The night air of Manhattan was thick with the scent of wet asphalt and the primal, musk-heavy odor of the reptile currently tearing up the street. Peter Parker, perched precariously on the hood of a crushed taxi, stared at the white and pink streaks of Spider-Gwen's costume as she landed with a heavy thud nearby.
His eyes immediately locked onto the silver bracers on her wrists. "Wait, web shooters? You're using mechanical shooters?" A look of genuine shock crossed his face as he realized his own question was a bit impulsive given they were in the middle of a war zone. "I thought you were like me! You know, the whole 'organic plumbing' situation?"
"I gave them to her, you idiot!" Huang Liang shouted, his voice strained as he parried a massive, scaly claw. "She can't weave webs out of thin air like you. If you just swing away and leave her stranded on a roof, how is she supposed to back you up? Use your head for something other than talking for once!"
Peter nodded quickly, a sheepish look hidden behind his mask. "Right, right. No wonder you were late to the party. It's weird, though. Both bitten by spiders, but I get the internal silk factory and she gets... what? Better fashion sense? Is it a gender thing?"
Slap!
Huang Liang's hand connected with the back of Peter's head with a resounding crack. He pointed toward the roaring Lizard, which was currently charging toward them like an armored tank. "Can you save the biological sociology lecture for after we stop the seven-foot dinosaur? Have you forgotten everything the Master taught us about focus?"
"Ah, right! Focus! Got it!" Peter snapped back into a combat stance, his lenses narrowing as he locked onto their target.
Peter knew Gwen was powerful; he'd felt the weight of her kick earlier on the skyscraper. That kick had sent him flying even when he was braced for it. But as he watched the Lizard, his heart sank. Gwen's heroic entrance kick, which should have shattered a normal man's ribs, had only made the monster stumble half a step. The Lizard's defensive capabilities weren't just high—they were off the charts.
"ROAR!"
The Lizard let out a sound that was less of a hiss and more of a mechanical grind. He lunged forward, his massive feet cracking the pavement. He didn't care about the cars in his way; he simply shoulder-checked a fire hydrant, sending a geyser of high-pressure water screaming into the sky. The street turned into a chaotic, slippery mess of flooding gutters and screaming sirens.
"Watch out! He's playing for keeps!" Huang Liang warned.
Admittedly, the Lizard's fighting style was reminiscent of the old, pre-mastery Hulk—brutal, direct, and fueled by raw instinct. But it lacked the domineering, planet-cracking presence that the current "Baguazhang Master" Hulk possessed. Still, for three teenagers, it was like trying to stop a runaway freight train.
The Lizard swung a massive, clawed fist at Gwen while simultaneously whipping his heavy tail toward Peter and Huang Liang. It was a wide-area sweep designed to crush everything in a ten-foot radius.
But the Spider-Trio wasn't easy to hit. While their raw strength couldn't match the reptile's, their agility was in a league of its own. Peter and Gwen's Spider-Senses screamed in their minds, allowing them to flip over the tail with inches to spare. Huang Liang, utilizing the "Walk in the Snow Without Leaving a Trace" technique, seemed to glide across the surface of the flooding water, his feet barely touching the ground as he danced out of the way.
The monster's tail slammed into the asphalt with a deafening CRACK, sending chunks of stone flying like shrapnel.
"Our turn!" Peter yelled.
The trio counterattacked instantly. Peter landed on the Lizard's back, raining down punches that would have knocked out a heavyweight boxer, while Gwen delivered a flurry of rapid-fire kicks to the monster's side. To their horror, it was like hitting a brick wall covered in rubber. Their physical strikes barely registered.
Only Huang Liang, channeling his internal energy into his palms, managed to draw blood. His strikes pierced through the thick, green scales, causing the Lizard to recoil with a hiss of genuine pain.
