Flames tore through the darkness, hurtling straight at Malekith's face.
But this guy didn't move at all. With a flick of his black robe, the ball of fire exploded into sparks as if it had hit an invisible Mars. Ye Mo's heart skipped a beat—oh no, the vortex that had cracked when this guy was shaken out hadn't completely dissipated yet, and the residual Force Field was still distorting space, causing the attack trajectory to completely deviate!
"Three steps to the left! Don't go to the center!" he shouted, already sliding to the side, his shoes leaving two black marks on the scorched earth. Before he finished speaking, a muffled "boom" sounded overhead, and the net of fire that was supposed to hit the enemy was forced to a detour, sticking directly to the rock wall, making the rocks sizzle and smoke.
Malekith's lips curled into a cold smile. His palms remained raised high, the black holes in them spinning faster and faster, causing the surrounding rubble and broken iron to float up and surge towards his hands. This wasn't defense; it was the charging up of energy before unleashing a powerful attack!
"If we don't press down now, we'll really become background!" Ye Mo gritted his teeth, and a layer of armor popped out of the Steel Bone in his left arm with a "crack," forcibly pushing the heat resistance to the limit. He slammed his hands on the ground, and the remaining flames shot out wildly along the cracks in the ground, weaving into a semi-circular fire net in the air, covering Malekith's head like an inverted pot lid—you want to fly away? I'll weld a ceiling for you first!
Just as the fire net was taking shape, Thor made his move. Mjolnir slammed into the ground with a thud, and he leaped onto the handle, using the momentum to push off. Instantly, arcs of electricity spread across the ground, precisely wrapping around several exposed metal pipes. These pipes, originally part of the spaceship wreckage, now became natural conductors, and the current crackled and circled around, forming a ring of blue light beneath Malekith's feet.
"It's pinned down!" Thor shouted.
Sure enough, Malekith's feet faltered, and the black flames, just as they were about to leave the ground, were pulled in by the conductive strip, as if he were welded to the spot. But his eyes hardened, a low growl rolled from his throat, and the muscles in his arms bulged as he began to withstand the electric current.
"It won't last ten seconds!" Thor's expression changed. "This guy's bones are harder than the ship's hull!"
"Not even ten seconds." Ye Mo stared into the other person's pupils. " Emma Frost —now!"
Emma Frost sat cross-legged against the right rock wall, her eyes closed, the blood on her forehead still damp. Hearing the command, she abruptly opened her eyes, her mental energy piercing Malekith's mind like a needle. It wasn't mind reading or manipulation, but rather a direct projection of an image into his consciousness: Thor leaping from his right rear, hammer raised high, ready to strike with devastating force!
Malekith almost instinctively turned his head to look to his right.
But Thor on the left!
-- Cognitive confusion takes effect, resulting in a half-second delay in receiving the item.
Now!
Ye Mo pulled his hands back, and the fire net suddenly contracted, forcing Malekith to raise his hand to block due to the intense heat. At the same time, Thor roared, his hammer shot up from the ground, and he charged in from the left like a cannonball, lightning coils around him, aiming straight for his throat!
"Bang!"
The black flame shield exploded, creating a dark ripple that blocked Thor's attack. However, the impact caused Malekith to stagger back half a step, his heel striking the center of the conductive ring. A burst of electricity erupted with a "whoosh," instantly paralyzing his entire left leg!
"Even if it misses, it's fine!" Ye Mo laughed. "At least it'll prevent him from doing his square dancing!"
He immediately changed tactics, pressing his palms back to the ground to lower the flame temperature and switch to a stable output. The crimson fire streams slowly crawled along the cracks in the ground, like three red snakes swimming towards Thor and Emma Frost's positions. This wasn't an attack, but a guiding line—unifying their energy paths to prevent them from interfering with each other.
"Follow the fire!" Ye Mo shouted, "Don't use skills recklessly, let's try something more advanced this time!"
Thor understood, raising Mjolnir high and stirring the remaining thunderclouds above. A silver-blue beam of electricity poured down like a waterfall, rushing down the path of flames at such speed that the air itself trembled. At the same instant, Emma Frost released a Mind Stone pulse, but this time she didn't target anyone. Instead, she precisely vibrated Malekith's brainwave frequency, slowing his reflexes by a full 0.3 seconds.
Three forces, three attributes, originally completely unrelated, were now truly connected through the "bridge" built by flames.
Malekith finally realized something was wrong. He wanted to withdraw his hand, retreat, or detonate his charged energy to counterattack—but that 0.3-second delay was fatal. Before his raised hand could fully close, the first wave of attacks arrived.
Thor's lightning struck first, the compressed beam of electricity slamming into his chest armor with a deafening clang, sparks flying. Immediately afterward, Ye Mo's flames abruptly contracted, shrinking from the size of a fist to a single point, following closely behind the lightning as it disappeared into a gap in the armor, and then—
"Boom!"
Internal detonation!
The intense heat expanded wildly within the armor, causing the black flame shield structure to instantly destabilize and develop spiderweb-like cracks. Malekith groaned, black blood spilling from the corner of his mouth, but he still tried to hold on.
Unfortunately, a third blow came.
