SKREEE!
The cry of a phoenix rang out, clear and resonant.
The moment Hawk's eyes closed, a being of pure light and fire—a magnificent, incandescent phoenix—materialized behind him.
The next second, the great phantom erupted in a blaze of glorious fire, the flames pouring into Hawk's now-still form.
BOOOOOOM!!
The brilliant fire formed a pair of burning wings at his sides.
The phantom phoenix, like a gentle mother, folded its wings and slowly enveloped Hawk in a protective embrace, as if careful not to disturb his slumber.
...
"..." Malekith's face had stayed stone-cold even after being horribly disfigured, but now his expression cracked completely—twisted into shocked disbelief.
Thor was equally thunderstruck.
"This is..."
"Thor." Natasha had moved to his side, her own expression a mixture of awe and confusion as she stared at Hawk, now seemingly one with the spectral phoenix, cradled in its wings, all signs of life having vanished. "What is this?"
Thor's mind raced, connecting the impossible dots. "Nirvana..."
"Nirvana? He's not a demigod."
It was only in this moment that Thor finally understood.
Demigod? Bullshit. This is a God!
...
The entire exchange, from Malekith's shock to Thor and Natasha's conversation, happened in a single instant.
Just like it did for Hawk.
One second, he remembered closing his eyes. The next, he opened them, and found that he had not been reborn.
Instead...
He was in a bar.
The slow, mournful strum of a Texas country song drifted through the air. The walls were adorned with decor that screamed dusty, backroad Americana.
What the hell?
Just then, the clink of glasses came from a nearby table.
Hawk turned.
A man sat where no man had been a moment before.
He wore an impeccably tailored dark suit. His long, dark hair, slightly disheveled, framed a pair of narrow, almond-shaped eyes that glinted with an unsettling dark-gold light. A playful smile curved his pale lips as he raised a glass to Hawk.
Hawk's brow furrowed. He walked over and sat down across from the stranger.
The man smiled and pushed a freshly poured glass of amber liquid toward him.
"Kentucky's finest. Thunder Distillery Bourbon."
"Have a taste."
"..." Hawk glanced at the glass, then met the smiling man's gaze. The next second, he picked up the glass and drained it in a single motion.
He set the empty glass back on the table with a soft click and looked at the man.
"Hello, Mephisto."
The man—no, the being disguised as a decadent, nineties-era Texas heartthrob threw back his head and laughed.
But the laughter died as quickly as it had begun.
Mephisto's smile vanished. He fixed his gaze on Hawk, and his true form seeped through the illusion. The fine fabric of his suit writhed and split—not tearing, but peeling back like living flesh to reveal what lay beneath: not blood and bone, but a roiling, viscous slurry of asphalt and magma.
His handsome human face melted away, giving rise to a snarling demonic visage. His skin turned the color of scorched crimson, rough and granular.
Two smoldering pits yawned where a nose should have been, and his dark-gold eyes blazed into hellfire.
When he spoke, his voice was a low, guttural rumble that seemed to echo from the very depths of the abyss.
"Welcome to Hell."
The Lord of the Hell Dimension—Mephisto—had made his entrance.
Hawk's expression remained unchanged. He simply watched.
Mephisto, seeing his performance had failed to elicit a reaction, let out another deep, rumbling laugh. "You don't seem very scared. You do realize you haven't been reborn, right? You're in Hell."
Hawk ignored him. "Can I see my sister?"
He didn't know how he had gotten here.
But one thing was certain: the process of his rebirth had already begun.
So... since he was here, he might as well make the most of it. He wanted to see Anya.
Mephisto's demonic face shifted as he heard the request.
The next second, he was human again. He laughed, and with a flick of his wrist, the bottle of bourbon floated from the bar into his hand. He refilled their glasses and slid one back to Hawk.
Hawk picked up his glass, clinked it against Mephisto's, and drank.
"I want to see my sister."
"I'm sorry."
Mephisto's refusal was immediate. He offered an explanation. "Your sister is in Hell. You are not."
Hawk frowned.
"Then where am I?"
"On the edge of life and death."
Mephisto refilled Hawk's glass again. "You know, now I understand why you were so bold as to threaten me. That talk of turning my head into a... was it a wine jug?"
Hawk raised an eyebrow, lifting his own glass to meet Mephisto's. "The original quote wasn't 'wine jug.'"
Mephisto downed his drink and turned the empty glass over on the table.
Hawk let out a short, humorless laugh and downed his drink. Yet he had not given up. He could feel his time here slipping away, the pull of the living world growing stronger.
