Chapter 301 |
After Josh destroyed Xandar last year, the Nova Empire fell into endless chaos.
Taking advantage of the situation, the Kree Empire temporarily suspended its other wars and launched a large-scale invasion of Nova.
Although the remaining factions of the Nova Empire tried their best to resist, without a central governing power and mired in internal disorder, they could not pose much of a hindrance to the Kree’s advance.
The Kree army soon swept in, occupying a vast territory of Nova space.
But just as Nova was on the brink of destruction, the Shi’ar Empire, which had only been covertly supporting Nova to counter the Kree, personally entered the fray.
And leading the charge was none other than the young emperor of the Shi’ar Empire—D’ken—who personally commanded a fleet!
A brief skirmish then broke out between the Shi’ar and Kree fleets.
The final outcome was unclear, but not long afterward, the Kree forces began a retreat. Though they still occupied a large portion of the former Nova Empire’s territory, they showed no signs of advancing further.
It was clearly a strategic withdrawal after reaching their objectives.
Clearly, for the Kree to withdraw so easily, the Shi’ar either demonstrated overwhelming strength or reached some form of agreement with them.
Either scenario indicated that the Shi’ar were not to be trifled with.
There were even reports from Dracula’s side that a star system on the Kree–Nova border had vanished.
If true, the implications were severe.
It would mean that the Shi’ar Empire possibly possessed the power to destroy entire star systems.
When Josh heard this, he was utterly stunned.
Destroy a star system? That kind of power—was he sure he was in the MCU and not some comic book universe?
Weren’t the Shi’ar supposed to be a peace-loving civilization? This was more like loving nuclear peace!
And their emperor was D’ken?
In his previous life, Josh wasn’t particularly well-versed in Marvel comics, and he knew very little about the Shi’ar. But if he remembered correctly, the Shi’ar ruler was supposed to be an empress named Lilandra or something like that.
He had never heard of this D’ken.
Maybe it was a timeline issue.
Regardless, judging by the power they had displayed, even with the Infinity Stones in his possession, Josh couldn’t afford to get cocky. The ability to destroy a star system outright—whether through personal power or military strength—was far beyond him.
In fact, he couldn’t even truly destroy a star. The destruction of Xandar was, to a large extent, a trick—using the Power Stone to wipe out all life and render the planet uninhabitable, rather than physically destroying the planet itself.
Fortunately, according to Josh’s intel, after driving away the Kree and all other hostile forces targeting Nova, the Shi’ar helped the remaining Nova factions stabilize their rule and reestablish a new government—without taking any further action.
Still, just in case, he had Loki arrange for some of the newly awakened Vrykul who had been implanted with psychological suggestions to be sent to Jotunheim, to align with Laufey.
These Vrykul, sent to Jotunheim, had no memory of Josh or his affiliated forces. Even if they were traced in the future, Josh’s identity wouldn’t be exposed.
But due to the psychological conditioning, they could solidify the link between Laufey and the "King of Destruction" who annihilated Xandar. And if needed, they could even turn on Laufey, becoming Josh’s key to seizing control of Jotunheim.
Although Jotunheim was cold and barren, holding little value, the Frost Giants made for excellent cannon fodder.
After reporting this to Josh, Loki vanished and returned to the banquet hall. He couldn’t stay away too long, or Thor and the others would grow suspicious.
A while after Loki left, Josh also returned to the hall.
………………
The next day arrived quickly.
Josh was resting with his beloved wife—at this point, the two of them had almost no need for sleep.
Still, they maintained a fairly normal routine, and even when they couldn’t sleep, they would at least rest.
Just as dawn broke, they heard the sounds of a fight.
Though the battle was quite far away, it made little difference to them.
“What’s going on?” Margot asked with a slight frown. Her strength was far beneath Josh’s, so while she could hear the commotion, she couldn’t distinguish who was fighting.
