Natasha grunted as she fought against the pull that was threatening to whisk them away by shifting the dimensional planes around them.
It was one the most beautiful things about magic: the rules were extremely malleable.
"Any progress?"
She would have lashed out at Bucky if she didn't have all her focus on trying to shield them from Draul's influence.
She was the first to notice the universal shift that had washed over everyone, Gods and Demons alike, and had she been a moment slower the same fate would have washed over them too.
'Like hell we're gonna leave you alone?'
She pushed all her powers, dismantling and forcing reality to acquiesce to her wishes. As someone who had the most complicated powers in their family, things like limitations were very hard for her to perceive.
Her wish when she had gained her abilities was for her to make their dreams come through. Since the universe couldn't grant any of their deepest desires, she decided to take that role… and that was exactly what she did.
All forces were under her control. Be it the fundamental forces or aspects of creation, she had a stake in all of them.
In terms of overall prowess, she trailed only behind Ororo and Draul.
'So… fucking… budge!'
Fuck the universe. Subconsciously they all knew that if they left him at this stage, it was highly possible that it would be the last time they ever saw him.
The void around them started evaporating as Natasha forced her powers through holes that weren't there, calling upon every aspect she could control to answer their wish and get to him on time.
"… Ororo!"
Understanding Natasha's call, Ororo commanded her divinity and tugged upon her connection with Draul before blasting at the tiny hole that was forming with all her might, widening it even further for Bucky to wedge himself into it to hold it from shrinking further.
With the three of them working in tandem, it didn't take long before they broke the pandimensional barrier that had formed between them and Draul.
What greeted them after they broke through was a red dimension that was nothing like the black universal sky they once knew, inside this place were three beings fighting each other with apocalyptic strength.
They were very familiar with one of them since he was the reason they were here while the other was one they were briefly knowledgeable of, the third being the enigma in this world ending tussle.
Unlike what they feared, Draul was not a losing battle even as he faced the two of them. The huge blazing red version of the man they knew was every bit as frightening as his opponents.
Unlike the others who were stunned at the display in front of them, Ororo shot forth without an ounce of care with lightning blazing her trail. Her ever growing divinity had been strengthened further after Zeus fell and lost everything that made him a High God of the Sky and she had usurped it. The all-encompassing sky was hers to control as she sees fit anyway.
Her lightning struck Chthon as he was the nearest to her beloved, making the Dark God scowl as he faced the intruding pests.
Having noticed the arrival of his family, Draul's buried feelings threatened to surge only for them to be hammered down. Sentimentality had no place in this battlefield and he knew it.
Seeing Ororo's leading charge, the others followed with no regards for their safety, rushing at Chthon while leaving Draul to battle the stronger foe of the two.
"Your sickening pests." Chthon growled as he was faced with the combined attacks from a bunch of ants but that was not enough to faze him.
The Darkhold flipped through pages while Chthon hands conjured a dark spell that was meant to draw out all their deepest fears and bring them into reality. A dark magic of the highest tier. Unfortunately it didn't work on that damned monster.
His lips formed a smirk as he saw the collective form of what they all feared.
Dark robes that hid a sensual body underneath its fabric only for the imagination of the ideal beauty to be ruined by the skeletal hands that peeked out from the sleeves and the baleful aura around her.
Death.
It was not surprising. There was nothing mortals feared more than death. He was about to taunt them when he saw the figure turning her head and directing her focus on someone else.
Draul.
If there was something they feared more than their death, then it was Draul dying. It was that very fear that pushed them forward and made them strive to be stronger.
But unlike what they all expected, Death didn't attack Draul, only watching with something akin to an amusing interest.
As for how they were able to make the Multiversal Embodiment of Death appear instead of an personified avatar of it, no one knew except Chthon. This wasn't the first time someone had summoned Death in a ritual after all. Even mortals with an appropriate sacrifice could summon a personification or an avatar of it.
The arrival of death didn't change anything as Ororo, Natasha, Bucky, Steve and Yelena did all they could to slow Chthon's steps by as much as they could.
On the other side of the battlefield, Draul clashed with Oblivion, drowning everything around them in perpetual end.
It wasn't until they clashed that Draul understood just why the Origin Chaos was here.
Amatsu-Mikaboshi, or his multiversal constant, Oblivion, as he was called, was someone or at least the entity that existed before the Marvel Multiverse came into being. He had always been there through the first to the present cosmos, making him the oldest Abstract, even more than the Living Tribunal.
His existence was so absolute that not even the total destruction of the Marvel-multiverse six times affected him. How could it when he alone represented the true end of all things?
Being the oldest existence in this segment of the omniverse besides The One Above All, no one truly knew anything about him since he never left his domain… But now Draul knew.
Nyarlatothep.
