Land of the Dead

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I would like to thank my beta, Akisu, for his help in this chapter.

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9th March 2012, New York City

(Jasmine Sayre POV)

Immediately, everyone got to their feet, worried. I just raised my hand, "Don't worry, he won't do anything. I just couldn't leave him bound like that for where we're going."

Thor looked confused, "I thought we were going to Asgard?"

I nodded, "Yes, but first, I'll need to check on something and it's in what I would call a hostile environment."

Loki blinked at me, still disorientated, and glared, "And where would that be?"

The malicious grin on my face must have scared him because he paled when he saw it. Even Thor looked nervous, and his eyes widened when I said, "We're going to Nifleheim."

"Wait, what…"

Before he could finish the sentence. I turned the Asgardian artifact, and teleported myself and the two Asgardians to one of the most dangerous places in the universe.

When I opened my eyes, I was met with a familiar sight. This was where I fought Entropy the last time, the dead realm of Nifleheim. I looked around and found the piece of bone that I had previously mistaken for a giant rock.

I truly hated this world; I could feel it constantly absorbing my magic. Any being who has blood in their veins would feel very unsettled staying here, feeling the implicit threat, and that's even if they don't feel their magic being siphoned away. I could even feel the excess energy from the Space Stone being slowly absorbed by the atmosphere. It wasn't enough that it could stop the stone from working, but the effect was still there. This is how powerful the realm of Nifleheim really is, to be able to affect one of the ingots of creation.

I look towards my passengers who had fallen down during the teleportation. They groaned as they got up, and Loki gasped and grabbed his chest, "My magic! What is this place? What is happening?"

Thor was also unsettled, "This place feels wrong."

I nodded at them, "This is Nifleheim. I don't think that your father would have allowed you to come here. It's truly a terrible place."

The God of Mischief straightened, "I have only heard of stories. No one has left this place alive."

I chuckled, "Of course they have, otherwise, you wouldn't have heard any of the stories. However, there's a reason why very few have ever escaped this place. This is a dead world, a truly dead world, a planet with no life, no energy, no magic. Nothing grows here, nothing will ever grow here. This realm is starving for energy, any energy really, and it will suck anything it can dry in the vain hope of righting itself. If we stay more than an hour in this place, the two of you will probably have your magic completely sucked away, giving you a terrible and painful death."

Loki looked at me like I'm an idiot, "I can feel that you're a creature of magic as well. Why would you ever voluntarily come here?"

I chuckled, "Do you honestly think that I want to be here? My magic is being sucked away, just like yours, but unfortunately, I have no choice in the matter."

The God of Thunder was the one who asked me this time, "Why? What could possibly be important enough to warrant a trip to this place?"

I sighed in exasperation, "A few years ago, I fought a very powerful opponent. Far more powerful than myself, that's for sure. It ambushed me, caught me by surprise and teleported me here. We fought and what do you do when you're weaker than your opponent, in terms of raw power and skill?"

Loki grinned, "You outsmart them, you trick them."

I nodded, "I was able to turn his victory into a draw by tricking him into a temporal trap, speeding up his time. By the time he even thinks about what I'd done, it would have taken him years to even muster the idea of escaping. Unfortunately, I was also caught in the blast, which explains my absence in the last six years. Since we were both affected, I wanted to see if my trap held him."

Thor looked confused, "why wouldn't it?"

Loki pinched his eyebrows in exasperation, "Other than the fact that this being is probably extremely powerful and dangerous, and the fact that this rock sucks away whatever energy it has access to."

"Oh!" Thor looked down, embarrassed.

"Yeah, "Oh", indeed. Now, I'm checking on him. He probably escaped, but if he didn't, I could reinforce the trap until I find a better way to contain it." I explained.

We stopped talking for a while and we kept walking past the mountain. Loki started to look around and the gasped, "this isn't a mountain, isn't it?"

I nodded, "Very good, Loki. You are correct, this is a bone."

He paled in shock, "a bone?"

"Ah yes, a testament of Odin's failures, or rather, his limitations. This place is a very dangerous one, and very few dare to come here. It's very easy to get sucked dry without realizing it. Because of this, no one ever cleans up here. No one tries to hide evidence of anything, because very few have returned from this place unscathed. And when something falls to this place, no matter how sensitive the matter is, they will stay there for thousands of years, gathering dust. I know you're curious, but you will gain nothing with this information, God of Mischief, so I will not tell you whose bone this is."

I knew it wouldn't be a good idea for Loki to know that this was the corpse of his son, Jörmungandr, from the previous iteration of Ragnarök. The guy was already unbalanced, and this knowledge could unbalance him even more. I didn't know about the memories of the previous iterations of Asgardians to risk it. The truth is, that this planet, this realm, was very important for the cycle. It was the funnel, where after everything is said and done, after Asgard falls and the realms are destroyed, the energy of the cycle comes to this place, to be collected, and the remnants disposed of, until the next cycle returns. In this planet's core is a breach in time and space, consuming the energy from the cycle, until it starts again, once more. Ever since the first Asgardian, the first cycle, this realm has stayed the same.

