"Merlin."
Upon hearing that the news was from Merlin, Selene stopped organizing and compiling the data at hand. She looked toward Esdeath, who was responsible for Servant field operations, and signaled her to continue with her eyes.
"The bad news is that after we left, Earth suffered another attack from extraterrestrial invaders," the Ice General replied. "Overall, the scale of the losses wasn't large. But our space pirate friends? That's another story... This is the battle report from the invasion."
The Guardians of the Galaxy ran into trouble?
Thoughtful, Selene tapped the console lightly. Energy tendrils linked into the terminal as she rapidly downloaded the data. About half a minute later, she raised her head and lightly tapped the table with her dulled claw.
"The Chitauri launched a second invasion of Earth. They did not attack major economic centers like New York, nor political hubs like Washington. They ignored our recruitment station sites still under construction. Instead, they carried out a precise decapitation strike on a small city in Missouri."
Selene turned her gaze toward the projection device. A curtain of light ignited, pale blue grids spreading rapidly, interweaving, shaping, coloring—then within seconds transmitting and projecting the image of a city after catastrophe.
A massive alien mothership occupied nearly half the sky in the projected scene.
Though far inferior in quality to the warships of Master Chief's 117th Fleet, the difference was negligible—both were beyond Earth's current military capacity to handle.
The once peaceful ease of that third-tier city was shattered. From the enormous aperture opening at the bottom of the Chitauri mothership, Chitauri clad in rust-colored armor poured out, riding small craft and hovering bikes. Like ants swarming from a nest, they rapidly dispersed in all directions across the city.
And unlike Master Chief John, they had no intention of reasoning. Just like their previous landing in New York, the moment the Chitauri touched down, they began destroying the city. Powerful energy beams punched through skyscrapers, the towering buildings collapsing one after another like dominoes.
Dust filled the air. On streets littered with rubble and shattered glass, cars and pedestrians screamed and fled in all directions. Selene pressed pause and zoomed in on a group of men and women beneath the sign of a Michelin-starred restaurant.
"Gamora."
Selene pointed to the conspicuous red-haired, green-skinned woman in the crowd.
Oh—and beside that interstellar mercenary in casual Earth attire, the slightly broad-shouldered white man—wasn't that Star-Lord, Peter Quill?
So they were on their honeymoon. And clearly, it had gone horribly wrong.
"Superheroes, anti-heroes... not such easy roles to play." Selene smiled faintly, tapping the console as she flipped through the images—
A couple crushed beneath collapsed debris. Lovers thrown apart by an explosion. A father kneeling before the body of his son, pierced by stray Chitauri laser fire. A woman covered in wounds, weeping beside her dying husband. Children wailing after losing their parents...
For a modest, unremarkable Midwestern American city with no iconic landmarks and little fame, crises that struck metropolises like New York, Los Angeles, or Washington should have been distant things—irrelevant to it.
But Star-Lord had returned.
And he had brought back his well-connected alien girlfriend.
"Retirement? Heroes don't retire. They can only move forward. Take one step back and disaster will fall upon those around you. Washing your hands of it all is nothing but wishful thinking. Your enemies, the supervillains who have marked you—they won't be so considerate. Stability? That was never a word meant for your Marvel heroes."
Selene shut off the projection.
"What about Saitama?"
"He didn't move. At least not at first."
Esdeath shook her head. "As the intermediary liaising with the American government, Merlin conveyed their meaning. The White House and the Pentagon tactfully expressed their wish for us not to interfere in their internal affairs. According to the terms negotiated by Master Chief—tax source territory, not a vassal state—they retain diplomatic autonomy."
"Then Merlin intercepted Saitama, who had just returned from the Dark Dimension of the inner world and was preparing to carry out justice."
At that, Selene let out a silent, mocking laugh. "Let them keep at it."
Setting aside Merlin's trickster mentality, as a nightmare entity he could easily sense the malice of the incoming Chitauri as soon as they entered the solar system. But he chose not to say a word.
After all, it was America that claimed to represent Earth and requested that they refrain from intervention. So he truly left the small contingent of Divine Empress Order troops stationed on Earth unmoving, and even hurried to Kamar-Taj to stop Saitama from acting.
Upon hearing that it was the Earth authorities' own decision, Saitama naturally stood down and was dragged back by the Ancient One to the library for further study and reflection.
