At this moment, Robert keenly noticed the subtle changes in Darkseid's expression. Emotions like resentment, longing, anger, and hatred flickered in Darkseid's eyes.
Although Darkseid, as the Dark Lord, was certainly capable of hiding his emotions, the immense pressure he was under had caused him to reveal a crack in his composure.
Coupled with Robert's natural ability to detect weaknesses in the heat of battle, he could clearly sense the shift in Darkseid's demeanor.
While Robert still didn't know exactly what Darkseid was longing for, he was certain that, in Darkseid's mind, this power could help him turn the tide of the battle!
This was precisely what Robert had hoped for before the battle began. If the plan unfolded as he had envisioned, Darkseid would inevitably clash with Earth's dimensional consciousness!
Now, all that was needed was the right opportunity.
However, what Robert didn't expect was that this opportunity would present itself so quickly.
But this opportunity didn't come from Darkseid himself—it arose from a problem on the other battlefield.
Originally, on the other battlefield, the Avengers had held an overwhelming advantage. As time passed, more and more of Darkseid's subordinates fell to the Avengers' hands.
Even Desaad, who had been severely wounded by Diana earlier, was repeatedly struck down by her and ultimately met his end at her hands. This enraged Darkseid's remaining forces.
Previously, those who had died on the battlefield weren't part of Darkseid's inner circle. His subordinates had still clung to the hope that Darkseid would descend like a god, saving them with his invincible power and turning the tide of the battle.
But Desaad was one of Darkseid's most trusted lieutenants. His death without any sign of Darkseid's intervention filled the remaining forces with dread.
Moreover, many of Darkseid's subordinates had witnessed the incident where Darkseid attempted to open a portal, only to be intercepted by an unfamiliar figure who punched him away and destroyed the portal in an instant.
This shattered any remaining hope among Darkseid's forces. They realized that Darkseid hadn't abandoned them—he was simply unable to come to their aid because he was facing a formidable enemy of his own.
This realization plunged Darkseid's forces into despair, prompting them to launch a desperate counterattack. If there was no way out, they would at least make sure the Avengers suffered alongside them!
Many of Darkseid's subordinates were hardened criminals. Knowing they couldn't survive and that the Avengers wouldn't spare them, they had no intention of going down without a fight.
As a result, the battle grew even more intense. While the Avengers still held the overall advantage, they began to sustain injuries as well.
At the same time, many of Darkseid's higher-ups began to regret their earlier decisions. If they had known the situation would escalate to this point, they would have done everything in their power to save Desaad.
After all, Desaad was the one who had created the Parademon army. With Apokolips destroyed and Darkseid unable to return, only Desaad could have activated the Parademons' final reserve energy through his control.
This was a last-ditch, mutually destructive measure, a deterrent Desaad had devised to deal with stubborn planetary civilizations.
But unfortunately, Desaad had died too quickly. Before his death, he had been relentlessly beaten down by Diana, and no one had come to his aid or given him the breathing room needed to activate the Parademons' ultimate protocol.
In this situation, Darkseid's remaining forces could only order the Parademons to launch large-scale attacks, hoping to overwhelm the Avengers. However, the Avengers had their own mech units to help block these assaults.
While the number of mechs couldn't compare to the Parademon army, and defending against so many attacks was incredibly difficult, losing mechs was still preferable to losing Avengers.
Even though a single mech was far more powerful than a Parademon and could take out large swathes of them, the mechs' defenses were limited, especially when facing attacks from multiple directions.
While the Avengers could dodge such attacks, the mechs, designed to protect them, had to stand their ground and absorb the blows.
Thanks to the mechs' assistance, the Avengers only sustained injuries and didn't face any life-threatening situations. However, the number of mechs was steadily dwindling.
"This isn't sustainable. The number of mechs can't compare to the Parademon army, even though we've killed countless Parademons so far," Tony Stark's frustrated voice echoed in the Avengers' comms.
"If it weren't for the Ultron incident, we'd have far more mechs. After Ultron, I did build a new batch, but it's nowhere near our previous reserves."
If the old Tony Stark had suffered from a bit of "firepower deficiency anxiety" and built a massive mech army to deal with supernatural crises, the post-Ultron Tony Stark had become wary of endlessly producing mechs.
Although the Avengers had no intention of continuing research on Ultron or the Celestials, the Ultron incident had taught them a harsh lesson.
Even though JARVIS and Victor Stone were now among the universe's top experts in artificial intelligence, who could guarantee that the mech army wouldn't be hijacked by a more advanced AI system, turning against the Avengers as Ultron had?
In fact, if Apokolips hadn't been destroyed by Robert's surprise attack, its advanced technology—considering the origins of Victor Stone's abilities—could have potentially taken control of the mech army.
