Avengers vs. X-Men

Things had taken a sudden turn!

When Ava was suddenly attacked by Xing Hua, she was startled and instinctively tried to activate her phasing ability to save herself. But when she tried, the ability actually failed to activate!

How was that possible!?

Since making her debut, she had never encountered an opponent who could ignore her ability… Well, except for the boss!

Her terrified gaze swept over the Xing Hua before her, then shifted to the Xing Hua standing beside Gamora with a baffled expression. Ava was just as bewildered as Tony had been.

With her throat clutched by the other party, she could not even save herself. And then something even more terrifying happened.

Ava discovered that the Phoenix Force, which had always lain dormant within her and had never been used, was actually being drawn along the arm of the woman who was squeezing her neck, sucked into the body of this woman who looked almost exactly like Xing Hua!

Not only could she change her appearance, ignore Ava’s phasing ability, and even extract the Phoenix Force from her body!

Who exactly was this person?

Could she be Jean Grey, the strongest person in this Parallel Universe and the perfect host for the Phoenix Force, whom Clark had mentioned before?

But Clark had never said that Jean Grey possessed the ability to change her appearance at will!

The moment Ava was attacked, Tony noticed the problem. He immediately raised a hand, and the repulsor in his palm was already charged and ready to fire. At that moment, a piercing shriek suddenly rang out from the sky. He turned to look and saw a missile of unknown type flying toward them. Tony hurriedly turned the cannon, and the energy blast struck the unexpected missile first, shooting it down in midair.

Boom!

When the missile was hit by the repulsor, it suddenly burst into a string of multicolored fireworks, dazzling everyone present. The electronic interference signals mixed into it even caused Eris and Friday, two top-tier Artificial Intelligences, to lose their ability to judge the situation for a short time.

When everyone’s vision recovered, the scene had suddenly become extraordinarily strange.

The originally open stretch of ground was now packed with people.

There were five Tonys, six Little Peppers, three Star-Lords, six Gamoras, twelve Xing Huas, five Erises…

In short, the number of every Avenger had inexplicably multiplied several times over.

After seeing what had happened when Xing Hua attacked Ava, how could they not realize that they were facing a special army capable of changing its appearance at will?

Before coming to this Parallel Universe, Li Congxin had told them that the abilities of Mutants were much like those of the Inhumans. Each person possessed one or more different abilities. The possibility of two people having the same ability could not be said to be nonexistent, but it was exceedingly small—roughly comparable to the odds of finding two people on Earth who looked exactly alike.

The awakening of Mutant abilities had no shortcut like being twins. Even if two people were truly twins, their abilities were often completely different, just like Wanda and Quicksilver.

But how were they supposed to explain these enemies with identical abilities?

Hadn’t Clark said that he had found no trace of aliens existing in this Parallel Universe?

Was the other party’s ability so well hidden that it could actually evade Li Congxin’s detection? Or was the universe simply too vast, and Li Congxin had failed to detect their existence?

Or were these all robots, or perhaps doppelgängers created by some Mutant using a special ability?

There were simply too many possibilities, and Tony and the others did not dare jump to conclusions. Their most urgent task now was to find the enemies among all these identical-looking people.

This was another enormous headache.

Even Eris’s electronic equipment could not distinguish the real enemies from the fake ones!

What a damn headache of an ability!

Bang! Just as everyone was at a loss, Tony raised his hand and fired a repulsor blast straight at the "Xing Hua" who was clutching Ava by the neck.

They could not immediately determine whether the others were real or fake, but the person currently stealing the Phoenix Force was definitely a fake!

With one strike, the fake Xing Hua was blasted away. Ava was caught in the shockwave of the explosion as well and sent flying in the opposite direction. However, an explosion of this level was still barely something Ava could withstand in her current state.

Although Tony’s attack saved Ava from having her Phoenix Force extracted, it also fired the first shot of the battle.

The next moment, the scene descended into chaos.

Using his spatial ability to arrive in the Himalayas, Li Congxin saw the Avengers team led by Captain America fighting an immensely powerful Mutant army that had already been united.

Unexpectedly, the opposing leader was neither Professor X nor Magneto. Instead, it was Jean Grey, who had clearly entered a darkened state—or, as she should probably be called now, Dark Phoenix.

Behind Dark Phoenix, Charles and Magneto stood to either side, looking as though they regarded the Phoenix as their leader.

