Thor had plenty of flaws, but at least one thing about him was admirable: he valued family above all else.
His deepest bond was with Loki... the same brother who had tricked and undermined him countless times over the years.
Thor looked down at the enhanced mutated creature Adam was pinning, which had already been implanted. He was clearly trying to observe its reaction and predict what would happen to him after the facehugger took hold.
The fact that he was even considering it meant he had already made his choice.
In the past, the proud and arrogant Thor would never have accepted such power. The hot-tempered god would have grabbed his hammer and tried to kill Adam on the spot, seeing it as an insult.
But things were different now. His terrible personality hadn't improved, and as a powerless mortal, he was forced to watch his brother fight for his life while he could do nothing. That arrogance and pride were eating away at what little self-respect he had left, like a swarm of hungry insects.
"Don't hesitate. You're a great warrior... you know rare opportunities when you see them. Your brother is facing so many powerful enemies right now. Look at them. The Eternals have a massive grudge against Asgard, and the cosmic gods behind them are probably watching this very moment. Kaecilius has been trying to kill your brother, and don't even get me started on Magneto." Adam's voice was calm and persuasive.
Every word he said was reasonable on its own. Put together, they painted a much darker picture.
The Abomination Xenomorph and the rest of the swarm formed a protective ring around Adam and Thor, blocking any stray energy waves trying to get close.
They were almost there.
"I don't understand what you're hesitating for," Adam continued quietly. "Without power, you'll lose everything... including your beloved brother. With power, you can survive this crisis, reclaim Mjolnir, and have all the time in the world to lift it again. Have you forgotten honor? Is your dignity worth so little?"
It was a killing blow.
For Thor, honor and dignity were more important than life itself. That was his creed, and the creed of every Asgardian.
"Mortal, if this were any other time, I would already have smashed your mouth with Mjolnir!" Thor's eyes flashed with burning shame and helpless fury. He extended his hand, allowing the facehugger to crawl onto his palm.
"But right now, I'm the only one willing to help you, aren't I? Don't think of this as coercion. When it comes to a bright future and protecting your family, I'm the reliable ally standing at your side." Adam said.
"If I weren't certain you were from Midgard, I would think you came from Hel... a devil very skilled at making deals."
Thor let the facehugger latch onto his face.
He was hot-tempered, not stupid. Of course he knew Adam wanted something from him.
But Thor didn't care anymore. All he knew was that if he didn't stand beside Loki and do something, the frustration would drive him to suicide.
Of course, once the battle ended and Loki was safe, Thor had already resolved to die... either by his own hand or by challenging Adam to preserve what little honor and dignity he had left.
Adam roughly understood Thor's thoughts. He watched as the god of thunder slipped into unconsciousness amid his inner turmoil.
"What have you done, you damned mortal?!"
Loki suddenly glanced in their direction, his eyes nearly splitting with rage as he roared in fury.
"He's not dead. Don't get so worked up. Why would I harm Odin's son?" Adam's expression shifted slightly. He looked down at the enhanced mutated creature he had implanted earlier.
Then Loki witnessed a horrifying scene: the creature on the ground convulsed violently. A Xenomorph burst from its chest in a spray of blood and flesh.
As for the host, its life force faded rapidly in Loki's senses until it died.
For a split second, Loki was stunned. Was he about to watch his brother suffer the same fate... convulsing and dying?
Loki's eyes turned bloodshot. Everything else was forgotten. His divine power surged wildly as he prepared devastating spells.
BOOM!
The overwhelming force collided with the magnetic field, creating countless storms of lightning and thunder that shot from the ground into the atmosphere, churning billions of clouds and triggering disasters across the land.
Loki soared high, trying to reach Adam.
"At this moment, you look more like a god than ever. But don't worry... he won't die. He isn't my target."
Adam watched the enraged Loki approach, then turned with his Xenomorphs and struck decisively. But his target wasn't Loki.
