Hawk finally suppressed the heat in his heart and chose not to join the excitement at Manhattan's main battlefield.
The Leviathan, the Chitauri's biological war fortress, roared as it emerged from the portal. Its stretched-out body was incomparably massive, covered from head to toe in heavy alloy armor.
Setting aside whether he could defeat a Leviathan, just in terms of size, they were worlds apart.
Besides.
If he had a Cloth, Hawk might have gone to the main battlefield to join in.
But for now, forget it.
Queens was already crawling with Chitauri Soldiers like a locust swarm. There was no need to head to Manhattan.
That was the Original Avengers' battlefield, not his.
He had grown stronger.
But only stronger.
Awakening Cosmo was merely the beginning, a starting point.
It was not the conclusion, nor was it the finish line.
So...
Hawk went nowhere. He did not even choose to take the initiative. Instead, he crouched right outside his own home, waiting like a hunter for the Chitauri Soldiers wreaking havoc nearby to receive news of their comrades' deaths and come rushing over to throw themselves into his trap.
That was far easier than taking the initiative himself.
After all, Chitauri Soldiers could fly. He could not.
And most importantly.
The apartment block where he lived was a slum.
What was a slum?
Put it this way.
From the moment an ambulance received a call, it would take at least half an hour to reach their neighborhood, while the wealthiest parts of Manhattan could be reached in as little as three minutes.
Surveillance was the same.
In wealthy neighborhoods, even trash cans tucked into alleyways had surveillance cameras pointed directly at them. In the slums, there were no surveillance cameras even on the main roads.
Even if there were, they would not last until the next day. A few Black guys would find a way to take them down that very night and sell them for cash.
Very soon.
Standing in a shadowed corner, Hawk spotted two Chitauri Soldiers sweeping over from nearby on their flying vehicles after receiving word that their comrades had died.
Hawk's eyes lit up.
Two minutes later.
Thud!
Thud!
Two more corpses had been added beside the two ugly bodies that Hawk had previously arranged neatly atop the apartment ruins, terrified the Chitauri Soldiers might somehow fail to notice them.
After sensing their pilots' deaths, the two equally ugly flying vehicles turned on their own and flew off in one direction.
Watching this, Hawk silently retreated into the shadows once more.
One minute later.
After detecting a sudden surge in Chitauri Soldier deaths in Queens, the Chitauri warship above Manhattan fired down a signal from within the wormhole.
The next moment.
Several Chitauri Soldiers nearby, who had been firing at full force, shrieking wildly, wantonly destroying buildings and vehicles, and slaughtering humans on Earth, all turned around in unison. After receiving the signal, they swiftly gathered toward the roar that had just echoed over Jackson Heights.
They had received orders to fight there.
The Chitauri Soldiers roared as they assembled behind their leader. Then, led by the Captain, who was taller and more muscular than the other Chitauri Soldiers and whose flying vehicle looked even more vicious than theirs, they arrived above the neighborhood.
In an instant.
They saw the mangled corpses of four comrades, lined up on the apartment ruins as if sitting in rows, then lying flat.
"Chitter chitter chitter!"
"Hiss hiss hiss."
The moment they saw their comrades' corpses, the Soldier Captain Chitauri and the six Chitauri Soldiers seemed to freeze in place.
The next second.
They seemed to recover, as though they had received new orders, and the flying vehicles beneath them started up once again.
In the blink of an eye, the Soldier Captain Chitauri and the six Chitauri Soldiers rapidly scattered, forming a circle around the neighborhood below. Then, their snake-like eyes devoid of any emotion, they pulled the triggers for the energy rounds mounted on their flying vehicles without the slightest hesitation.
Like cold biological weapons.
In an instant.
Energy rounds filled the sky, raining down like an inescapable net in a blanket bombardment of the neighborhood below.
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
Buildings throughout the neighborhood burst apart, roads cracked open, and vehicles on the streets exploded one after another and caught fire.
The Chitauri Soldiers circling the neighborhood and firing in unison from the sky remained expressionless, like machines. Their claws never left the triggers until smoke and dust filled the entire neighborhood, until every energy round in their flying vehicles had been spent, and until the Chitauri Captain stopped firing first. Only then did they release their triggers in unison, like precisely synchronized machines.
At that moment, the entire neighborhood had been completely reduced to ruins.
Old apartment buildings continued to crumble.
Vehicles still burning occasionally erupted in explosions.
Right now, this place looked more like Iraq after the ravages of war than Iraq itself.
Sitting on his flying vehicle, the Chitauri Captain swept his larger green-bean eyes over the silent, deserted-looking neighborhood once more. Only then did he withdraw his gaze, receive the latest command, and prepare to leave.
Under the Chitauri Soldiers' overwhelmingly powerful blanket attack, no life could possibly survive by chance.
Much less these primitive lifeforms on Earth, who could not even leave their own planet.
So...
The Chitauri alien mothership on the other side of the wormhole, which had been controlling and issuing commands the entire time, sent a new order to the Chitauri Captain through the Chitauri Soldiers' vision.
As the Chitauri Captain turned around, the six Chitauri Soldiers also turned their flying vehicles.
But just as those six Chitauri Soldiers began turning one after another, one of the riders suddenly bent forward like a cooked shrimp, except his body arched toward the front. With a wet splat, the armored chest instantly burst open.
The next second.
One, two, three, four, five.
The remaining five Chitauri Soldiers had no time to react before following in their comrade's footsteps.
The instant they turned around and faced away from the neighborhood, their chests exploded in response, leaving fist-sized holes.
Their chests had been torn through from back to front, as though someone had punched straight through them from behind.
Almost at the exact moment the six Chitauri Soldiers' chests burst open, six thunderous punches finally exploded through the air!
Boom, boom, boom!
Boom, boom, boom!
The Chitauri Captain, who had spun around on his flying vehicle the instant his six subordinates' chests exploded, heard the blasts ringing beside him. He mechanically raised his head, then leaped straight to the right without hesitation, jumping off his flying vehicle.
The next moment.
His personal flying vehicle, which looked faster and more vicious than the others, seemed to be struck by something and exploded in midair.
Boom!
Before you continue