Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
Amid the violent explosions, vast stretches of the city had been completely engulfed in war.
As the God of Mischief and Schemes, Loki might often serve as comic relief and Thor's "brother-obsessed boy," but that did not mean he was actually an idiot or a fool.
Quite the opposite!
He had always been exceptionally skilled at manipulating people's hearts, tactics, and politics. He knew perfectly well what kind of fierce reaction his invasion would provoke from governments around the world.
Most importantly, his adoptive father, Odin, King of the Gods, and his brother Thor, the heir apparent, would never simply stand by and watch Midgard—the most important realm among Asgard's Nine Realms—fall into outsiders' hands.
Therefore, he had to take advantage of the gap before the damaged Bifrost could be repaired. He needed to open the wormhole as quickly as possible, bring down the Chitauri fleet, conquer Earth with lightning speed, and complete his deal with Thanos to secure himself a truly powerful patron.
To achieve that goal, the first step was to exploit the fact that governments across Earth had always prioritized their own interests. He ordered the troops he had brought with him to scatter across the globe and launch indiscriminate attacks, creating chaos, slaughter, destruction, panic, and conflict. That would force his enemies to deal with their own crises first, preventing them from uniting in the short term.
He himself disappeared from everyone's sight with the Tesseract.
Inside the conference room at S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters, Nick Fury, who was being interrogated by the Security Council, watched the live footage projected onto the electronic screen. His old face was flushed dark red, then nearly purple-black. Even while enduring personal attacks, he could not utter a single word in rebuttal.
Because this was no longer merely