"Hmm?" The Lizard glared at Huang Liang, his yellow pupils slitting. But the victory was short-lived. Before their eyes, the jagged cuts on the monster's chest began to knit back together. The scales regrew in seconds, smoothed over by a terrifyingly efficient regeneration factor.
This was why he was called the Lizard—not "Lizard Man." He had the intellect of Dr. Curt Connors hidden somewhere deep inside, but the predatory instincts had completely rewired his brain. He didn't see people; he saw prey.
"What is this guy made of?" Peter grunted, firing a web-line around the Lizard's thick ankles. He planted his feet and pulled with everything he had, hoping to trip the beast. "Timber!"
For a second, the Lizard wavered. But as the monster felt the tension in its legs, it simply flexed. With a flick of its razor-sharp claws, it sliced through Peter's reinforced webbing as if it were wet paper.
"My turn!" Huang Liang shouted.
He didn't hold back. Gathering every scrap of his internal energy, he focused it into a single point—his index finger. He lunged forward, moving faster than the eye could follow, and drove his finger straight toward the Lizard's chest, aiming directly for the heart.
Puff!
The strike didn't just hit; it penetrated. Huang Liang's finger, empowered by Qi, acted like a spear, shattering the Lizard's calcified breastbone and burying itself deep in the muscle over the heart.
"ROAR!"
The Lizard's scream was ear-piercing. In a blind fit of agony, he swung his tail around in a lethal arc, aiming for Huang Liang's head. Huang Liang tried to pull back, tried to use his movement technique to vanish, but he felt a cold dread wash over him. His finger was stuck. The Lizard's hyper-regenerative flesh was already closing around his hand, trapping him like a fly in amber!
"Liang! Get out of there!" Peter screamed, but he was too far away.
Thwip!
Just as the massive tail was inches from crushing Huang Liang's skull, a white web-line latched onto his waist. With a violent yank, Spider-Gwen pulled him out of the death trap just as the tail slammed into the ground, creating a crater where his head had been a millisecond before.
"Splash!" Huang Liang landed in the gutter, breathing hard, his face pale.
"Thank you," he gasped, looking up at Gwen. "That was... a little too close."
"Don't mention it. We're a team, right?" Gwen said, her voice filtered through her mask, giving her a sweet but determined edge. "Besides, you gave me these web shooters. Consider this a return on your investment!"
"Hey! Less talking, more fighting!" Peter yelled. He didn't have time to celebrate. The enraged Lizard had grabbed him by the throat and hurled him through the air. Peter smashed into a parked car with enough force to trigger the airbags, the metal folding around him.
"He's too fast for his size!" Huang Liang noted, his pupils narrowing. Even though his internal energy was dangerously low, he couldn't stop. He lunged forward again, using his superior martial arts skills to tie the Lizard in knots. He couldn't deal a finishing blow, but his technique allowed him to parry and redirect the monster's momentum, keeping it occupied.
"This is what it means to be a hero, huh?" Gwen whispered to herself. She watched Huang Liang's desperate struggle, then fired a web at the car holding Peter. With a sharp tug, she ripped the door off and pulled Peter free. "You okay, Red?"
"I've been better," Peter groaned, shaking the cobwebs from his head. "But I'm not done yet!"
Gwen didn't wait for him. She transformed into a white-and-purple blur, a literal "Ghost" of the battlefield, charging back into the fray. Peter followed a second later, swinging on a short line to deliver a dropkick to the Lizard's jaw.
The Spider-Trio engaged in a rhythmic, desperate dance of violence. This was, without a doubt, their most grueling battle yet. Even the Green Goblin hadn't possessed this kind of relentless, unkillable stamina.
The struggle was real for two reasons: First, the Lizard's healing was simply too fast to overcome with standard blunt-force trauma. Second, none of them had a "finisher." Huang Liang's most powerful move had already been used, and while it had caused the monster pain, the Lizard's biology was simply too alien and too resilient to stay down. They were winning the exchange, but they were losing the war of attrition...