Marvel: Apocalyptic Beginning, a High-Level Game!

Chapter 246 The Chaotic Multiverse

Inside the Avengers base.

Sunlight streamed down through the glass skylight in the dome, its rays sliced ​​into patches by the steel frame, falling onto the brand-new marble floor.

The base was severely damaged in the Endgame, but due to the arrival of a certain cosmic deity, it began to recover its functions at an astonishing rate.

At this moment, there is no trace of war on the smooth walls. Only a faint smell of ozone remains in the air, the aftereffect of the combined effects of a large number of energy weapons and teleportation arrays.

At this moment, everyone's faces were undoubtedly beaming with smiles. It's no exaggeration to say that since its construction, this base has never simultaneously housed so many—so many different kinds of—heroes.

It's not just the founding members of the Avengers.

On the left side of the long table, Star-Lord was sitting in a chair with his legs crossed, holding a cup of cola that he had somehow gotten his hands on. He had the straw in his mouth but wasn't drinking, only occasionally glancing at Gamora, who was talking to Valkyrie not far away.

The praying mantis woman next to him was intently observing an earth fly, her eyes filled with amazement.

Drax the Destroyer ate a plate of spaghetti with a blank expression, chewing each bite with utmost seriousness.

On the right side of the long table, Captain Marvel Carol Danvers stood by the window with her arms crossed. Her short hair still retained the neatness she had in battle, and she looked like a sword that had just been sheathed.

She didn't sit down, but her posture was relaxed—the kind of genuine relaxation that comes after everything has settled down.

Further away, Black Bolt, the Inhuman, sat quietly on a sofa in the corner, with his wife Medusa standing behind him, one hand on his shoulder. Her signature long hair, unusually, did not wander today, but simply hung quietly at her side.

Black Bolt didn't speak—he doesn't usually talk much—but his slight nod was enough to say everything.

Doctor Strange, the Sorcerer Supreme, stood directly beneath the skylight, his hands tucked into his cloak. Spots of light fell on his face, making his expression appear to flicker between light and shadow.

The king beside him was speaking in hushed tones with General Okoye of Wakanda; both men appeared calm.

King T'Challa of Wakanda changed out of his black panther armor and into a dark gray casual outfit, yet he still stood as straight as a pine tree.

His sister, Suri, was not with him—she was reportedly in a lab researching some technology salvaged from the battlefield.

Meanwhile, King Namor of Atlantis, who was still completely bewildered—he had just been in his underwater palace—suddenly found himself surrounded by a golden halo.

Before he could even grab his trident, he was lifted up by a gentle yet irresistible force, passing through the seawater, through the rock formations, through the air, and finally, with a thud, his feet landed on the floor of the Avengers base.

He looked around at the superheroes in the room—both on the ground and not on the ground—and his eyebrows slowly furrowed into a knot.

"Explain," he said, his voice as deep as an undercurrent at the bottom of the sea.

No one explained. But no one chased him away.

So Namor—the monarch of Atlantis, the ruler of the oldest civilization on Earth—sat down without explanation, arms crossed, his expression somewhere between "I'm very unhappy" and "I'll see what you're up to."

But what truly excited the veteran Avengers was something else entirely.

They finally saw with their own eyes the woman they had missed so much, the woman who was like family to them.

Black Widow.

Natasha Romanov.

She stood there. Her long, rose-red hair fell over her shoulders, longer than I remembered, with slightly curled ends, as if casually blown by the wind.

She was wearing a black long-sleeved top with the sleeves rolled up to the middle of her forearms, revealing the spot on her left wrist that had once been burned by the Infinity Stones—now there were no marks left, and her skin was as smooth as ever.

Her posture was exactly the same as before: her weight was slightly shifted to her left foot, her hands were either in her pockets or crossed in front of her chest, always exuding a composure that allowed her to strike at any time or turn away at any time.

At this moment, she was tilting her head, a half-smile playing on her lips, looking at the two people in front of her.

"Xiao Na".

Hulk and Hawkeye spoke almost simultaneously.

Bruce Banner—now in his Intelligent Hulk form, his tall and imposing figure standing out in the crowd—his lips trembled slightly, and his enormous eyes, which usually only revealed reason and calm, were now filled with a kind of vulnerable light.

He opened his arms, but stopped just before touching Natasha, as if afraid that he would break the person he had lost and found again if he used too much force.

Clint Barton—Hawkeye—stood half a step away from Banner.

