Chereads / The Warlord System / Chapter 57 - Marvel Arc - 1

Chapter 57 - Marvel Arc - 1

The base building on each of the planets was progressing smoothly. The Zerg, Protoss, Blood Angels, Orks, and Drukhari, each had a world to build from, and there was one left over to turn into a forge world. Khan was slightly disappointed to learn that these planets had been created by the system so he wouldn't be able to keep them, on the other hand the number of planets were an indicator of how difficult this universe was going to be.

That being said, this universe's plot was different than the others. First, it looks like instead of one continuous plot with overarching story, it appears to be several different plots that Khan could choose to activate or completely ignore.

Second, in all appearances the cinematic universe has little too no influence on most of the characters backstory or appearance. Of course that being said, he wasn't an expert in Marvel's lore, especially after it was purchased by mouse. Characters were constantly being renamed, rebooted, or recycled. As well as a dozen other legal shenanigans were preformed to reduce royalty payments...

Khan decided to refocus his thoughts and look at the characters. To see who was who. The Ant-Man and Wasp were Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne, both were in their mid-twenty's, in a relationship but not married. Peter Parker was Spiderman and was currently dating Mary Jane. Carol Danvers was Captain Marvel; Professor Xavier was leading the X-Men. Johnny Blaze was an old man, and the enter Hulk family was active.

Khan realized it would get complicated fast decided to check the plots. It took Khan a minute to realize that all the plots were from video games. There was Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects, Ultimate Alliance, Marvel's Midnight Suns, and Marvel Lego Superheroes.

Khan thought about how to use this information. The Imperfects as he recalled despite their name was impressive. Solara, Wink, Johnny Ohm, Hazmat, Fault Zone, Brigade, and Paragon. Each one had their lives destroyed and then seemingly saved by Niles Van Roekel. Khan wondered how they would react if the most miserable events of their lives had been orchestrated by Roekel.

Khan then decided to look at his mission notice. It was as he expected, he needed to collect at least one of the six Infinity Stones. However, there was something he hadn't noticed before. A warning notice, he opened it.

[Warning, upon absorption of an infinity stone the connected rule will become unstable by varying levels.]

Khan looked at this message, and realized that if he wasn't careful, he could cause an implosion and collapse this universe with nothing to show for it. Khan then used his skill and found the stones' locations. This appears to be where the cinematic universe spent most of its influence, for the most part there were some discernable changes. The power stone was in a high security vault controlled by the Nova Corp, however instead of being their cinematic tech-based version, they're the comic version which have cosmically powered helmets making them similar to the Lantern Corps of DC.

The space stone was in a vault on Asgard; however, it was not inside the Tesseract but on a pedestal next to the Tesseract. The time stone was in the Sanctum Sanctorum. Also on a pedestal and protected by wards created by Doctor Strange.

The reality stone was in the Collector's vault, on his ship, and was constantly moving. The mind stone was in the head of the android named Vision. Finally, the soul stone was in a treasure vault. Not sure who the owner currently is, but there doesn't seem to be any sacrifice needed to obtain it.

Khan reviewed the benefits attached to each stone. It was instinct to want them all. After learning that each stone had a distinct lack of shadows surrounding them and their locations, Khan decided he would need a front man to steal the power and reality stones, maybe even the soul stone. While he launched invasions for the other three.

Khan set his sights to the Guardians of the Galaxy for the role of heist cutouts. When he turned his gaze upon them, they appeared to have a full roster with Peter Quill, Rocket Racoon, Drax, Groot, Nebula, Mantis, and Gamora. Upon closer inspection, Khan found Nebula with a full head of blue hair, apparently in this universe, she was Thanos's sister. Nebula had tried to lead a group of raiders against her brother and failed. Instead of killing her, Thanos made her a trophy of sorts. Forced to be Gamora's nanny and target dummy, Nebula preformed little acts of rebellion by making sure Gamora actually liked her.

So, when Gamora rebelled and left Thanos, Nebula was right beside her in that escape, and both of them joined the group.

With so much information to sort through, Khan decided he would take his time before he would start anything major. Preparation would allow him to come out on top.

