"Where is this...?!"
Staring at the starry sky turned purple-gold, and at the star-river weave belts crisscrossing through the heavens.
Red Skull's worldview, which he had thought had finally stabilized, was refreshed once again....
"Welcome to my Divine Kingdom. Don't worry—once I'm done dealing with the Soul Stone, you'll be released."
Ye Li was speaking to Red Skull—
Swoosh!!
An orange gem split the clouds, trying to shoot out toward the upper atmosphere!
"Inside my divine kingdom, where do you think you can run?"
Ye Li merely moved his mind, and the huge star-river bands spanning the sky wrapped toward the Soul Stone that was trying to flee, star-glimmering spider-silk weaving into a vast spider web that tightly cocooned it within.
Ye Li also floated up from the ground; after drawing on the power of the Divine Kingdom, his form rapidly enlarged—
In the blink of an eye, Red Skull saw a gigantic face reflected across the firmament; just those two eyes containing a violet-gold starry sky within them like sun and moon together!
…..
"You're nothing more than a turtle in a jar."
Ye Li's majestic figure stood vast and boundless—
He brought his hands together; his palms covered the tiny planet Vormir and pinched it into his grasp.
That naturally included the Soul Stone.
Ye Li began refining the captured Soul Stone, turning it into his divine artifact.
He hadn't intended to use such a rough method.
After all, with this method there was a risk the Soul Stone might get scared off.
Then it would be extremely hard to ever track it down in the universe again....
However.
Since the Soul Stone wouldn't play by the rules, he could only resort to extreme measures.
Fortunately, he hadn't let it escape and had successfully captured it.
…..
[Ah! No! Don't come in so roughly!]
A crisp voice suddenly rang in his mind.
Ye Li froze for a moment... this is... the Soul Stone?
How come it's a little-girl voice!?
[I was wrong...! From now on I'll listen to you... just stop doing that!]
The crisp voice kept sounding.
Ye Li frowned slightly, shrank back to his original size, and looked at the orange-glowing gem in his hand, feeling very strange....
He'd never heard that the Soul Stone had a Loli voice....
[Could it be deliberately trying to confuse me?]
Thinking that, to be safe, he ignored the pleading voice and continued the refining—
[It's over! It's over! I'm going to be enslaved! Waaa, big meanie!]
Ye Li raised a brow as he listened. Hey now, you're the one who started acting up first....
After the whimpering and sniffling had gone on for a while, he finally finished completely refining the Soul Stone.
…..
As for Red Skull, because the Soul Stone's power had been bound by Ye Li, his body also began to disperse into black smoke; the once-notorious villain finally found release.
Seeing this, Ye Li didn't bother sending the completely dead planet Vormir back—he simply left it within the Divine Kingdom.
And the Loli voice that had been ringing in his mind earlier also quieted after the gem was refined.
He couldn't help thinking:
[Don't tell me I refined it to death?.... That would be a real sin.... The voice was actually kind of cute to hear....]
[You're the one who's dead!]
..... .... ...
The crisp Loli voice rang in his mind again at this moment: [But I do like hearing you say I'm cute!]
This time, Ye Li could clearly sense the voice coming from the gem in his hand.....
So, the Soul Stone really did have a Loli voice?
[I'm telling you... from now on I'm sticking with you....]
The Soul Stone kept chattering to itself: [You'd better treat me nicely, or I'll have my mom beat you up!]
[Huh?]
Ye Li was even more confused: [Who's your mom??]
[Heh-heh~]
The Soul Stone said proudly: [My mommy is the Goddess of Vengeance—Nemesis! I separated off from her!]