Thor raised his axe again and staggered toward Dago.
There was no suspense.
Dago struck Thor in the abdomen with a heavy backhanded punch.
Thor fell again, but climbed back to his feet once more.
Again and again.
Even with half his body tainted by the Eternal Flame, giving off the stench of scorched flesh.
Even with his consciousness blurred and his vision reduced to a sea of blood-red.
Thor still stood swaying.
He could no longer even hold Stormbreaker, and it had fallen to the side.
Yet he still raised his bare fists into a fighting stance.
Blood foam kept spilling from his mouth, yet he continued murmuring names that meant everything to him.
"For... Odin..."
"For... Frigga..."
"For... Jane..."
"For... Anthony..."
"For... Loki..."
Thor's consciousness had already drifted to the brink of collapse, yet he kept getting up and kept walking toward Dago.
His movements grew slower, and the glow of lightning around him dimmed, but the fire in his eyes never went out.
Every spectator was deeply moved by Thor's tragic resolve to fight.
Even the bloodthirsty alien gamblers and the cosmic scum who loved to heckle fell silent.
They watched the man who fell again and again amid lava and blazing flames, only to rise again each time.
An inexplicable reverence welled up within them.
"Are all Asgardians this hard to put down? That physique is absurd."
"I bet a hundred thousand credits on an upset, hoping he'd lose, but now... I hope he wins," an interstellar gambler said, his eyes reddening.
"Odin's son truly lives up to his name."
"Why? Why won't he give up?"
"I've only seen this kind of terrifying willpower in the Space Marines of the Warhammer Empire. Yet he's risking his life for a lowly planet."
"Today, we've truly witnessed Asgard's