Chapter 121 - Humanity's fight.

This work is a piece of fiction. While inspired by real events, cultures, and practices in human history, the story blends factual history with fictional characters, dramatizations, and creative interpretation.

It is not intended to promote, glorify, or encourage any illegal activities, substance use, or harmful behavior. All depictions of sensitive topics are included solely for narrative and historical context.

For the effects of the story, all characters are to be considered above the majority age.

Reader discretion is advised.

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Earth-5H1N3, Year 2001.

Calling Reed Richards a smart man was an understatement. The understatement.

A few years ago, Aragorn had said that the mind of Reed Richards could think of random stuff and almost warp reality for his 'scientific' belief to actualize. Aragorn was sure that, beyond stretching like rubber, Reed Richards had no other power; even then, there was merit to his words.

There were many geniuses in the world. Yet, few of these geniuses had the stats in wisdom needed to properly wield their smarts. Among these geniuses, Reed Richards outdid all of them in both parameters; the dumbest smartest man alive!

Few could understand how smart and stupid Reed Richards could be, not even the three closest to him.

The Spatial Interference and Evacuation Volatile Expulsor, SIEVE for short, was possibly, at the moment, the best expression of Reed's stupidity and mad genius.

Delimitating a volume in space, cutting out, and ejecting it through the hole left behind was simple in words; in practice, though, it was as if a stick figurine cut out a piece of the paper it was drawn on and threw it to a portal it opened to get rid of it.

That's how impossible a crazy Reed's SIEVE was. Not only did it touch the immediate higher dimensions above him, but it also breached into the highest ones.

Yet... It was not a bomb, not a weapon, and not an independent object. No, in all of his wisdom, Reed saw it fit to build the thing fixed to the Baxter Building.

Stoic as only he was, not even Doom could stop himself from facepalming.

"... I hate Reed," Doom muttered.

"You can join the queue," Johnny commented.

"Can't you just hocus-pocus this thing to space, or better yet, to the evil god?" Ben asked.

"It's not that I can't," Doom replied.

"The building won't survive the displacement, right?" Susan asked.

"Affirmative, Susan," Doom nodded.

"... I hate Reed," Johnny said.

Ben followed with, "Join the line, dude."

"... I don't think New York will survive, either way," Susan spoke somberly with resignation.

"Are you referring to the army of netherworld monsters the Greek God of the underworld summoned?" Doom asked.

Susan nodded. "The city survived the bombardment because he was caught off guard a few klicks from Breezy Point Tip by the bombardment. But now," she tapped her P-Link and a live video of the streets of Manhattan appeared, "with so many monsters roaming and taking apart the city piece by piece, I doubt it matters if our home falls."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"Maybe, it's for the best," Johnny said. "Imagine how many of those things this building can splat into the asphalt?"

"... I can set it to fall laterally," Doom commented.

"Couldn't we go a step beyond that?" Johnny spoke in a conspiratorial tone.

"This can't be good," Ben commented.

"If it's gonna fall either way," Johnny smiled like a pyromaniac on New Year's Eve. "Why don't we flood it with methane?"

"..."

"..."

"..."

"Your genius is frightening, Johnny," Susan commented with an exasperated sigh.

"I'll get to work," Doom declared, and magic came alive around his hands.

"Come, Ben, let's open all dials," Johnny eagerly hollered.

"It's faster to open the distribution valves," Ben said before following after Johnny. "And for the love of my bricked ass, turn off that flame!"

While Doom and Susan readied the SIEVE, and Johnny and Ben prepared to commit domestic terrorism, in Africa, things were heating up.

"You're the closest one to our enemy, you've known him the longest, and you're one of Gaea's closest descendants... If you know of his terror, and you care for your survival, why do you side with him?" Osiris, the God King of the Celestial Heliopolis, demanded an answer.

Osiris was a god of jade skin, and no, it was not that his skin was smooth like jade, it was that his skin was jade color. He was also a tall and imposing man, about the size of Juggernaut, except that all that Cain Marko had for savagery, Osiris had in regality.

Originally, Osiris had been a god of agriculture and vegetation, but after resurrecting from being murdered by his brother Set for sleeping with his wife, he additionally became the god of resurrection and the afterlife, becoming a symbol of life and death.

With this being said, the reason the Ennead was so eager to join in Odin's madness was that the head of the pantheon, Osiris, was one of those deities related to afterlives who was greatly affected by the repair of the Cycle of Souls.

"I can't stress this enough, and I tire from repeating myself," Bast's words came with the undertone of a snarl, "she is not being kept captive! The progenitor mother doesn't need rescuing!"

"Gaea needs rescuing if the will of the Deities of Earth deemed it necessary," his words were said with finality. "The Council of Godheads has sided with Odin. The Ennead has sided with the Allfather, and Bastet, you're one of the Ennead or... you're not!"

The ultimatum reverberated like an echo in the vast desert, making the water ripple in the ancient Nile.

North of the border between Sudan and Egypt, in a land that, even before the solar hyperradiation of the last apocalypse, was as arid as the surrounding desert, the Wakandan army and their goddess hovered opposite one god-king above the Nile.

The Temples of Abu Simbel stood behind Osiris, as if offering their support, the waters of the Nile churned below the opposing sides, and Osiris, even while in front of an army that could devastate over 97% of the world's armies, stood with the poise of the strong, the winning side.

This was the truth of the deities of Earth-5H1N3. While on Earth-199999, a merely superhuman soldier with a vibranium shield could oppose a god of thunder or a god of mischief, on this Earth, all it took was a simple—lazy, even—command laced with divinity to make a mortal yield; vibranium or no vibranium.

Hence, Osiris, enhanced by the boost of Odin, gave all divinities on his side, only recognized Bast as his opponent. In his eyes, there was no Wakanda supporting Bast; there was only her, and she had always been weaker than him.

Which was why—

"Attack," Bast commanded with certainty.

Volleys of energy discharges flew in arcs above, beams of searing light flew straight from the front, and trajectory-controlled sonic ammunition shot in arcs from below. It was an all-encompassing attack.

However, Osiris, like any and all who were considered deities in Earth-5H1N3, had some form of energy manipulation. Kinetic energy, to the eyes of the average deity on this Earth, was the lowest of the most basic.

So, with familiarity that comes from repeated actions, Osiris waved a hand to disable all the projectiles, nullify all sonicwave attacks, and willed a speck of his vast divinity to veer light off-course.

With a wave of his hand, effectively, the combined attacks of Wakanda's centuries-beyond-the-rest-of-humanity-tech were rendered moot.

Or so it should have been, Bast, spendrif as if divinity grew in trees, desicively laced and bless all of the attacks with her divinity.

"Fool!" Osiris scoffed. "You think you can outlast me, ME?!"

"I owe no explanations to the enemy," Bast replied.

Osiris, following the logical path, spent divinity to nullify Bast's. Attacks of raw divinity met attacks of technology laced with Bast's divinity, and, like one meeting a minus one, zero resulted.

"Don't stop!" Shuri commanded, and Wakanda obeyed.

The next barrage came right after the last, and Bast blessed these attacks too and blessed them.

Osiris thought no more of granting advice to his opponent. In his mind, if Bast was futilely trying to outlast him, it was because she was pretending to side with Aragorn and oppose the Ennead, or because she had truly turned mental. It wasn't unheard of; immortality was not for all, not even for immortals.

Divinity met divinity, and zero was the result. The landscape might have disagreed with that, though. The Temples of Abu Simbel were no more, and the Nile's course had been twisted by the destruction of its bank. Everything left and right of the meeting point of both fronts had been carved as if a planetary-sized child had drawn a line on the sand.

Barrages, one after the other, met Osiris' divinity as if Wakanda had been preparing ammunition since the age before Christ, and Bast 'wasted' her divinity as if she had been her own pantheon.

"How?!" Osiris demanded. It was after the 159th clash that he recognized the truth; Bast was not running herself dry.

"I pray to a deity for power," Bast explained.

"Gaea's divinity is occupied protecting the terrans; she could not have fueled the amount you've been wasting," Osiris pointed out, enraged that Bast made such a stupid lie.

"I never said Gaea," Bast said with mirth.

Mortals pray to deities and deities absorb that faith, but what would happen if a deity prayed to another? A simple transfer of raw divinity is the answer. That's why no deity prays; raw divinity was their blood, status, and in some cases even their life force. No sane deity would gift their livelihood in such a manner.

"I think he would say something like: Have you heard of our lord and savior, the Drachantheon Therion?" Bast said with mockery undisguised.

The Drachantheon Therion was not like the other pantheons in many ways. Just like how old cities were normally badly planned when compared to newer cities, with twisted and narrow streets, with irregular city blocks, and with a topography of nightmares, the Drachantheon Therion was like a well-planned city.

