"That makes sense!"
For Nick Fury's words, Iron Man merely nodded indifferently, not offering much opinion.
Black Widow then joined in seriously, adding further analysis following Nick Fury's line of thought.
"If it's the first scenario, where the nuclear missile has entered the launch process but was forcibly terminated… Sir, this is not something just anyone can do."
"First, they would need extremely powerful intelligence networks, capable of gathering information from the White House or the Pentagon."
"Second, they would need to be intimately familiar with the entire launch process in order to deploy and arrange accordingly, meaning they would have precise and extensive intelligence sources."
"Lastly, they would also need a highly skilled rapid response team, capable of completing this seemingly impossible task on command."
"Sir, in simple terms, it would take someone very powerful, leading a capable team to accomplish this."
"Among the four options, only you, Sir, fit the bill."
"I could do it myself." Iron Man arrogantly interjected from the side.
Black Widow rolled her eyes, completely ignoring Iron Man's arrogance.
Even though she respected Iron Man as a rare tech genius, she did not believe he could accomplish such a thing.
That aside, launching a nuclear missile wasn't like finding gossip online—Iron Man would have no way of knowing about it.
"If it's the second scenario, where the nuclear missile has already been launched, then the chances of intercepting it are practically nonexistent."
"Unless someone possesses power beyond conventional interception systems."
At this, Black Widow glanced at Iron Man, "If that's the case, I believe only this arrogant fool could pull it off."
Iron Man did indeed control technology far ahead of its time. If anyone had the greatest chance of intercepting a launched missile, it would undoubtedly be Iron Man.
"Or Thor." Nick Fury added, "If the opponent is indeed the legendary god, it's not too strange for him to have such power."
Black Widow shrugged and said nothing, indicating agreement.
After all, he was a god—an otherworldly god. Solving a nuclear missile crisis would naturally be a reasonable task for him.
"That means we can rule out C, Romanoff as the option." Nick Fury said, slightly overwhelmed.
The question posed by the quiz system was clearly not very rigorous.
However, this did support Coulson's hypothesis—that answering questions may not be the point. The real purpose of the quiz system was to inform them about the future.
"Tony Stark, you seem to have been quiet this whole time." Nick Fury turned his one-eyed gaze onto Iron Man.
Normally, based on Iron Man's personality, he would have already made a decision. Thor, Nick Fury, Black Widow—who could compare to himself?
Only Iron Man could perform such a heroic feat, saving New York.
However, after experiencing the last round of the quiz, and witnessing the consequences of the rewards and penalties, he now knew that this wasn't something to take lightly.
This question was not a game.
Answering wrong could come at a painful price!
Thus, Iron Man was taking the matter seriously, analyzing it carefully.
"I've been thinking… What kind of war would this New York battle be?" Iron Man said, contemplating, speaking to Nick Fury.
"Then… What did you come up with?" Nick Fury stared intently at Iron Man, asking for his opinion.
Iron Man had experienced a round of the quiz system before, so he naturally had more experience in this area than Nick Fury.
"Looking only at the question stem, the information given is too sparse, so we can only speculate that this is a battle that took place in New York, with no other information available."
"However, if we look at the options, perhaps we can find something."
"If the four people in the question—myself, Nick Fury, this agent, and Thor—were all involved in this 'Battle of New York,' what kind of war would it be?"
Black Widow couldn't help but feel something was off.
Why did Iron Man speak as though this so-called Battle of New York was something that really happened?
"Thor is a god, and to some extent, we can consider him an alien. A war involving an alien is clearly not an ordinary battle."
"The most likely scenario is that this is a war involving aliens, perhaps an alien invasion of New York."
Iron Man continued confidently.
In the past, he certainly wouldn't have come to the conclusion of an alien invasion of Earth.
But after the last round of the quiz, Iron Man's perspective had greatly broadened and changed.
He now knew that an alien invasion of Earth wasn't as impossible as it once seemed.
Just like in the final battle of the last round of the quiz, Thor should have joined the Earth alliance and fought alongside them against the more powerful alien, Thanos.
In fact, Iron Man even speculated that this so-called Battle of New York might have been one of the battlefields in the final war.
Nick Fury nodded again.
As the director of S.H.I.E.L.D., he was already quite perceptive and had even personally experienced similar events, so he understood Iron Man's somewhat absurd words better than most.
"Considering aliens probably don't know how to use nuclear missiles, this missile was most likely launched by us Earthlings."
"So now the question is, why would we launch a nuclear missile?"
"Clearly, in this battle, we Earthlings must have been at a disadvantage, perhaps on the brink of losing, which is why the higher-ups would decide to launch a nuclear missile, trying to eliminate the alien forces with such an extreme method."
"This is the so-called 'nuclear missile crisis' in the question because the missile would not only destroy the alien forces but also level New York."
"And one of us four, to prevent this from happening, stepped forward and resolved the nuclear missile crisis."
"Sounds reasonable." Nick Fury nodded. "If we were all involved in that battle, my most likely role would be commanding the operations!"
"Then I can rule myself out."
"Because I couldn't be leading a battle against aliens while simultaneously planning to stop a nuclear missile from being launched."
"Now, we only have two options left." Black Widow glanced at Iron Man. "Is it you, or that legendary god, Thor?"
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(End of Chapter)