Blake immediately scanned his surroundings but couldn't locate the source of the danger.
Instinctively, flames erupted from his feet, preparing to either change position or fly into the air. However, the Dark Elves, with their years of experience and cunning, were not so easily outmaneuvered.
Just as Blake's feet lifted off the ground and he accelerated, massive hands suddenly burst out of the earth beneath him, grabbing tightly onto his ankles.
Blake felt a sudden weight pulling him down. As he instinctively increased the intensity of the flames from his feet, the soil around him cracked open, and several dark shadows emerged from the ground, pouncing toward him.
These were warriors forcibly transformed into living weapons by infusing their bodies with Aether particles. The immense power from the process often overwhelmed them, and most of these modified Dark Elf soldiers died shortly after the transformation.
Essentially disposable, these soldiers drew their strength from stones infused with the Reality Stone's energy. They were Malekith's last reserves, kept in hiding until now. Initially, Malekith hadn't deployed them, deeming it unnecessary, but Blake's overwhelming power forced his hand.
Ambush was the best option.
Towering over three meters tall, their bodies bulging with muscles resembling rock, the cursed warriors erupted from the ground. One grabbed Blake's ankles, another his legs, then his waist, torso, and finally his neck.
One after another, they piled onto Blake, each one clinging to him tightly. Their strength surpassed Earth's super-soldiers, with each possessing at least half the raw power of the Hulk.
Blake was now thoroughly immobilized, every limb, even his neck and head, restrained by the cursed warriors. If someone were to look from a few meters away, they wouldn't even see Blake, only a massive pile of these warriors clinging together. Only faint glimpses of Blake could be seen through the gaps in their bodies.
While they had temporarily restrained Blake's physical movements, they couldn't suppress the power within him. A small flame suddenly flickered out from between the gaps in their bodies.
Like a wildfire igniting after a spark, flames began surging through every gap between the cursed warriors.
"Arghhhhh!!!"
The cursed warriors let out ear-piercing screams, like metal scraping against iron.
Their rocky, hardened skin glowed red as it burned under the heat of Blake's flames. It was clear they wouldn't last long before they were incinerated.
"So, this is your final move, Malekith? It's useless. They'll burn to death in moments. You can't escape!"
Blake's voice echoed eerily from within the flames.
"No, powerful human. This is my true final move!" Malekith's tone carried no joy, only cold defiance—a final act of resistance, the Dark Elves' last shred of dignity.
As his words fell, the cursed warriors' bodies began to tremble violently. Suddenly, their forms swelled significantly before rapidly collapsing inward.
Blake initially thought they were about to explode like ordinary human bombs. However, after the swelling, their bodies imploded into singularities, forming a collapsing void.
Indeed, they were bombs, but not ordinary ones. These were singularity grenades. No, grenades wouldn't do them justice. They were more like super singularity bombs.
One cursed warrior's collapse formed a black hole with a diameter of at least six meters. As more cursed warriors collapsed, their black holes merged, generating colorful spatial turbulence from the distortions at the edges of their gravitational fields.
The resulting force was ten times stronger than dozens of singularity grenades combined.
In an instant, the flames surrounding Blake were extinguished. The surrounding area became a chaotic maelstrom of distorted gravitational fields.
Blake could even feel different gravitational forces pulling at a single finger in multiple directions. If not for his enhanced constitution, this alone would have torn him apart.
"I… can still hold on!" Blake forced the words out, his voice strained as the energy of the Space Stone within him surged wildly.
"How about if I join the fray?"
Malekith's cold voice echoed from the shadows.
A shadow suddenly lunged toward Blake. As it neared the black holes and began to be affected by the gravitational fields, Malekith's body, like the cursed warriors before him, abruptly exploded.
Another segment of space collapsed. The black hole generated by Malekith's detonation seemed to be the final straw that broke the delicate balance Blake had been maintaining to channel his energy.
The existing black holes around Blake collapsed violently, but instead of restoring the surrounding space, the area became even more distorted, as if a newspaper was being viciously crumpled by a hand.
The distortion reached its peak. After less than a millisecond of eerie calm, a massive black hole, with a diameter of over a hundred meters, formed right where Blake was standing. It rapidly contracted and then disappeared entirely.