Emma Frost's mental shock transformed into a cone-shaped piercing wave, piercing straight into his brain through the energy channel opened up by the flames and lightning. In that instant, Malekith's muscles went out of control, his arms twitched, his knees buckled, and he couldn't even stand up straight.
"It's over," Thor said coldly.
His final hammer blow carried rotational kinetic energy, compressing the remaining electricity into a sphere, which slammed into the center of the breastplate.
Three forces converge at a single point.
boom--!!!
The entire passage trembled violently, as if a bell at the end of the world had been tolled. The black flame shield shattered into pieces with a "crash," Malekith was sent flying backward like a puppet with its strings cut. His back slammed heavily against the distant rock wall, then bounced back and landed on his back in a pile of rubble, his limbs twitching, coughing up black blood. His black robe was torn in several places, revealing dark skin covered with runes, which was now cracking at a visible speed.
Did you win?
Ye Mo was panting heavily, his left arm's Steel Bone hissing and emitting white smoke, clearly pushed to its limit by overload. He stood motionless, his eyes fixed on the fallen figure, fearing it might suddenly spring back to life and launch a counterattack.
Thor, leaning on his hammer, knelt on one knee. His armor was torn in several places, and electricity flickered weakly from his wounds; he was clearly at his limit. He looked up at Ye Mo and grinned. "Well done, Earthling."
"Stop bragging." Ye Mo wiped the dust off his face. "My Steel Bone are practically melting; you'll have to buy me a new set later."
Emma Frost leaned against the right rock wall, her eyes closed, her breathing shallow but steady. She didn't speak, but her fingertips twitched slightly as a response.
None of the three moved forward.
It wasn't that they didn't want to confirm the outcome, but rather that they dared not let their guard down. An opponent of this caliber, even with only a breath left, could turn the tide. They stood twenty meters apart, quietly watching Malekith convulse on the ground, listening to the only sounds in the passage: the crackling of the dying flames and the gurgling sounds coming from his own throat.
Time ticked by, second by second.
Suddenly, Malekith's right hand twitched and rose, fingers spread, as if trying to grab something. But the hand only rose halfway before falling back to the ground with a "thud," and remained motionless.
Ye Mo breathed a sigh of relief, his legs almost giving way and he collapsed to the ground. He quickly grabbed a broken pipe for support, glancing down at his burning left arm. "System, oh system, if you had reacted at this moment, we could have discussed upgrading... Oh right, you can't speak."
He chuckled self-deprecatingly, and when he looked up again, he found that although Malekith was no longer moving, his chest was still rising and falling slightly, and black liquid was constantly overflowing from his mouth, as if some kind of vital sign was still being maintained.
"He's not completely dead." Thor stood up, hammer still in his hand, "But he won't be able to get up anytime soon."
"Then let's wait until he's completely dead?" Ye Mo asked.
"No," Emma Frost suddenly spoke, her voice hoarse, "He's waiting for something else."
All three fell silent.
An indescribable sense of oppression was quietly rising in the air. It wasn't coming from Malekith's body, but from somewhere deeper within him—as if something was awakening little by little with his breath.
Ye Mo narrowed his eyes, staring at the fallen body. He had no sensory abilities, nor any system notifications, but as someone who had teetered on the brink of death countless times, he instinctively sensed something was amiss.
"Don't you guys think..." he whispered, "That the black blood he vomited seemed to be moving?"
Thor frowned. "What nonsense are you talking about?"
"I'm not making this up." Ye Mo took a half step forward, squinting as he looked closely. "That stuff wasn't flowing on the ground, it was... gathering around his body, like it was sentient."
Emma Frost's eyes snapped open, and as she scanned the area with her mental energy, her expression instantly changed. "It's not just blood. The energy frequency within his body has changed, as if it's been reactivated by something."
"What does that mean?" Ye Mo's heart tightened.
"You mean your combo of punches just now," Emma Frost gasped, "May have only knocked him down, but not disrupted his real plan."
As soon as he finished speaking, Malekith's chest suddenly heaved violently, and the area dented by the lightning slowly rose, with black blood coiling around it like a living thing, beginning to repair itself. Even more strangely, the edges of his tattered black robe began to move without wind, as if drawn by some unseen force.
"Damn." Ye Mo turned to retreat, "You're still alive? Are you some kind of cockroach?"
"It's too late," Thor said in a deep voice. "He's already started."
"Start what?"
No one answered.
Because at that very moment, Malekith's eyes opened.
It wasn't a weak, barely open look; instead, his eyes widened suddenly, a crimson light flashing deep within his pupils. A low growl escaped his throat, not from pain, but more like... excitement.
Then, the corners of his mouth slowly turned upwards.
He laughed.
Ye Mo felt a chill run down his spine.
That smile is so sinister; it doesn't look like the smile of a defeated man who's been beaten to a pulp, but rather like the smile of a director waiting to see a good show.
"You think..." Malekith's voice was so hoarse it was almost inaudible, "That's the end?"
He slowly raised his hand, not to attack, but to gently press it against his chest.
"This is just... the beginning."
Ye Mo stared at the hand and suddenly noticed that the black blood on the ground below his palm was slowly forming a pattern—a seven-pointed star with a twisted crack in the center, like a door.
And that door is slowly opening.