Arc IX First travels - First encounter with Kang

Six hours after Eli's cosmic awareness flared up, he sat outside the ruins of a temple. He looked hagard, ready to pass out at any moment. There was a deep cut at his side where Shatterstar had pierced his armor, and despite his healing magic stopping the bleeding, the wound was still not closing.

Shatterstar was stabbed into the ground in front of him, and Eli was looking at it with furrowed brows.

'Just one stupid stone, and it changes allegiance? While not at the level of Mjolnir, Shatterstar should have some form of resistance to petty tricks like that.'

Eli looked toward two slowly but visibly decaying corpses of the same man with a blue face, deep tear-troughs running all the way down his chin, and ridiculous green and purple clothing.

"And just who was he?" Eli thought out loud.

"That is Kang the Conqueror. Whereever or whenever you come from must be a blessed place to have not been visited by this menace," Khonshu, the Egyptian God of the Moon and Vengeance, answered. "You have made a terrible mistake in facing and mocking him. One death will not stop him. No, he will take it personally and start messing with you."

"How would he know? I just killed the him of now, even if he is undying?"

"Your understanding of Kang is too shallow, young Asgardian," Khonshu scoffed.

"Just what I needed. An undying nemesis with a blood feud over something out of my hands and technology to manipulate space-time at a level beyond my spells..." Eli sounded tired. He had used up way more of his All-Force than he ever had before, even when fighting Thanos or Apocalypse.

"You should have taken me with you. We should have faced him together," Anya's voice could be heard as one of their ships landed next to him a few minutes after. She threw a third corpse of this 'Kang' to the other two bodies. This third corpse was badly burned and had deep peck marks and various cuts all over his body.

"I was arrogant, sorry. And I'm afraid you will have to guard me for a while. Allfather-sleep is slowly trying to claim me. Eli-sleep? We'll figure it out later. I can't fight it much longer," Eli apologized as he picked up his sword, turned it back into a necklace, but didn't put it on. He walked toward the ship, gave Anya a kiss on the cheek as he moved to the cabin of the ship with a tired expression.

Inside, he laid on a bed and gave Anya some last second instructions before a golden and green cocoon of energies enveloped Eli's form. The young Allfather quickly fell asleep. He rested on one of the medical beds his grandfather Odin had used whenever he fell into Odin-sleep.

A few gull like sounds rang out in the room. Anya turned to Tuuli and shook her head.

"No, you can have first watch over this idiot. I got some more steam I want to let off," Anya explained as she navigated the ship back to the X-mansion to gather the team for some more targets.

Five hours earlier. Eli had just teleported to Egypt high up in the sky. Eventually, he looked in a certain direction and flew toward it.

"Temple of... Ka?" Eli intoned as he looked at a freshly dug temple entrance several hundred miles inland from the Nile delta and tried reading the inscription on a square pillar just outside the temple.

He had spread out his senses, magical and otherwise, but only found two living people and dozens of corpses in his surroundings. He managed to read the surface thoughts of both, though with a little more strain that usual, and learned that he happened upon Autumn Rolfson, Apocalypse's Horseman of Famine, and Azazel, a red-skinned mutant with the power of teleportation.

"You have to stop these two," a hollow voice rang out from behind Eli. The Asgardian turned back to see a tall figure with a floating bird skull as a head and a long staff with a crescent moon on top of it dressed all in white.

"What are they trying to unearth here, Khonshu?"

"You know of me, that's good young norse god fledgling. They are about to bring a bunch of fragments of the Ka stone to an altar that will gather the remnant energies of the artifact and create a new Ka stone. You must stop them," the Egyptian god ordered.

"What does the Ka stone do?" Eli calmly asked. He didn't want to run into an ancient temple of a random Egyptian god without at least some information or preparation if he couldn't help it. He had never heard of a god called Ka, which made him wary.

However, Odin and Bor were very clear in their teachings that the pantheon of Egypt was full of treachery and, most importantly, ruthless with their curses and life-long banishments.

