In Times Square, a tourist taking a selfie tilted his head back and pointed his phone camera at the sky, a hint of wonder still in his voice.
The next second, a rift-one several kilometers long.
A scarlet rift, like a gateway into the depths of hell, suddenly tore open at the center of the web of lightning.
There was no sound, no explosion.
Only an absolute, crushing pressure from the depths of the soul-the sensation of being looked down upon by a higher-dimensional being-instantly enveloped all of New York City.
Beyond the rift lay an unknown vista of chaos and distortion, filled with madness and despair.
Then, some "things" began falling out of the rift.
The first to fall was a figure clad in battered red armor.
Half his face had rotted away, exposing stark white bone and flickering green flames. The reactor in his chest no longer glowed.
Instead, there was a bloody hole that constantly dripped pus.
He let out an inhuman roar in midair.
He spread his claw-covered hands toward the skyscrapers below.
An Iron Man variant from the Zombie Universe.
Right behind him came a Deep-Sea Behemoth the size of an aircraft carrier, covered in eyeballs and tentacles.
It squeezed half its body through the rift, its thick saliva crashing onto Fifth Avenue like a waterfall and instantly eating a huge, black-smoking crater into the pavement.
A troop of knights in black cloaks riding Bone Wyverns;
A swarm of constantly shifting ghosts composed of pure negative energy;
There was even an enormous airborne battleship from some Steampunk Universe, belching thick black smoke...
These monsters should have been struggling or perishing within their own timelines, but the excessively brutal clash between godlike beings at the End of Time.
Had caused a chain reaction of weak points