"You're the Lord of Hell. My sister is in your realm. You have the power to bring her back to life, don't you?"
"Of course."
"Then..."
"No."
"What?"
Hawk frowned again. "Aren't you worried I'll actually hunt you down in Hell?"
Mephisto just laughed. He leaned back against the sofa, crossing his legs casually. "I'll give you this—you might actually have what it takes to kick down my doors someday. But that is in the future, isn't it? Not today."
Hawk didn't argue. It was the truth. He met the demon's gaze and gave his answer.
"Bring my sister back, and I'll grant you any three favors. You can refuse—that's fine. But when I'm strong enough to march into Hell, Mephisto, I'll remember this conversation. And if my sister's been treated well, I might let you live."
He didn't have the strength now, so he could negotiate.
But when he did have the strength, what was there to negotiate?
Mephisto refused.
"I'm sorry."
"Alright."
Hawk's face showed no trace of disappointment. He simply nodded.
If you won't do this the easy way...
Then we'll do it the hard way.
Just then, Mephisto chuckled. "I have no reason to make an enemy of a future god. After all, I hope to one day gain dominion over the souls of your subjects."
The authority over death is not singular.
Where there is death, there is life. Mephisto's power was not just over the end, but the beginning. The more souls that fell under his purview, the greater his power grew.
And the kingdom of a great god was always one of vibrant, teeming life.
It was a future investment.
Mephisto had no intention of souring that investment over a single soul.
As for the Demon Hulk? That was just business. Hawk had talked trash, and he had sent a little trash back. The matter was closed.
Hawk frowned, listening. He was about to press the matter of his sister again when he felt it—a sudden, powerful jolt to his soul.
He looked down to see a golden flame licking at the tips of his shoes. "This is..."
"Your time is up."
Mephisto smiled, raising his fourth glass of bourbon in a toast.
Hawk picked up his own.
The sound of their glasses clinking was clear.
At that moment, the golden flame had completely engulfed him. Hawk pushed his suspicions aside and looked at Mephisto. "Take care of my sister."
Mephisto only smiled, lifting his empty glass as Hawk's form grew translucent within the flames.
"Goodbye, Hawk."
"Goodbye, Mephisto."
Hawk vanished in a shower of golden and star-like embers.
The next second, he was somewhere else.
"Where the hell am I now?"
--
In a realm of eternal absolute darkness.
Hawk, who had vanished from the Texas bar in a flash of golden fire, opened his eyes to a void where sight had no meaning. He stared into the suffocating blackness that stretched in every direction and couldn't stop a curse from escaping his lips.
He had thought his Nirvana was over. Apparently not.
Wait a minute...
'Isn't rebirth supposed to be instantaneous?'
A thought struck him, and he instinctively tried to sink his consciousness into his Cosmo.
But…
Hawk's eyes snapped open again, a flicker of genuine shock in them.
His Cosmo was gone.
'No, wait.'
He forced himself back from the brink of panic, his mind racing.
His Cosmo was still there. He could feel it.
But for some reason, he couldn't connect to it. It was as if it had been sealed away, shielded from him by this endless void, just as he had been stripped of his five senses.
Sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch—all gone!!
Understanding dawned. He instinctively sat down in the void, crossing his legs and assuming the same posture as Shaka.
Suddenly, he closed his eyes.
And in that instant, the world exploded into light.
The darkness was gone, replaced by a brilliant, blinding radiance.
Stars began to streak across the void like meteors. A universe of knowledge flooded his mind, only to vanish a moment later, leaving behind a single, pure understanding.
He knew where he was. This was the border between life and death.
He had succeeded. And with that success came an intuitive, overwhelming clarity.
But there was one thing that mattered more than anything else.
Hawk's eyes shot open.
And there it was—The gateway to the Sixth Sense—standing before him once more.
This time, there was no hesitation, no barrier. He took a single step forward—
Instantly, he was standing in the realm of the Sixth Sense.
...
At that exact moment, as the look of stunned disbelief was still frozen on Malekith's ruined face, as Natasha and Thor's brief, tense exchange came to an end—
The spectral phoenix, which had so gently embraced Hawk, unfurled its wings once more.
A vortex of crimson fire erupted, a pillar of flame that tore at the sky.
And from within that inferno, Hawk, who had been standing with his eyes closed, opened them.
His eyes, now burning with crimson fire, swirled with a golden light, his pupils transformed. The next second, from within the flames, he raised a single finger and pointed it at Malekith, who was still fifty meters away.