The Drachantheon Therion was not a group of beings who were born divine, or that coincidentally ascended as the civilization that worshipped them pushed them to apotheosis. No, the Drachantheon Therion was a fully planned and plotted endeavor.

Like so, they had stores of raw divinity in the [Script] that covered their bodies. Hence, when normally a prayer from another deity would siphon dry a deity, for them, it was a matter of using the stored raw divinity.

"You have a Celestial Heliopolis-worth of divinity, but I have something greater than a measly divine realm," Bast declared.

Osiris, enhanced by the Cosmic Cube, for the first time understood his predicament.

And, like the logical deity he was, he summoned back-up.

"What?!" he exclaimed.

Correction, he tried to summon back up.

"A space warper?" He questioned, shell-shocked.

Space warpers, via magic or mutation, were rare. Rare enough that intergalactic empires would always zealously secure their space warpers. Rare enough that deities related to the concept of [Space] always held seats of respect and authority.

However, no matter how rare and valuable space warpers were, simply by warping space, they could not contain a deity—beings that wielded the power of concepts to an extent.

Actuality was different, though.

Aragorn, in his myriad plans, left preparations for an eventuality in which even fury would have to respond to the call to arms.

In another hemisphere of the planet, sitting in lotus position while hovering a few feet above the ground, a root of the Arbor Mundi coiling around his torso, eye closed deep in concentration, magic circles flickering in and out, and craddling an orb in his hands, Fury was literally burning his brain while restricting different deities all around the world.

The Arbor Mundi and its roots, which by that point had spread all around the underground of the world, acted as his magic foci. The orb he was craddling was the power source. A power source so massively larger than his own reserves that it was a laughable comparison. And Fury, who, channeling this much magic at once, should have exploded in a mist of gore, was keeping his shape by the serum flowing through his veins.

During the first days of his arrival, Aragorn had obsessed over creating different variations of hominid-enhancing serums. It was during the early days, when his priority was to catalogue biologicals and grow his mastery over biokinesis.

Like the countless 'trinkets' too dangerous to leave in the open but too unimportant to care about, these serums were easily accessible with enough clearance in the Halo. Part of his plans included making use of Fury's spatial affinity to control a chaotic battlefield.

"51.5074∘ N0.1278∘ W, 3km (~2miles)," Stark's voice rang in Fury's intercom.

In London, encircling a squad of the einherjar, an invisible isolating field appeared. These Asgardians stood opposite Stark, Wolverine, and Laura, none the wiser of their new status as caged birds.

"35.6895∘ N139.6917∘ E, 5km (~3miles)," Magneto's voice rang next.

In Tokyo, surrounding a single yet terrifying god of the Shinto Deities, and the heavy hitters of Krakoa, an invisible barrier imprisoned them.

An origin point and the length of a radius, that's all Fury needed to create a spherical prison of space.

Naturally, this was only possible due to the Arbor Mundi and the orb in his hands.

Additionally, Gaea was supporting him.

Nonetheless, it couldn't be denied that one of the most troubling aspects of fighting a coalition of pantheons had been checked off the list. Now, only the weak could jump the strong.

"Nightcrawler," Magneto's authoritative voice called out. With a bamf, Kurt teleported next to him. "Can it cut that?"

At a distance, Storm was flying with the wrath of Geae at her beck and call, opposite her, Susanoo no Mikoto was standing in the air with the divine wrath behind him. Two storms, the likes of which covered the entirety of Japan, clashed for domination.

"Kitty told me that she had Aragorn remove the limiters," Kurt replied with concern edged in his body language.

This was not how he thought this day was going to go. It hadn't been even a full eight working hours since his best friend departed to become a goddess, and now he was about to attempt deicide. That's not how level scaling works! He could accept it if, after his best friend had returned, now a goddess, they had to go fight a deity or two, but not on his own with the help of his equally mortal leaders.

'At least Ororo is Gaea's... something,' he thought.

"Coordinate a sure hit with the girl," Magneto commanded.

Kurt didn't need to be told twice; he bamfed away after a nod.

"Sigh," Magneto let out a sigh heavy with responsibilities and concern. Like Kurt, this was not how he imagined his day was going to go.

The departure of the Haloans was not such an impactful event to Krakoa. The only Haloan they interacted with regularly was Seraph, and she had left everything set to be able to work without her input for at least a decade.

This didn't mean that Krakoa's Council did not concern itself with their departure; Halo, the Imperium, was their biggest investor, after all. Still, he didn't start the day planning to take on a regiment of deities.

A few minutes earlier, when Krakoa had been surrounded by 16 deities, even in its camouflaged state, Magneto thought that was it. That was the test that would determine the future of mutants; the test would unmake or propel Krakoa as a nation. Yet, it was not a test whatsoever.

Seraph spent most of her time between Halo and Krakoa, as the overprotective monster he was, Aragorn had set things in Krakoa to 'at least' be able to protect her from some 'measly' deities.

So, all Magneto and the resident not-speedster of Krakoa saw was the main spire lit up, and then 15 deities turned to gore.

Why was the council not informed of this weapon's existence? Wasn't it supposed to be only for protection? Since when could it also do that? These and many other questions swam freely in his mind.

It was a scary happening. Even scarier was that one of the deities survived the weapon and fled: Susanoo no Mikoto.

Krakoa rose in pursuit, literally, the whole island took to the air, and they followed after the weakened deity, then Odin boosted all deities on his side, and that's how they reached this impasse above Tokyo.

Storm, ennobled with Gaea's divine support, opposed Susanoo.

Krakoa and some of the more 'fragile' mutants were keeping their distance while making sure no other deity would ambush them. Magneto was acting as support for Storm while coordinating a sure kill strike on the deity. Yes, he did not expect to end the day in this way.

Eyes cloudy white, a long dark cape fluttering behind her, lightning rampaging between clouds, tornadoes crisscrossing in her background, Storm prepared to face the god.

Susanoo took a quick-draw stance, hand resting on Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi, his divine blade, and eyed with the wrath of the storm behind him at the mortal opposing him.

He waited not and drew his sword. A flying cut, moving far faster than Storm could react to, diagonally upwards, cut at her.

The winds and droplets parted way as if by the divine will for the slash, and the atmosphere bent to the cut's will.

It was a certain cut.

However, while Susanoo, certain of the mortal's death, expected the pieces of his opponent to fall, the cut met resistance.

A bubble of something faintly shimmered around Storm with a high-frequency pulsing surface.

"Electromagnetism?" Susanoo muttered, surprised.

Divinity, as a concept wielding authority, stood above all natural phenomena simply because of its nature. However, there were certain 'concepts' resistant to divinity; the fundamental concepts of reality. Matter, Energy, Time, Space, Strong Nuclear Force, Electromagnetism, Weak Nuclear Force, Gravitation, Dimensionality, and a few more that only higher beings could even recognize.

Through their divinity, they could influence these fundamental concepts, but never control and command. Kronos couldn't overcome the past, even as a God of Time; Nix couldn't control space, even as a deity related to the darkness between stars, and Susanoo, even a God of Storms, could not control electromagnetism, even if he could influence it, somewhat.

His eyes dropped to Magneto and narrowed with violence. "Certainly, only the Ceestials could create aberrations like your kind," he spoke with an edge to his words that attempted to cut Magneto.

His words carried over the storm and reached Storm and Magneto. When a god spoke, mortals listened; that was the principle governing his uncanny ability to speak with them despite the distance and loudness of the storms clashing.

"Is it impossible?" Storm asked Magneto. She was using the Link Seprah had made for Krakoa to communicate.

"I can feel the sword's metal, but I can't influence it," Magneto replied.

"The hard way it is," Storm declared.

"The only way we know," Magneto agreed.

"Are you jealous?" Storm asked, addressing Susanoo. "Aragorn told me you're one of my Lady's direct offspring, but you were abandoned like the rest."

"Let's not forget that the Celestials threw them out of Earth like the pests they were," Magneto added.

"I would be jealous of humanity in his shoes, too," Storm continued.

"..." Susanoo was not known for his wrath for nothing.

Before either mortal could register, their electromagnetic shielding was shining with the blinding light of divine lightning.

"!" Magneto gritted his teeth and directed all his might into the protection, keeping both alive.

"My Lady was right, you're just a tantrum-throwing child!" Storm exclaimed through the lightning and concentrated on Gaea's blessing and her mutation to wrestle control over the storm from the god.

"No wonder Goddess Gaea, or Izanami as you know her, abandoned you and faked her death to Kagutsuchi," Magneto added.

It was so out of character for Magneto and Storm that, had it been a more rational deity and not one known for their tantrums, their taunting would not have worked.

