Chapter 91: A Falling God, A Titan & Infinity

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"It's not some sort of special power, but he has the ability to make allies of everyone he meets. And that is the most fearsome ability on the high seas..."

- Dracule Mihawk, (One Piece)

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<(Atem POV)> 

"You don't get it; my father is not someone you can just make an enemy out of so lightly. If you have not heard of him, he is THE Mad Titan, Thanos. I do admit that you are quite powerful as well but defeating my father isn't going to be as easy as you are imagining. There is a reason why he has been able to conquer an entire galaxy and why every big intergalactic empire is afraid of his wraith. And once he gets all of the infinity stones, he will be able to conquer the entire universe." Gamora warned with a grim voice while playing with the shackles binding her arms. 

"Really? You are trying to scare me with how scary and powerful your dad is? So, what do you propose I should do? Release you so that you can go back to your daddy? Because if you still haven't figured it out, I am not really afraid of Thanos. Yes, a fight with him this soon will be annoying since I am not aware of the limits of his full power, but I am going to have to fight him sooner or later. After all, unlike you, I actually know what he is going to do once he gets his hands on all the Infinity stones." I smirked. "Anyways, it's not like I'll be waiting for him to get all of the stones before I kill him," I muttered to myself as I glanced at the big metal box behind me. 

Two para-demons were currently kneeling on the floor, holding the box for me while Brunhilde stood in a corner, observing me with curious eyes.

"No" Gamora responded after a few seconds of silence. "Instead, I want to make a deal with you. You and I want the same thing, to kill Thanos. I can help you do it. I can tell you all about his armies, his strategies, his weapons, his powers and mystical abilities, everything. I can help you defeat him. At least, then you will have a decent chance of success." She offered.

"And in return?"

"My freedom from Thanos and his ways, that is all I want." She answered, slightly bowing her head to show her submission. 

Instead of verbally answering her, I just slowly nodded in acceptance before turning my attention towards the box again. 

"If you are thinking of opening that thing, you should wait for some of our scientists to finish their tests on it. The feeling I get from that... orb is a lot like how I used to feel near the Tesseract back on Asgard... before it was a Tesseract that is." The Valkyrie warned after sensing my eyes on her.

"Why? Did it explode with power or something when opened?" I questioned, raising one of my eyebrows. 

"No, but a lot of powerful and godly entities were able to sense it with most of them wanting it for themselves. Attacks and break-ins were becoming so common that even Odin, power-hungry as he is, had to seal the actual stone inside the Tesseract and then hide it away on Earth, to protect it from prying eyes and greedy hands." She answered. "If I am right about this which I usually am, then the moment you open that artifact, you will become the target of a lot of beings in this universe."

"I see. Honestly, as much as I am tempted to forget about this stone, I know that it will only be a matter of time before Thanos or someone else discovers it and uses it for some nefarious purpose. So, better me than them." I replied before casually opening the box and retrieving the fist-sized orb within.

The orb looked like some kind of complex puzzle that could only be opened when twisted in some particular pattern or combination. It even seemed like it was made out of some rare hard metal not found on Earth to suppress the energy of the stone within it. However, I was not in the mood to solve childish puzzles, so I just applied a significant portion of my strength to the orb and broke it into several pieces with a single clench of my hands as the small purple stone inside it came into full view of everyone. 

"I don't think you are supposed to touch it with your bare skin. The radioactive signature of that stone is beyond the charts. Thanos has already gotten his hands on one of them and every time somebody touches it besides him, they go into a blind fury, trying to attack anything and everything close to them until their body can't take it anymore." Gamora warned from behind me although I mostly ignored her since I knew for a fact that I was powerful enough to at least hold one of these stones.

"Interesting! This feels so... wild and destructive. It's like I am holding a billion nuclear explosions in my hand. Hmm, I guess that is to be expected since this is supposedly the physical form of the concept of power in this universe itself." I muttered to myself while feeling the devastating energy of the stone trying to corrode my skin and annihilate my physical body even though it failed to inflict the slightest amount of damage on even the uppermost layer of my skin. 

'Now, what to do with this? Should I try to absorb it using the Rinnegan or should I just destroy it using my null powers to make sure that Thanos or anyone else will never be able to complete the infinity gauntlet using this stone?'

[Ding! Shard of Infinity (1/6) detected]

[Ding! New Quest Obtained]

[Quest Title: Godhead of Infinity] 

[Quest Description: Collect all those little colorful rocks called Infinity stones for yourself before anyone else tries to use them to do a measly snap or something. After all, this universe is your territory, nobody else should own a bunch of fancy rocks here except you. Remember, the entire Infinity stone set needs to be from the same Universe for this Quest to be completed] 

[Quest Rewards: Unlock your True Form as well as the True Forms of all the other New Gods in your pantheon] 

[Absorb Shard of Infinity (1/6) to proceed with quest?]

[Accept/Reject]

Well, that is surprising. The system seems to recognize these Infinity stones but instead of stones, it calls them shards... Interesting. 

I mentally accepted the system prompt upon which the Power stone immediately vanished from my hands before another notification chimed in front of my face.

[Congratulations! 1 out of 6 Infinity Shards collected]

"Wait, where did it go?" Gamora was startled after witnessing the stone suddenly vanish in thin air from my hands.

"I absorbed it." I simply responded. "Now, it is forever out of Thanos' hands. Problem solved... Now, tell me everything you know about Thanos and his forces." I enquired with a serious voice.

***

<{New Mexico, USA}>

<(Omniscient POV)>

A swirling slightly glowing tornado slowly formed in the sky amidst a raging storm before an unconscious butt-naked lone man fell from it like a bird whose wings had suddenly been cut off. 

A few moments later, a hammer also flew out from the storm with a few flashes of lighting. It descended straight like a meteor before crashing straight into the Earth. 

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<{Santuary, near Titan}>

"Y-you were right, sire. T-the reason that we lost communication with the Chitauri forces is because they were eliminated by some unknown force. Turns out Ronan lost his battle despite the help we provided him." A cloaked alien figure declared in front of Thanos with his head kept respectfully down.

"So not a single Chitauri soldier survived?... Fascinating! No worries, we have plenty more to go around. And what about my daughter? Any news about her?" The purple Titan sitting on a massive floating throne asked with an indifferent voice. 

"We have reason to believe that t-that Gamora has deserted her position and joined the enemy forces. She has backstabbed us, my lord... In fact, I always knew that she was a traitor. After all, she carries the dirty blood of her species... *Thump*" 

Unfortunately, the other could not continue his words any longer as his head just flew away like a ball with a single flick of Thanos' finger. The Other's lifeless body after standing for a few more seconds silently fell down like a puppet with broken strings. 

"A good servant should only answer what is asked," Thanos muttered to himself before looking away in the distance. "A new player has arrived in the game it seems... This will be interesting."

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(A/N: Sorry for the delay in updates but I am currently suffering from a fever and I can't even understand what I am writing. I took 3 days to write even a single chapter... In fact, I am not even sure if this author's note is grammatically correct or not🥲)

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