America's intentions were not hard to guess. They had grown used to reaping benefits and developed a skewed perception, while harboring a few private calculations. They wanted a degree of negotiation and cooperation with the Chitauri, unwilling to let the Divine Empress Order dominate Earth alone.
Balancing powers, creating constraints—perfectly reasonable. Standard practice for seasoned politicians.
Out of fear of the Divine Empress Order's military might, America's actions were cautious and conservative. Their rhetoric painted them as peace-loving, reluctant to fight, contacting the Chitauri to resolve disputes and avoid conflict.
And then... there was no then.
The Chitauri did not listen.
Seizing the opportunity, they brazenly invaded Earth's atmosphere and attacked Missouri. Not just that third-tier city—fond as they were of indiscriminate bombardment, blasting anything in sight, even a dog on the street would earn a shot—the Chitauri left devastation across multiple states.
It was a resounding slap to humanity's assumption that with the arrival of Master Chief's "Divine Empress Order," the universe was largely populated by civilized beings.
A slap so hard it left dents.
"This is a good thing. Saves them from indulging in unnecessary fantasies."
Selene had no intention of dwelling on the matter. Her delicate lips curved into a faint smile. Then, as if recalling something, she suppressed it and asked, "Did Saitama stop the Chitauri?"
"He did, but he deployed too late. The Guardians of the Galaxy's combatant Gamora has already been captured..."
"That's good."
"...Caught in a crowded urban area, their vigilance was low. Star-Lord and the others were also seriously injured... Huh?"
Startled at first, Esdeath looked at the faintly smiling expression beneath Selene's scaled arcane markings and asked, "Is Gamora special?"
"Mm. She possesses the entirety of a cosmic emperor's love," Selene said with certainty. "Her death will be exchanged for one of the universe's original singularities."
Gamora—Thanos' adopted daughter, known as the "most dangerous woman in the universe"—being captured did not surprise Selene in the slightest. Her skills were decent, but still far from deserving the title of 'most.'
But considering Gamora's background and what she had done to earn that title, it all made perfect sense.
Tell me—were those organizations across the universe flattering you out of respect for the "Mad Titan," unwilling to provoke the number one terrorist in the cosmos?
"I understand."
Esdeath nodded, grasping the implication. She would not leak their intentions. This was an accident that happened on Earth. It had nothing to do with them. They knew nothing.
"Well then. Go on. What's the good news?"
Selene withdrew her gaze from the screen, tidied her materials—the data codes issued by the Kree and the proof of commission—then rose and shifted the projection aside.
"A suitable garrison star system," Esdeath said.
"The coordinates were obtained after I annihilated a fleeing Skrull fleet. A royal—though from a collateral branch ranked somewhere in the thousands in the line of succession. In defeat and retreat, he had clearly selected a new homeland in advance. A system not publicly registered in the cosmos, located on the frontier between the Milky Way and the Andromeda Galaxy."
"Send the coordinates to Master Chief."
"Understood." Esdeath nodded and continued, "Also, Your Majesty, the monitoring results for the 'Sentinel Program' you instructed us to track have come in."
"Report."
"Without alerting them, without intervention, without exposure—Merlin and the tactical units stationed on Earth have uncovered remnants of the 'Sentinel Program,' consolidated from Canada's 'K Department' and surviving personnel from America's 'Rebirth Program'—the project that produced Captain America."
To be honest, Esdeath did not understand Selene's purpose. The so-called attempt to recreate the Super Soldier Serum—its only successful subject, Captain America, would likely struggle to defeat even an ordinary soldier from the 117th Fleet.
Was it for the theoretical target of amplifying the Super Soldier Serum ten thousandfold under the Sentinel Program?
But nearly half a century had passed. According to reconnaissance reports, the Sentinel Program had long since been split into multiple sub-projects, its lineage unclear, its structure chaotic. Paper archives from that era were severely lost. Some experimental data had vanished entirely. Many researchers were already dead. Numerous laboratories had even been outsourced to private contractors.
"Strictly speaking, this shouldn't count as good news. It's a mess," Esdeath concluded.
"It is a mess."
If she did not know the full context, Selene would never have given the order in the first place.
Because at first glance, truly—from its inception to its cancellation, the Sentinel Program was an unmitigated disaster. It felt like a budget scam. And a particularly clumsy one at that.
"Do we act? If we continue not to intervene, according to reports from the tax territory garrison, one of the laboratories we are monitoring—an old Sentinel Program site—appears to have drawn the attention of a group of street junkies and petty thugs."