"It is not of this Earth. Over five millenia ago chief wizard to Pharaoh Ramses II, Anath-Na Mut discovered this alien artifact and reigned supreme from the shadows as 'Sphinx' until he grew weary of his long life. The stone was thought to be destroyed by Galactus the Devourer over three decades ago. It appears now the devourer has done a... poor job," the Egyptian god explained.

"What does the stone do?"

"Think of it as a slightly weaker amalgamation of several inifinity stones. Though through its sentient nature, it would rather empower and influence an individual than be one of the six anchors of this reality. It should not exist and least of all fall into the hands of En Sabah Nur," Khonshu stated in a grave tone.

Eli fell into deep thought. He was weighing the pros and cons of letting these two get their hands on this stone because if he looked at Khonshu's words objectively, this Ka stone might be his first lead to gaining strength. His entire goal in this dimensional travel business.

"You must hurry. There is not much time left."

"I'm not one of those poor souls you break into pieces for easier control, Khonshu. Don't order me around," Eli argued back before turning invisible and entering the temple.

Azazel was following behind Autumn with a healthy distance between them. A cruel glint flashed through his eyes as he looked at the red shards in Autumn's hand. Shards that the weakened Apocalypse had produced out of nowhere and handed to them for this mission.

Apocalypse would have normally not allowed Azazel to be the only one to follow one of his loyal horsemen, but he didn't have a lot of followers or options right now after he was forced to start the process of changing bodies after his loss at the hands of the god of storms. But now that the weakened pharaoh had committed this folly, Azazel was thinking when to strike for the biggest payout.

An altar was involved, so would the process require some form of sacrifice? Is it safer to take the stone after an eventual price was paid, or would the power of the stone be too much to overcome, meaning he needed to end Autumn first.

But would Autumn truly die in one hit? She was a horseman, after all, and while he knew of Autumn's mutant powers, he did not know the full extent of her power up. One wrong move and Autumn could forcefully emaciate Azazel, resulting in him potentially dying of hunger in mere moments. It was truly a fitting power for a horseman of famine.

In the end, Azazel chose to wait. It was the safer of two choices and if it somehow didn't work out, he could just bide his time as someone in the good graces of the self proclaimed god of mutants that had just receieved a power-up thanks to him.

However, Azazel's fate today was something else. Unknown to Autumn, because of an intricate, perfect illusion spell, Eli had decapitated the sadistic mutant with demonic blood.

In his very last moment, Azazel wanted to counter Eli's imminent attack as he sensed a shift in the surrounding magic when the illusion was cast. He was horrified to notice, however, that it wasn't just an illusion that was cast upon him but also a spatial lock that blocked his teleportation. Before the nerves in his body ever sent the signal to dodge after knowing all of that, his head had left his body.

Before he thought his last thought, Eli read a few of the more important memories of the dying mutant. Apparently, Azazel was the father of two X-Men, Nils 'Abyss' Styger, and Kurt 'Nightcrawler' Wagner. Killing Azazel might result in a bad rapport with these two and, in extension, the X-Men, but Eli stood by his principles. If this was how he fell fully out of favor with the X-Men, so be it.

Under the leadership of both Sebastian Shaw and Magneto, and even just by himself, Azazel, with his own hands and tail, had killed thousands of people in his long life. Most of them undeserving of death from what Eli could see.

"A fine kill, Aesir."

Khonshu appeared from behind a decrepit looking stone pillar that held up the roof. Autumn didn't hear their conversation, the illusion still holding up.

"Now kill the other one. The stone should not exist."

Eli didn't even bother looking at the Egyptian god and continued following Autumn. The woman who looked like nothing but skin and bone eventually reached a raised altar cast in gold and made her way up some stairs.

Autumn placed the shards in a bowl-like identation of the altar and stepped back. No spell, incantation, or other command was needed to start the process. The altar immediately lit up in red lights, and the shards began floating. The pieces became fluid out of nowhere and came together to form a single water drop shape completely enveloped in red light.

