The sky cracked open…
Hundreds of battleships, obsidian-plated dreadnoughts of the Black Order, came spiraling out of warp, only to be instantly swallowed by Magneto's storming magnetic field.
Their engines shrieked and then died all at once.
A rain of starships fell from the heavens.
They plummeted like meteors, slamming into the metal-plated desert in waves. Dust clouds erupted.
Fortunately for the invading armada, most of the ships were built to survive impacts far worse than this. They held together intact.
Inside, however, Thanos's soldiers exploded into outraged shouts.
They were the Black Order Legion… Thanos's chosen, feared across galaxies and this was how they arrived?
Crashing like broken toys? It was unacceptable.
Even without power, the furious troops tore their hatches open with brute force, bellowing in Rage as they poured out of their fallen ships.
The moment their boots hit the metal ground, they charged directly toward Soren's camp.
At the center of the chaos, the Black Order's Five's flagship had taken the least damage. But within the magnetic storm, even they were cut off from their fleet, unable to coordinate or give orders.
Through the distortion, all five generals saw the gathered defenders.
And more importantly, they recognized him.
Soren.
They had studied him before coming to Earth. A man whose power Thanos had specifically warned them about.
There was no time to command their forces and no time to regroup.
They could only act.
General Corvus Glaive dissolved into a billowing shroud of black haze, shooting out of the ship like an arrow of shadow.
The remaining four generals followed, leaping from the flagship and streaking toward Soren's formation.
Dozens… then hundreds of Black Order soldiers poured out of the storm field. Rage twisted their expressions as their weapons ignited with alien energy.
But on Soren's side, no one flinched.
After all the gifts Soren had bestowed on them… after the potential amplification, the artifacts, the divine enhancements… these soldiers were nothing more than fodder.
Soren stood at the very front, watching the approaching swarm.
He didn't call on anyone else and simply lifted his hand.
"Space… Split."
Murderous intent flashed in his eyes, compassion had no place here.
A thin black line snapped into existence in front of him, razor-sharp, Space warped around it, bending inward like reality itself was wincing.
The line widened into a pitch-black fracture.
The soldiers saw the crack too late. Shock flickered across their faces as the rift sliced through their ranks, bisecting bodies as easily as air.
In a heartbeat, dozens of Thanos's elite soldiers fell in two neat rows, their halves collapsing to the metal ground.
The Five Generals halted mid-flight, stunned by the carnage. Soren had harvested an entire squad with a single gesture.
Corvus Glaive's body thickened into swirling darkness, and with a harsh snarl he unleashed the power of his legendary blade.
Black crescent slashes rippled through the air, screaming toward the edges of the magnetic storm field.
They hit the metal desert exploding in bursts that sent molten shards flying.
Tony's face went pale as the air around them stuttered.
Before he could shout a warning, the magnetic storm field shredded apart as though something invisible had sliced through its core.
Its aftershock alone had been enough to break their carefully engineered storm field, something no army in the universe could ever accomplish so effortlessly.
The moment the field vanished, the sky lit up again.
Engines switched back on, and starships regained control. And like a single, massive heartbeat the fleet opened fire.
A torrent of plasma, explosive shells, and alien energy rained from above, turning the sky into a storm of death.
The first volley struck the metal desert.
Tony had built that field to stall the invasion. And Corvus Glaive had cut it down like paper.
Soren stared ahead.
Corvus Glaive's killing intent, combined with the monstrous artifact in his hand, made the general more dangerous than most cosmic warlords.
But the barrage descending from the fleet… was meaningless.
Soren lifted a hand and summoned a space barrier, shimmering like a transparent wall of fractured starlight.
Every blast struck it and vanished, swallowed whole as if falling into another dimension.
Then Soren opened his palm wider… space itself ripped apart.
A massive rupture tore across the sky, widening into jagged cracks that crawled outward.
There were too many warships to target individually, so Soren didn't try.
He unleashed the rift as a wide-area weapon, forcing every ship in the sky to fight simply to evade being sliced in half by reality itself.
Panic rippled through the fleet.
"Alright, let's proceed as planned!"
The initial magnetic storm had caught the invaders off guard, but now the Black Order fleet had regained momentum.
And instead of retreating after seeing Soren's terrifying display of power…
They became bolder.
The elite warriors of the Black Order, tempered by endless war and loyal to Thanos, met overwhelming force with fury. Their determination impressed even Soren.
These soldiers were no cowards.
All five generals now remained outside their main ship.
From the moment they stepped out, they felt multiple powerful auras locking onto them. But each reacted in their own way.
Corvus's peerless blade pulsed.
Corvus aimed its deadly point directly at Soren, his eyes merciless.
Black Dwarf met the Hulk's roaring challenge with a grin full of bloodlust.
Two mountains of muscle and rage, moments from collision.
As Professor X's psychic pressure wrapped around Ebony, he didn't blink.
Proxima Midnight and Supergiant may have worn the faces of women, but their presence radiated a killing aura so dense it could suffocate lesser warriors.
There was nothing gentle about them.