Issue 61: Secret Wars Part XI

Ghost-Spider went out to face down the Exemplar Mysterio. This match was the most confusing to watch, since as soon as the battle began, both of them stood still for a while. 

Peter knew that the Ghost-Spider was in the middle of an illusion.

However, it seemed that it had little to no effect on avenging spirit that dwelled inside the Anti-Hero. The Ghost-Spider slowly made his way over towards Mysterio. Step by step, the ground beneath him lit up in blue ghostly flames. 

Mysterio started to freak out as he intensified the illusions, tearing into the Ghost Spider's memories to find a fear he could take hold of. However, once the Exemplar came across the memories of hell, something absurd happened.

Mysterio's eyes glowed seconds before blue-fire began to shoot out of them, destroying his fishbowl helmet in the while he screamed out in pain. 

Ghost-Spider touched his face and said, "LOOK INTO MY EYES!" 

Misterio's body went limp as he fell to the ground. He wasn't dead, but he was most certainly a vegetable now.

"That one has the power of a Fallen Angel coursing through him!" One of the Elder Gods shouted, making the rest of them tense up. If they didn't win at least one of the matches, they would have to leave earth forever and use primitive animals to recreate the bet of the Octessence.

He walked back and hopped over next to everyone who looked at him with a bit of fear, and fear was to be expected when dealing with the Ghost Rider/Spider-Man, after all, it's not every day that one gets a glimpse of hell! 

Peter trembled a little as he stared at Mysterio burned out eyes and said, "I don't envy him at all."

"Yeah, Hell can dive even the gods mad," The Beyonder Spider-Man said as he disappeared and reappeared next to his target. 

"This Spider-Man was smart to choose me to fight Styx, this way no one had to die."

As soon as the battle began, Beyonder Spider-Man snapped his finger and shattered Valtorr's relic. As the powers drained out of Styx, he snapped his fingers again and turned him into a dog. Everyone's jaw dropped as he walked back to them holding the now Immortal Dog Styx.

Voltorr's relic reforged as it seemed the Beyonder Spider had no intention to permanently destroy the object. After all, the deal would be void if he did.

Even Peter's jaw was dropped as it was his first-time seeing reality warping on that scale, he thought of his own Merlin Gem and shivered before saying, "Reality Warpers are scary!"

Next up was Richie V.S Gorgon. 

Everyone cheered him on as Richie flew over to him and started their fight. 

"Kick his ass, son!" Peter said with the rest of his other versions. 

"Man, this is weird, wait until I tell dad what happened." He raised his hand to his chest and tapped on the Eye of Agamotto. As the eye opened, Gorgon began to throw out mystically imbued chains. 

Richie smiled and opened up his bag of infinite space and started to pull in the chains, "Thanks for the relics. I'll take good care of them."

Gorgon's body moved like a blur, he appeared behind Richie and his entire body inflated with muscle as he swung the blade of his katana at Richie's neck. 

Richie's Spider-Sense helped him out as he stepped forward and appeared behind Gorgon. The Sorcerer Spider-Supreme then punched out with many powerful spell circles surrounding his arm, the air around them blasted out shaking the environment.

To avoid the attack Gorgon jumped back and surrounded himself in his chains. He threw out his arms like a maestro leading an orchestra as the chains began to fly out of his body and chase after Richie.

Richie jumped around dodging the chains as best he could, and every once and a while, he would teleport to avoid their assault. He suddenly started to fight back as a power violet colored webbing covered with spell circles shot out from his wrist. 

Gorgon used his chains to intercept the webbing's onslaught, but before they connected a portal appeared around the two lines of webbing and altered their course.

Seeing this, Gorgon had to react quickly as the portal open next to him, he moved out of the way and redirected his chains to defend. However, Richie had once again created another portal and shot through the chain barrier.

This continued on for some time; right up until the entire battlefield was covered with a complex and tangled structure of chains and webbing. They looked each other down as they stood across from one another on a line of Gorgon's chain and Sorcerer Supreme Spider-Man's webbing. 

"Well now, isn't this a strange predicament we find ourselves in?" Gorgon said as he started to lift the bandana that covered his eyes.