Lightning struck, and Storm and Magneto resisted with an effort beyond their mortality. The razor-sharp winds howled, the clouds churned like boiling water, hail weathered skyscrapers down, and snow/ice near the absolute zero built up only to be blown away by the jovian winds.

Disregarding the lightning, just the speed of the winds alone would have been enough to suffocate both mortals, and the temperature drop should have turned them into ice statues; however, Storm protected them from the indirect environmental hazards, and Magneto from the direct attacks.

By the lack of attacks from the part of the mutants, it was clear that Susanoo was beyond them, and even with this being so perfectly clear, the enraged deity could not see how blatantly obvious the two mutants were in drawing his attention.

When Kurt teleported behind him with a glowing purple lightsaber trained on Susanoo's head, it looked as if it was resolved. However, with uncanny lucidity, the god took a step backward and avoided the killing blow with a smug expression.

"Did you think I would forget about you after watching you teleport away?" Susanoo asked. He grabbed Kurg by his wrist as the blue mutant fell, pulled by gravity, and with a nasty grin, he attempted to crush his wrist.

That never came to be, though. The same glowing purple blade emerged from the middle of his forehead, missing the falling Kurt by mere inches.

About a quarter in from the point of the lightsaber, a star-shaped portal had swallowed the lightsaber.

Bamf! Kurt teleported away after turning the lightsaber off. Immediately after, he appeared next to Magneto, and Storm speedily calmed down the raging storm.

"I almost lost my hand," Kurt shivered due to dread and not the crazy weather.

"Sorry, I timed it too close," from a star-shaped portal, America Chavez appeared.

"It was just as it had to be," Magneto said before releasing a heavy sigh.

"We have to double-tap," Kurt said hurriedly. "Aragorn says only the poor and the idiots don't double-tap."

Magneto followed Kurt's eyes and found the still falling deity. With a resigned nod of agreement, he bent the metal of Tokyo to his will and, being pulled by the rebar, the skyscrapers closed on the divine corpse and slammed on it like train wrecks.

"Weren't we supposed to keep the damage to a minimum?" America Chavez asked, concerned.

"The temperature damaged the metal inside the buildings," Storm replied, her eyes still focused while she settled the divine storm down. "This entire sector of the city will have to be torn down and rebuilt."

The teens and the two adults glanced around at the largest metropolis on the planet, and couldn't help but be depressed at the astronomical cost they could only imagine this short fight had.

"Should we move to the next one?" America Chavez asked.

"Ororo and I need a moment to catch our breaths; you two can go ahead and join Krakoa," Magneto ordered them.

With a nod, the teleporter and the warper disappeared from the scene. Only after that did the facade of composure break down for the two adults. They all but crumbled down and took deep breaths.

The fight only looked easy because they were omega-level mutants, but even then, only they knew how much it took a toll on them to keep up with their taunting strategy. It had not been easy. No, it was probably the biggest effort either of them had done with their powers in their entire lives. And that was while Magneto was 'only' shielding and Ororo was 'only' wrestling the god's control over the storm.

"We need to move," Storm said between breaths.

"Not yet," Magneto shook his head. "We'll help no one if we collapse."

"... Let's take two minutes then," Ororo capitulated.

Two minutes was a short time, but since they were under the clock of Odin's return to the battlefield, two minutes were a necessary luxury.

While the two omega-level mutants caught their breath in Tokyo, in London, Stark, Logan, and Laura readied themselves to face the Asgardian squad.

With a Sknt Logan and Laura's adamantium claws came out. Their claws, if one paid close attention, were inscribed with runes, the same runes that covered Stark's armor.

"I'll provide cover fire and ranged support," Stark said. "You can do your thing worry-free."

He received two affirmative growls and then took flight.

The first to move was Laura. She was nimbler. She took a step forward and disappeared.

"What?!" Logan exclaimed.

"That was not an effect from my runes," Stark said through the comms.

"Aragorn," Laura replied. "RAGH!" She roared, her double claws sinking deep into the thigh of an unprepared einheri.

She pulled her claws out and, just as quickly, launched herself towards another victim and skipped distance, her claws trained on another thigh.

While she removed the mobility of the einherjar, the wounds of the first unlucky einheri bled out as if a hemorrhagic venom had been poured on the wounds.

"That's indeed the effect of my runes," Stark informed. On his left, a hard light riot shield appeared, on his right, his repulsor fired single shots aimed to maim. From his back, compact missiles swarmed away like bees.

While Stark and Laura were not overly concerned with ending their targets, Logan was. His claws were longer than Laura's, and he had the height to target the truly lethal spots. Additionally, the Asgardian physiology was such that only a truly deadly strike would finish the job. So, like a reaper, he reaped.

It was not a seamless culling of souls, though. This was the einherjar, warriors Odin himself had recognized; they were not the type of cannon fodder that could be culled like cutting grass.

An einheri speared Laura through her stomach, another took the chance to try and decapitate her with a lethal swing of his sword, yet, it was the thud of fallen head that was heard, but the clang of metal clashing metal when his sword connected with her vertebrae.

"RAGH!" She spun with her arms extended like the blades of a fan, with no regard for her spine, and cut at the legs of her would-be executioners. Her spine cracked when the movement dislocated an entire joint system, causing a catastrophic shearing.

Still, this was not enough to stop her. She flexed her muscles and spun her spine back in place before forcing with her legs the spear out of the ground. Then, spear still through her, she charged back into the fray with a skip of distance.

"That cub is far ruthless than you," Stark told Logan.

Logan, less nimble than his daughter/clone, would have been purcopine at that point, were it not for the fact that he at least had the decency to stop to pull or push the spears out of his body.

While the two nigh-unkillable wolverines were rampaging and Stark was providing tactical air support, and when things appeared to be going in their way, lightning crackled and the mother of all lightnings rained down and struck Stark true.

Mjølnir flew far faster than Logan could track and hit him straight in the gut like a divine sledgehammer.

"NO MORTAL SHALL SHAME THE EINHERJAR!" Thor Odinson roared and declared like the Asgardian he was.

"I think they've been shamed enough already, brother," the slithering voice of Loki followed after.

"THOR!!!" The einherjar chanted like a cheerleader squad.

"It's the princes!" Morale was boosted instantly.

Laura stopped her thigh-stabbing spree and turned cautiously towards the new arrivals. "Priority targets," she commented.

"Yep, I got that loud and clear," from the rubble, Stark whinced and walked out. Aside from the soot and the occasional arcs of electrostatic, his armor was nearly intact.

"Get this thing off of me!" Logan growled while doing his best to push the immobile hammer nailing him down.

"Not worthy," Laura shook her head. It was both a declaration of her unworthiness and an assertion of Logan's dilemma.

"Those are not the type of runes I can mess with," Stark said.

"Brother," Thor said while walking towards Stark. "Subdue the cub, I'll take care of the armor man."

"I have no problem with the casual babysitting, but you owe me one," Loki said, shimmering out of sight.

With Logan down, it was a 2v2 if the einherjar was ignored.

... Or so the godlings thought.

From below Logan, like ink, his shadow crept over him until only a three-dimensional shadow of Logan was left. Then, the hammer sank into the inky umbra. Immediately after the shadows receded, Logan volted up.

"Mjølnir?" Thor asked like a baby who had just lost their rattle.

'Summon it, now!' Loki exclaimed with magic in his head. 'There's a shadowmancer hidden!'

Thor raised his hand, beckoning his hammer. However, his entry lightning strike had overloaded a certain playboy's armor, and he was not going to wait. With no concern for the priority target, as Laura had appropriately titulated them, Stark fired a pillar of repulsive blast from the reactor in his chest.

The runes around the arc reactor lit up with arcane light, and the pillar changed qualitatively.

It happened too fast, and immediately after his hammer had been 'lost', so Thor was not ready.

Loki, understanding the disadvantage of losing Thor, sneaked behind Stark, ready to stab him. However, Laura skipped and appeared soundlessly behind his invisible form. Like Stark, with no regard for the priority target's well-being, she stabbed at his thighs.

"Protect the princes!" The einherjar moved, but it was too late.

By the time they reached Loki, he had been downed, his thighs turned into sieves, and Laura was standing above him with the tip of her bladed foot aimed at Loki's left temple. The message was clear: move, and he dies.

"Your lives are not in danger," Logan said to Loki, before turning to the einherjar, "but theirs are a different thing."

The light of the pillar of repulsive force died down, and Thor appeared in the middle of the crater left behind. His arm was still extended, his consciousness coming and going.

"Not down," Laura said.

"It's okay," Stark shrugged and moved towards Loki. He knelt down and placed a collar around him. "So long as this one is captured, that one is not a problem."

"... You know us," Loki said, eyes narrowed with suspicion.

