Rumbling thunder rolled across the sky as cages converged overhead. One by one, they came together until a gigantic iron sphere, packed with every Sentinel robot, slowly took shape above Egypt.
"Charles!!"
Veins stood out on Erik Lehnsherr's forehead. Holding all those Sentinels in place and keeping them from breaking out was taking real effort now. Once he had finally gathered them all together, he shouted at Charles behind him.
"I've got it."
The moment Charles heard Erik's voice, he activated his power and seized control of every nuclear weapon on Earth.
In an instant, countless missiles rose from the sea, from hidden silos, from military bases, and shot into the sky.
"Erik!"
After launching them, Charles turned toward Erik Lehnsherr.
"Leave it to me!"
Erik gave a slight nod. Not every country on the planet had nuclear weapons capable of reaching anywhere beyond its own borders. Some barely had the range to matter at all. At a moment like this, someone still had to drag them here from all over the world.
With one hand, Erik controlled the massive prison in the sky. With the other, he guided the world's nuclear missiles.
As hundreds upon hundreds of warheads appeared above Egypt, Erik thrust both hands upward.
In an instant, both the giant prison holding the Sentinels and the endless swarm of nuclear warheads shot up into space.
The next second, the sky exploded with blinding light, and everything caught within it was reduced to ash.
"We did it…"
Watching the gigantic fireball blazing in the heavens, both Erik and Charles smiled.
"Erik, this was the result of both of us working together."
Charles smiled at Erik and kept nodding as he looked up at the burning light in the sky. This was the outcome of Charles and Erik fighting side by side, and he was deeply satisfied with it.
"Yeah, Charles…"
Erik Lehnsherr looked at Charles, helmet on, smiling beneath it, and smiled back.
For a moment, the chemistry between the two helmeted mutant heavyweights was off the charts.
"Mr. Erik, Professor Xavier! Something even bigger is coming!"
Just as Erik Lehnsherr and Charles were sharing that intense moment, Jean suddenly clutched her head and dropped to her knees. She could feel an immense power rushing toward Earth, something both familiar and alien at the same time.
"What?"
Erik Lehnsherr and Charles both frowned as they looked at the clearly suffering Jean. They could feel the trembling in her mind and the strain in her body.
Then, just as the two of them moved to help her up, a tremendous ringing sound suddenly echoed inside the minds of everyone on Earth. At the same time, a gigantic wormhole opened in the sky, and an overwhelming pressure settled over the entire planet.
"What kind of pressure is this…?"
Every person on Earth began to tremble.
Then, in the next instant, an enormous face appeared before the eyes of the whole world.
"That's…"
When people across the planet saw that gigantic face, their eyes widened in shock. They recognized its owner. It was one of the Sentinel robots they thought had already been destroyed.
Only this Sentinel was so unimaginably huge that it dwarfed all the humanoid Sentinels they had fought before. Its power was obviously beyond anything those earlier models could compare to.
"What is that thing?"
The moment people on the ground saw the Sentinel, massive as a planet, despair washed over them. The sheer presence it radiated, the crushing pressure it gave off, made it obvious that this was not something ordinary people could ever stand against. All over the world, faces turned pale.
"Mom, what is that?"
On a city street, a little girl who had no idea what was happening looked up at the gigantic Sentinel overhead with innocent eyes. Tugging on her mother's sleeve, she asked in a soft voice.
"Oh my God…"
Her mother stared at the colossal thing hanging in the sky and couldn't help whispering in shock.
"It'll be okay, sweetheart. Don't be scared. Everything's going to be okay…"
The young mother pulled the girl into her arms and tried to comfort her softly.
"Mom, is that a really bad guy?"
The little girl, who had not been afraid at all a moment earlier, started to shake slightly after hearing her mother's voice. She could feel how frightened her mother was.
The young mother said nothing, but the trembling in her body said more than words ever could.
"It's okay, Mom. Superheroes will come save us."
The little girl wrapped her arms around her mother's shoulders and tried to comfort her the same way her mother had just comforted her.
"Julie…"
Feeling the warmth of the little girl's hug, tears welled up in the mother's eyes. She felt useless. Faced with an enemy this powerful, she was not even as brave as her own child. At the same time, guilt crushed her. She had no ability to protect her daughter. All she could do now was pray, pray that heroes really did exist, and that one of them would stand up for them.
"You're right, Julie. Heroes will come protect us. The U.S. military will step in when it matters."
The mother did not place her hopes in superheroes. She placed her final hope in the mighty armed forces of the United States.
At that very moment, inside the White House…
"Gentlemen, where are our nation's all-powerful nuclear weapons?"
The current President of the United States, a balding middle-aged man with a thick belly, turned and asked the senior officials around him.
"Mr. President, with all due respect, you already authorized Mr. Charles to launch them a moment ago. And frankly, even if we still had some left, they wouldn't do the slightest damage to something that large."
One of the senior officials bowed his head respectfully as he answered.
"Excellent. Then tell me how we're supposed to get off Earth."
While people across the country were still hoping their president would save them, their great leader had already given up on fighting and moved straight on to planning his escape.
At the same time, Charles and the others had also fallen into confusion.
No matter how they looked at it, that giant Sentinel was an existence beyond defeating. This had long since gone beyond anything they could handle.
Suddenly, Erik Lehnsherr coughed up blood and fell from the air, crashing down beside Charles.
"Erik…"
Charles looked at him, alarm rising in his eyes.
"It's no use, Charles. I've hit my limit."