The space returned to normal.
At the same time, the cosmic alignment of the Nine Realms reached its critical moment.
Above the nine kingdoms, the wormholes connecting the realms expanded uncontrollably, creating chaotic spatial disturbances.
In London, the chaos reached a fever pitch. One moment, someone could be sitting at home on their toilet, humming a tune. The next, they and their toilet might drop straight into the Thames—or even Asgard's Endless Sea.
A flock of doves flying serenely around a church roof one second could emerge from the ground the next.
A taxi driving through a narrow alley suddenly found itself atop the Tower of London.
Despite Captain America and Tony Stark having already contacted local authorities and retrieved Dr. Erik Selvig's gravity device, there was no stopping the cosmic alignment of the Nine Realms.
"Hurry up and find the right spot! I don't want to end up in some fiery realm or, worse, in Hel," Tony said.
Just as he finished speaking, a grand piano appeared above Tony's head.
Tony yelped in alarm. Unable to close his helmet in time, he threw his hands above his head to shield it.
Thankfully, the piano vanished just fifty centimeters above his head.
"Damn it! Dr. Selvig, you'd better stay close to us!" Tony growled, pulling the scientist, who was holding the gravity device, closer to himself and Captain America.
"The disturbances are getting stronger. We're almost there!" Selvig said, his eyes glued to the readings on his instrument.
After much searching, they finally found a suitable spot along the Thames to set up the gravity device.
"Here! Now follow my instructions!" Selvig said, distributing the equipment to the group.
Suddenly, a wave of blue energy swept across the sky, and all the wormholes connecting the eight realms vanished without a trace.
Tony and the others had just positioned the gravity device when the wormholes disappeared.
"Did you activate it, Doctor?" Captain America asked Selvig, puzzled.
"It wasn't me! I haven't even secured it yet!" Selvig replied.
"What on Earth just happened?" Captain America muttered, staring at the distant sky. "Tony, doesn't that blue energy look… familiar to you?"
*******************************************
You can get access to early chapters on patr*on.
If you like my work and you want to support me then you can become my patron on patre*n.
My patr*on account is S_Pandey_0170
This time, the Nine Realms Convergence crisis passed without much commotion, so much so that Dr. Selvig's gravity meter wasn't even needed.
Unlike in the movie, where the spatial interaction lasted longer, this time it was over shortly after it began.
As a result, there were barely any civilian casualties in the vast city of London, except for a few unlucky folks who accidentally fell into the Thames, which didn't warrant much attention.
This was undoubtedly good news for the Avengers saving the world, but there was also a piece of bad news.
Asgard, the Bifrost Temple…
Thor had Heimdall summon all the Avengers there.
During the battle between Blake and Malekith, Heimdall had kept a constant watch on that side.
Eventually, when Malekith went all in with a self-destructive move, several collapsing black holes created spatial turbulence, and Blake disappeared into the chaos.
Heimdall searched for a long time but couldn't find a trace of Blake.
"That's the situation. The spatial collapse triggered some chain reactions. Combined with the Space Stone he carries, I can't fully explain it, but it also disrupted the Nine Realms Convergence, and Blake has gone missing."
"Blake… is dead?"
Natasha's face instantly turned pale as she grabbed Thor's arm, staring at him intently.
"No! He's not dead! He's just missing!"
Thor quickly clarified.
"If Blake isn't dead, then why can't this golden-eyed guy find him?"
Tony stepped forward, asking.
"My eyes can instantly see every place within the Nine Realms and sense every being within them. However, beyond the Nine Realms, I can see but cannot instantly locate anyone."
"I can only scan a limited number of Earth-sized planets at a time, and as for the universe…"
With that explanation, everyone understood. Within the Nine Realms, Heimdall's vision acted like an automatic search function. Outside of them, he could only painstakingly search bit by bit.
"If that's the case, then it's not certain that Blake is in trouble. But Thor, why are you so sure Blake isn't dead? Don't get me wrong—I hope he's okay too. I'm just curious why you're so certain!"
Dr. Banner cautiously voiced his question.
"He carries the essence of the Asgardian fire god. If he had died, the essence would have returned to Asgard no matter where he perished, and Odin would have sensed it. That's why I'm sure Blake isn't dead. I just don't know where the spatial turbulence has taken him."