His temples were whiter than I remembered, and the wrinkles around his eyes were much deeper—marks left from what he had lost and then regained.

He raised his hand, then lowered it, then raised it again, his fingers trembling slightly in mid-air, somewhat at a loss. His Adam's apple bobbed, as if he wanted to say something, but his lips only moved a few times without uttering a sound.

Falcon Sam Wilson stood a few steps away, arms crossed, glancing at Natasha, then at Captain America Steve Rogers—

The latter was standing at the back of the crowd, her gaze landing on Natasha over everyone's heads. In her blue eyes was a complex mix of relief and guilt—

Then I looked at the Hulk, Banner.

"What a strange relationship," Sam muttered to himself, only to be elbowed back by Bucky next to him.

Are you for real?

Clint finally found his voice. It was so hoarse it didn't sound like his own; it was like someone who had been walking in the desert for too long finally seeing water.

He raised his hand somewhat uncertainly, wanting to stroke Natasha's cheek—

Of course, for him, a married man, this action was simply a pure expression of remembrance between comrades-in-arms, without any implied transgression.

His fingertips hovered less than an inch from her cheek, trembling, but never touched her.

Natasha looked into his eyes for about three seconds.

Then she chuckled softly.

The smile was faint and light, but it was indeed a Natasha Romanov smile—with a touch of cunning, a touch of provocation, and a touch of self-righteous arrogance that said, "How dare you doubt me?"

The next second, she suddenly turned her head and her body spun at an incredible angle.

That familiar scissor kick, which had struck fear into the hearts of countless enemies, clamped down on Clint's neck in an instant—

The inner thighs were precisely positioned on either side of his carotid artery, with just the right amount of force—enough to neither actually injure him nor cause anyone caught off guard to lose their balance in a second.

Clint's body was pulled forward and tilted.

He fell flat on his back, his head just two inches from the ground when Natasha's left hand caught him firmly—as if she always knew where the end point of every movement was.

"You still need to practice." Natasha looked down at him, the corners of her mouth curving into a wider smile.

Clint lay on the ground, the back of his head resting on her palm. He was stunned for a moment, then relaxed completely.

He laughed, his eyes reddening, his nose stinging, like someone who had finally found their way home.

"Okay, okay," his voice squeezed out from his throat, tinged with laughter and trembling, "I know, I know you must be real, you must be real—so hurry up and let go, let go, let go!"

Natasha released her fearsome legs, stood up gracefully, and tossed her flowing rose-colored hair. The strands arced through the air, refracting shimmering light in the sunlight.

"I don't know what happened either," she said, spreading her hands and shrugging.

His tone was as relaxed as if they were discussing what to have for lunch, "Anyway, I just closed my eyes, opened them, and I was back. Specifically—"

Her gaze passed over Clint's shoulder, over Banner's massive frame, over everyone else, and landed on someone in the center of the base who was curiously examining the quantum shuttle.

Following her gaze, everyone's eyes turned to her.

Clint got up from the ground, dusted himself off, and looked over.

Meanwhile, Scott Lang—Ant-Man—who was watching the show while holding his daughter, was leaning against the wall with an air of indifference. His daughter, Cathy, sat in his arms, her big, round eyes curiously observing all the heroes in the base.

Peter Parker, the little spider, was squatting next to Scott, teasing Cathy with a finger outstretched. The little girl grabbed his finger and giggled.

Tony Stark walked over.

His pace was slower than before the final battle, but infinitely faster than in the minutes after the final battle—the minutes following that snap.

His right arm has fully recovered and is now casually tucked into his pocket, while he holds a cup of coffee in his left hand.

His beard was neatly trimmed, and although there were still a few shallow scratches on his face, his complexion was so good that he didn't look like someone who had been struggling on the brink of death just fifteen minutes ago.

He walked over to the quantum shuttle, stopped, and looked at the Asian youth fiddling with the machine with a Tony Stark-esque, undisguised scrutinizing gaze.

"OW," Tony put down his coffee cup, clapped his hands, and began in a tone that was somewhere between formal and casual, "Thank you very much for your help, this—this—"

He paused for a moment, his brows furrowing slightly, as if he were rapidly searching his mind for a suitable title.

"Mr. Cold Dew".

"If you don't feel comfortable with it," the young man said without turning his head, his fingers still deftly fiddling with something on the quantum shuttle's control panel at a dizzying speed, "you can call me Yu. After all, I don't think we're that close yet."