"Aragorn," Laura replied while eyeing with curiosity at Thor. A second later, from a small fissure, Mjølnir appeared and landed in Thor's hand.

Catching a second wind, lightning thundered, and Thor stood up, revitalized. Well, that vitality quickly died down when he spotted the collar around Loki that Laura and Stark were helpfully pointing at. To drive the point further, with her other foot, the one not pointed at Loki, Laura demonstrated her ability to pull a sharp claw out.

"... Who is Aragorn?" Loki asked.

"Your father attacks him unprovoked, and you don't know who Aragorn is?" Logan asked.

"My father would not attack unprovoked," Thor declared. "My father is the ender of conflicts in the Nine Realms, the All-Father to Midgard. If father made a move on your liege, then the fault lies on your side."

"..." Laura made no comment to that; Logan was equally silent.

Stark, however, laughed with the mockery of a broken person.

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" He laughed nonstop, to the point that even Logan worried for him.

"Your father," Stark said after calming down. "If he is such an honorable man, why is he attacking when Aragorn is away with the help of most of the Deities of Earth? Why did he raze down our planet and effectively throw us into the fucking STONE AGE?!" he roared.

"..." Thor didn't reply. On one side, he felt he shouldn't believe the words of the enemy; on the other, Stark spoke with so much emotion and so raw that Thor was having trouble disregarding his claims.

"Or is it that you think because he claims to be the protector of the Nine Realms, he can do as he pleases?" Stark questioned. "You don't believe me?!" he shouted. "Her, take a good fucking look!" he projected the state of the world through the tech in his armor.

"Tokyo?" The projection of the result of Susanoo's rampage appeared. "Fucked up!"

"Manila?" It showed a crater slowly being filled with water from the bay. "Fucked up!"

"Jakarta?" Where the National Monument once stood, there was a smouldering crater, and the entire city was on fire. "Fucked up!"

"Manhattan?" The Baxter building tilted slowly, the streets covered in undead, and then, when it fell, it exploded. "Fucked up!"

"..."

"..."

Loki and Thor chose to remain in silence.

"Do you want me to keep going?" Stark asked, his fury palpable.

It wasn't only that many human lives were lost, or the destruction of property, the obliteration of history, or even the fact that some parts of the globe had been left uninhabitable by the divine attacks. The world had recently faced an apocalyptic event, and through the sponsorship of Aragorn and Stark Industries, they had made remarkable progress in keeping modern civilization afloat, yet... it all went to shit in minutes.

"Do you even know why Odin attacked us?" Logan asked.

"Father said your liege placed at risk the entire universe and the lives of all deities," Thor replied, his faith in Odin unbroken.

"The greatest threat since Gorr the God Butcher," Loki added.

To that, after remembering that the reason the universe was in a constant state of suiciding was Odin, Stark lost it.

He activated the collar on Loki's neck, and the god went rigid. As if all of his muscles had suddenly contracted. Then, before Thor could react, a tactical rod fell on him and the perfect angle to rip his arm, and with the perfect amount of kinetic energy to knock the god out while leaving them unharmed. For a reason, they were called tactical rods.

"Crazy," Laura stated.

"Did you lose your shit?" Logan asked.

"Not yet," Stark said with a broken voice while slowly turning to the stunned einherjar. "Not yet," he repeated. Then, a pillar of light fell over the Asgardians.

The light pillar cut through the einherjar, leaving behind a trail of molten slag. The heat was enough to make Laura and Logan blister up. When the light died down, when their eyes got used to the lighting, the einherjar were no more.

Stark heaved up and down with his forced breathing.

"I wish all Asgardians would die," he commented.

"Racist," Laura pointed out.

Thor was out; Loki, however, got to watch all that happened and finally understood that it was all a trap. Stark could have gotten rid of the einherjar long before he and Thor arrived. They were fishing for them.

"We've got to move out before their witch of a mother arrives," Logan said. He walked to Thor and lifted him to his shoulder like a potato sack. "Harry, take care of that thing," he pointed at the arm still holding Mjølnir.

Shadows crept around the limb and hammer before swallowing both.

That was the last thing Loki saw before he passed out.

They evacuated through a star-shaped portal, and not even a minute later, the Bifrost fell on the battlefield.

Frigga, the mother of Asgard, stepped out of the iridescent rainbow light behind a platoon of einherjar. "My children," she said, biting back a sob.

She waved her hands with grace and purpose, magic circles and runes came alive, her eyes deep in concentration. Then, something seemed to break in her, and she sobbed softly. "Where were they taken?" she murmured.

Her magic sought their traces for a few minutes before it died down.

"Heimdal?" She asked, hopeful.

'Something, Goddess Gaea, I believe, is interfering with my sight,' Heimdall replied in her mind.

Divinity was not everything there was to reality. Divinity was not an omnipotent energy/force. There was plenty beyond it. An example of this was America Chavez's portals. Her portals ran on a fuel more primordial than the power of concepts. Hence, Frigga's magic was helpless in tracking her kidnapped children.

Heimdal's sight failing him was the result of Odin's wishes and, as he suspected, Gaea's interference.

So, neither of them could track where Asgard's princes had been taken.

━━━━━━━ ● ━━━━━━━

New York...

Hovering at a safe distance, a quinjet bore witness to the transformation of Manhattan Island into a living hell.

When the Baxter Tower fell, it brought down with it all the surrounding buildings. Not only was the tower's base destabilized by the removal of the SIEVE, but the building exploded as it fell. The explosion, the unstable underground, and the impact of the tower's fall all combined into the needed circumstances to structurally bring down a few blocks surrounding it.

Then came the fire. With the destroyed blocks as the origin, it spread. Now, the island was on fire, almost in its entirety.

Normally, this would be nigh impossible; however, the absence of humans, the destruction caused by the undead and Hades' attack, the destabilization resulting from the earthquakes during the supercaldera explosion, the raging winds as a result of the multiple divine events intervening with the natural balance of the planet, the roots of the Arbor Mundi that emerged from underground to safeguard humanity, and simply terrible luck, which was the standard in a doomed reality, it all dominoed into Manhattan on fire.

However, to call it hell on Earth simply because it was on fire was not fair. The reason the description was so accurate was that many of the undead caught fire but simply kept roaming and destroying all they could until they crumbled and turned to ash.

"Did we at least end the necromancer bastard?" Johnny asked.

"Almost all deities have a form of energy manipulation," Doom explained. "It's unlikely the explosion killed him."

"Did we destroy Manhattan for nothing?" Ben asked.

"Not necessarily," Doom said. He made a pulling motion, and a crystal covered in runes and magic circles appeared in his hand. "Susan, can you do the honors?" he handed the crystal to the silent and mourning woman.

"I don't know what this is, Victor," Susan said while mellowly accepting the crystal.

"Think of it as a remote," Doom explained. "It only has one function, and that function is activated by crushing the crystal."

"Is that the wizard equivalent of a big red button?" Johnny asked, intrigued by the crystal and its functions.

"What will it activate?" Susan asked.

"Hopefully, a giant magical fire extinguisher," Ben quipped.

"Crush it to find out," Doom said while focusing forward as he piloted the quinjet.

Susan hesitated for a moment, then she used her force field to crush the crystal. A moment after, green lightning bloomed in from Manhattan.

"Injuring an arrogant god is easy," Doom commented. "They think so highly of themselves that they tend not to even account for the possibility of someone outsmarting them." There was something cold and eerie to his voice. "I may have gravely underestimated Mephisto, but with so much information available," he caressed the P-Link around his neck, "it's impossible to underestimate these divine fools."

The lightning grew in intensity and brightness; it raged through everything, ignoring even the natural insulators and powering through everything. This was magic lightning; it didn't follow the same rules as natural lightning bolts.

"You know," Doom continued. "I've been preparing for eventualities like this for a while now. Aragorn even said it was an interesting hobby."

"Dude, find yourself a woman, if not for your junior's sake, do it for the world!" Johnny cried out in horror.

"Victor," Benn said with a somewhat disappointed and concerned tone. "This hobby doesn't speak of a healthy mindset."

"Did I just finish destroying Manhattan?" Susan cried in horror.

"The city was already lost," Doom excused himself. "We may have even mortally wounded the god besieging the city," he added.

"I don't know," Johnny drawled. "I think something is happening inside that lightning storm," he pointed out, "my girl told me so."

"Since when can your omnipotent flame do that?" Ben asked.

"It's the fire, man," Johnny explained. "I can feel something in that fire that is not undead."

True to his guess, from the burning city and the magical lightning storm, something humongous, amorphous, and most certainly death grew until it shadowed half of the city.

"W-What is that?" Susan cried with horror.

"It's a golem," Doom replied. "An undead golem."