"Supersonic—"
"—Fist!"
A blinding white light coalesced on the tip of Hawk's finger. A split second before the thunderous roar of the impact echoed across the plains, Malekith's body was already arching backward, launched through the air as if struck by an invisible cannonball.
"BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!"
The Supersonic Fist.
A punch delivered at several times the speed of sound, generating a shockwave so powerful it could kill an ordinary Bronze Saint with a single finger.
And it was merely the standard technique of a Silver Saint. If he wanted to, as long as his Cosmo burned, he could use it forever.
But no Silver Saint ever would.
Why??
Because if the gap between a Bronze Saint and a normal human was the gap between a billionaire and a beggar, then the chasm between a Silver Saint and a Bronze Saint was the chasm between a God and a Stray dog.
Hawk, bare-chested and radiating an infernal heat, stepped out of the flames of his rebirth.
Within his Cosmo—the spectral phoenix spread its colossal wings—spanning his entire inner universe. It raised its head in a triumphant cry as his personal cosmos expanded, pushing against the void with unstoppable force.
BOOOOOOOOOOM!
Malekith slammed into the ground, gouging out a deep crater, then shot back to his feet, a look of pure, uncomprehending horror on his face.
"IMPOSSIBLE!"
"ABSOLUTELY IMPOSSIBLE!"
"You cannot be a God!" Malekith roared, his eyes wide with disbelief as he stared at the reborn Hawk, at the crimson flames that still licked at his powerful bare-chested physique.
Hawk's expression was calm, almost bored. "I am not a God."
He wasn't. At least, not until he had awakened the Ninth Sense. But when he did, he would be a Creator God.
The one and only Creator God of his own Phoenix Universe.
As for why Malekith thought he was one? Hawk held the very dominion over Immortality and Rebirth. And only a God could wield such power.
Praise the Phoenix!!
...
Malekith stared, then his disbelief curdled into a furious rage.
He threw his hands out, the Aether particles within him flowing like a crimson river to his palms. "I DON'T CARE WHAT YOU ARE! GIVE ME THE AETHER!"
A mountain of pure Aether manifested above Hawk's head and came crashing down.
The next second, it slammed to a halt.
CRASH!!!!
Hawk hadn't moved. He hadn't even flinched. He simply raised his right hand. He stood there, one-handed, holding up a mountain, his body as unmoving as the earth itself.
"..." Peter, who was still perched on one of the stone pillars, let out a sharp, audible breath.
Clint's pupils constricted.
Natasha's hands clenched into fists.
Thor patted Mjølnir. "That's nothing. I can lift a planet."
His hammer had been forged in the heart of a dying star. So theoretically, Thor could lift a star.
Natasha shot him a look, then turned her attention back to the impossible sight before her. She had never seen Thor lift a planet. But she was seeing Hawk hold up a mountain with one hand.
If the Supersonic Fist was the basic requirement for a Silver Saint…
Then moving mountains and parting seas was the true standard.
Every Silver Saint, even the weakest among them, could lift a mountain with ease or walk on the bottom of the deepest ocean as if it were dry land.
Hawk glanced up at the mountain of Aether resting on his palm.
The next second, he raised his left hand and tapped the base of the mountain with a single finger.
With a soft—crack—the entire mountain disintegrated, crumbling into a shower of pebbles and dust.
"..." Malekith's eyes widened, his mind unable to process what he was seeing.
Hawk just shook his head, a look of genuine disappointment on his face. He looked at Malekith, his voice calm.
"You were right."
"Before, I was like Thor. I couldn't control my full power. I couldn't have beaten you."
"I won't deny that."
Hawk's voice carried on, cutting through the silence.
"But…"
"Now that I have awakened, now that I have control… You are weak. So weak that I have almost no interest in fighting you."
He shook his head again and slowly turned his back, as if the fight were already over.
Malekith's ruined face twisted with fury, mottled and red. "You bastard. Are you calling me weak?"
He shot forward in a blur, appearing behind Hawk in an instant. A dagger of pure Aether formed in his hand.
"HOLY SHIT, HAWK, LOOK OUT!"
"LOOK OUT!"
Peter and Natasha cried out at the same time.
Instantly, Hawk spun around.
SLAP!!!
A single, contemptuous backhand slap sent Malekith flying a hundred meters through the air.