"Okay, no problem, Mr. Yu." Tony's mind worked very fast—so fast that he received, processed, and responded to the information almost the instant the other person finished speaking.

Because he already understood.

At that moment in the final battle—

The instant his fingers touched the Infinity Stones—

In that instant when he thought he was about to walk into that eternal nothingness—

The appearance of this person, that glimmer of light from him, that power that pulls the soul back from the abyss—

This was far beyond his comprehension.

He even had a vague feeling that the person in front of him, who looked like he had stepped out of an oriental painting, might have far more advanced power than they could have imagined.

Even Thanos—the Titan who once made half the universe tremble—might be nothing compared to this.

No.

It's not just Thanos.

Tony's gaze unconsciously swept over Thor at the other end of the hall—

At this moment, Thor was sitting in a reinforced chair, holding a large bucket of popcorn, his mouth stuffed full, his cheeks bulging like a hamster, completely unaware of what was happening around him.

His Stormbreaker leaned against the back of his chair, the blade still bearing traces of the Endgame.

Tony then thought of Thor's father, Odin—the legendary Allfather, the ancient being who once single-handedly suppressed the Nine Realms.

Then he remembered what the person in front of him had just done.

Extract the energy of the Infinity Stones from a mortal body, repair all the burned tissues, and even—even restore that body to a better state than before.

Could Odin do it?

Tony wasn't sure.

But he was certain that the person in front of him could do it.

Thinking of this, Tony's lips twitched slightly, and then he remembered something else—the subtle nuances of address from the East.

He cleared his throat, and his expression became serious, as if he were preparing for an important academic report.

"Thank you," he said, trying to enunciate each word clearly, his tongue pressed against the roof of his mouth, the air forced out, "Mr. Yu."

Chinese.

Although he didn't know the difference between "先生" (xiānsheng) and "先森" (xiānsen), he did try very hard to pronounce them.

When those three words came out of his mouth, they had a unique, clumsy yet earnest tone, typical of foreigners speaking Chinese.

The young man called "Yu" finally stopped what he was doing, turned around and glanced at Tony.

"Ah," he said, a slight smile playing on his lips, "you're wrong. But—whatever."

He didn't correct Tony's so-called syllable problem with the address; he simply withdrew his small hands that were fiddling with the quantum shuttle, turned around, and faced the crowd that had gathered around him.

Well, how should I put it?

This could be considered an accident.

Yu—or rather, Hanlu—casually swept her gaze across the faces of everyone present.

What is he thinking?

Perhaps he was thinking that not long ago, he was standing in some corner of the universe, fighting fiercely with some giant octopus.

Just kidding, has he ever backed down?

Activating the Emperor Armor is like unleashing a brutal beating—holding the Emperor's Halberd, the embodiment of the Ultimate Eraser, in his hand feels like holding the weight of an entire galaxy. He's not afraid at all, okay?

They chased after the other side and beat him until he was crying for his parents, then, just like before, hid in some remote corner of the universe.

As for what happened next—

Things changed.

Lugurgos transmitted a message to him, saying that their enemies seemed to have wandered into the wrong universe.

Hanlu also accurately discovered that her concept of "civilization" seemed to have been brought to this universe by Ant-Man and his crew.

In short, the concept has been sown—the cocoon from the void has taken root on the moon, right in the territory of the Inhumans.

With this concept, he can easily transfer his individual concept here.

Then he saw the great battle—from beginning to end, every detail, every moment, every breath of every person.

He even went over the script with Lukurgos and successfully got Puni and Sorensen to join him.

If I'm not mistaken, those two guys should still be fighting somewhere in the universe right now.

Oh, right, it seems they also crippled Arithm.

Although we don't know why we had to drag the Celestials into this mess, Hanlu shrugged inwardly—he didn't care anymore.

It's a mess.

The more chaotic, the better.

With a super brain as her thinking tool, Hanlu is ready to focus her attention on combat.

That is the step he is currently taking.

But it was precisely because of his arrival—when he came into this world in such a tiny way, given his own size—

Hanlu looked around at the people in the room, at the representatives from various planets, civilizations, and dimensions.

He couldn't help but feel a surge of sullen anger.

What the hell is this?

"So—" He brushed non-existent dust off his hands, looked up, and calmly swept his gaze over all the heroes present. A half-smile played on his lips, and his tone carried a strange mix of teasing and seriousness. "Let's talk, heroes. What kind of mess has your universe gotten into this time?"