Inside the quinjet, the atmosphere was stifling.
"Faster!!!" Tony roared at the pilot. "If this thing has an overdrive mode, use it now!!!"
Lin Huai sat quietly with his eyes closed. But Tony knew that the moment Pepper's distress call came in, Lin Huai had reacted faster than he did, instantly determining the call was genuine and deciding to return with him.
Half an hour later, the quinjet dove toward the ground at a crash-like speed, hovering over the Malibu mansion. Before the hatch even fully opened, a red-and-gold streak shattered through it and shot into the house—Tony Stark in his suitcase armor. Lin Huai followed right behind.
Alarms blared throughout the mansion. On the alloy door of the panic room, a molten hole still glowed red-hot.
"Pepper!" Tony rushed forward and wrapped his arms around Pepper, who was holding a pistol. The armor disassembled and folded back into a suitcase behind him.
Seeing Tony, the tension finally drained from Pepper, and she nearly collapsed into his arms. Lin Huai left them to their moment. He walked over to the molten hole; the attackers had vanished cleanly, their goal seemingly just to breach the door.
Back in the main room, Lin Huai walked to a clear space, took a silver pendulum from his pocket, and breathed calmly. He didn't ask a question aloud, only thought to himself:
"Someone deliberately lured us back to Malibu."
The pendulum hanging from his fingertips immediately began spinning wildly clockwise, giving a clear, affirmative answer.
A diversion.
"Damn it!" Lin Huai and Tony cursed in unison.
Tony understood instantly. The target wasn't Pepper or his tech—it was to draw him and Lin Huai away! The real storm was brewing back there!!!
"We've been tricked!" Tony's face was ashen. "Jarvis, get me a line to S.H.I.E.L.D. in New Mexico! Now!!!"
The comms were filled with crackling static, punctuated by screams and violent explosions.
"Quickly!" Lin Huai's expression turned grim. "We have to go back!"
The quinjet's engines roared to life once more. Carrying Tony, Lin Huai, and a shaken Pepper, it shot back toward New Mexico at full speed.
---
Back in New Mexico, just as they left, Thor paid the price for his recklessness. He was thrown across the field by the Destroyer in full view of everyone, lying motionless. But the very moment he was prepared to sacrifice himself, he earned mjolnir's recognition.
The God of Thunder had returned.
But the battle was not over.
The Destroyer was merely a kill program. It didn't understand resurrection; its logic was singular: eliminate all targets. Its single eye turned toward the newly risen Thor, energy gathering.
"Look out!"
A blue figure rushed in front of Thor—Steve Rogers, also exhausted! He planted his vibranium shield, a layer of solid white energy aura shimmering around it, barely holding back the beam.
"BOOM!"
The energy beam clashed against the shield, the deafening Impact shaking the ground. Steve was forced back, carving deep furrows with his boots, the light on his shield flickering wildly, clearly at its limit.
Thor looked at the human standing before him, something shifting in his eyes.
He was not fighting alone.
"Leave this to me, Captain!" Thor's voice was steady and commanding.
He stepped forward, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Steve. mjolnir in his hand hummed with joy, arcs of electricity dancing wildly across his silver armor.
Steve glanced back at him, saw the burning battle spirit and newfound maturity in those blue eyes, and gave a firm nod.
"ROAR——!" The Destroyer spread its arms, the plates on its chest retracting layer by layer, revealing a larger, more volatile core cannon!
"Here comes the big one!" Steve yelled in warning.
"Then let's give it something even bigger to taste!"
With a roar, Thor raised mjolnir high. The thunderous vortex in the sky responded to his call. A pillar of lightning as thick as a celestial column crashed down, pouring entirely into the hammer's head! mjolnir glowed like a miniature Sun, blinding.
"Now!" Thor bellowed. Instead of striking the Destroyer, he channeled all his might, slamming the thunder-charged hammer directly onto Steve Rogers's vibranium shield!
Steve instantly understood. He poured every last ounce of his remaining energy into the shield.
"CLANG——!!!"
An ear-splitting metallic shriek! Mjolnir, the hammer of thunder, and the shield imbued with the power of Vishanti—two weapons from different cosmic forces—achieved perfect resonance in that moment.
The annihilating beam, capable of leveling a small hill, blasted from the Destroyer's core cannon and smashed against the radiant shield.
But this time, the shield did more than absorb.
The star pattern on the vibranium shield spun madly. It acted like a flawless energy converter, forcibly merging and compressing the destructive red laser with the hammer's violent lightning!
A composite energy shockwave, swirling with lightning, light, and destruction—its color shifting wildly and twisting unnaturally—rebounded from the shield's surface. It shot back toward the Destroyer's exposed chest cavity at ten times the speed!
The Destroyer's logic couldn't process this incomprehensible event.
"KABOOM——!!!"
After the explosion, silence fell.
The violent detonation erupted from within the Destroyer, shattering its sturdy Asgardian Uru shell into countless pieces. Bereft of its core, the War Machine finally slumped to its knees, reduced to a smoking pile of scrap.
The battle was over. Thor looked at the scene, panting heavily, then at Steve, who was similarly spent beside him. They exchanged a look and a smile. That was enough.
In the distance, Loki watched the scene of brotherly unity and realized he had lost. Consumed by resentment and jealousy, he used his scepter to summon the Bifrost Bridge. He fled back to Asgard just before Thor's hammer could strike him.
"He's gone," Steve Rogers said, walking up.
"Yes," Thor gripped his hammer tightly, his gaze fixed firmly on the direction Loki vanished. "He's returned to Asgard. We must go back!"
He stepped up to Steve and looked at this soldier he had just fought alongside. For the first time, a genuine, equal smile appeared on his face.
"Thank you, Captain Rogers." Thor called him Captain, clapping Steve firmly on the shoulder. "You showed me what a true leader should be."
With that, he raised his head and lifted Mjolnir high toward the sky.
"Heimdall!! Open the Bifrost Bridge!!!"
Just then, the urgent roar of engines approached from the distance. A quinjet dove toward the ground at a crash-like speed, hovering in mid-air above everyone.
The hatch opened, revealing Lin Huai standing in the doorway.
"Hey! Mr. God of Thunder!" Lin Huai's voice carried down from the sky, cutting through the thunder. "Heading to Asgard? I don't suppose... I could hitch a ride?"