"Look into my eyes!" Gorgon shouted.

"You first!" Richie responded as he suddenly activated his trap. All of their webbing and chains were actually in the shape of a massive spell circle. 

Richie had not only used his webbing, but the chains to form one giant spell matrix. He had forced Gorgon to help him create it by positioning the attacking chains to follow him, strategically leading him around the battleground to key locations. 

The moment Gorgon revealed his eyes he felt he could no longer stop his abilities, and as a strange mirror appeared in front of him, his eyes widened in horror. 

"Mirror of Punishment! I made this relic based on the magical properties of reflection. Any abilities you have will turn back on you," Richie shouted as Gorgon's ability started to turn his body into to stone.

After a few minutes had passed, only a statue of Gorgon stood in place of his opponent. 

Richie then jumped back as he shouted, "Krakkan's Eternal Prison!" 

The chains started to rattle as the webbing forced them to surround Gorgon until it crushed him down to a human-sized box. 

He stared at the elder gods and bowed, "I win!" 

Krakkan was furious, to have his own power seal in his Herald was a great insult, it was like being defeated by himself!

"Talk about slapping your own face," Peter chuckled.

He then headed back to everyone to be met with cheers of joy, "Great match son!" The Peters said in unison, making everyone laugh. 

The Elder God's were fuming when they suddenly decided to bank it all on Kraven, they turned to Farallah and said, "Give him the full limit of the relic's power!"

Farallah frowned and said, "Fine!"

Kraven suddenly shouted in agony as his body began to morph into a large behemoth like creature, two long horns curled around the side of his head, and a cattle-like tail appeared out from his back. His legs turned into hooves as the rest of his body started to grow fur. A wolf-like snout appeared from his face before he grew claws that resembled those of a fierce lion.

He sent out a roar that showed he was losing his sanity, not that this version of Kraven displayed much from the beginning. His feral red beast eyes formed as he howled like a madman. However, energy accompanied this roar. The vibrations from his voice were so powerful that it shook the surroundings. 

Kaine looked on and thought, "This guy's like me. I guess I can't hold back in this one."

Kaine jumped down and started walking towards his opponent. His body then started to grow in size. His muscles bulged, he grew two and half feet, and six spider legs shot out from his back. Thanks to the suit being made of unstable molecules, they were still covered in the suit's fabric, and they couldn't see the Other's appearance. 

He couldn't help but be thankful for the suit. He could focus on the fight and not worry about freaking out his family.

He charged at his opponent as they began to fight like a wild beast. Two large fang-like stingers appeared from his wrists as he slashed out towards Kraven's neck. 

Kraven's claws shined as he cut away at Kaine's body before opening a gash on the Spider's chest and sending blood spraying across the ground.

Kraven narrowly avoided the blow to his neck but was cut across the face.

As they traded attacks like madmen possessed, neither of them backed down. Every slash or cut resulted in the loss of large sprays of blood.

Kraven leapt back on all fours and began to jump around at insane speeds while Kaine chased after, shooting out gigantic webbing from his spider limbs. 

Kraven dodged and tried to hit the Other several times, but the giant man-spider effortlessly dodged it and continued what it set out to.

The Other was hopping and dodging all over the battlefield, forming several large cobweb-like structures ready to entrap his prey while every time Kraven missed, he found himself with less room to maneuver and was slowed down slightly. 

As he clawed his way out of the sticky situation he fell into, he began growing frustrated. The inner beast of the hunter howled as a red glow surrounded his claws. Then, with a single swipe of his hand, the whole nest of webbing was cut in half. 

Kaine jumped over at Kraven, dodging over the energy empowered slash before they collided. They rolled around on the ground grappling, biting, clawing, and hitting each other with fierce punches. 

Everyone was shocked by the sheer brutality of their fight. The two continued to struggle, when all of the sudden, Kraven's body started to grow, it didn't stop until he was 10 feet tall. 

Kaine also continued to grow as he grew four more arms and almost reached 12 feet tall. Two spider-like feelers grew out from his mouth as the suit opened up an opening and grew 4 more eye slots.

The battle continued as they charged at one another. They slashed, bit, and bled across the platform.