But she was definitely angry—her daughter had just ascended the throne, and now someone was causing trouble at Schönbrunn Palace first thing in the morning? How was that acceptable?
“Don’t worry, it’s nothing serious. It’s just Carter and Sif sparring,” Josh replied after listening for a moment and understanding the situation.
Apparently, Carter had gone out early to train and happened to run into Sif.
And for whatever reason—itching for a fight, perhaps—they ended up sparring in the plaza.
“Want to go take a look?” Margot asked.
“No need. Nothing serious will come of it,” Josh said, shaking his head.
But Josh had underestimated the situation a bit.
Soon, the plaza became even livelier.
Sif and Carter’s sparring had attracted the attention of Thor and his group.
Carter was now quite powerful and had the aid of her equipment, making the fight with Sif a close match.
Thor and the Warriors Three were naturally battle-loving. They had noticed yesterday that the Austrian palace housed many extraordinary beings. Seeing Carter’s impressive strength that morning, they were immediately excited and expressed a desire for a “friendly contest” with the warriors of the Kane royal family.
Among the palace guards were several freshly graduated Jedi warriors. Being young, they were easily fired up.
Seeing Thor’s group issue a challenge—even though they knew these guests were gods of legend—the Jedi were still motivated by a competitive spirit.
Several off-duty Jedi warriors immediately accepted the challenge. While the Ouroboros organization enforced strict discipline, internal sparring was permitted when not on assignment, to maintain competitiveness.
At first, only the Warriors Three participated.
While powerful, the Warriors Three weren’t overwhelming. In one-on-one bouts, they typically won, but there was no crushing superiority. The fights were exciting and intense—especially since these were sparring matches, not deadly duels. The Jedi did not wear vibranium gear.
Still, if all the Jedi lost, it would reflect poorly on the Austrian royal family.
Thus, three divine warriors—including Vito, who had returned to Austria for Carol’s coronation—stepped in. These warriors had been infused with divine power from the four unlucky dimensional gods.
Of the three, Vito and another had received power from three gods, while the last—Bursta—had absorbed the strength of all four.
If these were ordinary divine warriors, the Warriors Three might’ve managed. But these three were clearly in a different league.
Naturally, the Warriors Three were defeated.
But upon seeing his three friends fail, Thor, who originally only intended to watch, couldn’t stay on the sidelines any longer.
He couldn't let Asgard lose face!
Moreover, he himself had developed great interest in these formidable warriors.
So he personally stepped onto the field to challenge Vito and the other two — and it was a one-against-three challenge.
The result was obvious: the three divine warriors were very strong, but compared to Thor, the prince of Asgard with the power of the god-king, they were simply not on the same level — even though Thor had not yet fully awakened.
Even the strongest among them, Bursta, only managed to exchange a few dozen moves with Thor.
Of course, a major factor in this was Thor’s Mjölnir.
But you couldn’t say Thor was cheating. In his own words, the hammer was a part of him — asking him to put it down was no different from asking him to surrender!
So when Josh arrived at the square, what he saw was Thor holding his hammer high, showing off and laughing wildly as he invited others to challenge him.
Although this kind of attitude made some in the Austrian royal family slightly displeased,
They didn’t take it too seriously, considering that the other party was a "god" and also an honored guest.
Seeing this scene, Josh, who had just arrived with Margot, couldn’t help but feel a slight stir in his heart.
“What? You want to give it a try?” Sensing something unusual from her bedmate, Margot also picked up on his thoughts.
“Yes, come to think of it, ever since receiving Tiamut’s blessing, I haven’t encountered a truly evenly matched opponent!” Josh nodded, not hiding his thoughts.
“Mr. Kane, want to come down and give it a try?” At that moment, Thor also spotted Josh. His mind lagged a bit, and he called out.
That one sentence instantly silenced the once-lively square.
The nearby warriors of Ouroboros, who had been looking on rather amicably, suddenly turned hostile.
