The horns of Asgard blared like
dying stars.
They cut through the dawn sky, deep, thunderous, desperate, the kind of sound that didn't just warn of danger... it promised it.
Peter's head snapped up instantly. His senses screamed before the first sound even hit. He could feel it in the air, a shiver through the fabric of the Web itself, like silk tearing strand by strand.
Then the first drop fell.
A single bead of liquid blackness splattered onto the golden bridge, hissing like acid as it ate through enchanted stone. Then another. Then another.
Within seconds, the sky opened.
What poured down wasn't rain, it was corruption given form. Viscous, oily masses fell from the heavens, writhing before they even touched the ground. Every drop that hit the streets of Asgard moved, crawled, screamed.
From the balcony of the war chamber, Peter, Susan, Sable, Thor, and Odin watched in grim silence as the shining realm began to darken.
"What in Hel's name—" Thor began, gripping Mjolnir.
Peter's voice was quiet, but sharp. "They're not drops."
He turned toward Odin. "They're berserkers."
The first shape rose from the steaming puddles below, tall, twisted, humanoid silhouettes, their forms barely solid, faces a writhing mass of fanged mouths and glowing eyes. Their bodies were forged from the same darkness that bled from the All-Black itself.
Dozens rose. Then hundreds. Then thousands.
Each shrieked with a sound that scraped the soul raw.
Odin's grip tightened around
Gungnir. "By the Norns..."
Peter's eyes flared gold as the runes on his arms ignited, the staff forming in his hand with a hum that split the air. "He's announcing himself."
Susan turned to him, her voice trembling between awe and fear. "Gorr?"
Peter nodded. "Yeah. The Butcher's here."
Sable's pistols materialized in her hands, forged now from the enchanted alloys Doom had given her months ago. "Then let's show him what happens when he knocks on the wrong door."
Odin barked orders to the Einherjar as they assembled outside. "Sound the call to arms! Protect the Bifrost! Do not let the filth reach the throne!"
Peter stepped forward onto the balcony edge, eyes tracking the writhing mass below. Each movement of the black tide sent a ripple through the Web, whispering something ancient and hateful in his head, a voice he'd hoped never to hear again.
You should have stayed dead, Weaver.
He whispered back, "Missed you
too."
Then he turned to Thor. "We hold the bridge. Keep them from spreading into the city."
Thor's grin was sharp and grim. "A fine plan."
The thunder god hurled Mjolnir skyward, lightning tearing through the storm clouds as the hammer sang. The blast lit the black tide like fire, for a heartbeat, the berserkers screamed and burned... and then reformed.
Sable's eyes widened. "They're adapting!"
"Of course they are," Peter muttered. "Figures. They're built from stuff that doesn't like staying down."
The ground trembled. The black tide surged.
Peter slammed his staff down, golden web-lines bursting outward across the ground, sealing off the bridge in a blazing arcane barrier.
The first wave of berserkers smashed into it; some disintegrated on impact, others clawed at the glowing surface, their howls echoing through the skies.
Behind him, Susan extended her hands, forming shimmering shields of energy around the soldiers. "I've got their defense."
Sable reloaded with a click. "And I've got offense."
---
The horns of Asgard screamed their warning, and the sky vomited darkness.
Thor was the first to leap into the fray, Mjolnir roaring with storms as he hurled himself from the balcony and slammed into the front ranks of the black berserkers. Lightning tore open the battlefield, ripping the twisted symbiotic things apart in molten chunks, yet each destroyed monster bubbled back into shape seconds later, shrieking with a thousand mouths.
"STAND YOUR GROUND!" Thor bellowed, spinning Mjolnir in a furious arc as he carved through a wave of them. "FOR ASGARD!"
The Einherjar roared back and charged, shields locked, weapons blazing with enchanted fire and starlight. But for every berserker that fell, three rose. The puddles of black rain spawned more and more, their claws wet with venom, their bodies swarming like obscene insects.
