Magneto's (Erik Lensherr's) voice echoed over the ruins, carrying a sense of desperate, almost hysterical conviction mixed with heartbreaking finality.
His words were like a poisoned dagger, aimed precisely at the softest part of Charles Xavier's heart.
A mutant planet...
No discrimination, no persecution, just their own kind...
Charles's fingers clenched the armrests of his wheelchair, his knuckles turning white from the strain.
He looked at his old friend—a man who, despite wearing a ridiculous spandex costume with hilariously oversized shoulder pads, still held his head high.
In that moment, the man with the world's most powerful mind couldn't find a single word to argue back.
Dignity?
In the face of the survival of their entire species, was dignity truly too much of a luxury?
"Charles! Don't listen to him!"
Tony Stark's desperate shout crackled through his armor's speaker.
But in Charles's ears, the sound drifted in and out, as if filtered through a thick fog.
"He's trying to brainwash you! That alien lunatic is going to kill all of us! He's just selling you a lie! Snap out of it, Professor!"
Tony screamed in despair, simultaneously piloting the massive Anti-Frieza Armor to blast the metallic barricade in front of him.
He knew the Professor's capabilities all too well.
If even Professor X defected, the fight would be truly over.
If Charles decided to mind-control the Avengers...
Tony shivered.
That was a trip straight to hell.
However, just as Magneto thought his mind-game was about to succeed, and just as Charles's eyes began to glaze over...
"ROOOOOOAAAAARRR—!!!"
A roar of absolute fury, like a sudden clap of thunder, shattered the tense silence, literally shaking the air.
The metallic cage that had pinned the Hulk down suddenly began to groan and twist.
Screeech—SNAP!
Countless solid steel beams, each thicker than a man's thigh, exploded under the green brute's strength.
They fractured like brittle pretzel sticks and flew everywhere!
The Incredible Hulk, the beast suppressed for too long, had finally broken free!
His eyes now glowed a luminous green, and two visible plumes of steam shot from his nostrils.
He didn't understand mutant futures, or the philosophical debate between dignity and survival.
He only knew one thing.
That old man in the red helmet had used metal sticks to squeeze him, and it hurt!
It hurt a lot!
"HULK... HATE... METAL MEN!!!"
BOOM!
The ground instantly fractured into a deep crater.
Hulk's enormous body shot forward like a cannonball, carrying enough kinetic energy to smash mountains, straight at the hovering Magneto!
The speed was terrifying, leaving a green blur in the air.
Magneto's face paled.
He had been so busy having a heart-to-heart with his old buddy that he hadn't realized the green monster was capable of this kind of power surge.
"Damn it!"
Magneto instinctively tried to generate a magnetic field for defense, but the Hulk was too fast—this was the ultimate explosion of pure physical power.
The enormous green fist was rapidly filling his vision!
Magneto could even see the rough texture on the Hulk's knuckles.
Was he about to be embarrassed in front of his Lord Frieza?
No!
In that fraction of a second...
A gray blur shot out from the side ruins like a phantom.
"FOR LORD FRIEZA!!"
It was a shout filled with fanatical fervor and devotion.
THWUMP!!!
A tremendously heavy sound of flesh-on-flesh impact rang out.
Hulk's unstoppable punch was intercepted in mid-air!
No, not intercepted.
It was deflected!
A monstrous, gray creature covered in bone spikes, and even slightly bulkier than the Hulk, slammed viciously into the Hulk's side.
The tremendous force sent both massive figures tumbling away, crashing through a stadium bleacher.
As the dust settled, the gray monster slowly rose, shaking its grotesque head and baring a mouthful of jagged fangs.
Emil Blonsky.
The Abomination!
The madman who once transformed himself into a monster in pursuit of power.
He, too, was now wearing the distinctive white-and-purple battle armor (stretched nearly to the breaking point) with the Frieza Force symbol stamped on his chest.
"Hah... Hah..."
Abomination glared at the Hulk as he crawled out of the wreckage, his eyes gleaming with savagery.
"Long time no see, Hulk."
"Heard you were scared of the blonde guy? HAHAHAHA!"
Abomination let out a grating, mocking laugh, then pointed up at the elegant figure in the sky.
"But I'm different!"
"I can feel the Lord's power! It's the power of evolution!"
"If I kill you, I'll become the Lord's number one muscle! That blue-skinned idiot will have to get in line behind me!"
Abomination stomped his foot and charged at the Hulk again.
"Come on! Let's go another round!"
"RRAH! HULK... SMASH YOU!"
The two powerhouses instantly locked into a brutal melee, punch for punch, each blow causing a miniature earthquake.
In the air, Magneto wiped the cold sweat from his brow, still rattled.
He glanced at Abomination battling the Hulk, mentally calling him a "brainless ape," but simultaneously breathing a sigh of relief.
At least he hadn't been humiliated in front of his new boss.
"Hmph, Charles, do you see?"
Magneto looked back at the old man in the wheelchair, a cold sneer on his face.
"This is the Lord's appeal."
"Even this mindless killing machine is willing to die for him."
"We are the ones aligning with destiny!"
On the ground, Tony Stark's heart sank.
"Damn it!"
Tony gritted his teeth. The Anti-Frieza Armor's engines roared. He had to do something.
"Professor! Don't listen to his bullsht!"
"That's fear! That's not loyalty! That's the subservience of a broken slave!"
Tony yelled, raising his arm as his pulse cannon began to charge.
"I'm going to take apart your magnet suit!"
However, before Tony could fire, Magneto merely gave him a dismissive look.
"Annoying."
He gave a slight flick of his finger.
Countless pieces of metallic debris from the ruins instantly flew up, forming an impenetrable steel tornado that completely encircled Tony, the CLANG-CLANG-CLANG of impacts echoing constantly.
While the common metal couldn't destroy the Vibranium armor, it was infuriatingly distracting, like a swarm of angry flies, completely blocking Tony's vision and line of fire.
As the ground battle devolved into a messy stalemate...
In another dimension.
The Mirror Dimension.
Here, the sky was inverted, and buildings folded and twisted in the air like gravity-defying blocks.
"ROAR!!!"
The now-enlarged Apocalypse (En Sabah Nur) was trapped, roaring furiously like a fly stuck in a glass jar.