No wonder that armor belonged to Odin, the King of the Gods—it was absurdly tough.
Watching the Destroyer rise from the rubble once again, Darren couldn't help but whistle in grudging admiration. The plasma railgun mounted on BT was powerful enough to obliterate a monster like Abomination. Yet even after two direct hits, the Destroyer had done little more than scuff its own paint. That kind of defense was just... ridiculous.
Meanwhile, far away in Asgard, Loki's eyes narrowed. Through the Destroyer's senses, he could see who was piloting that strange machine—a human named Darren. Fury flared in his chest at once.
He hadn't forgotten the humiliation that man had dealt him.
In his entire life, only Thor had ever bested him in combat—but even Thor had never beaten him half as badly as that mortal had. Not his father, not his mother—no one had ever dared to hit Loki Odinson like that.
And now that same human dared to challenge him again?
Loki's teeth clenched. This will be the last time anyone ever lays a hand on me. Not Thor. Not anyone.
"Kill him!" Loki hissed.
The command shot through the Bifrost's magic and straight into the Destroyer. The massive suit of armor jolted upright, its head snapping toward BT's position. The glow in its core flared violently.
BOOM—!
A blinding beam of energy screamed across the sky, slicing the air apart as it blasted toward BT.
Darren reacted instantly, jerking the controls. BT rolled hard to the side, the plasma cannon folding back into its mount as the engines roared. The mech circled in a wide arc, closing the distance at breakneck speed.
BT leapt high, towering shadow blotting out the sun, and brought its colossal metal fist crashing down on the Destroyer's head.
CLANG!!
The sound of metal on metal echoed like thunder. The Destroyer's head twisted sideways under the impact, its beam shooting wildly off course and vaporizing half the street instead.
Darren didn't waste the moment. BT drew the Titan greatsword and rammed it straight into the seam of the Destroyer's armor, pinning it in place. Then the mech's fists came down like hammers, pounding the armor over and over.
But even BT's blows, each one strong enough to shatter concrete, barely made a dent. The strikes thudded uselessly against the god-forged plating.
With a grinding roar, the Destroyer's armor shifted. The sword embedded in its body was forced out by sheer pressure. Its massive arm swung up in retaliation and smashed directly into BT's torso.
"Shields up!" BT's synthesized voice boomed.
In an instant, a field of shimmering blue energy enveloped the mech. The Destroyer's punch slammed into it, rippling the shield but failing to break through.
Then came the second strike. The Destroyer's head split open again, the energy within charging to blinding intensity before discharging point-blank.
BOOM!
The explosion of light and force shook the battlefield.
"Warning—shield integrity down twelve percent," BT reported calmly.
Darren gritted his teeth, forcing BT to shove the Destroyer's head upward, redirecting the beam skyward. "This isn't gonna hold," he muttered. "BT's power reserves won't last through a slugfest. I need something stronger... something divine."
Then, his eyes lit up.
"I think I've got just the thing."
The cockpit hissed open. Darren vaulted out, landing hard on the cracked asphalt. In his hand gleamed a strange metallic object pulsing with magnetic energy.
[Item: High-Power Magnet — can attract any metal object within 50 kilometers, up to one meter in size]
A little gift from the system—the reward he'd earned for helping Thor recover Mjolnir.
Darren raised the magnet toward the sky. A sharp, whistling roar tore through the air a second later.
A streak of silver light cut across the horizon—
—and slammed into the magnet with a deep metallic clang.
A hammer. Short-handled. Engraved with runes. Glowing faintly with divine lightning.
"Mjolnir!" Thor gasped, eyes wide with disbelief.
He wasn't wrong. Darren had just summoned the hammer of the God of Thunder itself.
Of course, the moment it arrived, it nearly ripped the magnet out of his hand. The hammer smashed into the ground, carving a crater where it landed.
"You can't lift it!" Thor shouted. "No one can lift Mjolnir except me!"
Darren smirked. "Who said anything about people lifting it?"
Thor blinked. "What?"
Before he could finish, the Destroyer tore itself free of BT's grip, its core flaring with deadly light once more. The beam locked onto Darren.
And then—
BOOM!!
The earth shook. The Destroyer's massive body flew backward through the air, crashing down in a cloud of dust and sparks.
Everyone turned in stunned silence.
BT stood there, one massive arm raised high—gripping Mjolnir in its mechanical hand.
For a moment, the world went still.
"By Odin's beard..." Thor whispered, utterly dumbfounded.
That was the nature of the hammer's enchantment: no living being could lift it, but machines, cranes, hooks—those weren't bound by Odin's magic. They weren't "alive."
Darren had pieced that together from a casual conversation with Thor days ago. And now, it had paid off brilliantly.
Sometimes, the best way to win wasn't to fight harder—it was to exploit the system's bugs until they became features.
Inside BT's systems, Darren grinned. "There it is—the ultimate gaming exploit turned divine strategy."
Now, in BT's hand, Mjolnir looked less like a relic of the gods and more like an oversized hammer waiting to deliver cosmic justice.
BT raised it high, voice booming through its speakers:
"I am Thor, the mighty God of Thunder, son of Odin—FOR THE GLORY OF THE NORTHERN GODS!"
Thor: "..."
Loki: "..."
Everyone else: "..."
Thor's face turned green. He turned toward Darren, betrayed.
Darren held up both hands innocently. "Hey, don't look at me. That was all him."
Bullshit, Thor thought. The lines, the tone—it was word-for-word what he used to shout before battle. There was no way that wasn't Darren's doing.
But before he could protest, BT moved.
The mech lunged forward, Mjolnir raised. The Destroyer's chest began to glow again—but BT gave it no time to react.
CLANG!
The hammer came down like divine retribution, smashing the armor flat against the ground.
BT pressed one heavy foot down on the Destroyer's chest to hold it in place, then lifted Mjolnir again.
CLANG. CLANG. CLANG. CLANG—!
Each blow echoed like rolling thunder across the desert town. Sparks and flames erupted with every strike.
Watching his beloved hammer being used like a carpenter's tool, Thor could only clutch his hair in anguish.
"That's my Mjolnir!" he howled. "Not a bloody sledgehammer!"
But BT didn't stop. The rhythm of its strikes was relentless, divine, merciless—like the wrath of a god reborn in steel.
And above it all, Darren's voice rang clear through the comms, smug and victorious:
"For Asgard... and for bug abuse done right."