The thing was truly humongous in scale. It was burning while being zapped by countless lightning strikes; even then, it was unresponsive to damage. Its face, or where they assumed his face was, was following the quinjet as it circled around it.

Its body was made from all the rotten corpses in Hades.

"We have to end that," Susan said. "Something feels wrong. That is not something we can ignore."

"You're experiencing the clash between life and unlife," Doom said. "It's not a matter of what we have to do, it's a matter of what we can do."

"I could try burning it," Johnny suggested. His eyes landed on the burning lower section of the thing, "though I doubt it'll have much of an effect."

"I can only hit it," Benn grimaced. "I doubt that will accomplish much before killing me with its stench."

"It's time to do a test run of Reed's toy," Doom declared.

"I thought we only had three shots, max," Johnny said.

"For once, you're not wrong," Doom stated. "The truth is that after we hit Odin with it, he'll wish it away, so we might as well at least try it once."

"I don't think a better chance will present itself if we wait longer than THAT!" Ben shouted in alarm.

The golem, in its enormity, unrooted a burning skyscraper and shot it at the quinjet.

Doom pulled hard and forced the quinjet upwards with all of his might.

"Shitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshit!" Johnny cursed.

"KYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" Susan shrilled.

"We're gonna die!" Ben gripped hard enough to crack the handles of his reinforced seat.

It was a desperate situation. With enough skill and luck, the quinjet managed to fly over the flying building while only scraping the aircraft's belly.

"... So, any objections?" Doom asked.

"No," Johnny retorted.

"Do it!" Ben exclaimed.

"This thing can't be left alive," Susan stopped caring about property damage. The world was ending anyway.

Doom tapped on his P-Link and said, "Jarvis, you heard."

[Director Fury was also interested in testing the SIEVE before its official run. Sadly, he is currently occupied. SIEVE activation in T-6... T-5... T-4... T-3... T-2... T-1...]

If reality were a simulation, if there was a supercomputer unimaginable to those inside the simulation, if everything were ones, zeros, and maybe something else that couldn't be thought or imagined by simulated entities, how would a glitch in the simulation look?

If reality were a drawing, how would a blotch be observed?

If reality were the product of a dream, how would failure in logic and continuity be experienced?

That, whatever it is you're imagining, was a hundred times wrong and equally correct.

There was not even the pull expected from when matter rushes in to fill a void. Matter could not, under regular conditions, escape space, so matter couldn't even rush to fill the void left because Space was ejected. It was not erased, it was not broken, it was not bent, it was warped. Space, the volume occupied by the golem, was ejected from the spatial mesh.

What was left behind was as if the drawing (reality) had been heavily creased, folded, and then partially flattened. A dense reticulation of corrugations, like a folio that had been meticulously plicated and then inexpertly pressed flat.

It was dizzying to simply observe.

"What in the eternal flame's name was Reed thinking?" Johnny interrupted the silence.

"Was he even thinking?" Ben asked.

"He could not have built this in a week or two," Johnny said. "At some point, he had to have come to a stop and asked himself what the fuck he was doing and if that was the responsible thing to do, right?"

"I don't know, matchstick," Ben said while shaking his head. "I don't think Reed's thought process works like that."

"The worst part is how pathetically he failed in understanding Aragorn's limits," Doom commented below his breath, low enough for the other not to hear him.

[The end of the deity has been confirmed.] Jarvis informed.

"It's time to move to the next target," Doom said.

"Next target?" Susan asked.

"Odin," he said.

"... What?!" Johnny exclaimed.

"Victor, are you as stupid as Reed?!" Ben questioned.

↓Part 2━━━━━━━ ● ━━━━━━━Part 2↓

In a well-lit underground bunker, roots by the tens of thousands coiled on the walls, motes of warm light bobbed slowly and rhythmically in the room, and a few dozen screens showed to the residents of the room the end of the world.

These screens were not connected to a miracle computer that could generate an appropriate estimation of what the end would look like, nor were they playing a masterful cinematographic creation. These screens were connected to plenty of surviving cameras and even a few satellites live-streaming the apocalypse waged on the surface.

A live-stream of the apocalyptic rokus above was not unique to this room. Almost all humans had some form of access to the Sat-Net. Even while protectively entangled in the Arbor Mundi's roots, blessed by Gaea, they had their tablets, smartphones, smartwatches, laptops, or any other device to follow how the progress of millennia was being undone by the invading deities.

What made this room unique was the humans it housed.

"... This is not... I can't see a way out of this," Alexander Pierce said, his voice as somber as the situation.

"It was never our objective to destroy civilization," Baron Wolfgang von Strucker voiced out in excuse.

"We gathered to conjure an approach for Aragorn," Daniel Whitehall said. "But it looks like that's not a concern anymore, is it?"

In one of the screens, in a replay, the destruction of Alduin played in a loop.

"That was not Aragorn," Elisa Sinclair, one of the few magic users on Hydra's side, commented. "I believe that was some form of voodoo doll, but even if that had been Aragorn, his death would not mean success for us."

"Madame Hydra speaks the truth," Arnim Zola, the human more machine and binary code than man, said. "That monster has kept to himself so far, but these gods... Under their rule, Hydra would certainly meet its end."

On various screens, they could see footage of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Denmark rapidly being conquered under Asgardian rule.

Everything southwest of Tokyo, South of China, and North of Australia had been taken over by the deities of Japan, China, and India.

The North of Africa was the Ennead's territory, with Wakanda forming a defensive line, stopping their advance to the South.

The Aegean, Ionic, and Adriatic Seas were a mess. The Iron Destroyer's fight against Poseidon and Zeus had leveled basically all coastal cities.

Latin America and the southern states of the United States of America had fallen with almost no resistance to the gods of the people who no longer existed and had been driven to death.

These were the major battlefields where the largest pantheons concentrated; however, the Gods of Earth were so numerous that it wasn't wrong to claim that barely any place was left above ground that could still be called human land.

"Forget Hydra," Pierce mumbled loud enough to be heard.

At any other day, the phrase 'Forget Hydra' would have been sacrilege enough to warrant a total overhauling of your psyche and a few cybernetic implants in your prefrontal cortex; this time, however, it only warranted a few raised eyebrows.

"Humanity can't recover from this," Pierce sated.

"This won't be the end of humanity," Daniel Whitehall spoke with conviction. "Adaptation is in our blood; that is the way of our kind."

"We recovered last time," Strucker added. "This time, maybe it'll take longer, but we will also surface back up!"

"... I'm not even sure the planet will be inhabitable after this," Helmut Zemo said somberly. He had been quietly evaluating the feed of the fight between Alduin, Carol Danvers, Pietro, and Odin.

"What do you mean?" Strucker asked.

"Zemo is not mistaken," Zola stated. "Last time, the timely intervention of Jean Grey managed to preserve the delicate balance of Earth's surface," various shots of Jean protecting the planet from overirradiation shuffled through the screens. "Even then, the effects of a slight imbalance could be seen easily by the global famine that followed. This time, the imbalance appears to be greater."

"That's terrible enough without accounting for the effects that this much divinity will have in the environs," Elisa Sinclair added. "Warped lands due to divinity poisoning, warped life, warped phenomena, and plenty more. In conclusion, life on Earth will be inadvisable."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"Sigh, not everything is bleak," Elisa Sinclair continued. "There are certain locations currently still standing," with a gesture, the screens showed the places she was referring to. "Latveria, Wakanda, Krakoa, Re-Nazca, the poles, Northern Russia, North of Tibet and South of Mongolia, the Oceans... and the Halo. All of these places remain largely unaffected. Also, the West Coast of the USA still stands, but not for long. Quetzalcoatl is on its way." A massive green feathered serpent could be seen even through satellite view, slithering its way towards California.

"So the most inhospitable places on Earth and the locations safeguarded by those related to Aragorn or his people, great," Pierce said what they all were thinking.

"If the world is reduced this much, it will be like a gu jar between us and Aragorn," Zola said.

"Assuming he survives," Zemo added.

"Which, to our dismay, is the best case scenario for us," Whitehall pointed out.

"There's another possible path," Strucker suggested with a glint of madness in his eyes.

"... What?" Alexander Pierce asked.

"We carve our own piece of the cake now," his eyes fixedly staring at Quetzalcoatl. "That divine snake, won't it conveniently pass above us if it's headed to California?"

"That's madness!" Whitehall exclaimed.

"No, no... Let him talk," Elisa Sinclair commanded with equal madness in her eyes.

"We have some of our most promising toys in this base," Strucker continued. "Sinclair, that blue energy, you once said it was something even beyond the gods, didn't you?"

"The Tesseract is a weapon beyond mortals, is what I said," she replied.

"There's some validity to this madness," Zola commented. "The serpent will pass 3 klicks west from overhead. If we set the mother of all claymores mines in its path... Maybe we could secure our piece of the cake."

