The golden light that filled the sky instantly dimmed, like a candle being snuffed out.
"Ah!!!"
A shrill and miserable scream echoed through the world.
Under the horrified gaze of everyone present, an arm, still encased in a golden energy gauntlet, fell to the ground, accompanied by a spray of gushing blood.
It was Captain Marvel's right arm!
Carol clutched the smooth, mirror-like wound of her severed arm, her face contorted with unbelievable terror.
"My arm... my arm!"
Blood rained down like droplets, staining the ruins below crimson.
"See?"
Frieza shook off the few drops of blood that had splattered onto his hand, a look of helplessness on his face.
"I told you to consider your actions carefully before striking, but you refused to listen."
"This is the consequence of impulsiveness, Ms. Danvers."
"No... this is impossible!"
Carol suppressed the intense pain, the fury in her eyes not extinguishing. Instead, it burned even more wildly.
She was Captain Marvel! The strongest warrior in the universe!
How could she possibly lose to a villain from Earth?
"I'm going to kill you!"
Having completely lost her mind, Carol ignored the injury to her severed arm and roared as she charged forward once more.
Her remaining left hand gathered its last reserves of photon energy, aiming for a desperate, final struggle.
Looking at the woman rushing toward him like a rabid dog, the mockery in Frieza's eyes vanished, replaced by the cold indifference one reserves for garbage.
He gently shook his head. "I said this before."
"If you do not know how to respect the Emperor, your fate will be the same as that nation."
"That is—destruction."
As he finished, Frieza did not launch another attack. He simply slowly raised his left hand.
Then, a surge of purple Ki instantly erupted.
Vwoom—!
A vast and boundless spatial fluctuation instantly enveloped all of New York, and even the entire Western Hemisphere.
"Since you claimed you could move planets..."
Frieza looked up at the sky. Though it was daytime, a massive satellite was hidden up there.
"Then I shall let you have a close encounter with it."
Rumble... Rumble...
The entire Earth's atmosphere seemed to wail in agony at that moment.
The Avengers on the ground discovered in terror that the bright sky had suddenly gone dark.
A massive, grayish-white silhouette was rapidly growing larger at a speed that defied all physical laws.
No! It wasn't growing larger!
The distance was closing!
Using his inherent great power, Frieza had folded the spatial distance between Earth and the moon.
In just the blink of an eye, the massive, crater-filled Moon looked as if it had been forcibly dragged right outside Earth's atmosphere.
The immense sense of oppression made everyone feel suffocated.
If Frieza hadn't been controlling the gravity, this action alone would have instantly triggered massive tsunamis on Earth.
"Is that... the moon?!"
Tony plopped down onto the ground, utterly dumbfounded.
Plucking the moon barehanded?
Is this even something a damn carbon-based life form is capable of?
"Oh ho ho ho..."
Frieza looked at the crowd, who were stunned speechless by the magnificent sight, and let out a maniacal laugh.
"Basic move, no need to be impressed." He casually waved his hand.
An irresistible force generated by his Ki instantly enveloped the one-armed Carol.
"Since you love to fly so much, go cool off on the moon."
Whoosh!
Carol was thrown into the massive spatial folding zone, like a launched cannonball.
The next second.
Visible through the atmosphere, Carol's figure slammed heavily onto the lunar surface, kicking up a massive cloud of dust.
"Next..."
Frieza slowly raised the index finger of his right hand.
The despair-inducing, dark purple Death Ball condensed once again. This time, it was twice as large as the one that destroyed Country X.
"Goodbye, Captain Marvel."
"And without the moon, there won't be any more damn monkeys turning into giant apes."
Frieza lightly flicked his finger.
That massive black Destruction Ball, carrying the grim smile of the Grim Reaper, shot skyward.
It plunged into the spatial folding zone, heading straight for the moon.
A few seconds later.
Anyone in the world who looked up could witness the unforgettable scene.
In the sky, the grayish-white moon.
The moment that black sphere of light plunged into its surface, it exploded, from the inside out.
BOOOOOM!!!
No sound traveled back to Earth.
But the intensely brilliant explosion instantly illuminated the entire sky of the Western Hemisphere (though it was daytime, the light was blinding).
The moon... was shattered.
It was reduced to countless fragments, drifting in the cosmos.
Captain Marvel, the one hailed as the hope of the entire Earth, was reduced to cosmic dust as well.
The Avengers stared blankly at the sky, their eyes hollow.
It was over.
Everything was over.
A monster who could casually crush the moon... what did they have left to win?
[Ding! Global collapse of faith detected! Fear Points +500 billion!]
[Ding! Fear Points...]
Listening to the system's frantic alerts, Frieza spread his arms, basking in the afterglow of the moon's explosion, and smiled with immense elegance.
"This is... the fate of those who disrespect me."
At this moment, the sky was no longer the familiar sky.
The grayish-white satellite that once hung there—the moon that had witnessed countless human nights and carried the romantic fantasies of countless poets—had now turned into a grand and mournful meteor shower.
Countless burning meteor fragments, trailing long fiery tails, scattered and flew throughout space.
Frieza floated ten thousand meters high, his arms spread wide, as if embracing this feast of destruction.
He took a deep breath, as if he could smell the nonexistent scent of burning in space.
"What a marvelous sight."
...
On the ground.
Inside the Anti-Frieza Armor, Tony's world was collapsing.
"Beep—Beep—Beep—"
J.A.R.V.I.S.'s piercing alarm continued to ring, but to Tony, it sounded more like a death knell tolling for him, the self-proclaimed genius.
"Sir, detecting high-energy residue... lunar gravitational field has vanished... tidal forces are about to change drastically... Earth's axis of rotation may shift..."
J.A.R.V.I.S. calmly reported a series of data points sufficient to wipe out human civilization. But Tony could no longer register the information.
He was slumped in the cockpit, his faceplate open, his bloodshot eyes fixed on the empty spot in the sky.
Just one minute ago, he had naively believed that assembling all of Earth's superheroes, combined with Wakanda's Vibranium technology, would give them a fighting chance.
The moment Captain Marvel appeared, he truly thought the chance for a comeback had arrived.
But now?
"Ha... haha..."
Tony let out a dry, hoarse, and despairing laugh.
"What were we doing?"
"What exactly were we doing?!"
Tony slammed his fist onto the control panel.
"Is this a problem that technology can solve? Is this a gap that tactics can bridge?!"
"That was the moon! That was the damned moon!"
He was an engineer, a scientist.
He believed that if you gave him a fulcrum, he could move Earth.
But that monster floating in the sky didn't need a fulcrum, he just crushed Earth's companion.
This absolute, tyrannical, and unreasonable power shattered all of Tony's pride and sanity.
Resist?
How could they resist?
Even if he built ten thousand Anti-Frieza Armors, they would be nothing more than a pile of scrap metal in front of a monster who could destroy a celestial body barehanded.
"We lost... we lost completely..."
Tony weakly lowered his head, staring at the ruins beneath his feet, his eyes hollow.