It was a completely revolutionary approach.
If Spider-Man and Spider-Woman didn't derive their powers from biological mutations, but rather from the magical domain—from the blessing of some hidden Demon God—it changed everything.
It was a brilliant leap of logic!
Even the most seasoned veterans in the room had to admit it was a genius deduction.
"The blessing of a Demon God, huh?" Nick Fury rubbed his bald head, a distant memory suddenly surfacing. Hadn't he encountered someone like that before?
A certain unnamable, chain-smoking British occultist whose powers were fundamentally tied to demonic pacts and divine blessings came to mind. S.H.I.E.L.D. actually had a file on him, along with a few records of him handling localized paranormal incidents.
Fury hadn't made the connection before, but with Coulson laying out the framework, it suddenly seemed entirely plausible.
"Make sure this goes into the official threat assessment," Fury ordered. "Demonic or divine blessings must be classified as a legitimate third pathway for acquiring superhuman abilities."
The agents jotted it down. It wasn't as if S.H.I.E.L.D. had never dealt with paranormal entities before. They had files on supernatural beings pulling the strings in the shadows.
Vampires and werewolves, for instance.
However, those cases were incredibly low-level. Compared to the apocalyptic events recorded in Lucas's diary, they weren't even worth mentioning. Dealing with a werewolf or a vampire usually just required a specialized tactical strike team armed with UV rounds and silver bullets. It was strictly low-level magic.
They had yet to encounter high-level magic.
But now they realized the truth: in the future, the world would likely see supervillains and superheroes whose powers were directly granted by high-tier Demon Gods.
"So, mapping it out, we currently have three verified origins," Natasha summarized. "The poor rely on mutation. The rich rely on technology. And the third is the blessing of a Demon God."
"This also implies that the 'Gods' like Thor are fundamentally different entities from the 'Demon Gods' Lucas mentions," Nick Fury deduced, pacing slowly. "This shifts our entire understanding of the cosmic hierarchy. Initially, when the diary mentioned Gods and Demon Gods, I assumed it was just a semantic difference within the same pantheon. Now, I suspect they are entirely separate ecosystems."
"Gods are Gods. Demon Gods are Demon Gods. These Demon Gods might possess the power to grant a human superhuman abilities, but they clearly aren't friendly to Earth. Otherwise, the Ancient One wouldn't have spent centuries slaughtering enough of them to wrap around the solar system."
"Agreed," Agent Hill chimed in. "If we assume the Ancient One is humanity's ultimate guardian against mystical threats, then these Demon Gods are strictly hostile. It matches human mythology. Think of the legends of making a deal with the Devil. You sell your soul for power or wealth. Demon Gods never give out their blessings for free."
"Conversely, the orthodox pantheons—like the Eastern Heavenly Court, the Egyptian Ennead, the Greek Olympians, and our newly verified Asgardians—likely operate on a completely different conceptual level than the Demon Gods," Coulson added.
"But not all Demon Gods are necessarily our enemies," Hill countered thoughtfully. "Let's stick with our working theory: Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy received their powers from a Spider God, or a Spider Weaver. If this Spider Entity was truly malevolent, wouldn't Peter and Gwen turn out to be supervillains? Yet, the diary implies they are beloved, righteous heroes. Therefore, some Demon Gods might be benevolent, or at least neutral."
"We can't just blindly categorize every single mystical entity as a hostile threat. It's tactically unsound," Hill concluded.
"If we follow that logic... does the Christian God count as a Demon God?" Hawkeye suddenly asked. "I mean, He grants blessings. And the Vatican's secret knight orders are notoriously shady."
The room went dead silent.
Holy shit. That is bordering on ultimate heresy.
But the more they thought about it, the more plausible it seemed. Could the entity worshipped as God just be another member of this vast, cosmic pantheon of Demon Gods? It was a blasphemous thought, but entirely within the realm of possibility.
"The main issue is that we have no idea what these Demon Gods actually are," Nick Fury groaned, his headache returning in full force. Because they lacked basic intel on these entities' biology or origin, they couldn't accurately gauge their threat level.
Were they conceptual beings formed from human belief, or were they just immensely powerful physical aliens?
"It looks like we'll just have to ask Thor the next time he visits," Fury decided.
Unfortunately, Thor was currently stuck in Asgard. Lucas had explicitly written that the Bifrost was destroyed, severely delaying any travel to Earth.
"This is the most frustrating part about Lucas," Barton complained. "He always writes half the story and leaves us to blindly guess the rest! If we could just sit him down in an interrogation room, we could ask him point-blank what the difference is between Thor and a Demon God!"
At that moment, the Diary flared with golden light.
[Speaking of the Battle of New York, it features one of the absolute greatest Loki scenes of all time. Hahahaha! I guarantee you, if you made a list of the most humiliating moments in Loki's entire life, this one takes the crown.]
[Doesn't the God of Mischief have any dignity left? I mean, this is the same guy who canonically becomes the Sorcerer Supreme in one timeline. Can you believe that?]
[But out of all the different Lokis across the multiverse, the Sorcerer Supreme isn't even the most memorable one. The most memorable one is the Alligator.]
[Why is there an Alligator Loki?! What kind of unhinged mental state was Laufey in to procreate with a swamp reptile?]
[The only things more absurd than Alligator Loki are Frog Thor, or maybe the Shiba Inu Thor from that parody cartoon.]
["I am Thor, God of Thunder! For the glory of the Northern Gods!" Hahahaha! Thor's reputation is absolutely ruined in my head. Ever since I saw that Shiba Inu Thor, I can't look at the real Thor's face without laughing!]
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