Chapter 141: Battle of New York

"You might not believe me if I tell you."

With a serious expression, Ancient One said, "The main responsibility for this lies with you."

Lin Yu, his face dark, retorted, "The main responsibility lies with me?"

"Exactly!"

Ancient One nodded seriously, then took out the wand radiating green light and said in a low voice,

"Look at what this is..."

"The time seal you set?"

"Exactly, but if you hadn't clung so tightly to the wand, refusing to return it, how could the time seal on the wand have been triggered, causing the anchor point of the Dimensional Gate to roll back?"

"..."

Hearing this, Lin Yu was stunned, then frowned and asked, "Are you saying that the struggle between us triggered the time seal?"

"Correct!" Ancient One nodded, then said frankly, "Of course, I also bear a tiny bit of responsibility. I underestimated your strength and shamelessness, setting the threshold of the seal a bit too low."

"This caused the anchor point of the Dimensional Gate to roll back by about eighty years..."

"Wait!" Lin Yu understood his meaning and said with a face full of black lines, "So the Parallel Worlds I just experienced were all the ones you traveled through with the wand during these eighty years?"

"Of course!"

"What about the Zombie Universe?"

"That is the universe I visited most recently."

Lin Yu: "..."

No wonder this guy greeted him with a purification spell the moment they met; he was worried Lin Yu carried the zombie virus!

Ancient One sighed, "I stayed in that world full of despair and silence for about a month and successfully researched a white magic spell capable of purifying the zombie virus."

"Unfortunately, the effect of this spell is too strong; while purifying the virus, it also purifies the zombies..."

Hearing this, Lin Yu was stunned, then seemed to realize something and asked with a strange expression,

"So that's why you didn't leave that spell behind?"

"Correct!"

Ancient One nodded and said, "That world still held hope. At least, in the future I saw, there was a perfect ending where a vaccine was developed, successfully curing all the zombies."

"To be fair, I felt quite sympathetic toward the plight of that world, but the duty of the Sorcerer Supreme prevents me from staying in other worlds for long; I must return as soon as possible to protect my own universe."

"Since I cannot continue researching the virus in that world to create a more gentle purification spell, nor can I risk bringing the zombie virus back to my own universe, I can only choose to trust in the future!"

As he spoke, Ancient One noticed Lin Yu's expression growing stranger and stranger.

Moreover, when Lin Yu returned, there was no residual zombie virus on him, indicating that either he had blocked the virus from the very beginning, or he had already used the purification spell he created...

Thinking of this, Ancient One couldn't help but frown tightly.

"Wait, you didn't do anything unnecessary, did you?"

"How could that be!" Lin Yu laughed dryly, "I just killed a few zombies who didn't know their place. They attacked me first; you can't expect me not to fight back, can you?"

"..."

Ancient One's eyelid twitched.

After pondering for a moment, he sighed softly, "Well, since it's done, it's done!"

"To be honest, since leaving the Zombie Universe, I have been regretting not leaving the spell behind."

"That perfect ending was indeed beautiful enough, but the hope of achieving it was truly too slim, so slim that even I, the Sorcerer Supreme who can glimpse the future, harbor doubts..."

Lin Yu said thoughtfully, "So you mean I should thank you?"

Ancient One said irritably, "I was just comforting you so you wouldn't blame yourself."

Lin Yu shook his head and said, "I am not blaming myself. Admittedly, when I heard there was an even more perfect ending, I did feel some guilt, but just as you said, a beautiful future is truly too uncertain."

"My approach might not be the most ideal upper strategy, but it is absolutely the most realistic middle strategy."

"Compared to those who have already become zombies, I am more willing to consider those who are still alive."

"Therefore, even if it happened again, I would still do the same..."

Hearing this, Ancient One looked deeply at Lin Yu.

Indeed, no matter how human this one before him appeared, in essence, He was still a Great Existence, and His mental state was far beyond what an ordinary human like him could compare to...

It was just that Ancient One possessed powerful innate mental defenses.

If Lin Yu could hear his inner thoughts, he would definitely complain about the four words 'ordinary human'.

In Lin Yu's eyes, a human like Ancient One, who could peer into the future, had long since transcended the scope of those four words.

The fact that he could stand by and watch Little Spider lose Gwen proved that he had already placed his perspective above the entire river of time; this was a mindset no human could possess.

From this angle, White-Bearded Ancient One indeed possessed the qualification to follow the Eternal Great Deity...

In short, two non-human existences who considered themselves human were mentally complaining about each other, but neither was willing to show it.

"Perhaps so!"

Ancient One sighed lightly, "Perhaps from the moment we met, this ending was already destined..."

Lin Yu said irritably, "Stop sighing. Is the wand fixed? Hurry and send me back next door. After delaying for so long, the Battle of New York has already begun!"

