Upon hearing this, everyone withdrew their wary gazes from Rhodes slightly and looked at Ryan in confusion, waiting for his explanation.
After the recent events, they had developed great trust in Ryan, the leader of the Spider Family from another Universe.
Ryan continued:
"Remember? Time in the Quantum Realm is different from reality. Natasha's group traveled for less than half a day and returned. Tony, you were in my Universe for about a day, and Thor and the others stayed for several days, yet the return time was set for exactly one minute later."
"So even for members of the same group, as long as they don't teleport back at the exact same millisecond, Thanos has a chance to swap Nebula. After all, Nebula was modified by him; he has supreme control over her body. At the moment Rhodes pressed the teleport button, remotely controlling Nebula's body wouldn't be difficult."
As Rhodes' close friend and the creator of the GPS Bracelets, Tony was the first to step forward and testify: "That's right, I created the GPS Bracelets, and I can confirm what Ryan is saying is true. Everyone, calm down!"
Hearing this, the tense crowd finally lowered the weapons they had aimed at Rhodes.
It wasn't their fault for being so high-strung; after all, the previous Thanos had beaten them so badly they barely recognized themselves, and a single snap had taken away half the life in the Universe. Now, just hearing the name Thanos triggered a stress response.
Just like Thor, who had reacted the same way when hearing Thanos' name again before they traveled through the Universe to borrow the stones.
Seeing everyone calm down, Ryan continued playing the memory footage from this Nebula.
The footage played at ten times speed...
Ten minutes later, everyone who finished watching the video learned that Thanos had actually copied a sample of Nebula's Pym Particles and obtained the coordinates of their Universe!
The reason the other Thanos sent a 'fake' Nebula was to reap the rewards of their labor—to open the quantum portal from their side and take all six Infinity Stones from them at once, so that the other Universe's Thanos could directly implement his 'Universal Population Family Planning'!
Furthermore, the Thanos from the other Universe already knew through Nebula that his future self would die at the hands of the Avengers, and that the Avengers were traveling through the Universe trying to sabotage his life's work.
Thus, this other Thanos was even more ruthless than the one from their own Universe; he actually intended to wipe out all life in the Universe once he got his hands on the six Infinity Stones!
This sent shivers down the spines of all the Avengers present!
The looks they directed at Ryan were now filled with profound gratitude!
Fortunately, this Spider-Man cousin from another Universe had come along and used the Parker Family's 'Parker Tingle' to discover the fake Nebula's anomaly. Otherwise, it would have been disastrous if Thanos had crossed over and seized the Infinity Stones they had gathered from various Universes!
If that had happened, they wouldn't be heroes saving the other half of life; they would be sinners who dragged the remaining half into the abyss!
Feeling the sincere gratitude radiating from the Avengers, Ryan couldn't help but think to himself: Odin and the Ancient One were truly wise to choose him to get close to the original World of the God of Stories!
Who else but himself could so easily gain the recognition of this World's Avengers?
Sigh, when all is said and done, I'm just damn awesome!
But on his face, Ryan maintained a blank expression and said coolly: "Don't celebrate too early. Do you think everything is fine just because I caught the fake Nebula ahead of time?"
Hearing this, the others, who were still wallowing in relief, looked at each other with expressions that said, 'Isn't it?'
Ryan shook his head and pointed at the dead fake Nebula in his hand:
"Don't forget, in the video, Thanos already copied the Pym Particles from your Universe's Nebula and mastered your Universe's coordinates!"
"While Thanos lacks the most crucial quantum teleporter, don't underestimate the intelligence of alien races. If even you could invent something like a Quantum Time Machine, do you think Thanos can't?"
The Avengers' expressions changed drastically upon hearing this. Tony, in particular, inexplicably recalled what Thanos had once told him: 'Stark, you're not the only one cursed with knowledge.'
If they could build a Quantum Time Machine, then Thanos, whose intellect rivaled his, certainly could too!
Realizing this, everyone's hearts sank to rock bottom.
Except for... the most hot-tempered one, Thor.
Thor even sounded a bit excited: "What's so hard about this? If you ask me, we just travel again and go hack that Universe's Thanos to death!"
Thinking about getting revenge again, Thor was so excited his fat trembled!
Captain America immediately stopped him: "No. Since that Universe's Thanos already knows about our Universe-hopping, he certainly won't be unprepared. If we blindly go there now, no one knows what kind of traps we'll face!"
Hearing this, Thor slammed his axe and hammer onto the ground and said indignantly: "This won't work, that won't work... then what do you say we do? Are we just going to sit here and wait for a second Thanos to come and steal the stones?"
"No!" Tony suddenly stepped forward, his face solemn: "We open the quantum tunnel and actively 'invite' Thanos to our Universe!"
"What?!" *6
Everyone except Ryan was shocked by Tony's bold decision.
They were all trying to avoid Thanos, or at most take the fight to Thanos's Universe. Why was Tony thinking of actively letting Thanos come to their own Universe?
Could it be... that Tony had been swapped too?
Tony ignored the shock of the others and looked at Ryan, smiling: "You didn't object. It seems that after you exposed the fake Nebula, you already had the same idea as me, right?"
Ryan didn't deny it, nodding calmly: "Yes, that's what I was thinking. But this is your Universe after all; the decision is yours. However, if it were me, I would never choose to fight on someone else's home turf; I would choose to fight on my own."
In the American comic Universes, there had been plenty of instances where superheroes proactively charged into a big boss's lair.
But basically, these superheroes only met one end... losing miserably.
Whether it was Marvel or DC superheroes, it was often the same. In Marvel, take Avengers 3 for example: Tony and Star-Lord led a group to ambush Thanos. The result? Even with a numerical advantage, weren't they still pinned down and hammered by Thanos?
Or take the DC Universe, where the entire Justice League set out for Apokolips to fight Darkseid. The outcome was even more tragic than the Avengers'; if those scenes were made into a movie, they probably wouldn't even pass censorship!
Therefore, fighting on home turf was the optimal strategy!
As for whether this would affect the ordinary people on the home turf, for a Spider Monarch like Ryan, that was the least of his concerns.
If dying a few ordinary people could trade for a big boss capable of annihilating all life in the Universe, he would choose to sacrifice those people without the slightest hesitation!