Behind them stood several powerful Mutants. Behind Professor X were Mystique, Beast, Storm, Cyclops, Nightcrawler, and other familiar faces. Li Congxin even saw Wolverine among them, someone he had never encountered before!

Behind Magneto stood Psylocke and Angel, two of the Four Horsemen of Funeral Love. Aside from them, there was also a burly man whose aura was extremely similar to Wolverine’s, as well as a little girl with an East Asian face, purple hair, and green eyes…

These were only the Mutants Li Congxin knew or found somewhat familiar, the ones able to stand at the front. As for the hundred or so densely packed people behind them, Li Congxin honestly did not recognize many of them.

When Li Congxin appeared out of thin air, a helpless look surfaced on Professor X’s face. He spoke first: "Mr. Li Congxin, we do not wish to become enemies with you, but there are some matters we need to clarify first." After a slight pause, he pointed toward the Sky-Shattering Sword behind the Avengers and asked, "Can you tell me what exactly this thing is for?"

"Explaining this thing is rather troublesome." Li Congxin rubbed his nose and helplessly explained, "In truth, your world has always been under the influence of the evil god Dormammu from the Dark Dimension. The thing I created is a divine artifact capable of resisting Dormammu and preventing your universe from being corrupted by him."

Charles frowned at that and said, "Is the corruption you mentioned a special substance that causes people to become violent and insane?"

Li Congxin nodded slightly. "If you insist on understanding it that way, that is not entirely wrong. It seems that even you have noticed how dense the Dark Energy has become."

Charles nodded slightly, then added, "But according to what we know, that energy, which severely harms both Mutants and humans, only appeared after you and your daughter visited us last time."

What?

The moment Charles said this, Li Congxin’s superbrain immediately saw through the entire sequence of events.

It would have been better not to know. Once he understood the cause and effect, he could not help cursing inwardly.

Dormammu, Dormammu… As expected of the ruler of the Dark Dimension. What an ingenious way to pin the blame on someone else.

First of all, the people of the X-Men Universe had no idea that Dormammu existed, and knew virtually nothing about him. Even after the Dark Energy began affecting certain people, their current technology made it impossible for them to discover the truth. Unless someone deliberately guided them from behind the scenes, causing some "genius" to suddenly emerge among humanity and discover the existence of this energy.

By now, Li Congxin had more or less guessed the method Dormammu had used to frame him.

After Li Congxin left, Dormammu had definitely greatly accelerated the rate at which he corrupted this world, while secretly focusing his attacks on certain targets.

If his earlier subtle influence had affected everyone equally, ordinary people would have had difficulty noticing anything unusual. Even if they sensed that people’s tempers had grown more volatile, they would merely have blamed it on the changing times and the restlessness of society.

But once certain targets were singled out and treated differently, the problem would immediately become obvious.

It was like a large group of poorly behaved people all spitting on the ground. No one would find it particularly strange. But if someone suddenly appeared who went around killing people or assaulting others, the nature of the matter would instantly change. Everyone would wonder whether that person had gone insane.

If there were only one or two such people, it would be attributed to individual causes. But once their numbers grew, it would throw the entire society into panic, and everyone would spare no effort to investigate the reason. After all, no one wanted to become the next such person—or a victim harmed by one.

Under such circumstances, all Dormammu had to do was guide a scientist devoted to researching this field from the shadows, just as Ares had done in Wonder Woman. The existence of the Dark Energy would immediately come to light.

The people of this universe did not know who Dormammu was. Yet before the Dark Energy erupted on a large scale, a person named Li Congxin had appeared who could overpower the Phoenix!

No matter who they were, they would probably have listed him as their prime suspect.

In response, Li Congxin could only helplessly explain, "I truly mean you no harm. You should know that if I had intended otherwise, there would have been no need for me to awaken your abilities after eliminating Apocalypse."

"I would very much like to believe you, Mr. Li Congxin." Charles shook his head. "But you said that, without our knowledge, you spent an enormous amount of money and effort creating this thing capable of resisting an extraterrestrial evil god, all to help us… I truly find that explanation difficult to accept."

Thus, Li Congxin could only say helplessly, "The truth is, our helping you resist Dormammu is ultimately for the safety of our own universe as well. You surely understand the principle that when one’s lips are gone, one’s teeth will be cold, Mr. Charles. As for why we did not inform you beforehand… Damn it!"