"Next time, lead with that before diving into other explanations."
The Captain patted Thor on the shoulder, then looked reassuringly at Natasha.
"Don't worry. He can open a portal back at any time. He might just be dealing with some temporary trouble!"
"Let's hope so."
Natasha let out a heavy sigh of relief.
It was, of course, good news that Blake wasn't dead, but considering he carried the Space Stone and could open a portal at any time, the fact that he hadn't returned meant he was facing significant trouble.
---
So, what kind of trouble had Blake encountered?
When Malekith made his final lunge, the resulting black hole tore apart all the surrounding space.
Blake didn't even have time to use the Space Stone's power before he was swept into the black hole and vanished as the space around it healed.
What followed was a dizzying sensation, as if his very soul was being torn apart.
It was an intense feeling, like extreme motion sickness mixed with altitude sickness, acting directly on Blake's soul.
Finally, Blake couldn't hold on any longer. His head tilted to the side, and he passed out.
Who knows how much time had passed...
Blake slowly opened his eyes.
*Dizzy...*
It felt as if his brain had turned into a blob of jelly, with his skull having expanded a size too large, causing the jelly to wobble uncontrollably inside.
The wobbling left Blake unable to see anything clearly.
He struggled to get up, reaching out to brace himself on the ground, but his hand slipped, and he fell heavily back down.
He tried again, only to fall even harder this time.
After several attempts, all unsuccessful, Blake furiously cursed the ancestors of some unlucky soul in his mind, then resigned himself to lying flat on the ground.
Thankfully, this sensation wasn't permanent. Blake could distinctly feel the intense dizziness gradually fading away.
Roughly half an hour later, the dizziness subsided significantly, but he still couldn't move.
The moment he tried, the strong vertigo returned. Frustrated, Blake could only pull out a tablet from his portable space.
It took him a full two minutes just to flip himself over. After waiting for the dizziness to pass, he turned on the tablet, picked a random downloaded movie, and lay there watching it.
He propped a pillow under his head and placed a mirror nearby to keep an eye on his surroundings.
Just like that, Blake lay in the barren wilderness, carefree, watching his movie.
As long as he didn't move too much, his vision was mostly restored.
Unfortunately, the area within his line of sight was nothing but a desolate expanse of yellow-brown rocks. Not a single animal or even a blade of grass was in sight.
The sky, on the other hand, resembled Earth's, though it appeared overcast, like the eerie half-darkness before a thunderstorm.
After a few minutes, Blake suddenly heard faint footsteps coming from behind him.
Glancing into the mirror, he spotted a small tree-like creature, about 20 centimeters tall, bouncing its way toward him.
"Groot?"
Blake instinctively tried to sit up to get a better look, but the sudden motion was too much. His head spun, and he collapsed back onto his pillow.
"Good thing I had the sense to use a pillow!" Blake grumbled, cursing as he peered into the mirror.
Sure enough, it was Groot—just a baby version of him, and he was alone.
Blake remembered from *Guardians of the Galaxy* that Rocket's companion Groot was supposed to be the last of his kind.
The only one left in the entire universe.
So, who was this?
If this was the Groot he knew, then according to the current timeline, the *Guardians of the Galaxy* team shouldn't have formed yet, and Groot wouldn't have become this small.
Could it be that this universe still had surviving Groot tree people?
Speculating wouldn't change much. The result would remain the same.
Blake waited as the bouncing little tree creature approached. Forcing a smile, he greeted him.
"Hi, Groot! Hello, I'm Blake!"
Baby Groot paid no attention to Blake's words. He curiously examined the tablet screen for a moment, then turned his gaze toward Blake, lying on the ground.
He walked around Blake in a full circle before stopping next to Blake's neck.
After staring at the skin on Blake's neck for a while, Groot plopped down on the ground. The small branches on his tiny feet began quickly wrapping around Blake's neck.
"Hey! What are you trying to do? I think we can talk this out—don't you think so? Hey, Groot! Do you know Rocket? Rocket Raccoon!"
*******************************************
You can get access to early chapters on patr*on.
If you like my work and you want to support me then you can become my patron on patre*n.
My patr*on account is S_Pandey_0170
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