Russell was a little confused.
Tony Stark—wasn't he the one who snapped his fingers in Avengers: Endgame?
And Hulk only managed to survive with one arm, so technically it was possible...
But within a second, Russell refuted his own thoughts.
Iron Man was already dead. There would be no Battle of Titan, and without that, Avengers: Endgame wouldn't exist.
It didn't make sense anymore.
Not to mention, the Marvel universe is full of chaos and danger—an ordinary person like him might not even live long enough to reach that point.
For example...
Right now!!!
Russell suddenly noticed from the corner of his eye—Killian, who had just spit magma and killed Stark, wasn't dead yet. He slowly turned his neck to look at Russell, his throat twitching!
After killing his most hated enemy, it was clear that his next target was the "justice from heaven"—Russell himself!
Killian was definitely furious. Victory had been within his grasp, yet fate robbed it from him again.
If he hadn't needed to kill Iron Man first, his first target would've been this weird intruder who just dropped in out of nowhere!
The next second, his shattered chest began to twitch and regenerate, condensing back together. He opened his mouth again!
In that instant, Russell felt a chill down his spine—as if the Grim Reaper himself was staring into his soul. An icy breath of death enveloped him, paralyzing his body.
Some strange mechanical noise echoed in his mind.
But he didn't have time to figure out whether it was an illusion or something else. He screamed inwardly, forcing his terrified body to roll to the right!
He was too young to die.
He wanted to live!!
Whoosh!!!
A ball of molten magma brushed past his ear, instantly burning off a dozen hairs, and then shot into the night like a meteor.
Plop!
Russell collapsed onto the steel frame, ignoring the pain. He gasped for breath, sucking in the cold night air.
He had dodged it!
By just one centimeter!
If he hadn't overcome the fear and forced his body to move, that molten magma would've melted through his skull—just like it did to Iron Man!
He almost died!!
And in that moment, fear turned into pure, raging anger.
He sprang up, gripping a sharp piece of metal debris in his hand, roaring as he prepared to fight to the death.
Anyone who wants to kill me—go to hell!!
But when he turned around, the heat radiating from Killian's body was gone. The flames in his eyes had extinguished. His eyeballs were burned into blackened, lifeless orbs.
Killian was dead.
Russell froze, then sat down heavily on the steel beam, panting.
A few seconds later, he gave a bitter, helpless laugh.
Is this the Marvel Universe? Just one minute after crossing over, it had already tried to kill him.
This place was basically a graveyard for isekai travelers.
And if he remembered correctly, Pepper didn't die in this battle. She would rise from the ashes soon.
So how was he going to explain his appearance here?
Why was he even here?
Pepper Potts was no naive fool. She managed Stark Industries like a pro—there was no way she'd just trust some random stranger.
If he wasn't careful, he might end up being handed over to Nick Fury.
Besides, Iron Man was dead. Pepper was probably losing her mind by now.
Russell sighed again.
Of all the 36 stratagems, fleeing is the best.
If you can't solve a problem—run.
But at that moment, an orange light flashed across the night.
A glowing rectangular portal appeared out of thin air in front of Russell.
And the next second, a squad of black-armored soldiers stormed out of the portal—each one wearing suits marked with the orange TVA logo and carrying short black stun batons.
Russell's face froze.
He instantly recognized them.
The weapons. The uniforms. The orange emblem.
The Time Variance Authority.
A terrifying organization that openly maintains the Sacred Timeline and ruthlessly purges all time branches.
Sh*t... Russell cursed internally.
He finally realized the most dangerous part of being in the Marvel Universe wasn't the villains.
It was TVA.
He had just killed Killian (by accident) right after arriving.
Iron Man had died due to the butterfly effect.
This wasn't the Sacred Timeline anymore—it was a brand-new time branch.
No way TVA would miss that.
Russell was pulled back to reality by the sound of hurried footsteps behind him.
He turned around and saw more soldiers flooding out of another portal, blocking the steel frame from the other end.
But it wasn't over.
Four more orange portals lit up—left and right, above and below!
Four new squads stormed out, stepping on temporary red space barriers, surrounding him completely.
Russell's eyelid twitched.
Wasn't this a little overkill? Even when they captured Loki, it wasn't this dramatic.
TVA seriously overestimated him.
Just then, a low voice echoed from behind the main portal.
"A high-level time sequence anomaly hiding in plain sight… I haven't seen that in years."
A man walked out—around forty years old, with a tall nose, silver hair slicked back, wearing a red vintage-style suit and gold-rimmed glasses.
He gave Russell a scrutinizing stare and muttered:
"Why is he just a normal human?"
The TVA's high-level radiation scanner found no trace of energy. Just an average male body—no enhancements, no powers.
The man frowned, then put on a stern face.
"I'm Tesseract, Senior Overseer of the Time Variance Authority."
"You are under arrest for violating the Sacred Timeline. Commence arrest protocol."
The soldiers swarmed him. Russell, knowing there was no point resisting, surrendered quickly.
Resistance was pointless.
He wasn't going to win. No reason to get beaten up for nothing.
He wasn't Loki.
Better to play along, buy some time, and figure out how to survive in the Void after getting pruned.
That place—full of time-variant monsters and TVA rejects—was way more dangerous than the real world.
Who knew how many anomalies TVA had dumped there?
Seeing Russell surrender so easily, Tesseract frowned slightly.
Just then, a TVA agent scanned him again and reported:
"Supervisor, no trace of any energy reaction. He's just a regular human."
Tesseract was puzzled but turned away and vanished into the portal.
The remaining soldiers began to retreat in an orderly fashion, leaving behind a cleanup squad to drop time grenades and cut off the rogue timeline.
Russell remained silent as he was escorted to the portal.
But just as he was about to step through—
He heard the mechanical voice again.
This time, it wasn't an illusion.
[System activation successful.]
[Detected death at host's location.]
[Initiating loot extraction... Extraction complete.]
DING!
[Extremis (Green)]
[Curse of Knowledge (Purple)]
[Mechanical Furnace (Blue-Purple)] — detected incompatibility, initiating mutation...
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