Hawk turned his back on him again, his voice as calm as ever. "But, as thanks for helping me awaken my Sixth Sense, and for the gift of the Aether, I will honor you with my strongest attack—"
As he spoke, the crimson flames behind him erupted once more. But this time, they did not form a phoenix. Instead, they coalesced, carving the image of a fearsome Fire Dragon onto his back.
BOOOOOOOOM!
As the Dragon took form, Hawk turned to face them again. He raised his right hand toward the sky, settling into the opening stance of his most devastating attack.
The spectral Fire Dragon on his back released a roar—its body coiling and uncoiling with terrifying, barely restrained power.
As the Dragon moved, the air around Hawk began to crackle and burn.
A moment later, Hawk looked up at the sky.
"Rise to the sky!"
"ROOOOAR!!!"
--
A deafening roar split the sky above Stonehenge, echoing across the entire Salisbury Plain. A dragon—massive, magnificent, bathed in crimson fire—burst from Hawk's broad back and shot into the sky.
BOOOOOOOOOOOM!
The thick storm clouds overhead responded instantly. The moment the fire dragon pierced through them, they ignited, transforming into a burning tapestry of scarlet and gold.
Blood-red storm clouds.
Within Hawk's Cosmo, the Phoenix Heart pulsed with power. Countless fragments of celestial energy rapidly coalesced, flowing together at the Phoenix's command, reconstructing the Draco constellation—a constellation Hawk had once wielded, but had surrendered when the Phoenix went all-in, betting everything on him.
He could no longer claim Draco's core powers.
It wasn't a matter of want—it was a matter of choice.
Theoretically, as the only Saint in this universe, he could have claimed every constellation's core. But a man only has one Cosmo. And he had already made his choice.
The Phoenix.
The Phoenix had chosen him first. Even before he had awakened the Ninth Sense—before he'd even mastered the Sixth—it had given him its core powers:
Immortality and Rebirth.
So...
Better to repay a debt of gratitude than to enjoy unearned luxury.
The Phoenix had gambled on him when he was nothing. In return, he had transformed his entire Cosmo into a Phoenix Cosmo.
When he finally manifested it in reality, the Phoenix Constellation would no longer be just a constellation. It would become a parallel universe, just like Asgard.
And the Phoenix would be its Yggdrasil—the World Tree at its heart.
But that didn't mean he couldn't use other constellations.
It was a parallel universe, after all. Having other constellations was perfectly normal. The only difference was that any constellation that appeared in his Phoenix Universe—even the Twelve Zodiacs of Gold—would rank below the Phoenix itself.
No questions asked.
The Phoenix had bet everything on him first.
So, naturally, it was the boss.
In short—
While Hawk could no longer earn the recognition of other constellations' cores, he could still channel their techniques through the Phoenix's power.
Just as he was doing now.
The dragon silhouette of Draco should have been emerald green. But Hawk was channeling it through the Phoenix's crimson flames.
And so, it was born of Crimson Flame.
VMMMMMMM!!
The ground around him trembled. Small stones and pebbles began to float upward, defying gravity. The air itself groaned under the strain, compressed and torn apart, rushing toward him from all directions.
Hawk's feet were rooted to the earth, his stance wide and solid as he assumed the classic opening form—
Left fist extended forward in a loose guard, right fist coiled tight against his hip. The air, now burning crimson with his flames, swirled and condensed behind him, slowly forming into a massive humanoid silhouette—twice his height.
"Rozan—"
Hawk's voice was low. The right fist at his hip was like a bowstring drawn to its absolute limit. His Cosmo burned with terrifying intensity, and raw energy from his Cosmo flooded into that coiled fist, every ounce of power concentrated into a single, devastating point.
In the blood-red storm above, the crimson dragon's massive head emerged, as if waiting for a command.
"—RISING DRAGON STRIKE!!"
His power peaked. He poured everything, his strength, his will, his very life force into that single, devastating blow.
The next second—
He threw it.
BOOOOM!
BOOOOM!
BOOOOM!
The crimson dragon descended from the storm, coiling around the spectral silhouette behind Hawk. As the phantom mirrored his punch, the dragon—forged entirely from his Cosmo—burst forth from the phantom's fist with an earth-shattering roar.
It was terrifyingly real—every scale and claw rendered in exquisite, deadly detail. It tore across the plain like an unstoppable river of destruction, the earth cracking and splitting in its wake.
The dragon roared, eyes locked on its target a hundred meters away.
Malekith, still dizzy from Hawk's backhand, had just staggered to his feet. He looked up, and his eyes widened in horror as the fiery maw of the dragon filled his vision.