"We came here, risking the end of most heads of the high command, to bunker down and resist Aragorn in case of retaliation due to our contribution in Odin's plan," Zemo said, "We have enough ammunition to truly build the mother of all claymore mines."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"..."

━━━━━━━ ● ━━━━━━━

Inside an undertermined root of the Arbor Mundi, Fury hovered in lotus position, his eyes closed in sharp concentration, blood flowing down his nostrils mixed with cerebrospinal fluid, sweat pouring down his forehead.

"Goddess Gaea," he called with difficulty.

'No need to say it, I see it,' Gaea replied in his mind.

'It's razing everything in its path to San Francisco,' Fury said in his mind.

'This one is too much for Stark,' Gaea commented.

'What about Doom?' Fury asked.

'It may be possible, but he is currently occupied setting the SIEVE on Odin,' Gaea explained.

'... I wanted to at least keep the West Coast in one piece,' Fury lamented.

'Sacrifices are part of life, child,' Gaea comfortingly replied.

'We've made so many of those lately,' Fury grieved. 'I don't think Earth will have a space for us after this is over.'

'... I doubt it, child,' Gaea replied with the cruel truth.

'Do you think he'll help us again?' Fury questioned.

'Who can predict the whims of Aragorn's heart?' Gaea asked in return.

'I can predict he won't allow humanity in the Halo,' Fury grumbled. 'Maybe he'll let us into Re-Nazca. I doubt the Council will allow more than a few non-mutants into Krakoa. And Latveria is... Latveria. How bleak a future awaits us.'

'It's not the first time civilization has been undone, child,' Gaea said.

'Really? Can I hear more about that?' Fury asked, intrigued.

'A few millennia after the Celestials left the Eternals in charge of the planet, and after the Deviants overpopulated and enslaved most of humanity, the world, civilization, could have been divided into three.

'The plenty and strong, the Deviants. The few and strong, the Eternals. And the weak and few, Humanity. Things had escalated out of the Eternal's hands, and they had no choice but to call the Celestials back.

'The Celestials, after hearing the Eternals' plea for the end of the Deviants, acted.

'A Celestial weapon unleashed an explosion such as humanity had never seen before or has seen since—so powerful that it rocked the entire planet, plunging it into the worldwide disaster known as the Great Cataclysm.

'All of Lemuria, as well as Atlantis, sank beneath the raging seas. Most of the Deviants perished amidst the earthquakes and floods. The Eternals were helpless to save most of the victims of the great deluge—but one Eternal, Ikaris, guided a huge Ark filled with human beings and animals to safety.

'This was also, partly, the manifestation of Yahweh's Nexus Event. Back then, all had been finished. Civilization was destroyed, and the planet was but a truly blue sphere. It took me tens of thousands of years to drain the flood, so don't despair, it might be ten millennia later, or two, or three, but humanity shall resurface!' Gaea said in high spirits.

'... Thirty thousand years?' Something broke in Fury.

'With Aragorn here, worry not! It could even be less,' Gaea said as if delivering the news that the baby and mother were healthy.

'...' Deep inside, Fury prayed. He didn't pray to Gaea, he didn't seek any of the Drachantheon Therion, he certainly did not hand his faith to Aragorn, no, his belief was aimed higher, as high as possible or impossible; he did not care, he prayed: 'Someone, anyone, please help me! Someone must stop that serpent!'

As if answering his prayers, 'Oh, this is quite fortunate, child,' Gaea said.

In the few fractions of a second that it took Gaea to continue delivering the news, Fury was a man of faith, belief, and trust in the higher power. Then, Gaea continued, 'Hydra is making a move on Quetzalcoatl!'

'... Motherfuckers!' Fury growled. No faith, no belief, no trust in the higher power. Just rage.

In Henry W. Coe State Park, before San Jose, California, ~60 miles (100km) from San Francisco, a mushroom cloud bloomed. This was not the usual thermonuclear explosion. This was the largest manmade explosion in the history of humankind. It was blue with arcs of blue lightning zapping even beyond the horizon.

It was so large that a quarter of Santa Clara County was razed to the ground.

The blue energy of the Tesseract polluted the area, and, worse than radiation poisoning, it amorphously warped space.

Fury, even while his brain was being liquified, wanted to cry just out of sheer rage.

'That's good, no? Quetzalcoatl certainly died to that explosion, I can confirm,' Gaea chirped happily.

The problem was not that Hydra took Quetzalcoatl down, it wasn't even that parts of the outskirts of a few major cities of Santa Clara County were touched by the explosion, it was not the cost in repairs, it wasn't even the wrath at Hydra for hiding a weapon like that, it was that the explosion was going to fuck up the weather patterns and east of Santa Clara County, Stanilaus and Merced Counties counld be found, some of the most important surviving agricultural sectors of the West Coast.

To the Drachantheon Therion, who had spent 300,000 on a different Earth, the famine may have been a thing of the far past, but to Earth-5H1NE, it couldn't be a more present reality. And Hydra had just fucked up a few of the surviving granaries in the USA.

While fury was seething in wrath, in a certain undisclosed underground bunker, a certain group of squids was celebrating as if they had just landed Apollo 11 on the Moon.

While this was happening, outside the shield protecting the Arbor Mundi, near the first landing point of the Bifrost, Logan, Stark, and Laura stood in waiting.

At their feet, Thor and Loki, fully covered in sealing runes, kneeled facing forward.

Loki was lightly bruised, but otherwise unharmed. Thor, on the other hand, was armless.

Strapped to his back, his two arms could be found. The wounds were sealed, so he was not bleeding out, and both arms were preserved with runic script, but none of this took away the savagery and demeaning flair of the scene.

Laura cared too little to comment. Logan was just as pissed as Stark. And Stark, he had snapped before, and he was not getting back to his usual self anytime soon. In fact, his shoulder missile launchers and various of his hidden weaponry were actively targeting both gods; to make the point clearer, he was using a red laser targeting.

The wait was not long. A minute after they stepped outside the Arbor Mundi's barrier, the Bifrost slammed down with the violence of the Nine Realms.

Frigga, accompanied by the Warriors Three and Lady Sif, marched out of the Rainbow Bridge; this time, she was not followed by a platoon of the einherjar.

The sight of her captive sons and maimed son was as much a shock as it could be for any good mother; however, what she was not prepared for was the sight of her husband above the Arbor Mundi in a constant loop of gore and reconstitution.

With a gasp that died in her throat, she brought her hands over her mouth in horror. The Warriors Three and Lady Sif could hardly stomach the horror any better.

"Witch," Stark called out with vitriol. "We must be looking pretty evil here, mustn't we?"

"We maimed your crown prince," Stark kicked the back of Thor into the ground and stepped on his head. "We hold hostage your other son," he activated Loki's collar, and this one tensed into the ground, landing beside Thor. Thor grunted and tried to resist, but the muzzle and the runic inscription made it impossible to do anything more than wiggle like a caterpillar. "And let's not mention whatever the fuck your henious husband is going through," he pointed at the All-Father with his thumb.

"Can you believe this shit?!" Stark exclaimed. "All of this started because you and your husband fucked up with Lady Death!"

For a moment, Frigga felt her heart give up.

"You doomed us! You doomed the universe! And then, when Aragorn makes progress repairing it, you attack us!!!" Stark stumped on Thor's head like a madman.

The Asgardians gave a start, as if they were going to launch themselves into combat. But the claw slowly coming out of Laura's foot aimed at Loki's head stopped them.

"Calm down," Logan advised.

Runes lit up on the armor's helmet, and Stark slowly calmed down.

"You have one chance," Stark declared with a clarity that starled them. One moment, he was stumping on Thor's head; the next, he was speaking with the clarity of a skilled negotiator. "In a few minutes, Odin will be unsealed from his torment. Have him give up the Cosmic Cube and leave the realm. Upon his return, Aragorn will return, unharmed, your sons to you."

"... I can't do that," Frigga said, her heart in her mouth. "You're not giving me any guarantees, mortal child."

"Guarantees?" Stark asked in disbelief. "What about I guarantee I'll end them if you don't act your part?"

Logan's claws slowly came out.

"..." Frigga was mother and queen; at this moment, her two identities clashed. The mother in her wanted nothing more than to accept the deal, but the queen in her couldn't.

The impossibility of choice was shared even by the Asgardians on her side. They were Thor's friends, and even Loki's, to an extent, but they were also loyal to the All-Father.

"Frigga, long time no see." In this loaded impasse, Gaea's mellifluous voice cut through, and a root of the Arbor Mundi pierced out of the ground. It opened up like a cocoon, while morphing into a throne, and Gaea appeared sitting on it like a nature spirit queen.

