Chapter 77: From Today On, I Shall Become a Hero

The three heroes barely managed to dodge, but the entire block behind them was engulfed by the highly corrosive black water. This was no exaggeration. No one could fathom what the black water was made of. Cars parked along the street sizzled in the liquid, melting away within moments. The buildings on either side seemed to dissolve like ice cream under the sun, melting at a visible pace; within ten seconds, they emitted a gurgling sound, as if someone had tossed a block of ice cream into water.

Everything was swallowed by the black water, soon becoming part of the darkened space. Not only was the dark Statue of Liberty present, but countless stone-like spheres, manipulated by writhing tentacles resembling living creatures, began hurtling at the three heroes without rhyme or reason.

Some of these spheres were so enormous that even Central Park could not contain them; the smaller ones were at least the size of a swimming pool.

“Are these things real? Aren’t they just balloons? Friday?” Tony asked his AI assistant.

“The spatial and energy data ahead is chaotic. There is a significant discrepancy between what you see and what my scans detect. I am analyzing it,” Friday replied.

Before she finished, a stone sphere suddenly lifted upward, unpredictably scraping Iron Man’s leg. The latest high-strength alloy instantly caved in. This was not a simple collision, but the sheer crushing weight caused by an overwhelming difference in mass.

Warning sirens blared within Iron Man’s visor. “Alert! Alert! Preliminary calculations suggest the unidentified sphere you touched has a mass approximately thirty times that of the moon!”

“Thirty times? Good heavens! What did they use to shrink thirty moons to something the size of my backyard?” Tony retorted.

“Insufficient data for calculation.”

Not far away, Vision faced the fiercest assault, as giant nets of dark energy swept toward him indiscriminately. Some were as large as football fields, others rivaled the main runway at Kennedy International Airport. Vision had no space to dodge, and could only unleash powerful beams from the Mind Stone on his forehead, confronting the attack head-on.

“This won’t do!” Spider-Man leaped swiftly, having realized the central issue—their advance was slower than the expansion of the dark space.

Just as the three Avengers found themselves trapped, Meimu and his companions…were still running.

The opening of the dark space had disrupted all of New York. The place where they had just opened a door was now the nearest spot where space remained stable enough for a portal.

As he ran, Meimu silently watched the sky churning with dark energy, observing the shifting clouds beneath the night.

In that instant, a hidden chord was plucked within him.

He saw layers of figures and events before his eyes; the scene was like a director’s cut replay of an old film, or perhaps a vision lingering in history. He was witnessing the birth of a new ‘history.’ Yes, in this parallel world, everything unfolding before him was beginning to merge with the Marvel comics and cinematic universe in his own memory.

Before him, everything was plunging into the torrent of destruction. Fierce winds spun sparks from the falling neon lights, whirling in chaos. Someone, in despair, screamed as they fell from a tall building. Along the avenue, the enormous glass windows that once showcased luxury brands shattered piece by piece, eliciting even louder cries from passersby. Trees along the street toppled, countless leaves torn from their branches, swept up by the currents and soaring toward the sky. People screamed, pressing down their windswept hair, crawling and rolling in their desperate escape.

Standing at the intersection, Meimu suddenly noticed a small squad of fully armed special forces at the corner of the parallel street, their backs emblazoned with “SWAT.”

Their faces were marked with fear, tension, and unease, but they still maintained tactical formation, marching resolutely toward the dark space.

Meimu was suddenly moved—

They possessed neither indestructible bodies nor advanced technology to fight aliens, nor any special superpowers. Yet with mere mortal flesh, they joined this war. Knowing it meant death, they still moved forward.

“So aside from the Avengers and Kamar-Taj, there are still warriors left in this world,” Meimu murmured.

Mordo responded, “Master once said, when everyone else is running away and you advance toward the enemy, you are already a hero.”

A hero…?

Meimu was stunned.

He had been in this world for so long, always struggling to survive. He attributed all his efforts to sheer survival instinct.

He had never felt anything for the word ‘hero,’ yet now, returning to his senses, he found himself counted among their ranks.

Was this fate’s reward for his perseverance?

“That’s right! If we do nothing, the world will be destroyed. In that case, let us begin to be heroes today.”

“Well said!” Fat Wang was the first to echo him.

Then Mordo, baring his teeth, watched as Meimu opened the Eye of Agamotto. “Are you…going to use that again?”

“I know, it’s a violation of natural law. But if humanity must perish for the sake of natural law, to hell with natural law!”

Crude, but real.

Meimu was a staunch humanist. If humanity was doomed, let the flood come for all he cared!

Drawing a deep breath and chanting the spell, Meimu unleashed the Eye of Agamotto without restraint.

Green phosphorescence formed concentric arrays, attaching to Meimu’s left hand. The Time Stone, processed by this artifact, now released its power steadily.

Meimu raised his hand at Fat Wang and Mordo, and both were instantly detached from the flow of time.

The scene before them was so overwhelming that neither could utter a word.

It was an operation that affected at least half of Manhattan.

Everything around them seemed to play in reverse; the expansion of the dark space was immediately suppressed, and the distant dark world shrank back at a speed visible to the naked eye.

In the distance, the grand red arch at Chinatown by the sea in Manhattan, whose giant red pillar had collapsed, now righted itself. Fallen architectural fragments returned to their places, fitting together like pieces of a puzzle.

A young woman who had died in a car crash, thrown through the windshield because she hadn’t fastened her seatbelt, now flew headfirst and feet up, back into her car.

Fallen neon lights and billboards soared back to the facades of buildings.