Khan then turned his gaze towards Shield. When making his moves on earth they could be an obstacle after all. Nick Furry was in charge as expected, however it was the old white version. Black Widow is a trusted agent and Maria Hill, while very capable and competent, has no direct connections to Furry. Basically, the setup for Ultimate Alliance.

Khan thought about who was here with him. Tanya is more than capable of making sure everything continues on schedule. Then there's was his newly minted four riders. Dordoni, Gantenbainne, Pesche, and Dondochakka were each accepted by an aspect of the apocalypse. Dordoni was embraced by war, Gant was accepted by death, Pesche got famine, and Dondo had pestilence. On the surface those four didn't really change, but the truth was their new power manifested in a second form after their release.

With that ace, Khan was confident that those four could handle any wayward powerhouse that might wander in here. He knew some preparation would be necessary. Recruiting some, convincing others to stay out of his way, and sowing a little discord in the hero community.

The best bet would be to have someone else play the role of big bad on earth until he was ready to make his moves. Khan's thoughts turned to Lilith the mother of demons, who's every action was in effort to save her child the Hunter and be rid of Chthon.

She didn't care how others saw her, she only cared about her goal. So much so that it would actually be very easy to manipulate her as long as Hunter's safety was guaranteed. Khan had ideas for his next steps and gave standing orders before departing.

...

Dr. Steven Strange, the current Sorcerer Supreme was meditating using the mystic arts to try and peer into the future. There wasn't any particular reason, this was something he did to make sure there wasn't any immediate threats on the horizon.

He never bothered to look beyond a few weeks because the future was always changing and the further away, he looked the less clear and unreliable things became. So, he was caught off guard when his power of foresight began to diminish.

As he stood up his assistant and friend Wong noticed something was wrong immediately. Wanda, his new apprentice, also felt something was off. She immediately asked, what was wrong? Strange answered, "I'm not sure the future has become increasingly muddled for some reason. It might mean something big on the horizon or it could be simple interference from some fool who just got some premonition ability and isn't using it appropriately. Time will tell, but as a precaution we will step up your training, Wanda."

Wanda nodded in agreement, then Strange said, "In the meantime, my friend, could you please look into the source of the disturbance?" Wong smiled and said, "Of course. I check the usual sources and if it's more serious than we thought, I'll notify you immediately."

...

Heimdall, sentry of the Bifrost, did not like what he was seeing, or more specifically what he wasn't seeing. A massive nebula that he was aware of, has become distorted. Or he should say, its interior was beyond his sight.

He had always known of the nebula was hollow; he half expected them to become some sort of smuggler haven or a pirate's den to be built within when that detail was discovered by others. From there he would inform his king, and it would be dealt with accordingly. However, it is unlikely that the all-father take any serious actions just because Heimdall couldn't see them anymore. Especially since there weren't any planets there, there wasn't anything to attach to the Bifrost's network too or the fact there was no proof that this anomaly was a direct threat to Asgard. The fact that in order to inspect the anomaly, the scouts would have to go by ship, which would take several months for them to go there and then return, also contributed to the unlikelihood that something would be done.

Still, it would be better to report it and have nothing happened than to do nothing and have it to comeback to bite him later.

...

Peter Quill, aka Star Lord, was sitting in his chair. Rocket was so excited by the money they were going to make, that he was skipping over details. Peter stood up and said, "Alright Rocket, I get that your excited, but perhaps you could tell us what this easy job is." Rocket took a breath and then he said, "All we have to do is fly through the Titan Nebula from one end to the other.

Everyone was silent, Peter knew why. On the surface this really was a easy job. The problem was that nebulas would play havoc on sensors, so if it held any hazards, they would need to see them with their own eyes. It didn't help that the Titan Nebula was the biggest nebula on record. Most ships tried to avoid the area if only not to be caught in an ambush.

That did eat up a lot of time and fuel, so if they could confirm nothing hazardous was there it would definitely open up new trade routes which in turn would more then cover the expenses of being paid. So, the possibility that this job was on the up and up was good.

Peter looked at his crew and asked, "Alright who's in?" While they didn't immediately say anything, he could tell what their answers were going to be. For better or worse they had a new job.