"Even when Ultron escaped, I lost my sense of urgency. In my eyes, it seemed like all I could see was the distant Celestials—who hadn't arrived yet, and who might not even arrive in my lifetime. I seemed to have forgotten what it would mean if, just as Ultron said, every Earthling died before the Celestials descended..." Tony Stark continued, his voice filled with grief and self-reproach.
Tony Stark's mindset had undoubtedly undergone a tremendous shift. This was not merely because the Avengers were now showing signs of becoming the target of universal condemnation, but also because so many lives truly had been lost due to his and Reed Richards's mistakes...
So-called superheroes did not actually have any rules, at least not within the Avengers. There were no rules dictating what the Avengers could or could not do.
But the Avengers still had a basic consensus: everything they did was to better protect Earth, reduce casualties on Earth, and prevent more people from being affected by supernatural incidents.
And now, Tony Stark had gone from guardian to the root cause of disaster. It made him feel that no matter how many people he had saved before, or how many he might save afterward, none of it could change the fact that he had now caused the deaths of so many people.
Lives were not merely a number, nor could they be exchanged at equal value. Much less could any so-called balance of merits and faults bring those who had truly died back to life...
"This can't be blamed on you alone. I did say something like that before, but didn't I later agree to your actions too? After all, the Saiyan had already solved quite a few problems ahead of time, and it hadn't led to more disasters. In the