"I see it!"
Tony Stark wasn't the only one who saw the impossible happen. Down on the ground, Captain America, Black Widow, and Hawkeye saw it too. The Leviathan's massive, armored body flying through the New York sky had been incredibly eye-catching, a looming shadow of death.
The moment the colossal war beast was casually smashed flat and fell from the sky, the morale of the entire Avengers squad soared.
On the shattered street, after finishing the evacuation assignments with the NYPD, Steve Rogers rushed back to Hawkeye and Natasha's position, clearing out the surrounding Chitauri foot soldiers with his shield. He looked around, drawing a breath to coordinate their next tactical push.
"Captain, guess who I saw up there," Tony's voice crackled over the comms, followed closely by the whistling wind of his Iron Man armor landing heavily on the asphalt.
Following right behind Tony was Thor, who landed with a thud, quietly clutching his bruised ribs from his earlier encounter in the woods.
Before Captain America could process Tony's riddle, a battered little motorcycle sputtered down the ruined street. Dr. Bruce Banner awkwardly parked the bike and stepped off, looking around at the apocalyptic carnage.
Steve smiled, tapping his comms. "Suit up."
As Banner calmly walked toward the advancing Chitauri horde and transformed into the Hulk, shattering a second Leviathan with a single punch, the iconic circle formed.
Avengers Assemble. Dr. Banner's arrival undoubtedly gave everyone a massive shot of adrenaline. The true battle for New York had begun.
.....
High above the chaotic warzone, Meliodas was sitting casually on the ledge of a skyscraper, his legs dangling over the edge. He was leisurely picking small pebbles off the rooftop gravel and flicking them with his thumb.
Fwip. THWACK.
However, infused with the overwhelming physical strength of the Demon Clan, every tiny pebble Meliodas flicked tore through the air like a .50 caliber sniper round, instantly blowing a flying Chitauri soldier clean off its chariot.
"I miss Ban and Diane and the others," Hawk sighed.
The little pink pig sat beside Meliodas, looking down at the Avengers assembling at the bottom of the building. His two large, floppy ears were pinned flat against his head as he spoke with a somewhat dejected expression.
The Seven Deadly Sins used to be exactly like that team down there. No matter what apocalyptic difficulties lay ahead, as long as their members stood together, they feared absolutely no hardship or obstacle.
"Don't worry, Hawk. Can't we just figure out a way to call them over later?" Meliodas smiled cheerfully, flicking another pebble and downing a distant alien sniper. "It just so happens that Britannia is very boring right now. The Seven Deadly Sins could use a brand new adventure."
Hearing Meliodas's confident reply, Hawk's large ears immediately perked up. His dejected expression melted into a joyful smile.
"It's a promise, Meliodas!"
When the Avengers Initiative was being formed, Nick Fury had officially extended an invitation to Meliodas. But the Dragon Sin of Wrath, who already had his own elite Knight Order, directly refused the Director's offer. Even if they were separated by dimensions right now, he could only ever be the Captain of the Seven Deadly Sins.
That was the unbreakable promise between him and his crew.
Meliodas continued to leisurely flick pebbles, raining casual destruction upon the Chitauri armada.
Down below, the Avengers fought fiercely. Several more Leviathans poured out from the massive wormhole. However, this time the Avengers could handle the beasts themselves with the combined, devastating might of the Hulk and Thor.
As the battle raged on, Natasha finally fought her way to the roof of Stark Tower, using Loki's scepter to penetrate the Tesseract's energy shield. She found a way to shut down the spatial device. The Chitauri soldiers on the ground were being methodically cleared out.
The dawn of victory had appeared.
Right at that triumphant moment, Director Nick Fury's frantic voice rang out over the encrypted comms.
"Stark! Do you read me?!" "Loud and clear, boss," Tony grunted, blasting a Chitauri chariot.
"A rogue jet has taken off from the Helicarrier under orders from the World Security Council," Fury warned, his voice tight with rage. "It's carrying two tactical nuclear missiles. Enough to level the entire city center and the surrounding tri-state area. You have three minutes until detonation!"
Receiving Fury's message, Tony slammed his armored fist hard against a brick wall.
No one expected that when victory was finally within reach, they would have to face a lethal backstab from their own government. The cold, ruthless logic of politicians was always so bizarre.
Clearing out a final wave of surrounding aliens, Tony Stark had no time for anything else. He diverted all power to his thrusters and flew directly toward the outskirts of New York to intercept the payload.