"No..."
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
The dragon, pure energy given form, met no resistance. It swallowed Malekith whole in an instant, never slowing. Its jaws clamped down on the Dark Elf, and with unstoppable force, it kept charging forward.
Straight toward Stonehenge.
...
"HOLY SHIT!!!"
Peter, who'd been perched on top of one of the ancient stones for a better view, felt every hair on his body stand on end. He fired a web straight up—didn't even care what it stuck to—and swung for his life.
The moment he cleared the henge, the dragon arrived.
There was no explosion, no blinding flash. There was only the sound of the dragon's roar, and then, a terrifying, unnatural silence as the ancient stones of the henge, which had stood for thousands of years, simply... dissolved, melting away into nothingness under the crimson flames.
In that same instant, Malekith, trapped within the dragon's mouth, met the same fate.
Thud.
The moment the dragon dissipated, the immense energy Hawk had unleashed—born from his rebirth and the full might of his Cosmo—vanished completely.
A crushing wave of emptiness slammed into him, threatening to drown him whole.
Hawk, who had been standing like an unshakable pillar just a second ago, felt his body give out. His knees buckled.
THUMP.
He collapsed to his knees, his strength gone.
...
"Thor!"
"The Convergence is almost here! The doctor said if we can just hold Malekith off."
"Wait."
"Where's Malekith?"
Jane Foster, who had just arrived by car and was running toward her boyfriend, Thor, shouting that they only needed to stall the Dark Elf for eight minutes, suddenly froze. She stared at the massive trench carved into the ground, then looked around for Malekith.
He was gone.
The next second, her gaze landed on Hawk. She watched as the man who had just unleashed that apocalyptic attack swayed, his knees giving out as he collapsed onto the grass.
"..."
"Hawk!" Peter, who had just landed safely nearby, cried out and started to run toward him.
Thor's hand shot out, grabbing his arm. "Wait. Don't go."
"What?"
"Look."
Thor's eyes were fixed on the spot where the dragon had dissipated.
Peter followed his gaze.
And there, hovering in the air, was the Aether. The crimson, liquid-like substance writhed with a life of its own, twisting through the air as it followed the path of the trench, surging toward Hawk at the far end.
It didn't just surge—it pounced.
In the blink of an eye, before Hawk's knees even fully touched the ground, the remaining Aether plunged into his body, disappearing into his Cosmo.
The Reality Stone was whole again.
...
Within Hawk's Cosmo, the Phoenix Heart felt the arrival of the final piece.
With a cry, the Phoenix ignited the universe again, throwing it into chaos. Phoenix Fire flooded the void, consuming everything in its path. The fully assembled Aether writhed in the flames, twisted and grotesque, as the fire scorched and refined it mercilessly.
The Phoenix Fire intensified, rising higher and higher, forcing the transformation.
The Aether was evolving.
From liquid... to solid.
Time stretched. It felt like an eternity.
And yet, it happened in an instant.
Finally—
The Phoenix Fire receded. The liquid Aether was gone. In its place, two dark red gemstones floated side by side, each one containing the swirling, imprisoned essence of the Reality Stone's liquid form.
The two gems hung side by side, brilliant and conspicuous.
But then, the phantom image of the Phoenix began to form once more, and their light was eclipsed.
In that instant, the Phoenix seemed to come alive.
Its gaze fell upon the two red gems.
SKREEE!
The cry of the Phoenix echoed through the universe, shaking the very fabric of reality.
With the two halves of the Reality Stone now serving as the Phoenix's eyes, the great bird—no longer just a phantom—spread its wings wide, spanning the entire breadth of the chaotic void.
WHOOOOOOSH!
Crimson flames erupted from its feathers. With every beat of its wings, the fire washed over the surrounding chaos, burning it away, revealing a new, more brilliant starfield beneath.
In the blink of an eye, Hawk's Cosmo was reborn.
BOOOOOM!
...
Back in the physical world, Hawk who had been on the verge of collapsing from exhaustion—opened his eyes once more.
This time, the crimson flames that burned in his gaze did not fade.
And the golden light, which had previously only rimmed the edges of his pupils, began to spread inward, claiming the center.
In moments, Hawk's once-blue eyes transformed into something entirely new—half celestial blue, half molten gold. A perfect dichromatic gaze.
His Cosmo continued to evolve.
With the dual force of his mastery over the Sixth Sense and the complete Reality Stone working in tandem, a new Cosmo emerged.
One far more ancient and brilliant than before.