Three hours later, the lightshow stopped, and the floating red drop had grown to roughly the size of a toddler's fist from its initial almond size.

"Kill her already, before she can claim the stone you so foolishly allowed to exist again," Khonshu once again ordered from behind Eli. The Egyptian god had told Eli to stop this process numerous times during these three hours.

And, for the first time, Eli felt inclined to listen to what Khonshu had ordered him to do.

By now, he was certain that no more steps were necessary to recreate the stone. He had read enough of Autumn's mind during this time to know. However, he had also read enough of her mind to know that despite her twisted goal to use her powers to bring forth another famine, she wasn't truly deserving of death. A very intense and long therapy session, sure, but not strictly death.

Before he could cast the binding spell and blink Autumn away from the stone to figure out what to do with her, Eli noticed a shift in the space behind the mutant and watched as a laser burned a hole in her head.

"Perfect timing," a blue-faced newcomer stepping out of a portal spoke with greedy eyes set on the newly reformed Ka stone.

"STOP HIM! DON'T ALLOW HIM TO GET THE STONE!" Khonshu yelled in panic.

Eli immediately shot into action with furrowed brows. He had found another person that he couldn't read the mind of in this reality. A clearly very powerful someone, because despite his full concentration, Eli had not felt the intruder approaching or observing, and he had not felt the shift in space before the portal sprung to life either.

Shatterstar in hand, Eli shot toward the green and purple-clad figure trying to pierce his head and grab the Ka stone for safekeeping at the same time. But he was stopped by a ball-like forcefield shining in bright blue upon contact with his sword roughly two meters in diameter. The forcefield showed signs of breaking almost immediately however, it did not shatter.

Eli cursed himself for underestimating his enemy and pointed his charged destroyer arm forward. A beam of concentrated magical energies hit his enemy, but while it might have pushed the man away from the altar and therefore the stone, it also pushed away Eli from the altar.

"Who are you supposed to be?"

Eli didn't answer the question meant to stall time and charged forward again, this time charging his destroyer arm while Shatterstar floated next to him, covered in an evergrowing green glow.

Instead of releasing a beam of magical energies, Eli used his destroyer arm to punch the forcefield before his enemy fully got his bearing back, and this time it shattered a short moment after the impact. His enemy's eyes widened, and with his own eyes glowing in emerald green, Eli sent a fully charged Shatterstar into the chest of his enemy.

Eli furrowed his brows. Despite the strong forcefield and other clearly scientific powers that were demonstrated, the enemy died too quickly. As he contemplated how through all of this the blue-faced man just died with a gaping hole in his chest drilled by Shatterstar, Eli felt something from behind. Khonshu, with an outstretched hand, was caught off-guard and was frozen in place by three balls on the ground that formed a triangle of lightning that sometimes arced to the Egyptian god.

Another man looking just like the enemy he had just killed looked toward the Ka stone, disregarding the god he had just imprisoned with some technological gizmos.

"Finally something new for my collection. Never held one of these before, yet," he said as he picked up the still floating red gem stone.

Eli grew wary. Khonshu had kept repeating over and over how dangerous the stone was, and now this enemy with unknown technological means had grasped it.

And clearly, it wasn't like grasping an infinity stone that would overload a mortal body and constantly damage it. It looked like it wanted to be held and empower his owner, going by the soothing pulses of red energy it gave off.

"Didn't think I'd lose a perfect clone for a simple smash and grab. Didn't think I'd find some unknown powered individual either. Who are you supposed to be? By those runes on your metal arm and getup, I'd say you're Asgardian. But I have never heard of you or seen you in any records. Some kind of remnant from an obscure Ragnarok cycle? A Thor but with a different skill set? Like that Runeking Thor, but both eyes intact and shining green instead of the usual blue? Hmm, no... someone from a deviant timeline I have not been to? That's certainly... rare," the man mused, his curiosity growing with every sentence.