"Goddess Gaea," Frigga said with surprise. "I thought you were... Oh no!" She turned to Odin, startled and horrified like never before.

"I see you need no explanation," Gaea stated. Her eyes landed on Thor below Stark's boot. "That one is technically my son, did you know?"

"... Aragorn gave me explicit instructions on handling this one with utmost care," Stark said in defense.

"Was there a need to maim him?" Gaea asked.

"I had no way of stopping that annoying hammer from returning to his hand," Stark complained.

"Ah, Mjølnir... She can be quite the loyal thing, can't she?" Gaea asked nobody with a chuckle.

She controlled her throne to inch closer to Thor. "Allow me," she said to Stark. Stark, understanding who not to mess with, stepped down from Thor and cleared the way.

Vines extended from her throne and wrapped his arms before unstrapping them from his back. Then she attached them back in place under the green healing light of her divinity.

Thor was still muzzled, so he couldn't express his thanks or surprise at the reveal of his mother's identity. However, his eyes said enough.

Even so, that was not enough to lower the value of the threat he represented.

"Sleep, child of mine, for everything will be over when you wake up," Gaea whispered, and Thor fell into a slumber.

With the care of a mother, Gaea wrapped in vines and roots and made him disappear into the ground. Loki got the same treatment.

"Frigga," She addressed the concerned but now at ease goddess. "I'll keep them safe, you have my word. But you'll do as this child instructed," she placed a relaxing hand over Stark's armored head.

"... What will happen to my husband?" Frigga asked.

"... Have you seen the state of Midgard?" Gaea asked in response. "Who is to be made responsible for this?"

"Asgard will answer in its king's stead," Frigga succintly declared.

"Isn't it the other way around? A king answering for his kingdom," Gaea asked.

"Asgard is my husband as much as my husband is Asgard," Frigga desperately declared.

"... That is why you could not save your eldest daughter, Frigga." Gaea's words cut deep. "Instead of stopping him, you aided him."

"She is as much responsible for the state of the universe as he is," Stark growled.

Logan gave Stark a look that said: How batshit crazy are you to intrude on the discussion of these divine ladies? All my wild instincts are going haywire, and here you are, intruding as if you were their equal!

"Calm down, child," Geas whispered. She used her magic to get Stark's rampaging emotions under control. "You've done a great job. I'll put in a good word for you. I'm sure Aragorn will begrudgingly allow you to see Seraph with the intention of dating. I'll take it from here."

"... Okay," Stark registered barely half the words Gaea whispered. He was laser-focused on the Asgardians.

Gaea wrapped him and the wolverines in vines and dragged them down away.

"Frigga," Gaea called out. "Is Odin still the man you fell in love with?"

"..." That was a painful question for which Frigga wanted no answer.

"I remember the days when it was you, Fireheair, Odin, and me," Gaea said in remembrance. "Firehair was crass about most things but protective of Earth, I cared for the small lives populating my surface, you were about your magic and the Aesir, and Odin, he was a leader, a king, a father, and honorable, even despite his mistakes.

"I don't see any of that anymore in him. All I see is a desperate man digging his grave deeper with every action and choice taken... Don't see the madness in him, Frigga?" Gaea asked.

"... I... I see it... and it's breaking me apart," Frigga said with a sob.

"My Queen," Sif said with concern.

The difference in class and status prevented her from giving a much-needed hug to her queen, so she showed her support by standing closer to her side.

The contents of the conversation had overturned many facts for the four Asgardians, and a small part of them, a less honorable part, wanted nothing than to abandon Frigga to deal with the mess caused by the royal family and return to their home with Thor and Loki.

"When Aragorn told me Odin was responsible for the current doomed state of the universe... I wanted to deny it," Gaea spoke with her heart. "It made me feel like the time we spent together had been built on a lie, Frigga."

By the time Thor was born, Odin had already doomed the universe.

"Was it, Frigga?" Gaea asked. "Was it a lie?"

"N-No," Frigga denied.

"Then, is it too much to ask for him to take responsibility for his actions?" Gaea's question was like a brick to the head for Frigga. "So many carefully crafted plans burned, so much progress undone, so much of Aragorn's mission was destroyed by his recklessness and desperate actions. Not even for the sake of our time together, or the child that we three parented, will I ask Aragorn to spare his life. Not even in exchange for Asgard or the remaining eight realms will Lady Death pardon his life."

"... Gaea," Frigga voiced out. Her voice was breaking, a reflection of her crumbling heart. "Who are they to you? Who is Aragorn to you that you lent him your womb?"

"... While this one is one with me," Gaea placed a motherly hand over her belly, "I am his and I am hers, I'm theirs," her eyes, despite speaking of herself as a possession, were tender, "and when this one is born, I'll be his," the love of a mother could be seen as she tenderly caressed her belly. "Does that answer your question?"

"..." Frigga nodded with hollowed eyes.

Slowly, she took flight towards Odin.

"My Queen!" Sif yelled, worried and scared.

"Please let us accompany you!" Fandral cried.

"Please, see to their safe return, Heimdal," Frigga commanded.

The Bifrost didn't fall immediately; it was as if the Asgardian observer was doubting his vow to follow his Queen's command. Then, the rainbow bridge fell on the four Asgardians faster than they could escape its pull.

Odin's body, through the torture the ritual subjected him to, had seen all sorts of horrors that the Alduin construct had survived. Poison, soul, bodily, mind, magical, divine, and many more types of damage washed through Odin, killing him countless times. However, what almost broke his mind and tore his soul apart—had it not been for the Cosmic Cube—was the last damage Alduin experienced; the damage wrought by the rejection and hostility of Reality, that which made it turn to dust and activate the ritual.

The way the terrans were tracking how long Odin had left before he had braved through all the damage was through the effects on his body. When the first deaths by reality rejection started—marked by the atomization of his body—the general command was issued for all to seek refuge inside the Arbor Mundi's roots.

Over the ancestrals waters poisoned with divinity of the Nile, Osiris's body bled out ichor slowly. Wakanda had been reduced in numbers considerably, Bast was spent, and no more fighting spirit could be sensed from them or their opponents.

Bast raised her eyes from the dead body of Osiris and counted three divine corpses more. Opposite her, the wary remains of the Ennead eyed her with rage, fear, and recognition.

Basta took a deep breath and ordered, "Retreat!" Wakanda didn't need to be told twice.

Their figures retreated to the surfacing massive roots and sank into them as if the roots had been an illusion.

Bast turned back to those who had been her pantheon before the war started and said, "Hide if you want to avoid his wrath." She said nothing more. Her body merged with the nearest root like those of her followers.

Somewhere in space above the Arbor Mundi, a quinjet attached to a satellite also received the call for retreat.

"We need to leave, Victor," Susan said.

"..." Doom didn't acknowledge her comment.

"We won't have enough time to get from high up here to down below," Johnny pointed out. "Unless we want to crash into the World Tree."

"I would rather crash than get turned into dust," Ben commented.

"The next part of the plan doesn't require your assistance," Doom revealed.

"Next part?" Susan asked.

"What plan?" Johnny questioned. "Didn't all plans go to shit when the divine daddy decided to mess with Aragorn?"

"I'm pretty sure we've been improvising since the Green Door," Ben quipped.

"The plan to stall for more time," Doom explained.

"Victor, what are you thinking?" Susan asked, worried.

"I'll see you when this is over, Sue," Doom said. He waved his hand, and green portals swallowed the Fantastic 3.

"Green in position?" Fury's voice came over through the comms.

"Green in standby," Doom replied.

[Sat-Net ready in T-17] Jarvis' voice came next.

Doom leaned over to watch through the quinjet's window as a swarm of satellites arrived and docked around the SIEVE.

"Wakanda, secured," Queen Shuri's voice came next.

"Krakoa, secured," Magneto informed.

Somewhere East of the Philippines, over the Mariana Trench, a massive flying island slowly dropped to the ocean. Equally massive roots broke out of the ocean and accepted the island. Slowly but efficiently, the island was cocooned in brown, crystal-like roots.

"This is humanity's last play," Fury commented. "According to Abner, not many advanced civilizations can withstand the might of a single deity. Today... regardless of the collapse of our civilization, we proved our true mettle!"

Many nodded with pride, many harbored grief for the end of humanity, and many harbored rage and a craving for vengeance.

"We did more than that," Doom added. "After this is over, no matter the form humanity will take, respect will be received from the greater quadrant of the universe."

"We leave it in your hands," Magneto said.

"See it that hurts him," Shuri snarled. "My goddess would greatly favor you for that."

Doom nodded.

With the SIEVE and the quinjet at the center, the Sat-Net created a spiderweb.

"I'll hide you for as long as I can," Fury said before disconnecting the conference call.