As the battle carried on, it became apparent that Kraven was still far faster than Kaine. 

He flew by biting and eating chunks out of Kaine's shoulder, but Kaine's body began to heal the damage almost instantly as he spun in a circle, shooting out giant webs from his arms and mouth that were around 4-feet thick. 

Kraven started to jump at the space in between the webs and clawed the ones in half that almost reached him. However, the entire battlefield was slowly filling up with dense webbing that was getting harder and harder to cut.

Kraven's foot stepped in some of the webbings as Kaine grabbed two giant cords of webbing and used them to slingshot over and pounce onto Craven. 

Kaine was getting even bigger as he grabbed both his opponent's arms and legs and stretched them out as his spare arms laid dozens of punches into the defenseless hunter's body. 

Kraven opened his mouth, ready to create a sonic boom with his voice. However, Kaine was ready. 

A stream of webbing shot out of his spare hands, filling up Kraven's mouth, it traveled throughout his body, locking up his organs and muscles from the inside, while it filled his lungs. After there was no more space he continued to web until Kraven's entire body was covered up with webbing like a fly prepped for dinner.

With a monstrous cheer that shook the tower, Kaine Totem reveled in the fight and his victory.

The Scarlet Spider then dropped to the ground and shouted in pain as his body morphed back into a more human shape. 

He shrunk down and held on to his body face down on the floor, curled up as he grasped his sides. After a few minutes of him enduring this agonizing pain, he finally returned to his natural form.

The Elder Gods look on in fury as they had lost the bet, they turned to the Spider Goddess and said, "You haven't heard the last of us Kokyangwuti, you realized you just made enemies of us all!?"

Kokyangwuti looked at her Strongest Spider and said, "I don't think you'll be able to bother me, after all, My Strongest Totem can easily just kill you all, even I could swat you all with the entire power of the multiverse, but as you know that's not what I'm about. Leave now, I'm losing my patience."

The Elder Gods all went red faced and their faces twitched.

From Peter's perspective, it looked like the Elder God's were acting like spoiled brats stomping their feet, whining, and crying about their loss. 

The eight relics began to glow and rise higher into the sky before shooting across the cosmos like a bat out of hell. The image of the elder gods started to fade when Peter noticed that the powers from the Exemplars weren't disappearing. 

"Hey, why aren't they being depowered!?" Peter asked in frustration.

"That wasn't part of the deal." One of the Elder Gods mocked as they disappeared.

The Beyonder Spider-Man walked over to Peter said, "Can we go home now!? I could help with the hole depowering thing if you want, but when a person alters reality on this level permanently, it usually has a ton of negative consequences when it comes to Gods of Chaos." as he snapped his fingers returning Styx to human form and bound in glowing webbing.

Peter sighed as he said, "If you could just make a device that seals their powers that would be better."

Beyonder snapped his fingers as 8 thin leather-like collars formed around their necks and suddenly forced them all to lose their Exemplar powers, they were now just regular old humans.

Kokyangwuti smiled down at her Totems and watched on as they said their goodbyes. They spent a few hours conversing and taking a few pictures, when Kokyangwuti waved her hand opening up a portal that led to each of their universes. 

Beyonder Spider-Man smiled and said, "It's been fun, and really good to see you again." He stared at Ben and his parents, "Later!"

And with that, they all left saying their goodbyes one by one.

"It's been cool hanging with a younger version of you Dad! Mom! Later!" Mayday gave her family a large group-hug before she flew into her portal.

"I'm glad to see there was a responsible version of Ben in this universe," Ghost-Spider said as he headed into his portal.

"I think I'll come back and visit some time!" Warlock Spider-Man said as he waved goodbye, vanishing inside the door made of light.

"I can't wait to tell dad and see the look on mom's face when I tell them that you're with Aunty MJ in most realities." Richie giggled mischievously, 

"Be nice to…other me!" Peter shouted out. 

MJ laughed, "Give em hell kid."

"Let's not do this again!" Kaine said as he waved his hand behind his head and walked into his portal.

"I'm glad that's over!" Peter said as he fell on to his butt. 

"Now what do we do about them?" MJ said pointing at the Depowered Exemplars