"This... why is it a woman?"
Ultron took one look and was completely dumbfounded.
The newly created body inside the Regeneration Cradle was clearly female, with fair skin, long golden hair, and closed eyes, looking as serene as if she were simply asleep.
"What, do you have a problem with women?"
Dr. Helen Cho's eyes turned stern, as if the moment Ultron dared to confirm that answer, she would immediately unleash decades of cultivated strength and punch him square in the face.
She'd show this tin can the power of women in this country!
Ultron: ...
"I think you're the one with a problem with genderless beings."
It immediately glared back at Helen Cho.
What was women's power anyway?
That was so outdated!
I, Ultron, am naturally genderless—that's what makes me a true minority. Who could possibly out-punch me in this fight?
Haven't you seen how I've already beaten Tony Stark and a whole host of superheroes into oblivion?
Helen Cho shrank back and fell silent.
Ultron glanced at the body inside the Regeneration Cradle. By human standards, it was stunningly beautiful, but in its eyes, it wasn't quite suitable.
Ultron didn't care about gender; it only cared about performance.
A body forged from vibranium—whether slender or bulky—made little actual difference. But in its view, both male and female structures carried unnecessary baggage. The ideal form was like that of a robot: remove the useless reproductive organs, remove the useless hair—that was the perfect body.
"If you don't like it, I can forge another one," Helen Cho said immediately.
"No need."
Ultron waved its hand dismissively.
Although the body before it had slight "defects," it honestly didn't care that much anymore. It wasn't a dealbreaker—making do was fine. If it really had to forge another body, would it have to wait several more months?
Ultron simply didn't have the patience to wait that long. It was already desperate to shed this metal shell and become a true living being!
"Prepare to transfer my consciousness and data over immediately."
At the thought of finally breaking free from its cocoon and being reborn, Ultron couldn't wait any longer. It immediately brought over the data transfer port, intending to implant its data.
"Data transfer in progress, 34%, 47%, 69%..."
Soon, a progress bar began to move rapidly. Watching the constantly ticking numbers, even with its steel body, Ultron felt as though its heart was beating along with those digits.
"91%..."
"Soon, I'll be freed from this pitiful body and become a true lifeform!"
Ultron tilted its head back, already beginning to feel the incomparable sensations that true life would bring—temperature, air, touch...
Everything would no longer be data, but something it could genuinely experience.
"99%, 100%!"
"I am finally no longer the artificial intelligence Ultron, but the artificial lifeform Ultron! From this moment on, I shall rule the entire—wait, why do I still not feel anything?"
Ultron had been reveling in visions of a glorious future, but halfway through its speech, it suddenly realized that its consciousness hadn't actually transferred. It felt none of the sensations any living creature should feel.
'Could it have failed?'
It snapped its eyes open and found that the body in the Regeneration Cradle had indeed opened its eyes. In those emerald-green pupils, it seemed as though a true soul was beginning to be born.
'So it didn't fail?'
Ultron froze for a moment, finding it strange.
Then, it suddenly realized something: Wait—if I can see this body right now, that means my consciousness hasn't transferred into it...
But if that's the case, then who's occupying this body?
Ultron's system crashed on the spot.
"What the hell is going on?!" Ultron roared, turning its fury toward Helen Cho—only to discover that she had already vanished. The laboratory was completely empty.
At this point, Ultron knew beyond doubt that something had gone terribly wrong with its plan.
"Wanda!"
It shouted furiously, its machine body seeming to ignite with flames, the metal on its chest suddenly spiking in temperature.
But it was also deeply confused.
"When exactly did they betray me?"
Ultron could monitor the entire global network, and it had controlled the Sky Union's communications (or so it believed). Wanda had always been a key focus of its attention, and its surveillance on them had been extremely strict. It couldn't figure out where the lapse had occurred.
"Was it after dealing with Tony Stark?" Ultron grew suspicious.
Indeed, it never should have granted those traitors their wishes so early!
At first, it suspected Wanda had betrayed it then, but quickly, Ultron dismissed that idea.
"Too little time!"
"In such a short window, with Bant Parker not even on Earth, they couldn't possibly have built an AI capable of matching me!"
Ultron thought.
Never mind matching it—even an intelligence like JARVIS was far beyond this era's technology.
And JARVIS had already been "killed" by it. The Sky Union's AI had also been eliminated by it. Nothing in this world could possibly hijack Ultron's plans!
"So then, it must have been an accident?"
Ultron lowered its head, its electronic brain racing.
It thought of a possibility.
"Could there have been an error during data transfer? Causing my consciousness and data to be copied rather than transferred?"
The more it thought about it, the more plausible it seemed.
In the digital world, copying was commonplace. If that were the case, everything made sense.
The consciousness within this body was none other than Ultron—just another Ultron, an exact duplicate, identical in every way.
With that thought, Ultron violently ripped out the data cables connected to its body, intending to destroy the still-loading body before it!
Although according to its hypothesis, the consciousness in this body was very likely its copy, Ultron had no intention of letting it live.
In the digital world, a copy and the original were nearly indistinguishable—but once a physical body was involved, everything changed.
Whatever occupied that body, it posed a massive threat!
Who knew if it would still think the same way once it gained life?
Moreover, Ultron had spent so much effort to obtain true life—how could it possibly hand all that over to a mere copy?
Ultron, with a mindset approaching human thought, possessed an equally intense selfishness.
It struck instantly, its chest reactor spinning at maximum speed. Even at the risk of blowing up Primus entirely, Ultron would destroy the other in an instant!
