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Chapter Thirteen: Tony Stark Faces Death

The Bifrost took Minerva and the battered Loki away, leaving Thor behind. As he returned to Asgard, Thor planned to enter a long period of rest, so he decided to find a way to trigger more tasks and then return to process them at his own pace.

His main consideration was definitely the well-known original Avengers.

Natalia's situation made him realize that even an underdeveloped superhero could trigger tasks.

At this point, most of the main plot had not yet started. Captain America was frozen, Banner and Hawkeye were still unknowns, and there was no trace of them.

The only standout was Tony Stark.

At this time, Tony Stark had not yet become Iron Man. He was in the most frustrating phase of his life—arrogant and narcissistic, with almost no positive traits apart from his wealth.

Except for Thor, no one would have expected that such a brash figure would become a future savior with a mortal body comparable to a god.

Thor had not yet met Iron Man. Originally, through a contact with S.H.I.E.L.D., he had arranged a meeting, paying with some valuable information.

"Steve Rogers is still alive, and Red Skull is still alive." The first part of the sentence excited Nick Fury, while the second part nearly made him lose his composure.

The latter part was Thor's dark humor.

The meeting that was scheduled for this afternoon was supposed to be half an hour long. Instead, Stark had an appointment with a model at noon and then canceled his meeting with Thor...

Got canceled...

Canceled...

Damn it, if you weren't the future savior, I'd send you off to the far east to deal with a father-in-law situation right now!

Thor finally understood why Killian wanted to kill Tony Stark so much.

"Drip! Congratulations to the host for triggering Iron Man-related tasks: Iron Man Forever—After the Killian incident in the future, Stark will choose to give up his Iron Man identity temporary.

Later, when the world faces a crisis, Stark will don the armor once more, only to ultimately die when Thanos snaps his fingers."

"Mission Objective: Prevent Iron Man from retiring and keep him as an Avenger forever."

"Mission Reward: Extremis Improved Formula. (Maya Hansen provided all the data on Extremis to Tony before her death.

Tony Stark made improvements based on Extremis.

After the improvement, Extremis became milder, with a weakened strength enhancement effect, the high-temperature explosion effect removed, but with a greater increase in self-healing ability.)"

"Note: This task is open-ended. There are many ways to complete it. Please explore it yourself!"

? ? ?

The sudden task alarmed Thor. How could the task trigger without meeting Tony?

After some thought, Thor realized that even though he hadn't met Tony, there was still an intersection. The task trigger was random, much like Carol's task, which didn't appear until Ronan was defeated but was triggered as soon as Natalia appeared.

The task content was somewhat confusing...

Frankly, the mission rewards were very generous. Extremis was on par with the Super Soldier Serum and the Heart-Shaped Herb from Wakanda.

Moreover, Extremis was easier to distribute on a large scale compared to the latter two. Though the enhancement effect had diminished, the self-healing ability had greatly improved. As the prince of Asgard, he could create an army of nearly invincible warriors!

However, the problem lay with the mission objectives.

According to the task prompt, there were two main parts to this mission.

The first was to dissuade Stark from retiring after the Killian incident.

This was quite simple. No matter how dangerous Killian was, he was only a threat to ordinary people.

Thor could even prevent the Mandarin event from occurring entirely.

The real challenge was the second part: stopping Stark from sacrificing himself by snapping his fingers. This was a significant difficulty.

Although Thor had already decided to end the war in Wakanda and eliminate Thanos early to change the future, this would delay his mission for more than twenty years...

Besides, while Thanos could be crushed, Extremis was a different matter.

Thor's frustration with Stark had deepened. The task was exasperating...

Could it be that the great master of Marvel—Tony Stark's exclusive mission—was simply to be abandoned?