Cul slammed his scepter heavily onto the ground!
With this movement, a pitch-black and eerie inverted pentagram array instantly emerged.
Buzz~
The entire Mariana Trench trembled violently at this moment. Seven streams of energy, originating from the same source as Skadi's hammer, overflowed from the array, tore through the atmosphere, and turned into seven meteors, flying toward the vast, boundless firmament.
...
Meanwhile, at Avengers Tower.
Tony Stark was drinking coffee while admiring his latest achievement—the "Iron Legion," composed of hundreds of Iron Man Suits.
Because Peter had helped Tony solve the new element issue and had brought Vibranium early to provide a reference for Tony's nano-suit technology,
The research and development progress of the Iron Man Suits was much faster than in the original timeline.
Now, less than two months after the Battle of New York had ended, his suits were already nearly ready for lightweight mass production.
"Jarvis, calculate how long it would take to settle a conflict similar to the Battle of New York if this entire legion were deployed..."
Before he could finish his sentence, a piercing alarm rang through the entire laboratory.
"Sir! Our satellites have detected seven high-energy objects entering the atmosphere at extreme speeds! They are projected to crash at different locations across the globe within three minutes!"
Almost at the same time, the communicator on Tony's wrist lit up. Nick Fury's iconic one-eyed "braised egg" look appeared on the screen, with deep space as the background:
"Peter, Tony! Did you see those seven 'surprises'?"
As soon as he finished speaking, a holographic projection appeared next to Tony, forming a remote three-person virtual meeting.
"What's the situation?" Peter had been busy "sending benefits to his family" lately, so he hadn't paid any attention to the changes in the World or the Universe.
"It's not clear exactly what they are, but it's certain they aren't meteorites, nor is it a coincidence. It's definitely a man-made conspiracy."
Tony ordered Jarvis to freeze and enlarge the detection footage. Looking at the vaguely visible shapes in the pixelated images, he couldn't help but frown:
"Peter, don't you think these seven unidentified flying objects look a bit like..."
"Hammers?" Peter finished the second half of his sentence.
"Exactly!" Tony snapped his fingers and couldn't help but complain:
"It couldn't be that Thor got drunk and is throwing his toys around for no reason, could it?"
"Or... did he offend his cranky old man again?"
"It probably has nothing to do with Thor?" Peter shook his head gently.
In his past life, he didn't remember Thor having a plotline where he threw hammers around randomly.
Instead, he vaguely remembered hearing about a big comic book event that involved something like eight hammers.
Could it be... because Wanda's Chaos Magic awakened early, some monster sealed on Earth was released?
At that thought, Peter suddenly became excited.
Not just because the new items he had just purchased could be put to use, but also because... if these unidentified flying objects were all hammers.
Then wouldn't he be making a huge profit!
If these hammers were really related to Asgard's enemies, then they must be high-grade items made of uru metal.
Something this good would surely be worth twenty or thirty thousand sacrifice points each, right?
Eight of them added up would be nearly two hundred thousand sacrifice points, plus the extra gains from the behind-the-scenes big boss whose origin he wasn't yet sure of.
What crisis?
This was purely a visit from the God of Wealth!
With that thought, Peter immediately ordered:
"Nick Fury, find a way to determine the landing points of these seven hammers."
"Tony, notify my father-in-law to initiate a state of wartime alert. If necessary, start a global live broadcast for unified coordination."
"What about you?" Tony couldn't help but ask.
"Me?" The corners of Peter's mouth curled up unconsciously,
"I'm going to face them head-on, of course!"
As he spoke, Peter had already taken out the eye of aurora.
Peter then cut off the meeting and instead made a call to Sif:
"Sif, try to contact Heimdall and see if Asgard has noticed anything unusual."
A moment later, Sif called back:
"Strange, no matter how I call Heimdall, I get no response. It seems... Asgard has unilaterally cut off the Bifrost Bridge and entered the highest state of combat readiness."
When she said this, her tone carried a hint of urgency.
Asgard was her home, after all. Not being able to get news from home was not something that would put anyone at ease.
"Don't worry. Let me first study what exactly is going on on Earth. Once it's settled, I'll personally take you to Asgard."
Just after finishing the call with Sif, Tony contacted Peter again:
"The landing points for the seven hammers have been determined. The one closest to us will land on Staten Island in New York."
"OK, wait for my news."
Peter immediately activated the eye of aurora and instantly teleported to Staten Island.
...
Staten Island, cargo terminal.
A piercing screech tore through the sky.
A longshoreman subconsciously looked up and saw a massive fireball tearing through the clouds, trailing a long tail of flame, crashing straight toward the pier!
"Oh! My God!"
"Run!"
Boom!
After a deafening roar, the "fireball" smashed a large open area on the pier into smithereens.
The longshoremen gathered their courage and looked over.
They found that the body of the fireball was actually a... primitive-looking hammer.
How primitive was it?
The answer was that it looked like a rubber mallet used on a construction site, scaled up ten-fold.
"A hammer?"
The workers had confused expressions, and then they egged each other on to pick up the hammer.
After all... if they dragged it out here, the foreman would dock their pay later.
While everyone was egging each other on and passing the buck, but not a single person wanted to move the hammer, a middle-aged man named Bill Foster stepped forward.
In some parallel Worlds, this guy was also a superhero.
His code name was "Goliath."
But in the Universe Peter was in, perhaps because Pym Particles were always strictly controlled by the original Ant-Man, Hank Pym, this guy had lost the chance to become a superhero.
Seeing that his fellow workers were unwilling to step forward, the kind-hearted Bill took the initiative to stand out.
The moment his fingers came into contact with the hammer's handle.
Boom!
Majestic dark energy soared into the sky, completely enveloping Bill.
His figure swelled at that moment, his work clothes tearing apart piece by piece, and a set of earthy-yellow armor flashing with strange inscriptions appeared out of thin air, wrapping his burly body tightly.
At this moment, he was no longer Bill Foster.
He was Cul's apostle, one of the eight Worthy, Kuurth the "Breaker of Stone"!
"Power... endless power!"
Feeling the surging power within his body, the controlled Bill raised the war hammer high and smashed it wildly at the surrounding workers, forklifts, and other facilities.
For a moment, the entire pier was in chaos, and the emotion called fear spread frantically across the dock!
"Bill, please, don't kill me!"
A longshoreman was about to have his head smashed by Kuurth. Just as he closed his eyes in despair,
A hand abruptly appeared in front of him, steadily catching the Breaker of Stone war hammer in Kuurth's hand...
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