It was Thor!
"The implantation succeeded. The new Xenomorph is already forming in Thor's chest... I can feel it clearly. But controlling Thor was never my goal. Odin is probably watching too, and he wouldn't allow it."
A flicker of intense excitement flashed in Adam's eyes.
He was normally a very composed person, rarely showing strong emotion. But at this moment, he couldn't help it.
Yes. The real reason he had rushed here from New York wasn't to control Thor himself... it was for the divine power!
His goal, the Xenomorph ascension plan, had never changed.
The simplest and most brutal method was to obtain divine power. Across the universe, gods of all sizes were common, and some ancient technological civilizations had even created their own pantheons.
Divine power was both precious and cheap.
What could be more cost-effective than using Thor... a being who had lost his powers but still carried the blood of the gods?
Adam reached out and performed a brutal open-chest "surgery" on the unconscious Thor, who would soon wake up.
Squelch!
Thor's chest was violently torn open in an instant, blood and flesh spraying everywhere.
The insane act drew every eye. This was Odin's son, freshly implanted. Was Adam really going to kill him?
Ajak's face turned ashen. "What is he trying to do? Implant Thor and then kill him? All of Earth will have to face Asgard's… huh?"
The moment Loki completely lost control, right in front of everyone, Adam used his other hand to slash open his own chest with brutal precision. In the bloody mess, he dug out an undeveloped Xenomorph larva about the size of a palm!
The ruthless self-mutilation made everyone's skin crawl.
Even the screaming Loki paused for a moment.
"Ruthless," Magneto muttered, glancing over while fighting multiple opponents. A hint of approval crossed his face.
But none of them understood what Adam was trying to accomplish with this mad self-harm.
"Could it be…" Ajak realized something, her face filled with shock.
Before exiling Ikaris, she had spoken with him and learned how the Abomination Xenomorph had burst from its host and devoured the corpse to grow rapidly.
What if you removed the Xenomorph before it could burst out? Many people had speculated about it in secret. Of course Ajak had considered it too.
Now she was seeing it with her own eyes.
"He had one inside his own body… and now he's taking the one from Thor…" Ajak found it almost unbelievable.
In that moment, the fiercely battling figures all turned their attention. They watched as Adam took the larva he had extracted from Thor and shoved it into his own chest.
"???"
What kind of move was that??
No... how was something like this even possible???
It defied all logic!
Every person present was a powerhouse capable of shaking an entire planet. They were all brilliant and experienced, yet this was the first time any of them had seen anything like it. Their understanding of reality felt like it was shattering.
Magneto was the first to catch on. He had been in contact with Raven, so he knew the most about Xenomorph biology. He understood that larvae could be used without chestbursters to enhance the host, eventually forming a strange symbiotic relationship.
"So this is what you really wanted. No wonder you invited me a second time in such a terrible way."
Magneto's voice carried across the roaring battlefield, amplified by his magnetic field.
From the moment Raven informed him, he had come to the battlefield, seized Mjolnir, and gone all out…
"I didn't expect things to go this far. The mutated creatures were a complete exception. I still don't know why they appeared here. At most, I predicted the Eternals would move for Thor."
Adam's face had been pale, but the moment he implanted the larva from Thor into his own chest, color flooded back at a visible rate, restoring a healthy glow.
The massive wound he had torn in his own chest sizzled with white smoke as it rapidly healed.
Everyone finally understood. Adam had traveled all this way, taken enormous risks, and done all of this just to transfer the larva that had implanted in the God of Thunder into his own body?
But why…?
Adam took a deep breath, carefully sensing the new power surging within him.
Previously, the Xenomorph larva inside him had been excellent, but it couldn't give him a true leap in power level.
Now, using the larva as a "converter," he directly harnessed the power carried in Thor's genes.
Parasitism without chestbursting already allowed the host to use the genetic abilities of the Xenomorph inside them.
