Chapter 401: Ethan, About to Walk Alone
Ethan trudged into his room with heavy steps, weighed down by his thoughts. Every step seemed to carry an invisible burden.
The light in the room was soft, but it couldn't chase away the gloom in his heart.
He didn't sit down right away. He went straight out to the second-floor balcony, where he often went looking for a moment of peace.
From here, Ethan could watch the everyday lives of Hell's Kitchen's residents, all the bustle and warmth of ordinary life.
It reminded him that everything he'd done was right.
The breeze on the balcony brushed past him, carrying a hint of chill, and it seemed to blow away some of the restlessness inside him.
Ethan rested his elbows lightly on the cold railing, a fine cigar between his fingers. It was something he occasionally turned to when he needed to relieve stress.
He lit the cigar slowly and drew deeply. Thick smoke spread through the air and wreathed his slightly weary face, as if draping it in a veil of mystery.
He let the smoke curl around him on purpose, as though deliberately hiding his emotions, unwilling to let anyone glimpse the turmoil inside.
Looking up at the boundless sky, Ethan's eyes glinted with complicated emotion.
Ever since meeting Loki, Ethan had realized that his Marvel Universe had gone completely off the rails. Compared to the movie timeline, you couldn't say it was the same. You could only say the two had nothing to do with each other.
The Battle of New York had only just ended, and Thanos had already been taken care of in passing. Avengers 2, 3 and 4 could never play out now.
In truth, Ethan was in the middle of a struggle and a choice unlike any he'd faced before. He stood on the balcony gazing out at the land he had protected with his own hands, his feelings a tangled mess.
He was thinking about whether to leave this universe and head to others.
That's right: he'd changed his mind. His original plan had been to raise the power of Hell's Kitchen's superheroes along with his own, then lead the people of Hell's Kitchen in a counteroffensive and wipe out the Council of Reeds, Battleworld, the whole lot.
But the more he thought about it, the more he realized this fight would be crueler than anything he'd imagined.
He didn't want to force that heavy burden on everyone in Hell's Kitchen, least of all the companions who would be dragged into it through no fault of their own.
He thought back to Chen Ye's lonely, tragic figure, facing the hostility of the whole world alone. That loneliness and resolve filled him with awe, and it helped him make his decision. If that day ever really came, he would shoulder everything alone, the way Chen Ye had.
He didn't want anyone destroying this place he'd built with his own hands. It was his utopia.
And he didn't want to drag his companions down with him.
After all, Ethan might not be able to beat the enemies ahead even himself, let alone protect Hell's Kitchen or protect them the way he had before.
Besides, none of this was their business to begin with. Ethan didn't plan to tell his companions about any of it.
Even if he told them, there was nothing they could do. They'd only worry for nothing.
Ethan wasn't someone who only knew how to take. At first, it was true, he'd made friends because he coveted the superheroes' skills. But now, in his heart, Tony, Wanda and the others had long since gone beyond companions. They had become his family. He didn't want to see them hurt because of his choices, even if that meant facing powerful enemies alone, enemies so strong even he couldn't easily beat them.
He didn't want his family hurt because of him. Of course, he was no saint, either.
If a gang fight were an option, Ethan would gladly lead Hell's Kitchen in a righteous beatdown.
The problem was that the power gap was just too wide. The enemies they'd face were all far too strong. Throwing the people of Hell's Kitchen at them would just be feeding them to the enemy.
Right now, the ones in Hell's Kitchen with real potential were Wanda and Jean, who could grow to the level of someone like Kang the Conqueror. Strange, Thor, Tony and Professor X had a decent chance of reaching that tier.
At most you could add Deadpool. The guy got stronger the stronger his opponent was, and his power level was a total unknown. At his weakest, a bullet could kill him. At his strongest, he could slaughter the whole Marvel Universe.
And Kang the Conqueror was, you could say, the weakest of all the enemies Ethan would face in the future.
The others were the very embodiments of Marvel's power. Put bluntly, every power these superheroes had came from those gods in the first place.
How were they supposed to fight that? Knowing exactly how strong the enemy was and still dragging them along? Wasn't that just screwing over his own teammates?
Or should he just forget it and give up the dream of going home?
After all, the dream was pretty hard to achieve. Even someone as strong as Chen Ye had failed. Could Ethan really succeed?
Besides, he had a home of his own now. Going back to the original world wasn't necessarily a good thing anyway.
Maybe he should just let it go. He might even avoid being hunted.
The thought of giving up flashed through his mind, but his resolve quickly returned.
Some things weren't his to give up just because he wanted to. Setting aside whether it was for Chen Ye, he wanted to go back to the original world for his own sake.
And those enemies would never let him off, either. As long as he was connected to Chen Ye, they would stop at nothing to take him out.
Unless he killed the only one who knew the truth, Loki, God of Stories, Ethan would never be safe.
That was obviously impossible, and Ethan didn't want to do it anyway.
Before, when he didn't know how to get home, he'd kept working toward it. Now that he knew the way, was he going to lose his nerve and back down?
That wasn't who Ethan was.
"What a headache. How did I end up forming bonds? I'm not Naruto." Ethan gave a wry smile and shook his head.
There was one more reason to leave: he wanted to grow stronger fast. Right now the only way to do that was to go to other universes and meet more people.
He'd already met just about everyone in this universe.
Everyone he could befriend, he'd befriended. The rest were enemies.
Still, Ethan wasn't going to leave right away. He'd stay in Hell's Kitchen a while longer.
First he'd make his family stronger. Only once they had at least some ability to protect themselves against the enemy would he feel at ease leaving.
He didn't expect Hell's Kitchen's superheroes to beat the Five Great Gods. But they should at least be able to hold their own against one or two Kangs, or a Reed.
Ethan also wanted to stay in Hell's Kitchen a little longer, at least until Hogwarts was finished, before he left.
Most important of all, before leaving this universe, he needed to get his hands on the other two Infinity Stones.
Of course, Ethan knew that making his family stronger wasn't really the top priority. The top priority was still making himself stronger.
Only once he was strong enough to rule over everything could he face anything with composure.
Ethan stayed on the balcony thinking for a whole hour, smoking one cigar after another, before he finally thought of going back inside to do his gacha pulls.
At last he let out a slow breath of smoke and watched it dissipate into the night sky.
He slowly straightened up, his gaze steady and deep.
The road ahead was uncertain, but he was ready to face whatever came.
Ethan thought no one had noticed. Little did he know, Tony and the others had seen all of it.
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