[The Great Tomb of Nazarick - Throne Room]
"A wonderful performance."
The Great Tomb of Nazarick was located underground, not far from the outskirts of New York. Everything happening in Manhattan was currently being broadcast live within the Mirror of Remote Viewing.
Neither the desperate combat power of the human Avengers nor the vast numbers of the Chitauri invaders caused any significant emotional fluctuations among the Floor Guardians. To Nazarick, it was merely an entertaining theater of lower lifeforms.
However, the glowing blue cube capable of tearing open a sustained wormhole across space... that caught their absolute attention.
Even among the vast, legendary treasuries of the Great Tomb of Nazarick, there was no single item that could open a permanent, stabilized cosmic wormhole on such a massive scale without immense mana expenditure.
'That blue cube...' Ainz Ooal Gown thought, his red eyes flaring beneath his skeletal brow. 'Could it be a World Class Item?'
The moment he saw the Tesseract, the Supreme Being had already formed the idea of taking it for himself.
....
While the masters of Nazarick were watching the show, the rogue fighter jet had already reached its firing coordinates.
"Nuclear payloads launched. Detonation countdown: 02:43."
Under Tony Stark's desperate gaze, a sleek missile trailing a white tail of exhaust screamed toward Manhattan. Pushing the Mark VII armor to its absolute limits, Tony flew directly underneath the missile, hoisting the massive weapon onto his armored back, and violently altered its trajectory straight up toward the wormhole.
But as the G-forces crushed him, a horrifying thought pierced Tony's mind.
'Where is the other one?'
Tony immediately opened a channel. "Fury! I only intercepted one nuclear missile! Are you sure your intel isn't wrong?!"
Back on the Helicarrier, Nick Fury was looking at the radar tracking screens. His lone eye widened in absolute horror.
"Motherfucker," Fury cursed, slamming his hands on the console. "Those bastards!"
"Fury! Where is it?!" Tony yelled.
"The target of the second nuclear missile isn't New York, Stark!" Fury yelled back. "It's the Great Tomb of Nazarick!!"
At this moment, Nick Fury fully understood the World Security Council's ruthless, two-birds-with-one-stone logic. Since they had already given up on New York City, they decided that Nazarick—the terrifying, undead superpower situated right next to the city—could naturally be vaporized along with it.
If they are not of our race, their hearts must be different. This xenophobic philosophy had always been a core theory for those in absolute power. Furthermore, the entities existing within the Great Tomb were undeniably the Undead. In any human culture, they were the undisputed villains.
Now, Fury could only pray that Nazarick would actually be wiped out by the nuclear blast. Otherwise, after they finished fighting off the Chitauri, they would have to face the apocalyptic wrath of a surviving Necromancer Army.
Carrying the first missile, Iron Man charged blindly into the starry void of the wormhole at the very last second.
Under the hopeful eyes of the Avengers, the nuke detonated in deep space, destroying the Chitauri command ship. The armored suit, dead and out of power, fell back through the portal just as Natasha forced it closed.
The suit plummeted powerlessly toward the Earth. Thor began to furiously spin Mjolnir to fly up and catch him, but the Hulk roared, leaping massively from a building to snatch the falling Iron Man out of the air, sliding down the side of a skyscraper to break their fall.
Tony was alive. The wormhole was closed. Everything seemed like a perfect, miraculous happy ending.
As Thor, Cap, and the others gathered around Tony, relieved smiles broke out across the Avengers' exhausted faces.
However, at that very instant...
RUMBLE.
A massive, terrifying seismic impact hit the bedrock of Manhattan, throwing the Avengers off balance.
Accompanied by a blinding flash of light, a towering, apocalyptic mushroom cloud rose violently into the sky on the distant outskirts of the city.
The second nuclear missile had successfully detonated!
"What the hell is going on?!" Steve Rogers shouted over the roaring wind, raising his shield against the distant shockwave. "Wasn't the missile sent into outer space?!"
Nick Fury had only informed Tony Stark about the second payload over his private comms. Because of this, Captain America and the others were completely in the dark.
Tony ripped off his damaged faceplate, looking out at the distant, glowing mushroom cloud with eyes full of absolute dread.
"There were... there were two missiles, Cap," Tony said, his voice trembling slightly. "The World Security Council wanted to level New York and Nazarick together. And of course... they were perfectly fine with wiping out all of us 'freaks' along with them."
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