The Crawling Chaos. The God of a Thousand Faces.
He was Oblivion. Or rather, Oblivion was the closest aspect to his true self.
His very existence had drowned countless dimensions to a black end and his sickening laugh was enough to reduce even Gods to madness.
He had devoured the Celestials who had fought in futility to stop his entering into this dramatic stage. The other Abstracts? None would dare face him.
Though the Crawling Chaos couldn't descend, Oblivion was one of the strongest beings in the Marvel-multiverse, even when taking the likes of The Living Tribunal and the present Beyonder into consideration.
Death watched the fight between her progenitor and Draul for a while before she left, paying no mind to the fight between Chthon and Draul's family. The only reason why Chthon couldn't just down them in his presence like he had done with Zeus was that he just couldn't. This wasn't his domain.
Though the laws had changed, this was still a place where Draul's influence was at its strongest, and it was increasing as the moments flowed on. Chthon could access the full powers of his domain through the Darkhold but he couldn't bring it forward, the same with Oblivion. All they could do was drown this space in their presence.
… And he could also see how the domain was automatically favoring the pests.
…
Draul's hand dug into the side of Oblivion's head which shook the entity for a bit but a bit was all the time Draul needed to move around him and wrap his hands over Oblivion's head and broke it against his shoulders, only for another embodiment of him to appear above Oblivion's wedged neck and punch it with his full might.
THWACK! BOOOM!
Oblivion staggered further but the slight smile on his face widened by a few centimeters as he rushed at Draul. His movements were hard to follow or trace as he simply ended the space between them and arrived in front of Draul the next moment and drove an elbow to his head in retaliation and then stepped on Draul's leg to bring him down before driving his head against his.
"You might have touched upon the void but that means nothing in front of me. It's a part of who we all are. It's something we can all do, Dreamer." He mocked.
Draul roared and rushed at Oblivion once again with his face bleeding blood and darkness. His mind working in overdrive as his subconscious monitored the two battlefields.
They both tried 'ending' the momentum of the strike each other attacked with, with Oblivion having the upper hand due to his innate existence.
Though they were both astral beings of the highest level, against each other the differences were negligible, which meant they could make the other bleed and feel pain.
BOOOM!
Their punch connected but none of them moved an inch and they forced their bodies forward and landed punch after punch on each other.
Oblivion was the first to break out of the stalemate as he finally gleamed something that gave him an instantaneous advantage which he immediately implemented on.
He ended Draul's connection with the dimension they were in.
Draul's face widened in surprise and incomprehension as he realized what the avatar of Nyarlatothep did.
Not having time to panic, he turned towards Oblivion to keep him on the back foot but the latter was one step ahead as he formed a formless weapon and wrapped it around Draul, squeezing his body to the point that darkness oozed out of it in huge amounts.
"You don't have what it takes to possess a 'Dreamspark'. It is something so unfathomable for you to be in possession of."
Draul felt as if whatever was holding him bound were trying to get inside his body by chewing out his flesh and his energy.
"Without your connection to this domain, tell me how are you going to escape my palms?"
The pain that assaulted Draul got stronger as his bindings kept chewing him out, threatening to hollow him out in search of whatever it was looking for. His powers ran wild and unfettered as he tried to resist the influence they had on him, causing Oblivion to expend more effort as the dimension they were in started fighting against him. Even he was surprised by how much stronger the man had grown since they started fighting.
"Don't bother fighting. These bonds will continue to weaken you the longer they stay in place so do us both a favor and stop struggling."
Draul's eyes glowed fiercer with every word from Oblivion's mouth as emotions he had kept at bay started raging out.
Yelena was stabbed through the stomach while Ororo was facing the full brunt of Chthon's anger.
Seeing the intense reactions Draul was displaying and mistaking them for being directed at him, Oblivion laughed.
He very much enjoyed how the man before him struggled, even in the face of futility.
All he wanted was a piece of Azathoth's 'Dreamspark' and he would be gone. Although they all had a piece of Azathoth in them, it was never a bad thing to have more, more so when the only two who could contend with him for it didn't have any interest in it except staying in that Idiot's court since their first emergence, only seeking the tiniest bit of fun every once in a billion years while.
If he were to have this spark, one that resonated with Dreams more than anything he's ever found, he was sure he could elevate himself to a place even Yog-Sothoth couldn't – drawing directly from Azathoth's dream… or even directing it. Such thoughts made Nyarlatothep's body shiver in ecstasy.
To him, Draul was nothing more than that very human in the saying who bit more than he could chew, so all he needed to do was shake him thoroughly for him to spew everything back out.
"Give it to me!"
…
…
Alas… Dreams that deny their dreamers any comfort or inspiration are known as nightmares.
…
…
And with every nightmare…
…
…
He That Dreameth stirs awake.