But Adam had taken it a step further... he treated the implanted larva that granted immense power as interchangeable "equipment"!
The results proved he was right.
A steady torrent of power surged through Adam's body. The larva in his chest acted like a reactor, violently pumping energy into him with every breath.
This was the genetic power of a direct descendant of Odin, the All-Father and King of Asgard... even if only a portion.
"Strong… but not enough! This level alone wasn't worth the risk!" Adam suddenly looked up, meeting the shocked gazes around him.
Everywhere he looked, powerful figures stood amid a landscape they had flattened.
In less than ten minutes, these beings had created destruction on par with a super-disaster.
And this was clearly only the beginning. If they truly cut loose, the entire planet would suffer heavy damage.
Terrifying waves of energy slammed chaotically against each other, enough to reduce ordinary people to nothing.
Kaecilius swore this was the most chaotic battle he had ever joined. Everyone in sight was an enemy.
Yet he remained fixated on the Queen.
"Xenomorphs…" Kaecilius looked moved. He finally understood why even Dormammu had taken such interest in these creatures.
When had it started? Kaecilius remembered... it seemed to be after Adam implanted one into a dark sorcerer, drawing Dormammu's attention.
The uses for Xenomorphs were endless. Even someone like Kaecilius, who dabbled in all kinds of dark magic, had never imagined they could be used this way. His eyes had been opened.
Kaecilius immediately raised his hand toward the Queen, attempting to cast a mirror dimension spell to seize her.
Once inside the mirror dimension, the Queen would be his!
BOOM!
His spell was interrupted almost immediately, the prismatic construct shattering.
"Damn it. It's too chaotic here... severely disrupting spatial stability." Kaecilius frowned.
The next second, Mjolnir smashed toward him.
Magneto was growing more and more comfortable with the hammer. His cold gaze turned this way. These damned intruders attacking his magnetic field without warning was the ultimate provocation.
"You think you can do whatever you want on my turf? Who do you think you are?!" Magneto's anger was genuine now.
Kaecilius dodged sideways, narrowly avoiding the hammer, and sneered. "This is our first meeting, but it had better be the last. If I didn't have more important things to do, I could end you right now."
"Perfect. That's exactly what I want. Come on!" Magneto replied, bathed in raging magnetic energy.
At the same time, Loki had used countless magical particles to forcibly twist the magnetic field, closing to a dangerously close distance from Adam. At this range, Loki could bombard him with powerful divine magic.
A deep madness burned in Loki's eyes. The sight of Thor twitching on the ground had turned them crimson.
In his view, this mortal who commanded strange creatures had to die by his hand... simply for reducing Thor to such a miserable state.
For over a thousand years, Loki had known Thor. When had he ever seen him like this? To preserve his image as the older brother and fight alongside him, Thor had lowered himself to beg power from a mere mortal.
That was the greatest humiliation possible for Thor. Loki had originally found it amusing to see his brother suffer such shame, but he refused to let Thor die like this!
"Mortal, you will pay with your life for what you've done! No one dares to humiliate the gods like this!!"
"Is that so? I don't think so."
Adam stood among his Xenomorphs. He glanced at Thor, who was half-dead on the ground, confirming the god wouldn't die anytime soon. A satisfied look crossed his face. Then he raised his head and stared at Loki, who had forced his way through the magnetic field.
He had implanted Thor, swapped the larva, and claimed the bloodline of the God-King. One of the main goals of his trip had been achieved. The key to the future was firmly in his grasp.
Since things had already gone this far, he might as well do even more. A fight with Loki wasn't out of the question.
Mjolnir, which Kaecilius had dodged, continued flying forward. Under Magneto's powerful control, it should have slowed and flown back to smash Kaecilius again.
At that moment, Adam moved. From over a hundred meters away, he reached out toward the hammer with an open hand.
^^^
If you'd like to read up to 50 chapters ahead, feel free to visit our patron: pat reon . com/XElenea