Moreover, the destruction of Apokolips had rendered many of its contingency plans useless. Otherwise, both Darkseid and his forces would have had numerous trump cards to play.
Take, for example, the Mother Boxes, which had merged and nearly wiped out the Avengers, forcing Barry Allen to use the Speed Force to reverse time and change everything. These were terrifying entities that the Avengers would have struggled to deal with.
Just because the Mother Boxes from Darkseid's failed invasion of Earth thousands of years ago had been left behind didn't mean Apokolips no longer possessed them.
The way the Parademons had opened spatial portals earlier showed that their technology was derived from the same source as the Mother Boxes.
In fact, if the Mother Boxes still existed and were under Apokolips' control, not only would the mech army be at risk of being hijacked, but Victor Stone's abilities—which originated from the Mother Boxes—could also be compromised.
Fortunately, Apokolips had been destroyed by Robert, and with it, the Apokolips network had nearly collapsed. While controlling the Parademons was still possible, achieving anything more was out of the question.
But even with Apokolips weakened so many times, the Avengers still felt immense pressure. The desperate Parademons and Darkseid's forces were incredibly difficult to deal with, and the number of mechs continued to dwindle as the Avengers sustained more injuries.
"What's there to fear? We've been through desperate situations before. They're battle-hardened and unafraid of death, and so are we!" Steve Rogers' impassioned voice rang out in the comms, injecting a surge of morale into the team.
His words were like a shot of adrenaline, reigniting the Avengers' fighting spirit.
Yes, from the start of the battle until now, the Avengers had held the upper hand, killing countless enemies. Were they really going to falter just because the enemy was fighting desperately? It almost seemed as if the enemy had the advantage!
"Boom!"
Sentry, feeling the power of Steve's words for the first time, felt as if a fire was about to explode within him. With a single punch, he obliterated the body of Kant, who had already been on the verge of collapse and from whom Sentry had learned countless combat techniques. Kant's desperate counterattack had no effect.
However, Kant's death only made Darkseid's forces even more frenzied. They were determined not to die alone—they would drag someone down with them!
"It seems it's time for me to step in. I'll help the Avengers divide the battlefield, making it easier for them to take down Darkseid's forces. Then I'll inform Robert of the situation, giving Darkseid a chance to escape," Ancient One murmured, her eyes flickering with determination.
"Whoosh!" In the next moment, the blue and green light of the Space and Time Stones enveloped the entire star system, intertwining with Ancient One's mystical magic to instantly split the battlefield into smaller, more manageable sections.
"Huh?" The sudden change caught Darkseid's forces off guard, but the Avengers were prepared, as Ancient One had warned them beforehand.
The spatial division of the battlefield wasn't the most critical part. What truly mattered was that, with Ancient One's intervention, the Parademons' attacks began to miss their targets—whether Avengers or mechs.
The Space Stone and spatial magic continuously shifted, redirecting the Parademons' attacks onto their own ranks.
This move struck at the Parademons' weakness. The mindless Parademons, following their programming, continued to attack, only to end up killing their own comrades.
In fact, from this point on, the Parademons became the ones who killed the most of their own kind, instantly relieving the pressure on the Avengers and allowing them to focus on dealing with Darkseid's remaining forces.
However, in this situation, Darkseid's forces launched their desperate counterattacks, leading to the anomaly Robert had sensed earlier.
"Die!" On the battlefield, Harry Osborn excitedly unleashed a bolt of divine lightning, striking an enemy and obliterating their body.
This was Harry's first large-scale battle after gaining the power of Shazam, and it was also the first enemy he had killed in this fight.
Of course, Harry hadn't taken down this enemy alone. The enemy's strength had been drained by Venom, and most of their injuries had been inflicted by Peter Parker.
In other words, this enemy had been left for Harry to practice on, giving him a taste of what a real supernatural battle was like.
But neither Harry nor Peter had expected that such a one-sided fight would take a sudden turn.
When the enemy's body was obliterated by Harry's lightning, two different-colored gases erupted from the explosion. The white gas caused nearby Parademons to fall into a deep sleep, while the gray-black gas instantly killed a group of Parademons.
Under the enemy's control, these two gases enveloped Harry, immediately putting him into a deep sleep and causing his life force to weaken rapidly.
If it weren't for the divine protection granted by the Shazam power, Harry would have already died.
But even with the gods' protection, Harry's condition was critical. The death gas seemed to be breaking through the divine barrier.
If the divine protection dissipated, Harry's body—which was only slightly stronger than that of a super-soldier—wouldn't be able to withstand the death gas.
Fortunately, Robert had keenly sensed the change, especially when he noticed that Darkseid's forces were nearly wiped out. He felt that this might indeed be the opportunity he had been waiting for…
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