Somewhere between the canopy of the Arbor Mundi and Doom, Frigga reached the crumbling body of her husband.

With unimaginable pain, she observed Odin go through a cycle of dust and regeneration. It was a cycle with a frequency so high that Odin could not react because when he was, the ritual would make sure he wasn't, and when he wasn't, he couldn't wish his salvation.

"What led you to this, husband?" Frigga asked. She extended her hand towards Odin's armored cheek, as if afraid of breaking him.

A second later, the cycle ceased.

Rage, wrath, pain, suffering, and transhuman ire, Odin experienced it all at once.

"GRAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!" He snarled like a wounded predator.

"Husband, I'm here," Frigga craddled his face.

"F-Frigga?" Odin asked, barely making it out of his frenzy before he wished whoever dared to touch him away. "You can't be here, my wife."

"I shouldn't be here, is that what you mean?" Frigga asked with a pained, chiding tone.

"..." Odin offered no response.

"Why?... Why have you done this?" Frigga asked, imploringly.

"... Because it was the only choice," Odin said. His senses scanned the planet in its entirety. He registered the divine ichor left by the fallen deities, he registered the change in the landscapes, he registered the remaining ones on his side, and he concluded he was still winning. He wasn't wrong.

The only deities who had followed him to Earth were those under the title of the Gods of Earth. The remaining 'alien' deities, the extradimensional, and those foreign to Gaea banded to attack Nirn in the middle of the Nova Empire.

When the popularity of the potions released by Imperium exploded across the universe's quadrant, it wasn't only the mortals and long-lived who enjoyed them. The potions garnered the interest of even the deities. So, beyond the loss in authority, these deities also cared about staking a claim over the now unprotected treasure world.

So, even if some of the deities that followed him had perished, Odin didn't feel it was a loss.

"Explain it to me, husband," Frigga pleaded.

"She would not have pardoned our slight, Frigga!" Odin exclaimed.

"... Lady Death?" Frigga asked.

"I felt her! I've been feeling her for years now!" Odin revealed. "Ever since that thing stole Midgard, ever since our seers went blind, I've been feeling her come and go! I thought she had forgotten us, I thought we were as insignificant to her as we truly are, or that she didn't have the freedom to deal with puny us... But then I saw it. I saw that monster go into that green path and then returned no worse for wear... I understood then that even if she didn't have the freedom to rid the universe of us, it did.

"... It was this or certain death, Frigga. There was no other choice!" Odin yelled in frustration. "I need Gaea. I need what she houses. WE NEED IT!"

"... My husband... Even with that thing you fused with, even then, was this the only option left?" Frigga asked, her hollow eyes on the Cosmic Cube fused to Odin.

"Even then, Frigga," Odin affirmed. "This tool barely places me on the board."

"..." Frigga locked eyes with Odin, searching for something, and Odin didn't shy away from her; he stared back unrepentant. She found despair, ire, fear, but most importantly, she found certainty in his belief.

Odin's eyes were not clouded by madness. It was not paranoia that drove him to extremes. It was not rashness that had him leaping without thinking. Among the swirling, intense emotions, she found the wisdom her husband was known for.

"Okay, I'll help you," Frigga declared.

And that was all Doom needed.

A rod coated in enchanted vibranium with a core of adamantium cloaked in green magic fell on her and erased her faster than even Odin's hyperenhanced perception could register.

"AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH" Odin despaired.

And in that despair, Doom found the chance he needed. He activated the SIEVE.

Like that, Odin was no more inside Reality. Only the wound created by the aberration built by Reed Richards was left in his place.

Above the Arbor Mundi, the Sat-Net burned and exploded. Like a shower of stars, the Sat-Net reentered the planet's atmosphere.

Only the Sieve and the quinjet attached to it were left in orbit.

The Sat-Net, beyond a global targeting and bombardment system—and communication relay—could also be used as a magical foci. In this case, Doom designed a magic circle, and Jarvis arranged it with the satellites as ink.

The magic he cast burned through all the surviving satellites of the Sat-Net, and it was all to achieve that one shot that went beyond the perception of Odin, a monster who could measure the passage of [Time].

It was psychological warfare. Odin was no Hades; Odin would have avoided the SIEVE even before he had adapted to Pietro's speed. So Doom used the information he had available through his P-Link and what he had heard from Gaea herself to come up with this heinous plan.

"I can't move, Fury," Doom said. His words were soft, yet heavy. His breathing was erratic, his magic drained.

Space warped below him, and he fell through.

At the core of the Arbor Mundi, Gaea witnessed it all with cold expressionlessness.

"You were right, child," her words reached Doom's flickering consciousness. "Injuring an arrogant god is easy."

'I aim to please,' Doom replied in his head.

Gaea nodded, evidently pleased.

"Oh, Frigga... Didn't you know me well?" Gaea murmured. "Did you forget how protective I can be?" Contrary to her cold listlessness, she caressed her belly with care. Motherly care.

In the void between Realities, Odin raged and wailed.

"FRIGGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" He bellowed. "WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?WHY?!"

The absence of concepts was undoing him, his armor was pealing back, his senses were overloading with nothingness, his mind... his mind should have been breaking, but his wife's death took care of that.

How could something born from [Matter] in [Space] during [Time], powered by [Energy] and driven by [Spirit], survive in the absence of concepts?

Odin was rational, and his wisdom, granted by Yggdrasil, bordered on Cosmic Awareness. Selfish as he was, he acted on logic. He was right; Aragorn would have done Death's bidding even if she had not asked. He was right; there was no other option within his reach. He was right; the Cosmic Cube barely placed him on the board. He was right; only their child would have protected them (Odin and Frigga) from their wrath.

Odin made plenty of mistakes. But by this point, after he had already fucked up during Hela's exile, what other choice, aside from rolling over and waiting for his and his wife's deaths, did he have if not this one path to possible survival?

Odin was right.

But right or wrong meant nothing.

"I WISH FRIGGA BACK! I WISH FRIGGA ALIVE! I WISH FRIGGA HEALTHY! I WISH MY FRIGGA BACK!"

His wishes were backed by so much intent that they transcended the concept of [Wish], but even so, that meant nothing.

The cube glowed in response to the fervent, ardent exigence, yet nothing happened. There was no Reality to warp, there was no matter to transmogrify, there was no material aside from his host's.

"I WISH FRIGGA BACK! I WISH FRIGGA ALIVE! I WISH FRIGGA HEALTHY! I WISH MY FRIGGA BACK!"

The cube's glow intensified. It could not warp, for it had specific orders not to harm its host. There was nothing else to use, so... it [Created] for the first time.

It started small, atomic in scale, and it slowly built up on it.

Light shimmered.

It created more, it needed more for its host's wis—yearning!

Brightness lit up the confines of nothingness.

More! It needed MORE!

The brightness was such that even from the upper strata of the Multiverse it was beginning to be noticeable... and that was not good.

Light gained substance. Matter gained permanence. And something began to shift, something began to change.

And finally, it was done... Frigga was back.

"M-My Frigga," Odin called out, his lips quivering, his voice barely above a sob.

"My husband," it said.

"... I almost lost you," Odin brokenly mumbled. He reached for it and hugged it with all of his broken love.

"You could never," it said. "For you and I are almost one."

"Wife?" Odin asked. "What do you mean?"

"Let's become one, my husband," it seductively stated. "Let's be one and escape this void. Let's become one and return to that which is full. Let's become one, and all shall be fixed."

Odin noticed for the first time how his body was crumbling apart; he raised his reddened eyes towards it, and he nodded.

He cradled with love its delicate face and kissed it. It was a kiss of relief, love, happiness, care, and acceptance.

It accepted it all, and something not even Aragorn thought possible occurred. Their spirits fused, truly fused, and became one. Odin ceased to be, and it emerged from its chrysalis.

"Now we shall be K̸͔̰͕̎U̸̗̜͉͛̋B̷̠̻̺̾̅͝Ó̵͓̿̌S̵̨̼̠͂!"

It made a slicing motion, and something that was not quite a portal, not quite an Astral Path, opened back into Reality. Back into Earth-5H1N3.

The moment it stepped back into Reality, the Arbor Mundi's defenses shrilled in agony.

"..."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"..."

With the destruction of the Sat-Net, magic and mutant abilities were the only ways to peer into the happenings from above; however, no matter who, no matter the level of life, no matter the side, they all felt it.

╚═══━━━─── • ───━━━═══╝

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{A/N:

Please check out my P@treon account! There are already 10 chapters ahead for premium members, which is at least 100,000 words. Premium members also gain access to a new chapter every week.

[email protected]/ExistentialVoid

Free Members get access to all free chapters, and I upload free chapters about 12 hours earlier on P@atreon.}

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