Even informing Gwen and the others about the gathering had been left entirely to JARVIS. The three of them were seriously addicted to gaming.
Not long after, the hired chef arrived as well. Aside from the three idiots still immersed in the virtual world, everyone else busied themselves preparing the dining table.
"Ms. Pepper, Agent Natasha has arrived."
JARVIS's voice echoed through the house.
"Let her in."
Pepper immediately headed toward the entrance.
JARVIS opened the door, and Natasha walked in carrying a paper bag.
"I borrowed a few bottles from the Director. Top-shelf stuff."
Natasha handed the bag over to Pepper. Pepper opened it for a glance and, unsurprisingly, found several rare vintage liquors inside.
Looks like Nick Fury had unknowingly suffered another heavy financial loss.
A few days later, Pepper finally received Tony's birthday gift—the Rescue Armor.
And after trying it on just once, Pepper finally understood why Tony was so obsessed with his suits. She also understood why he loved flying around in them so much.
Actually flying yourself and using transportation were two completely different experiences.
On Pepper's birthday itself, only she and Tony spent the day together. Everyone else tacitly avoided disturbing them.
Meanwhile, far out in deep space, a massacre had taken place.
Thor personally witnessed the death of his younger brother Loki.
Aside from Thor and Hulk, no one aboard the ship survived.
At the final moment, Heimdall used the Bifrost to send Hulk to Earth before breathing his last.
Ebony Maw, whose face resembled Voldemort's, picked up the Tesseract that had rolled across the floor and respectfully presented it to the towering purple figure beside him.
Thanos took the Tesseract and crushed its outer shell with one hand, revealing the glowing blue Space Stone inside.
As he slowly brought the stone toward the golden gauntlet, the gem and its socket seemed to attract each other naturally.
Click.
The Space Stone embedded perfectly into the slot on the gauntlet's middle finger.
And on the index finger, a purple gem was already set in place—the Power Stone that Quill and the others had once taken from Ronan.
Now that the Power Stone was in Thanos's possession, it meant Xandar had already fallen—or at the very least, half of it had.
The moment the Space Stone locked into place, blue energy exploded outward. Starting from Thanos's left hand, the energy coursed through his veins before gradually settling down once more.
"There are still two Stones on Earth. Find them and bring them back to Titan."
Thanos's voice was deep and heavy, his gaze fixed upon the gauntlet.
Four empty sockets still remained.
"We will not disappoint you."
Ebony Maw and the rest of the Black Order knelt on one knee.
Then Thanos waved his left hand, and purple flames instantly engulfed the ship.
Meanwhile, he and the Black Order vanished within a burst of blue light.
Thor helplessly cradled Loki's already cold body as blood continuously poured from his mouth.
From his remaining eye, a tear of blood slid down his face.
Moments later, the entire ship exploded.
Behind it loomed a gigantic vessel dozens of times larger, making Thor's ship look no bigger than a peanut in comparison.
Elsewhere in the galaxy, a streak of rainbow-colored light hurtled through space at incredible speed.
After an unknown amount of time, the light passed by a massive orange-red star and finally entered the Solar System.
After streaking past two planets, it plunged headfirst toward a blue world.
As it tore through the atmosphere, one could clearly see a black figure tumbling wildly inside the rainbow light.
Meanwhile, two weeks had passed since Thanos destroyed the Asgardian ship.
During those two weeks, the world remained in an unusually peaceful state.
No major wars.
No supervillains.
The Avengers Headquarters only needed routine operations, and the Avengers themselves enjoyed a rare vacation.
"You've got to be joking, Wong. Since when do we need money?"
Inside the New York Sanctum, Stephen Strange descended the stairs dressed casually, with Wong following behind him.
"Kamar-Taj still needs funding to operate. Where do you think daily expenses come from? You think supplies appear out of thin air?"
Wong mercilessly shut down Strange's complaint.
They were sorcerers, not criminals. Daily necessities still had to be bought with actual money.
"Hm... let me check. I think I still have two hundred dollars somewhere~~"
Strange searched through his pockets and eventually pulled out two wrinkled bills.
He used to be wealthy, but most of his fortune had been spent trying to heal his hands.
"What do you want to eat? My treat."
Waving the cash around, Strange headed toward the front entrance.
Suddenly—
BOOM!
The building was instantly smashed apart as a rainbow-colored beam crashed straight through the ceiling and into the staircase behind them.
The staircase collapsed under the impact, leaving behind a crater over five meters wide.
"What the hell~~~?! My hundred-year-old staircase!!"
Strange shouted as his blue Cloak of Levitation instantly flew over and wrapped around him.
At the same time, his blue sorcerer robes appeared.
Strange and Wong immediately rushed to the edge of the crater and looked down.
At that moment, Hulk was rapidly transforming back into Bruce Banner.
Banner looked up at the two of them and hurriedly spoke.
"Thanos... Thanos is coming. We need to—"
Before he could finish, his head tilted sideways and he passed out.
"Thanos? Who's Thanos~~?"
Strange turned toward Wong.
Wong looked equally confused.
In a park nearby, Tony and Pepper were enjoying a rare peaceful moment together.
Both wore sportswear, clearly having just finished jogging.
"You know, I had a dream last night. We had a kid."
Tony lay half-reclined on a bench, his head resting against Pepper's shoulder.
"Boy or girl?"
Pepper wiped the sweat from Tony's forehead.
"A girl. I even named her after that weird uncle of yours. What was his name again..."
Tony thought hard but couldn't remember the name of Pepper's particularly eccentric uncle.
"Morgan. His name was Morgan."
Pepper reminded him.
"Right, Morgan. Though honestly, now that I think about it, the name's not all that special~~~"
Tony shrugged.
"What else happened in the dream? Did you teach little Morgan how to become the next Iron Man?"
Pepper teased lightly.
Being a superhero was dangerous, and she definitely didn't want their future child involved in something like that.
"I... I forgot. Who knows what happened after that..."
Tony sat up and pointed toward the arc reactors on both his and Pepper's chests.
"Then again, maybe it's unavoidable. We're both technically Iron Man now. Leaving her out might seem unfair~~~"
Tony grinned and leaned in to kiss Pepper—
Only for sparks suddenly to appear beside them as a circular portal opened.
"Oh come on~~ Stephen, could you pick a worse time to show up?"
Tony's face instantly darkened.
He had been in the middle of a romantic moment. Did Strange want to get blasted back through his own portal?
"Tony, I need you to come with me immediately. Something important has happened."