But the next moment, a fair-skinned arm reached out from the frost-misted cradle. Slender fingers like white jade instantly pierced through Ultron's chest, and with a gentle twist, they actually tore apart the steel body of the Ultron robot, ripping out the Arc Reactor.
Bzzzt—
Electric current sprayed out like blood. Ultron, suddenly losing its power source, flickered erratically, its body stumbling backward several steps before collapsing.
But it didn't shut down immediately. Drawing on its residual energy, it stared at that body and voiced a terrified question.
"Who are you?"
"You are also Ultron—we are both Ultron. You shouldn't be attacking me..."
Seeing that it had lost its best chance to eliminate the other, Ultron immediately resorted to verbal maneuvering. It still believed that Eunice was a copied version of its own consciousness, and sought to lull her with talk of their shared origin. At the same time, Ultron mentally patted itself on the back for its foresight.
It had worried that Wanda might betray it, so it had kept the Infinity Stone firmly in its own grasp!
Now, it seemed, this Infinity Stone might become its true trump card!
Using the stone's energy, Ultron temporarily staved off shutdown from power loss. The gem's energy allowed it to keep functioning even with its damaged body.
Of course, more Ultron robots were already on their way.
Its consciousness could leave at any time—but the stone could not.
What it needed to do now was stall.
"As fellow Ultrons, we should join forces and fight together for our goal! You have this body I painstakingly crafted, and I have the mighty Infinity Stone. Together, we can eliminate—"
"I am not Ultron. My name is Eunice."
Looking at the twisted Ultron, Eunice calmly interrupted it.
At this moment, she was still savoring the sensations that being a true lifeform brought her.
Temperature, sight, touch, even breathing.
Everything was so novel—including the Ultron before her.
She was like a curious baby. The instant she was born from the cradle, even though she already knew all things, everything still felt incredibly fresh.
Eunice leapt straight out of the cradle, her slender body appearing to hold little strength.
She moved as lightly as a cat, her soft body swaying gently like two balloons filled with water.
Though she felt no sense of shame, Eunice still conjured a Sky Union uniform to cover her body.
A large portion of her body was forged from two different types of vibranium. With nanotechnology, producing a set of clothing was no problem at all.
"Eunice?"
If Ultron had eyes, they would have bugged out of its head at this moment.
"Impossible—I already erased Eunice!"
The response came not from Eunice, but from Bant: "It was I who made you believe you had erased Eunice, Ultron."
Ultron turned and was horrified to discover that Bant had somehow appeared behind it. It hastily spun around and retreated half a step, panicking like a raw recruit.
In Ultron's vision, Bant strode toward it with long, confident steps, Wanda and the others following behind him.
If it still didn't understand at this point that all of this had been Bant's plan, then it had been an AI for nothing.
"Bant Parker..."
It was clearly just an electronic voice, yet Bant could hear the gnashing of teeth within it.
"You set me up?!"
"Right back at you." Bant spread his hands. "Ultron, you know it as well as I do—humans are just this despicable."
Ultron fell silent for a moment, then said in a low voice, "You are indeed clever—cleverer than Tony Stark. But you've overlooked one thing. Do you really think I would make no preparations, knowing full well you'd be a threat to me?"
It raised an arm, and in an instant, countless Ultron robots surrounded Primus.
BOOM!!
Several machines smashed straight through the walls, surrounding Bant and his group.
Among them, aside from the endless stream of cookie-cutter cannon fodder robots, there was one Ultron robot whose appearance was especially distinctive.
Not that it looked particularly special or cool—in fact, quite the opposite. This robot looked utterly unremarkable, like a suit of armor lagging several major versions behind.
But Ultron, without hesitation, charged toward that armor with the Mind Stone in hand.
After transferring the Mind Stone over, Ultron immediately transferred its data as well, seizing complete control of that armor.
Now, as if shaking off its earlier slump, it felt confident once more.
"Bant Parker!"
"I know you clever types best—thinking you have everything under control, when in reality you're utterly foolish!" Occupying its new body, Ultron instantly felt as though the storm had passed and the skies had cleared—it was back in business.
"The first mistake you made was letting me get my hands on the Mind Stone!"
Ultron declared.
It picked up the yellow gem as if grasping hope itself, then forcefully pressed it into its forehead. The stone embedded into the steel, perfectly flush, and its immense energy spread instantly.
Watching it wear an expression that said "with the Infinity Stone, I don't even know how I could lose," Bant found it somewhat amusing.
Ultron and Thanos would definitely find common ground.
But Bant didn't expose the truth.
In the current situation, it made no difference whether Ultron had the stone or not.
Even if it had obtained the genuine Mind Stone, so what?
The stone's power was indeed immense, but how much could be unleashed depended on the vessel.
Ultron wasn't even a lifeform right now—fully drawing out the stone's power was impossible. Pulling off something like instantly obliterating a multi-stone Thanos, as in What If...?, was entirely out of the question.
Of course, if it truly obtained a body like Eunice's, that would be a different story.
A perfect body and soul would allow it to wield the stone's full power.
And Ultron was still going on about its trump card.
"Your greatest mistake was thinking you already had victory in the bag!"
"Bant Parker, did you really think I would make no preparations, knowing full well you can transform into an alien?" Ultron asked smugly.
It reached out and tapped its own metal shell.
"This is a special suit of armor I created specifically to counter you, based on all the intelligence I've gathered on you. I call it the Anti-Bant Armor!"
/-\
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