Esdeath spread her hands and made a slicing gesture across her throat. "They've been staking it out for a day. They may very well risk breaking in to steal or destroy the lab's data... Shall we eliminate them?"
"No. Continue surveillance. Have Merlin personally monitor it..." Selene considered briefly, then added, "On second thought, I'll handle it myself." She began walking toward the door.
"Insert a new stop into the itinerary. After all, one of those junkies will become the strongest human hero of the future."
Emphasizing her words, Selene glanced back with a smile, as though all the starlight in the universe shimmered within her eyes. Only Esdeath instinctively showed a trace of apprehension.
Because she recognized that look.
It was the voracious hunger of a predator about to feed.
...
"Gamora..."
In North America, amid the ruins of a small Missouri city that had briefly become an alien battlefield, Star-Lord Peter Quill sat slumped among gravel and shattered debris, his expression dazed. His vacation had barely begun before it ended.
Beside him, a brand-new record player played soft music, oblivious to the fact that the couple who had purchased it together were now separated.
The entire city had become rubble. Houses and trees burned to ash were everywhere.
Skyscrapers had been sheared and left leaning at grotesque angles. The air carried the sting of scorched ruin. Acrid smoke choked the lungs. Ash drifted down, turning the city gray and somber—just like the tragedy that had unfolded here.
"Hey, Quill."
Rocket Raccoon stood nearby, looking worriedly at Star-Lord, who ignored his injuries and simply sat there. His casual T-shirt now looked like a shredded rag, strips of fabric fused to flesh by high heat, forming horrifying scars.
"Quill, we've moved the old man to a farm further out in the suburbs. Pull yourself together," Mantis said anxiously.
"See? I told you, if we'd all come along, it would've been better. But no, you insisted on your little world for two..." Drax the Destroyer stood with his hands hooked in his waistband. His blunt face carried what he clearly thought was a comforting expression—but the moment he opened his mouth, the others clamped a hand over it.
"Drax, shut up. When you're getting intimate with your wife, do you want a third wheel standing there?"
"If it's you guys, I don't mind..."
"Shut up!" This time it was Mantis.
"I am Groot..." The small tree-being sensed Star-Lord's grief. For the first time since arriving on Earth, he set aside his handheld game console and gently stroked Star-Lord's hand with his vine-like fingers. "...I am Groot."
"Groot, are you saying we should go rescue Gamora?" Star-Lord lifted bloodshot eyes, a flicker of understanding passing between them.
"I am Groot!" The little tree nodded vigorously.
"Yeah?" Star-Lord looked around. The streets were chaos in the aftermath of disaster. Sirens, cries for help, sobbing, hurried footsteps—all intertwined. Chitauri corpses lay scattered across the ground alongside wrecked vehicles and the remains of half-mechanical, half-biological Leviathan craft.
He remembered Gamora's vigilance. Yes—he had grown complacent.
"Guardians of the Galaxy?"
The voice sounded almost casual, as if greeting someone at a party.
Star-Lord followed the sound and saw a Divine Empress Order officer walking toward him, waving.
Centered around the Order's garrison officer in Missouri, first-response units—including city police, county sheriffs, state troopers, and the National Guard—had gathered nearby.
"Please accept our condolences," the officer said as he approached. "If possible, we require a detailed account of the events leading up to your engagement with the Chitauri."
"You... didn't you promise to protect Earth?"
Rising to his feet, Star-Lord spoke in a low, heavy voice.
"Earth is declared a tax-protected territory under your authority. So why? Why were those bastards able to enter so easily and attack us?!"
"That was a matter of Earth's own negotiations, involving diplomatic autonomy."
The officer frowned slightly, displeased by Star-Lord's tone. But remembering the Guardians' good relationship with them—and recognizing that he was grieving—he answered patiently.
"North American authorities intended to pursue peaceful dialogue with the Chitauri. When negotiations collapsed and the Chitauri began widespread destruction, we responded immediately upon the treaty's activation."
"To hell with peace! Negotiations! Fuck you—"
Fortunately, Mantis reacted swiftly. She reached out and brushed her hand over the enraged Star-Lord's head, easing him into sudden sleep.
Rocket bared his teeth in an awkward grin. "Cut him some slack. His girl just got taken. He's not exactly calm right now."
"You. Give the statement."
Taking a deep breath, the officer gestured for Rocket to provide the local authorities with the necessary information. Then he looked toward Mantis.
"Come with me. Lord Merlin and Mr. Saitama wish to speak with you."
—
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