While the police outside were frantically trying to figure out how to rescue the hostages in the building, inside, the terrorist Emend Gool was sprawled on the sofa in the lounge area, with two abducted women hostages serving him tea and water, pouring fine red wine into a goblet and bringing it to him.
Gool took the goblet of red wine, drank it down in one gulp, then frowned, spitting out the wine in his mouth. He said with disgust, "What is this stuff? How can you call this wine if it tastes so bad? Go, bring me your strongest liquor."
After speaking, he didn't forget to smash the glass in his hand hard onto the floor.
The two women hostages beside him were very displeased to see Gool trashing things. If it were any other time, they would have unhesitatingly cursed Gool as a hillbilly. But not now. For their own lives, they could only endure the humiliation and swallow their anger, diligently getting Gool a different drink.
Even though Gool was covered in explosives now and bossing hostages around from the sofa, he was actually a man of suffering.
His country was a small, underdeveloped nation next to Bilia, ruled by a queen bee. It was plagued by internal strife, with various terrorist organizations taking root and engaging in fierce firefights with the government forces.
If that were all, Gool would at most blame his bad luck for living in a chaotic country.
What was most infuriating was that the US had also meddled in. However, unlike other battlefields in the Middle East, the US did not directly send troops to overthrow the government. Instead, they chose to supply weapons and equipment to terrorist organizations.
Heavy machine guns, jeeps, even armored vehicles. Even when exposed by the media, high-ranking US officials claimed these were not weapons but ordinary vehicles that had been demilitarized during resale.
Whether the facts were true or not, we do not know. But what Gool knew was that he once had a happy family: kind parents, a loving wife, and two adorable children.
Until one day, when Gool returned from work, everything was gone.
A missile hit his home. All his happiness, everything, vanished in an instant. Gool saw nothing but rubble and ruins.
Seeing this, Gool was on the verge of collapse. He searched frantically in the ruins, not stopping even when his hands were burned, until he found his wife's charred body amidst the debris.
When he saw his wife's burned corpse, her blackened body was curled up.
Gool used all his strength to straighten his wife's body, and what he saw next made the man weep uncontrollably.
The moment the missile struck, his wife, sensing the danger, immediately held her two children close, using her body as a protective shield.
Mother's love is great, but reality is cruel.
Even though the mother had done her best, the final outcome was that neither child survived.
As Gool despaired over the loss of his wife, children, and parents, a piece of missile shrapnel amidst the ruins caught his attention.
That name, the name that had destroyed everything he owned: Stark Industries.
This name was etched into Gool's mind as if carved by steel.
From then on, revenge became Gool's sole motivation for living in this world. He would use the rest of his life to take revenge on Stark Industries, to make Tony Stark pay the price he deserved, even if it meant selling his soul to the devil.
Thus, after years of preparation, Gool put his plan into motion today.
Sitting on the sofa, Gool took out a photograph. It was a family portrait, a happy family of four, a loving couple and two adorable children.
This was all the memory he had of his family.
"Don't worry, Dad will make that bastard Stark pay the price he deserves."
As Gool said, despite lounging on the sofa and enjoying the services of hostages, he had secretly prepared a grand gift for Stark.
Since he wanted to retaliate against Stark Industries, he had to start with the most iconic, Stark Tower. You, Tony, are too cowardly to show your face? Fine. I'll blow up your entire building, and then we'll see if you still dare not show your face. Su Nan Novel Network
To blow up Stark Tower, the few bombs on his person wouldn't be enough. He needed a large quantity of explosives. But it was too late to get them now. So Gool decided to use the existing resources in Stark Tower to assemble a super-bomb.
However, with Gool's knowledge, making a few remote-controlled bombs was already pushing it. Asking him to build a super-bomb was truly asking too much of him.
But Gool wasn't worried. It didn't matter if he didn't know how; as long as others did.
Don't forget, this was Stark Tower, where a large number of top talents in the US were gathered. Under duress and temptation, he managed to get a few fearful experts to build bombs for him.
To increase the efficiency of these experts, Gool also promised them that he was only targeting Tony Stark and no one else. As long as they built the bombs, he would let them leave first.
These experts had either had their brains fried from working in labs, or the soundproofing of Stark Tower was so good that they didn't notice the explosions outside. They didn't know that the person who said the same thing before was now just dust.
As for what to do with the hostages trapped here after the bombs were made, Gool had also thought of a solution. Releasing them was impossible. They were working for the evil Stark Corporation, so they weren't good people either. He would kill them all, kill them all, to be buried with his deceased wife and children.
"Hey, haven't you brought the wine I asked for yet?!"
Just as Gool was getting impatient, his peripheral vision caught sight of a strange figure, which immediately drew his attention.
"Who are you!"
Gool leaped up from the sofa, taking rapid steps back to create distance. However, upon seeing that the person was a woman, his guard slightly relaxed.
Gool was certain that she was not one of the hostages he had captured earlier. Otherwise, with her figure and face, he couldn't have missed her.
But looking at her attire, she seemed like a secretary. Was she a scatterbrain? Everyone else had escaped, and she had stumbled into a trap all by herself?
Yet, judging by her competent, strong woman aura, he couldn't see any sign of her being scatterbrained.
Before Gool could say more, Natasha began to introduce herself. "I'm a negotiation expert sent in by the police. You are holding hostages, so you must have demands. I'm here on behalf of the police to negotiate with you."