After Zane stepped through the portal and saw Thanos, he immediately enlarged himself to match Thanos' size. He didn't want to be looking up at anyone while talking.
"Hey, Purple Brinjal, I guess this is our first official meeting, right?"
"Relax, don't be so tense."
Zane glanced at Thanos, who was fully on guard, seemingly ready to strike at any moment, and spoke casually.
If it weren't for the coldness deep in his eyes, this scene could almost look like two old friends reuniting.
But right now, there was no way Thanos could relax—he was practically about to cry.
They had already clashed from a distance when Zane took the scepter from Loki. At that time, Zane hadn't yet ascended to become a mid-level god; he was still a five-dimensional being. Thanos had been confident in standing against Zane and competing for the Infinity Stones.
But now Zane had ascended to the sixth dimension. And remembering how the Collector and Grandmaster had said they couldn't take Zane down even together, Thanos' legs were trembling.
He wished he hadn't been so arrogant. It would've been so much better to just take the Infinity Gauntlet and quietly disappear, instead of wiping out the Dwarves.
Thanos clearly felt regret now. He regretted it so much his insides were turning green.
"Lord Zane, long time no see." Thanos forced an awkward smile onto his deeply wrinkled face, making him look especially ridiculous.
"Not that long, really. We just saw each other in the arena a few days ago," Zane said with a smile.
"Uh..." Thanos was left speechless.
The next moment, a glint of coldness flashed in Zane's eyes.
"By the way, I never got the chance to thank you for delivering the Mind Stone to me last time."
Seeing the extreme coldness in Zane's gaze, the hairs on Thanos' body stood on end. He quickly responded:
"No need, really, no need! Lord Zane, if there's nothing else, I'll just be on my way."
With that, Thanos moved to walk past Zane and leave the Dwarven realm.
But Zane let out a cold laugh, and suddenly the Reaper's Scythe was at Thanos' shoulder.
The sharp blade instantly cut through Thanos' skin, and a dark red line of blood flowed along the scythe's edge to the ground, splattering drops of blood.
"Why the rush? My gifts never go undelivered," Zane said lightly, looking at the now-rigid Thanos.
The indifference in his voice made the Dwarf King Eitri, who had just started to catch his breath, hold it again. He stood silently to the side, not daring to make a sound.
Thanos, meanwhile, stared at the gleaming scythe at his neck in fear. If he had taken even half a step further, his head might have already been separated from his body.
Taking a deep breath, Thanos tensed his muscles and carefully turned to face Zane.
"Lord Zane, whatever gift you want to give me, I'll gladly accept. No need to use weapons."
By now, the smile had vanished from Thanos' face. He realized Zane didn't plan to let him go.
Since that was the case, why continue to beg? Might as well fight!
"Alright then, let me grant you the gift of eternal death!"
As soon as Zane finished speaking, the Reaper's Scythe resting on Thanos' shoulder instantly pulled back, slashing straight toward Thanos' thick neck with unstoppable force.
At the critical moment, Thanos, who had long been prepared, quickly raised his left hand, wearing the Infinity Gauntlet, to block the scythe's blade. He didn't care about the deep gash the Reaper's Scythe had made in his newly acquired weapon.
Summoning all his strength, Thanos clenched his right fist and swung it fiercely at Zane's temple. He knew all too well that, against Zane, who had reached a whole new level, this was his only chance. If he missed it, death was the only outcome.
As the punch, so powerful it threatened to tear through space, came hurtling toward him, a mocking smile suddenly appeared on Zane's face.
"Pointless resistance. Why not just let me crush you?"
With that, Zane's god core spun rapidly from deep within his soul, and waves of deathly power, infused with the laws of death, surged out. Gray halos formed around his body, and in the next instant, they wrapped around Thanos' iron fist, engulfing it.
Like a virus, the gray halos quickly spread over Thanos' entire body, wrapping him up like a giant cocoon. Through the gray veil, the tall figure inside could still be seen, frozen in a punching stance.
A moment later, all the gray shrouds covering Thanos suddenly seeped into his body, leaving his form once again exposed to Zane.
But now, Thanos' iconic purple skin had turned to a lifeless ash-gray. The right fist that had once held unimaginable power was now suspended in the air, completely devoid of any energy.
"I..."
Thanos opened his mouth, trying to say something, but even that small movement seemed to disrupt his body, which had been soaked in the power of death.
In an instant, Thanos disintegrated like a pile of sand blown away by the wind, disappearing completely from the universe.
The Mad Titan, once hailed as the ruler of the cosmos, died without a sound, leaving behind no final words. The only trace of his existence was the corroded Infinity Gauntlet that fell to the ground with a few crisp clinks, marking that he had once been there.
There had been no intense battle. Thanos, who was still at the early stages of five-dimensional existence, was no different from an ordinary human on Earth when faced with the six-dimensional Zane—both could be crushed with a mere flick of the wrist.
Zane looked at Thanos, easily erased by his power, and a complicated emotion flickered in his eyes. A strange sense of detachment washed over him.
Back when he first arrived in the Marvel universe, this Mad Titan's snap had been his greatest fear. But now, a mere ten years later, he had killed him effortlessly.
Time truly is a strange thing.
It could turn even the mightiest heroes, like the Ancient One, into mere shadows of their former selves. And it could also elevate those once insignificant, like Zane, to heights where they could look down on all life.
Still, Zane only felt a brief sense of reflection. He had no real connection to Thanos—dead was dead. Apart from that infamous snap from the original storyline, Zane felt no emotional stirrings.
But looking back at the original, it was interesting to note that while individual Infinity Stones weren't that overwhelming, once Thanos collected all six, a single snap wiped out half of all life in the universe. That certainly was something worth pondering.
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