Chapter 237 238: Strange Spaceship

Thor charged forward, lightning crackling on the hammerhead. "Want to run? Have you asked my hammer first?"

He raised Mjolnir, and lightning descended from the sky, striking the hammerhead and transforming into a blue pillar of electricity that blasted toward the direction of the Eternal's retreat.

Gilgamesh turned, crossed his fists, and took the lightning strike head-on. He was left trembling from the shock, but he did not fall.

He let out a roar, shook off the remnants of the lightning, and turned to continue running.

Tina's short sword flashed with a cold light under the moonlight. Her swordsmanship was precise and fierce, with every strike sealing off any route Hela might take for pursuit.

Hela was forced back two steps by her swordsmanship and frowned. This woman's swordsmanship was indeed impressive.

Loki's clones swarmed in from all directions, attempting to surround the Eternal, but the Eternal's retreat speed was fast. They covered each other and coordinated, like a pack of well-trained wolves, maintaining their formation even while retreating.

Sersi ran at the back of the group, her hands pressed against the ground. The ground changed, shifting from solid Earth to soft marsh, and from marsh to slippery ice.

She was not trying to attack Hela, but rather to slow down her pursuit.

Hela stepped onto the ice, her feet slipping slightly. She frowned and used the power of death to manifest several spikes beneath her feet, piercing them into the ice to steady herself.

But this delay allowed the Eternal to run over a hundred meters ahead.

Thor chased after them, swinging his hammer at Gilgamesh's back. Gilgamesh turned to block, and was knocked back a few steps, but did not fall.

Using the force of the blow, he leaped back over a dozen meters and continued running.

"You cannot escape!" Thor shouted.

Loki's illusions permeated the forest, creating dozens of false figures in an attempt to confuse the Eternal's vision.

But Makkari's speed was too fast. She wove through the illusions, bypassing every false figure she encountered, and led the team out of the illusion's perimeter.

Hela finally broke free from the constraints of the ice. She leaped up, the black sword coalescing in her hand, ready to be thrown.

Just then—the sky darkened.

It was not clouds obscuring the moonlight, but some kind of massive, metallic object slowly descending from the night sky.

It was silent, like a massive shadow covering the entire forest.

Hela looked up and saw a spaceship.

It was not an Asgardian spaceship, nor was it a ship from Earth; it was a shape she had never seen before—circular, like a gigantic ring with a hollow center, its edges emitting a faint blue light.

Its volume was immense, obscuring nearly half the sky. It hovered above the forest without making a sound, like a sleeping behemoth.

A beam of light descended from the spaceship.

It was not an attack, nor a weapon, but a gentle tractor beam, blue-white in color, carrying a strange energy fluctuation that Hela could perceive.

The beam enveloped the nine members of the Eternal, and their bodies began to rise, pulled toward the spaceship.

"What is that?" Thor stopped in his tracks, looking up at the spaceship.

Hela was watching too, her brows furrowed, a flash of vigilance in her deep green eyes.

She could feel that the spaceship was not from Earth, nor was it from the Eternal; its energy fluctuations came from a civilization she had never encountered.

"A third party." Loki walked to Hela's side, also looking at the spaceship.

"A third-party force has intervened."

The ring-shaped spaceship slowly turned above the forest, taking the nine members of the Eternal with it, and vanished into the depths of the night sky.

...

In Nidavellir, countless light-years away from Earth, the blast furnaces of the Dwarven Kingdom were still Burning.

But the light of the furnace fires was no longer as warm as it used to be.

This was a hollowed-out Planet, its interior transformed into a massive forge workshop.

Countless suspended bridges connected the various platforms, and massive gears rotated slowly, emitting a low, rumbling sound.

The central blast furnace was taller than any other structure, with flames gushing from the furnace mouth, illuminating the entire space.

The dwarves had been forging here for thousands of years, crafting countless divine weapons: the Bifrost Bridge of Asgard, Odin's Eternal Spear, Mavuika's Thousand Blazing Suns, and Mjolnir.

But at this moment, the light of the furnace reflected nothing but deathly silence.

The dwarves huddled in corners, some clutching injured arms, others with their heads bowed, silent.

The air was filled with a burnt smell and a strange metallic scent—the traces left behind by the invaders.

Mavuika passed through the light of the Bifrost Bridge and landed on the central platform.

She looked around, seeing the silent dwarves, the damaged equipment, and the massive footprints left on the ground—not human footprints, but those left by some much larger creature.

The edges of the footprints were cleanly cut, as if imprinted into the metal floor by some precise technology.

Her gaze locked onto one person.

That person was sitting on the steps next to the blast furnace, back against the furnace wall, hands hanging over his knees.

His frame was massive; even while sitting, he was taller than an average person standing.

His skin was dark gray, like weathered rock, and his hair and beard were white, braided into thick plaits.

There was a deep scar on his shoulder, as if slashed by some sharp blade; the edges of the wound had scabbed over, but it was still shocking to behold.

Eitri, ruler of the Dwarven Kingdom. The greatest blacksmith in the Nine Realms.

His strength was as renowned as his craftsmanship; there were few opponents in the Nine Realms capable of leaving him in such a sorry state.

Mavuika landed beside him and quickly scanned him, finding no obvious wounds other than the scar on his shoulder.

But as her gaze swept across the entire Dwarven Kingdom, she saw some broken walls, smashed equipment, and destroyed bridges.

Someone had been here, someone had fought here, but the Dwarven Kingdom did not appear to have suffered large-scale destruction—it had not been burned, it had not been razed, and there were no corpses of dead dwarves.

"Eitri," Mavuika's voice echoed in the cavernous workshop, "was it you who sent me the signal?"

Eitri raised his head and looked at Mavuika. In those eyes, clouded by the passage of time, there was a glimmer of relief.

His lips moved, and his voice was hoarse and weary, like sandpaper rubbing against an iron plate.

"Your Highness Mavuika... you have come."

"What happened? What occurred here? Who attacked you?"

Eitri took a deep breath and slowly began to recount.

"Five hours ago... Thanos descended upon Nidavellir with his fleet."

His voice was slow, every word seemingly squeezed from the depths of his throat.

"I don't know how he managed to bypass the surveillance system of the Nine Realms. Heimdall's eyes did not see him, the energy of the Bifrost Bridge did not detect him, they just... appeared suddenly."