We kept talking in silence for what felt like hours, but it was barely for more than ten minutes. It was the fatigue probably, the strain on the body from our magic constantly being drained.

Finally, I came to place of my battle with Entropy. It could easily be seen from afar. The mountain was barely more than rubble, the sand had crystallized from the heat. There were craters everywhere. I ignored the gaping looks the boys were giving me. They probably never knew what a large scale magical battle was like. Odin had never unleashed his full power in front of them. They didn't know that he could destroy cities, countries, even small continents in a single attack, and so could I. Truth be told, I didn't know if I could win against Odin in his prime, in a direct battle, that is. My magic against his Odin Force. But what I do know is that the collateral damage would be too much. The man didn't even risk fighting Hela directly, fearing the chaos and destruction that their fight would cause. He wouldn't dare risk a full fight against me, nor would I risk a fight against him. Not on an inhabited planet anyway.

Loki murmured to himself, "Is this what happens when titans fights?"

I snorted, "This is nothing. I was weakened, taken by surprise and my magic kept getting drained. Trust me, if I was at full power, the damage would have been higher, but I would have probably lost all the same," I turned to him, "the both of you have the potential of becoming titans as well. Thor, your overreliance on Mjolnir has stunted your growth. It's a very powerful weapon indeed, but you need to learn how to control you powers without it. As for you, Loki, you're obviously trying to conform to Asgardian standards by constantly using a weapon. You're far stronger than you realize. When you finally accept yourself and your magic completely, you will be able to do things that you couldn't even imagine."

They were both thoughtful of my criticism. They were probably too tired from this place to argue like they probably wanted to. Asgardians were a proud people, and criticizing their martial and magical prowess would cause them to react rather rashly. It was probably my reputation that stopped them from attacking me outright.

I ignored them completely as I walked to where my trap laid, heart beating soundly in my chest. I could feel the traces of time magic, showing me exactly where I trapped Entropy. I simply kept walking, until I was at the exact location of my trap and unfortunately, Entropy wasn't here.

Shit, things couldn't be as simple as that, could they?

I needed to analyze the place properly. There were still traces of my trap, meaning that he didn't escape as soon as I went through the portal at the very least. The planet would have erased any traces of it. I started analyzing the remnants of the magic. It was very well put together, considering it was a blood magic trap centered on a celestial rune of all things, and I made it in less than a minute in my head and executed it while I was being choked by a cosmic entity.

I took a closer look, and it seems that it worked perfectly. The blast of time magic was because I used my life force to power it, but I didn't account for my extra life force that came when I became the Avatar of Death, which means that I overloaded the runes, and it reacted by sending the extra energy away in a blast which affected the dimensional portal I fell through.

Well, at least that's confirmed. For now, let's focus on the big question. How much time did I buy myself. Delaying Entropy like that meant that I gave him less time to manipulate the events of the world at his leisure. So far, the invasion went exactly as I predicted it would go, which was odd, because if he had arranged for the Avengers to die somehow, then there would be no one to oppose Thanos when he goes for the stones, meaning that I would have to split my attention to both trying to stop him, and trying to stop Thanos from using all six infinity stones at once, which would allow Entropy to perform his spell.

The traces of the original trap were faint, very faint, and I was barely able to pick up on them and use them to analyze when the trap failed and how. Funnily enough, Entropy didn't overpower the trap. His mind was enslaved to his perceived time, meaning that he couldn't even think about escaping in time.

Instead, the life force I used to power the blood runes was drained from the trap over time. The fact that it held for years, was enough for me to be proud of how energy efficient my trap was, especially given the circumstances.

I used the energy remnants of the trap to extrapolate when it had failed. Huh, it was barely a few months ago. It seems that I had truly extrapolated a draw out of this. I sighed in relief; at least some good came from that fight. I was worried that I lost six years with Selene and Wanda for nothing.

I got up, still staring at the remnants of my experimental trap that almost defeated a cosmic entity. Since it worked, it meant that Entropy was fallible, that there were ways to defeat him. I already had plans upon plans, traps upon traps. For the first time in a while, I felt hope.

I looked at the two godlings looking at me worriedly, "He isn't here. Let's go."

They both held onto me as we teleported to Asgard.

Meanwhile, far away in the other side of the galaxy, a man in black was looking at one of the most feared beings in the galaxy if not the universe. He wasn't afraid though, and the so-called Mad Titan realized it.

He gave the Titan a smug look, "I told you that your little scheme would fail."

The man sitting on the floating chair didn't seem to care, "And yet, I lost nothing."

"Nothing except your access to the Mind Stone."

"The planet can barely be considered developed. They will not be able to defend themselves. I will take it back, along with the rest of the Stones, when I am ready to make my move. Although, I couldn't help but note your surprise at the dark woman's presence. Are you familiar with her?"

The man in black chuckled, "You could say that, Thanos. I have to admit that I am impressed with her survival. I was sure I would never see her again after the last time we spoke. What an exciting turn of events."

"Is she a threat?"

The man nodded, "More than you realize. But she won't be a problem with me here."

The Titan stood up from his throne, "Who is she?"

The body of the cosmic entity named Entropy grinned, "Her name is the Morrigan and she's the single most powerful opponent you will ever face."