Erik looked at Charles and helplessly shook his head. He had tried to restrain the Ultimate Sentinel, but the enemy's power was beyond his limit. Even if he burned away his own life, he still could not move it in the slightest.
"Mutants, today is your final day."
The Ultimate Sentinel's voice rang out in the minds of every person on Earth.
In the next moment, a gigantic sphere of light burst from its hand.
"It's over…"
Charles looked at everything in front of him, then took off his helmet. He had already given up. This younger Charles clearly did not yet have the steadiness or courage of the older version of himself.
He let out a sigh and rubbed his gleaming bald head.
"Shit. If I'd known it would come to this, I never would've let Apocalypse shave my head."
Charles was genuinely annoyed. If he was going to die, he had at least wanted to do it with a little dignity.
"No. We're not going to die."
Jean, who had been lying on the ground, suddenly rose to her feet and shook her head at Charles.
"We're not going to die?"
Charles froze. He had no idea what Jean was talking about. And maybe it was just his imagination, but at that moment Jean somehow seemed even more like a mystic than he was.
"Die!"
At that very moment, the Ultimate Sentinel hurled down its Ultimate Judgment Cannon at Earth.
"You think you're destroying Earth without my permission?"
Just as humanity watched in despair while that blazing sphere, bright as a second sun, came roaring toward Earth, a cold voice suddenly rang out in everyone's mind.
A man in a black-and-white battle suit appeared in front of Earth and casually absorbed the Ultimate Sentinel's attack.
"Jov, no… Apocalypse is here."
Jean's expression turned solemn and almost sacred as she spoke to Charles and the others.
"Apocalypse is back…"
After hearing Jean's words, Charles slowly let out a breath. He did not know whether Jovian could defeat the Ultimate Sentinel, that planet-sized monster from deep space, but if even Jovian could not stop it, then Charles certainly had no chance.
"But Apocalypse can't win, or rather, he can't protect Earth while fighting the Ultimate Sentinel."
"To keep everything I've foreseen from…"
"To keep Earth from being destroyed like this, Charles, I need your help."
Jean spoke in a deep voice. For an instant, it seemed as though a vast figure behind her was speaking in perfect unison with her.
"What do you need me to do?"
Charles did not ask for an explanation. At this point, questions were meaningless. He believed that once this was all over, Jean would explain everything.
"Thank you for helping me, Charles."
Jean's expression became more and more divine. With grave seriousness, she took the helmet from Charles's hands.
Charles blinked.
He stared at Jean holding his helmet, brows lifting in disbelief. So this was the help she needed, borrowing his helmet? What kind of help was that?
Then, right in front of Charles's stunned eyes, Jean put it on.
"Wait…"
"You can just put that helmet on like that?"
Charles stared at Jean, utterly baffled.
"Of course."
Jean nodded. It was a helmet. Why would putting it on require some kind of ceremony?
"No, then what about my hair?!"
"If that helmet can be worn just like that, whether you have hair or not, then I shaved my head for nothing!"
Charles's face went dark. He suddenly felt like he had been completely played, thoroughly and absolutely played by Mr. Apocalypse.
Jean burst out laughing. Her beautiful face lit up as she laughed so hard she nearly doubled over.
"Charles, being bald is your destiny. Even if you didn't go bald today, you'd go bald tomorrow. Hair was never in the cards for you."
Jean shook her head and delivered that grim prophecy about Charles's fate.
"What the fuck?!"
Charles cursed under his breath. What kind of ridiculous destiny was being fated to have no hair?
"All right, Charles. Don't interrupt me…"
Jean's way of speaking was growing stranger and stranger. The normal Jean would never have called Charles by name so directly. She would have called him Professor.
"Jean, what are you trying to do?"
Charles frowned and asked.
"To save this universe, I need to communicate with every fragment of the Phoenix Force scattered throughout it and make Jovian this universe's White Phoenix of the Crown!"
"This is dangerous, Charles. One mistake, and it could become a catastrophe that sweeps across the entire multiverse!"
Jean's voice seemed layered now, carrying a second resonance that pressed down on Charles like something from a higher plane of existence. It felt as though the one speaking through Jean was no longer Jean herself, but some being from a far greater dimension.
"The White Phoenix of the Crown?"
Charles repeated the words softly and fell into thought.
"Yes. The White Phoenix of the Crown."
Jean closed her mouth after that, as if she had begun communicating with certain beings somewhere out in the universe.
Meanwhile, out in space…
"You cannot defeat me. Your power is not enough to defeat me!"
"We both possess the Phoenix Force, but beyond that, I also possess the powers of every other mutant. I am immortal!"
The Ultimate Sentinel looked down on Jovian with total contempt. In its own mind, it was invincible. Jovian was strong, but not strong enough to kill it.
"Don't get cocky, Sentinel. Even if I can't kill you, trapping you is enough. As long as I'm here, Earth will remain safe!"
Jovian dismissed the Sentinel's words completely.
"Is that so? Then let me see you do it!"
"I'd really like to know how you plan to protect Earth and fight me at the same time."
The Ultimate Sentinel gave a cold laugh. With the Phoenix Force amplifying it, it now possessed the full range of human emotion.
"Then watch."
Jovian spread his energy across all of Earth. Today, he was going to go all in against the Ultimate Sentinel and see which one of them was really tougher.
Then a phoenix cry rang out from the deepest reaches of the universe.
That single cry instantly pulled both Jovian and the Sentinel's attention away.
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