Indeed, while he was seeking clarification from Ancient One, the messages in the chat group had not stopped.

According to reports from the group members, Loki's preparations this time were extremely thorough; he was not coming alone as in the movie but had brought two of the Black Order under Thanos.

Without the Scepter of the Mind, he still used rhetoric to sow discord among the Avengers who had not yet formed a team, and had Hawkeye Barton sneak two Black Order members onto the Helicarrier, successfully destroying the engines and forcing the ship to make an emergency landing on the sea.

Afterwards, taking advantage of the Avengers being scattered in various locations, he successfully boarded Stark Tower and opened the portal as planned.

When Lin Yu spoke these words, the group members had already seen that cyan-blue light streak cutting through the sky...

"No problem," Ancient One said seriously, "I will now lend you a hand!"

……

Let's rewind the clock five minutes.

New York, Stark Tower.

Accompanied by the hum of the device operating, a cyan beam of light shot up from the tower's peak, pierced through the clouds, and exploded with a boom at several thousand meters above the ground.

In an instant, space distorted like water, with ripples spreading outward at incredible speed.

At the center of this distorted space, a patch of black suddenly burst forth from the cyan beam, then instantly expanded, transforming into a black portal intermingled with blue specks of light.

Residents of New York City were all startled by this earth-shattering phenomenon, staring in shock at the portal in the sky.

They saw that hovering within the universe behind the portal was an entire, incomprehensibly vast interstellar fleet!

Strange nebulae emitting blue-purple light filled the backdrop of the vast, deep starry sky, highlighting a black warship shaped like a giant four-clawed crab.

Countless dense black dots floated around the vessel, jointly guarding the four massive limbs extending from the ship's body.

Looking closely, those dense black dots were almost every single one a black warship armed to the teeth.

Around these warships, numerous half-mechanical, half-biological ferocious beasts roamed, like a dense school of fish swimming through the starry sea, slowly drifting against the backdrop of the blue-purple nebulae.

Without a doubt, these whale-shaped beasts were the Chitauri's strategic biological weapons, the 'Leviathans'!

Judging by the film's visual impact, each of these Leviathans possessed a terrifying size of nearly a hundred meters, yet even such massive beasts were smaller than those black warships.

By the same logic, the black warships, which were even larger than the Leviathans, could only be considered ants at the feet of that black mothership, looking so insignificant...

"So this thing is the Chitauri Legion's mothership?!"

On a high-rise building near Stark Tower, Su Su Haoming stared dumbfounded at the scene within the portal.

Fan Xian beside him frowned, asking skeptically, "Counting those extending limbs, it's at least dozens of kilometers long. Can a mere nuclear bomb really destroy it in space?"

"..."

The group members looked at each other, all expressing strong doubt about this.

Xiang Yunye clapped his hands, drawing everyone's attention, and encouraged, "Don't lose heart, there is good news too. The widest part of the portal is only about thirty meters, allowing at most one Leviathan to enter alone; the main warships definitely can't get through!"

Before he finished speaking, the portal in the sky expanded again, growing from thirty meters to about thirty-five meters.

The faces of all group members turned dark, and they couldn't help but turn their gaze toward Xiang Yunye, the jinx.

Xiang Yunye gave a sheepish smile and whispered, "At least the increase isn't big, it only expanded by one ring..."

"Shut up!"

Fan Xian rolled his eyes, turned to look at Lin Lie, and said, "This is your turf; you decide how to act."

At this moment, the black warships and Leviathan beasts behind the portal began to move, carrying locust-like Chitauri soldiers, rushing rapidly toward the portal.

Seeing this, Lin Lie's Expression Grim, and he immediately decided decisively, "Brother He and I will deal with Loki; brothers, do as you please and intercept the Chitauri army!"

"Good!"

Everyone agreed one after another, then each used their own methods and scattered away.

Meanwhile, the Chitauri army closest to the portal finally charged in.

Hundreds of Chitauri soldiers equipped with exoskeleton armor swarmed out, riding lightweight flying devices full of technological style, holding Chitauri infantry forearm cannons, and excitedly pouring blue energy beams down onto the city below.

"Hey, look over here!"

A slightly provocative voice came from between the nearby high-rise buildings.

A Chitauri soldier instinctively turned his head, only to find a beam of light growing larger and larger right before his eyes.

"Boom!"

With a deafening roar, the ugly, reptile-like head exploded.

The surrounding Chitauri soldiers all turned to look at the sound, seeing a gold-and-red iron armor floating in the air, giving the middle finger with the right hand that had just fired the palm cannon, then quickly turning around and flying back the way it came.

Many Chitauri soldiers let out angry screeches, not knowing whether they understood the gesture or were simply provoked, and all turned their flying devices around, chasing after that gold-and-red armor.

(End of this chapter)