After completing his mission, Billy Butcher was transported back to The Boys world, and later sent to the Marvel world.
Because the repeated mission resets he had experienced earlier were so strange, even the Ancient One took special interest in him. She personally examined Billy Butcher's soul and consciousness.
Her assessment was that something unusual had occurred on a soul-deep level.
The immediate consequence was that he needed a period of rest to recover his depleted mental state.
In addition, Billy Butcher had somehow awakened a superpower on his own. Although it was only a weaker version of a healing ability, his body contained no trace of Compound V.
Tony Stark, Dr. Bruce Banner, and others speculated that this was the result of Billy repeatedly injecting Compound V during his missions. At the soul-consciousness level, this had caused some kind of mutation, leading his body to spontaneously develop superpowers.
Whether this was a blessing or a curse remained uncertain.
In the long run, a person's soul is fragile — any abnormality could have severe consequences.
But for the moment, Billy had clearly profited: in the mission world, he had personally taken revenge by killing Homelander, and he had gained superpowers for free.
However, Billy himself showed little concern for these changes. Upon learning that he was now in the Marvel world and that his wife, Becca Butcher, was here as well, he didn't even rest — he rushed off to find her.
Maeve didn't try to stop him; after all, they were both adults.
The next day, Thor was successfully retrieved by Dr. Banner. Compared to Billy Butcher, Thor was in far better condition. Though he too had been trapped in a time-looping world and faced a troublesome boss — Thanos — Thor already possessed a strong power base. The loop's starting point was even set at a moment in the future when he, wielding Stormbreaker, had nearly killed Thanos.
In terms of difficulty, Thor's mission was easier than Billy's.
After about ten resets, he first chopped off the arm wearing the Infinity Gauntlet, then split Thanos's head open with one swing, finally making up for his regret from the future.
"Wait… the world collapsed? Oh no, that's such a pity. I thought I could change that parallel timeline's future!"
After killing Thanos, Thor also fell unconscious. When he awoke and learned that the mission world had been destroyed along with his completion of the mission, he shook his head repeatedly.
Without other players helping him, and without realizing in advance that the mission world was fake, Thor had simply believed it to be another parallel future. Filled with zeal and anger at the thought of defeating Thanos, he pressed on until he finally cleared the mission.
Only to find out afterward that nothing had changed — except that he'd had the satisfaction of the kill.
Dr. Banner shrugged. "Not satisfied? I guess you might get a similar chance next time."
Thor twirled his pink hammer twice. "You know, I just chopped Thanos's head clean off! It felt amazing! And that axe was incredible… Hey, Mjolnir, don't be jealous — I'm not saying you're bad, really!"
Apparently, the hammer was feeling jealous, for it flew out of his hand, forcing Thor to chase after it.
Dr. Banner chuckled. "His weapon gets more jealous than his girlfriend!"
With a sigh, he turned toward the temporary holding cells in the base.
Despite being worn out from two back-to-back retrieval missions, Banner still had one task left — analyzing samples from Homelander.
Homelander's body was incredibly resilient; without Superman's personal intervention, it would have been nearly impossible to collect his blood and tissue samples.
Now, Homelander was confined in a specially modified laboratory cell, bound from head to toe in chains made of reinforced special materials. From behind the transparent wall, he watched as Dr. Banner entered in a white lab coat.
Homelander's pupils widened, memories flooding back of the torment he'd suffered as a child — used as a lab rat. He roared in rage:
"You hypocritical bastards! You talk about saving the world and protecting justice, but in private you're just like Vought — turning me into a lab rat again?!"
"Calm down. Relax."
Banner raised a hand in a placating gesture.
"Listen — yes, we are conducting some research on you, but it's nothing like what you went through before. For example, we're working on a serum to remove your superpowers. Once that's done, you'll be free again."
The Defenders had struggled with how to deal with Homelander.
In the end, they decided on a punishment far worse than killing him — stripping away his greatest pride and the source of his corruption: his superpowers.
For Homelander, this was agony.
He thrashed violently, shouting curses without pause. Banner shook his head, thinking that compared to this man, Clark Kent was practically a flawless saint.
But Homelander's struggles were useless. The chains restraining him, as well as the cell itself, had been purchased by the first Spider-Man from the Quiz Game's points shop. The total cost had exceeded 200 points — even after discounts. Without his recent string of high-reward missions, he wouldn't have been able to afford it.
This prison was so well-built that not even Superman could escape from it.
In fact, from another perspective, Superman might be easier to contain than Homelander, since Kryptonite was a guaranteed weakness.
Ignoring Homelander's impotent fury, Banner pressed a button that silenced all sound from within the cell. Finally, peace.
"He still hasn't admitted he's wrong?" Clark entered, frowning at Homelander.
Banner sighed. "His mental state is terrible. Even without powers, he'd probably still be a sociopath… though the root cause is really his disastrous childhood."
"…You're right."
Clark couldn't help but think back to his own upbringing — loving parents who taught him right from wrong, especially his father, whose self-sacrifice had cemented his beliefs.
Clark had always valued family, but after seeing Homelander's childhood, he felt even more grateful for his own.
One could even imagine that, had Clark grown up the way Homelander had, he might have turned into another Homelander.
Banner added, "Vought is the real culprit. But that world is complicated — too many ties to official powers. It's like Charles and Logan's world; the mutant problem isn't easily solved either."
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T/N:
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