Odin strode into the battle next, Gungnir blazing with solar fury. Each thrust of the spear unleashed a beam of annihilation that vaporized hundreds at a time. When the tide pressed close, Odin's voice thundered across the sky:
"YOU DARE BRING THIS FILTH TO MY REALM!? BE PURGED!"
Explosions rippled across the golden streets as berserkers burst like overripe fruit, yet the tide still surged.
Susan's force fields expanded around the soldiers, shifting and bending like crystalline bastions. Every time a berserker struck her barriers, the walls flared and cracked, but she held steady, sweat lining her brow.
"I can hold them!" she shouted. "Just don't let them flank us!"
Sable was a blur of silver and sorcery-forged metal, her pistols ripping concussive holes through the creatures' bodies. She moved with ruthless precision, rolling between lunging claws, tearing through every monster that came near her.
"These things don't stay dead," she snarled as she emptied another clip, "but I can make dying hurt."
Still, the black tide pressed deeper into the city, driven by some unseen will. The sky darkened further, not from storm, but from sheer number of bodies climbing over one another, screaming in a single collective hive-mind howl.
And then—
The air shifted.
Every warrior felt it.
Every berserker froze mid-lunge.
Every instinct screamed.
Something was coming.
The clouds above tore apart as though split by the hand of a god.
A column of swirling flame, lightning, and rain shot downward like a divine spear. The Web-sense of creation itself thrummed through the realm, rattling the golden towers, shaking the ground beneath the soldiers' feet.
Thor looked up in awe.
Odin's eyes widened.
Susan's breath hitched.
Sable whispered, "...that's him."
The storm hit the ground.
And Peter Parker stepped out of it.
Not walked.
Descended, as though the storm itself was carrying its master home.
His staff blazed like a newborn star.
Runes burned across his arms. His eyes were molten gold, reflecting a thousand spider-sigil constellations swirling in their depths.
The berserkers screeched in terror.
For the first time since their creation...they hesitated.
Peter raised a single hand.
The world obeyed.
A telekinetic shockwave blasted outward, launching hundreds of berserkers into the sky like broken puppets. They exploded mid-air, raining down as smoking chunks of black tar.
He swept his staff sideways—
—and a scything wave of golden fire and lightning carved through an entire battalion, evaporating them so thoroughly they didn't even have time to scream.
He flicked two fingers.
Shards of shattered Asgardian glass rose like a shimmering swarm, spinning around him before launching outward with the speed of high-caliber rounds. Wherever they hit, berserkers burst into mist.
One creature lunged at him from behind.
Peter didn't turn.
He simply looked over his shoulder.
A single baleful golden gaze.
The berserker disintegrated into dust.
And then—
The sky cracked.
Reality itself split open behind Peter as threads of the Great Web poured into the physical plane like liquid starlight. From that crack, something massive shifted.
A colossal golden spider, impossibly ancient, pushed its legs into the world, eyes, hundreds of them, opening at once. Each pupil was a cosmos.
Those eyes fell upon the berserkers.
The berserkers froze.
Mindless, yes.
Soulless, yes.
But in that moment they understood something primal.
They were prey.
The cosmic spider's mandibles clicked.
The berserkers broke.
They scattered, screaming, fleeing in all directions with a terror that did not belong to their nature, but even running did not save them. Peter lifted his staff, and a rain of burning sigils fell from the sky, detonating every creature that dared remain on Asgardian soil.
The Web whispered through him like a storm of gods.
Peter slammed his staff to the ground.
BOOM.
A shockwave of golden fire expanded outward, vaporizing every remaining berserker for a full mile.
Silence followed.
Heavy.
Shaking.
Reverent.
Thor swallowed hard.
Sable stared.
Susan put a hand over her mouth.
Even Odin's breath caught.
And Peter, breathing steady, eyes still glowing, looked toward the horizon, where a far darker presence stirred.
"He's close," Peter murmured.
The sky trembled.
"Gorr is coming."
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