Eli listened to his enemy's rambling and decided he didn't want to know what his adversary would do with the knowledge of his origin. Especially if he had more of these 'perfect clones'. And, he also wanted to know more about this eye-less Runeking-version of his father, but that was a question for later.

With both his sword and arm glowing in magical energies, Eli's eyes turned pale green as storms of energies gathered in the vicinity. He charged toward his enemy and began a short melee bout. With his concentration on Eli, the enemy was able to ward off the lightning fast sword strikes, jabs, and punches with smaller but concentrated forcefields.

A technological weapon manifested in the air behind the blue-faced man and started shooting at Eli. At the same time, he took out some balls from his belt and threw them at the Asgardian who parried the projectiles. The balls stayed close to Eli however, and began zapping the god of storms in increasingly short intervals. More and more balls and higher rates of fire meant that Eli was taking more and more damage.

As he began to take out these balls with a long-lasting, sweeping beam from his destroyer arm, the enemy took out another sort of pistol out of nowhere and shot Eli faster than he could react to. The weapon held some kind of freezing powers, thankfully temperature based and not time based, and Eli slowed down even more.

"Hmm, time to test out the power of this stone," the man said with a gloating tone as he eyed the Ka stone.

Space began warping, elongating, and shrinking around Eli. Had his physique not been that of a mighty Asgardian god, this space movement alone would have gravely injured Eli. Just as the movement grew more chaotic, the control over the movement of space all around him began to shift toward Eli instead of the stone.

Eli's eyes started glowing brighter, and he used his control over the chaotic space to destroy all of the balls and other weapons shooting at him.

Eli's enemy raised a brow and muttered 'interesting' under his breath, and once more, the stone in his hand shone with red energies. This time around, reality seemed to shift, and the temple began to look like a modern laboratory with screens everywhere.

Metallic restraints shot out of the ground and started capturing Eli, and despite their flimsy looks, the restraints actually managed to stay intact despite the strength Eli put into breaking out.

Having had enough, Eli began drawing on his All-force much more. He used Shatterstar to cut into the restraints, and with brute force and storms of magical energies, the new reality began to shatter all around, sending both foes back to the ruined temple.

The changing of reality happened four more times. From a jungle environment with vines catching Eli to an underwater cave with sea-weed entangling him, sapping Eli of huge amounts of his All-force, until his enemy decided to change tactics. As Eli controlled Shatterstar next to him with telepathy and his connection to the uru weapon, he suddenly lost control over the weapon.

It disobeyed him and left an opening in his defenses. Another technological weapon manifested out of nowhere and put Eli into a passive blocking stance with a concentrated beam. Just then, Shatterstar finally fully diverted from its path, and instead of impaling his enemy, it left a deep cut in Eli's side.

Feeling angry but not losing his cool, Eli stayed on the defensive for a moment preparing a spell with his destroyer arm. A handful of exchanges later that cost Eli a lot of energy and concentration, the spell was ready.

His enemy was locked in place, possibly even in time and Eli used that short break in his adversary's rhythm to use his destroyer arm's wristblade to stab the blue-faced man's throat.

His enemy's eyes went wide at the sudden blade piercing his body, severing his spine. Chaotic energies inside of him were slowly starting to rampage inside of him despite his perfected physique and internal defenses.

"Better luck next time, weirdo. Wish I could read your mind to find out about that runeking version of Thor, though," Eli quipped with a taunting smirk as his enemy slowly lost his life.

Before he could grab the Ka stone out of his dying enemy's hand, Kang used the last of his willpower to shatter the stone. He lost this battle and didn't want to leave any loot for the winner. Especially since he felt enormous amounts of heat moments earlier and lost connection to another clone of his he had left behind high up in the air to cover for unexpected eventualities.

His last thoughts before 'dying' were all spent on how to fight his enemy the next time, what weaknesses to exploit. He engraved this 'hideous' smirk in his mind for next time.