort I've put in all this time will be wasted," Oz said.

"Sorry, that's not what I meant. Please continue."

Spider-Man knew that Oz was definitely not just a crow who only complained, scared people, and stole other people's fries. Judging from the instant teleportation he witnessed, he was certain that Oz had many more outrageous tricks up his sleeve.

If Oz were to take over, Dr. Dara, who had transformed into a lizardman, would likely be easily dealt with.

But... is it really necessary?

He's the one who created this mess; without his blindly providing the formula, we wouldn't be in this situation today.

Now that he can't solve it himself, he's asking someone else to solve it?

Wouldn't that mean that if I encounter something I can't handle in the future, I'll have to rely on Oz to clean up the mess?

So why did he choose to become Spider-Man?

What then do the things Uncle Ben said become?

Responsibility, Parker, responsibility!

do not forget!

"From the moment we met until now, you've kept it in the same place as that group of lizardmen from this morning."

Oz overheard Peter's thoughts and was very pleased with the boy's awareness.

"I'm too lazy to explain why it's different; you just need to know one thing."

"Make the most of your spider-like strengths. You are Spider-Man, not some web-climbing man or a wall-climbing man."

"Since he likes to compare the merits of genes, then you should tell him whose genes are superior."

"Remember, you are far more powerful than you imagine."

Spider-Man listened silently to everything Oz said; it was a rare moment when Oz spoke seriously.

He digests and understands things very quickly.

Spider-Man closed his eyes to calm himself down, then took a deep breath.

"I see."

"Understand what? There are still twenty seconds left, don't just stand there like an idiot!" Connors suddenly heard Peter's mutterings and then quickly said.

The voice just fell.

Spider-Man then shot out a strand of web, heading straight for Dara before disappearing from the spot.

"I already said—"

Seeing Spider-Man flying towards him like a cannonball, Dallad felt that the other man was foolish.

It resorted to its old tricks, outwardly extending its large hand to confront the opponent, but in reality, it mobilized its tail behind it, preparing for a fatal blow.

As expected, Spider-Man easily dodged its giant hand, but its tail was already prepared!

"You're just a lowly genetically modified being!?"

However, what happened next left it somewhat bewildered.

Spider-Man should have easily shaken off Spider-Man's tail, but instead, Spider-Man used the momentum to grab him, just like a spider, clinging tightly to its thick tail.

The power that has been stored up for a long time will always have a certain buffer time before it is released.

Taking advantage of the momentary cushioning, Spider-Man stuck his webs onto the lizard and wrapped them up around its tail.

Meanwhile, Spider-Man's webs kept spinning.

He used every available ledge he could find, from the ceiling and the floor to any other point of leverage.

His body was instantly bound and unable to move.

Dara could even feel Spider-Man crawling on his massive body!

It looks like a... real spider!

"You—uh-uh-uh!"

Just as Dara was about to speak, his mouth was stuffed with spider silk, and then he saw Spider-Man's figure crawl over his head.

My hands and feet tensed up instantly as my breath was blocked!

It was trapped in place by spider silk, looking like a mummy.

Spider-Man jumped in front of it, making it visible.

He reached out and shot a spider silk thread towards the ceiling, which propelled him upwards.

Then I felt a strange force in my shoulder.

Then Dara glimpsed two spider silk threads shooting towards his feet.

At your feet?

My thoughts simply can't keep up with Spider-Man's actions.

The next moment, the force on my body quickly increased, my legs involuntarily bent, and a sound suddenly rang in my ears!

"Kneel down!"

boom!

Dara knelt completely on the laboratory floor.

Spider-Man, who had silently finished the countdown, stood atop Dara's massive body and roared:

"Doctor, you'd better manage your time better!"