After all, Josh was their lord. It was fine for Thor to challenge their warriors, but to challenge Josh — that definitely carried a tone of provocation.
The three warriors and Sif, who had been chatting warmly with the guards they just fought, couldn’t help but feel a little awkward.
Loki, who had been watching the spectacle from the sidelines, simply covered his face.
Knowing Josh’s true strength, he clearly wasn’t thinking the same as everyone else.
While others thought Thor’s challenge was inappropriate, Loki knew that Thor had just picked what he thought was an easy target — and unknowingly picked the strongest one.
In fact, the moment Thor spoke, he realized there was something wrong with his words. But with his pride, he couldn’t admit fault, so he quickly laughed it off: “Haha, it’s nothing, we can do something else — like arm wrestling or something!”
“No problem. I just happen to want to see the strength of the Thunder God, famed across the Nine Realms!” Unexpectedly, Josh simply smiled and accepted the challenge.
Now it was Thor and his group’s turn to be shocked — all except Loki.
In their eyes, compared to those divine warriors and Jedi, Josh looked a bit slender and didn’t seem to possess great strength.
But Josh gave no explanation. Instead, he directly activated his power.
Suddenly, overwhelming divine energy surged forth. A mighty golden armor appeared on his body, along with a similarly golden cape in a style similar to Thor’s. The Broken Steel Sword also appeared in his hand.
The reason it was the Broken Steel Sword and not the Divergent Sword was because the latter had the Power Stone embedded in it, making it unsuitable for display.
Plus, the Power Stone was too powerful. This was just a spar with Thor, not a death match — if Thor got hurt, that would be bad.
The Broken Steel Sword was just right.
Josh’s transformation immediately stunned most of those present.
Because Josh’s current form had never been shown publicly, except to a very close few. Even most members of Ouroboros had never seen Josh in this state.
Thor and the others never expected that Josh — who they thought was just a “king’s father” — was actually a god.
That’s right, a true god.
In fact, when Thor and the divine warriors had fought earlier, they had already sensed the divine power in them. But Vito and the others were artificially infused with power — although their strength was decent, in Thor’s eyes they were merely false gods with brute strength.
But Josh before them now was truly on the same level as Thor, with incomparably pure divine power.
Even Loki at the side was surprised by Josh’s current form.
Although Josh had displayed overwhelming power on Xandar, for secrecy’s sake, he hadn’t manifested his battle armor at the time — only using the Divergent Sword.
To be honest, in terms of presence alone, Josh looked even more like a god than Thor did.
“So Mr. Kane is also a god — I misjudged you. But I’m really looking forward to fighting such a powerful opponent!” Thor finally softened his words a bit, though the excitement in his eyes betrayed his true feelings.
“Same here. But this isn’t the right place to fight… I’ll trouble the Ancient One then!” Josh smiled slightly, then looked toward the Ancient One, who had somehow appeared at the edge of the square.
Both of their powers were considerable, and if they fought, it would be difficult to hold back. Josh didn’t want to destroy his daughter’s palace.
Hearing this, the Ancient One didn’t say much. She simply smiled and nodded, then began to cast a spell.
The next second, everyone in the square was pulled into the Mirror Dimension.
And to prevent possible collateral damage from Josh and Thor, she even separated the space containing the two of them from the rest of the audience.
This way, everyone could watch the fight between Josh and Thor safely — just like watching a holographic movie.
“What an astonishing spell. My father never mentioned it. I never imagined Earth had such powerful sorcerers…Now I think I understand why he insisted I bring people to attend Her Majesty’s coronation!” Thor looked around at the Mirror Dimension in amazement.
“Now you know — better late than never. Alright, let’s begin!” Josh raised the Broken Steel Sword in his hand.
“Then I won’t hold back!” Thor responded without hesitation, immediately swinging his Mjölnir as powerful lightning surged around him.
In the next second, Thor leapt high into the air, his hammer crackling with thunder as he smashed it down toward Josh’s head!
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