The moment Peter uttered that final demand, the atmosphere in the office grew heavy enough to suffocate.
Natasha felt an inexplicable wave of pressure crash over her, accompanied by a bone-chilling cold.
In that single instant, she understood the weight those two names—Ben and May—held in this boy's heart.
They were his "Reverse Scales." Touch them, and you die.
This discovery left Natasha with mixed feelings. On one hand, she was relieved; a young man who cherished his guardians this much was unlikely to be a cold-blooded villain.
When a true threat eventually descended on the world, a person like this would surely stand beside them. Having such a powerful ally was far more comforting than having an enemy.
On the other hand, she was deeply worried. Their Director, Nick Fury, was a man whose obsession with control bordered on the pathological—a man who would use any means necessary to achieve his ends.
If "Fury" insisted on using Peter's family as leverage... she didn't even want to imagine the fallout. It would be a catastrophe that S.H.I.E.L.D. simply could not survive.
Shaking off her momentary daze, Natasha looked at Peter, her voice carrying an uncharacteristic hint of complexity. "I understand. I will relay your demands exactly as stated to my superior."
"Good."
Seeing the legendary "Black Widow" being so compliant put Peter in an excellent mood. "I like people who are sensible. Since you've been so cooperative, I'll give you a little gift."
As he spoke, Peter reached out and gently pressed his hand onto Natasha's shoulder. With that movement, the power of the Horse Talisman surged.
A warm, soft white light enveloped Natasha. It wasn't blinding; instead, it carried an indescribable sense of comfort that permeated every cell in her body.
It felt like a deep-tissue cleansing and restructuring. She felt a sudden, unprecedented warmth blooming in her lower abdomen and knees, as if hollow voids deep within her were being filled for the first time in decades.
"Mm~ What... what did you do to me?"
Natasha's eyes were full of suspicion, but her voice trembled from the sheer physical sensation, accidentally letting out a soft, embarrassed hum.
Peter withdrew his hand, his tone casual with a playful edge. "Just repaired some old combat injuries and... restored a few things you once lost."
There were certain secrets Peter didn't voice—namely that under the influence of the Horse Talisman, even the microchips implanted in her body by the Red Room had been neutralized. Telling her that would have been a bit too terrifying.
Even so, Peter's casual words hit Natasha like a thunderbolt. Her body trembled involuntarily, and her hands moved toward her stomach, as if she could already feel the "lost things" he alluded to.
This was her most private scar, the wound in her soul that could never heal. As a top operative from the Red Room, Natasha and her fellow "Widows" had been forcibly sterilized as part of their graduation.
She had spent her life searching for a sense of belonging, longing for a real home. But the cruel irony was that, due to her physical deficiency, she was biologically destined to never have a family of her own.
She had resigned herself to finding warmth in pets or colleagues. But now, Peter had handed her a miracle.
Realizing this, even a hardened agent with a heart of iron found herself overwhelmed. A tidal wave of complex emotions surged up, making her eyes sting.
She bit her lower lip hard, fighting back the sob rising in her throat, unwilling to show such vulnerability to a high school boy.
Peter looked at her with a mischievous glint in his eye. "If you want to cry, I can lend you a shoulder...
"In your dreams!" Natasha rolled her eyes at him and turned her back, but inwardly, her opinion of Peter had shifted dramatically.
She wasn't a naive girl like Gwen; she knew Peter had seen through her desire to hide her weakness and had offered the joke as a graceful way out.
By the time she turned back around, she had regained her sultry, effortless composure. She pulled an encrypted phone from her bag and punched in a number.
"Regardless of whether the Director agrees to your terms, we will contact you through this. And if you ever need us to handle something, use this line."
Handing the phone to Peter, Natasha picked up her bag and headed for the door. "I'm heading back to report. You might be asked to take a trip to S.H.I.E.L.D. tonight. Make sure you clear it with your family so they don't worry."
Watching Natasha's silhouette disappear down the hall, Peter let a confident smile curl on his lips. With today's "little gift," he had essentially planted the seeds to flip the Avengers' future "glue" to his side without firing a single shot.
An hour later, Natasha arrived at S.H.I.E.L.D.'s secret New York branch. She took the elevator down seventeen floors to a large office where Nick Fury was pacing, waiting for news.
When he saw her enter, he paused. "Agent Romanoff, that was fast. Did you find the one calling himself the 'Arbiter'?"
Natasha nodded. "I did. The Arbiter is Peter Parker. And I'm ashamed to say he made my identity before I even spoke. He has demands."
She laid out everything that had happened, though she pointedly omitted the part about the "little gift."
As expected, Fury—who had been riding high on his secret Skrull assistance and his own ego—flared up immediately upon hearing Peter's terms.
He didn't even show respect to billionaires like Tony Stark, constantly plotting ways to control them. Backed by the cosmic power of Captain Marvel, he wasn't about to let a high schooler dictate terms to him.
He slammed his hand on the desk and barked his signature catchphrase:
"Motherf***er! Who does he think he is? The President of the United States?!"
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