Marvel Magic Case Files

Chapter 1725 The Kree Experiments

Hammurabi no longer needed to consider the Hydra problem.

The vast majority of parasites and their hosts were burned by the expeditionary force with Molotov cocktails, and even though the Hydra multiplied rapidly enough, it couldn't interfere until the Emperor killed all the Kree. The Praetorian Guard now faced a more pressing problem. He forcefully ordered all mortal soldiers to retreat, at least away from the dense fog. The vision of beings from the material universe couldn't discern what was within the fog, but Hammurabi knew perfectly well that the extradimensional anomalies of the material universe meant that extradimensional spiritual entities had arrived here—what humans called demons.

The surrounding temperature was dropping rapidly. Some of the wounded who couldn't evacuate in time received basic medical treatment, picked up weapons, and set up a defensive line, intending to use their remaining hours to hold off the invincible enemy. Dense fog quickly engulfed the village, and the slowly descending flares extinguished rapidly, leaving only burning reeds and the corpses of the alien race.

The several bonfires that could have illuminated the entire village seemed to be gripped tightly by some unseen force, and even their light could no longer illuminate much of the area. The ordinary soldiers could barely see the tips of their shoes; anything further away was completely filled with thick fog and darkness. "Don't move," the Imperial Guard's voice came from the neck megaphone, even the last shred of humanity had been erased, "Stay on guard."

"There's something in the fog!" Kasper muttered nervously.

He and the other soldiers who hadn't managed to evacuate stayed beside a still-burning reed fire, using a firecracker to ward off the thick fog. They watched nervously as a colossal black shadow slowly moved through the fog, illuminated by the firelight. The enormous shadow was several elephants tall, with a few slender legs dangling from its massive body, their stomping on the ground producing a sticky sound, like rotting muscle slapping against each other. A strange humanoid figure, emerging from the fog, followed it slowly, like a walking corpse summoned by an evil wizard. A suffocating stench wafted with the fog, and only the flames could dispel the odor.

An unspeakable fear gripped the minds of every mortal soldier. The sounds emanating from those terrifying, grotesque figures were like stepping on filthy, greasy feathers, the stench of which gently rubbed against the very edge of their sanity. Kasper found himself trembling; an incomprehensible fear seeped into his body like cold air. He didn't know why the things in the fog were more terrifying than the monsters created by aliens. Even without seeing them with his own eyes, a terrifying intuition, as if from the depths of his ancient ancestral memories, had been awakened.

Human ancestors relied on fire to evade the ghosts that roamed the night. Fire gave mortals courage and strength. Instinct from the depths of their genes urged soldiers to approach the fire, even if their skin was dried out and burned, it was better than being preyed upon by monsters in the thick fog. Casper felt his face burning from the flames, sweat streaming down his back, but he felt an unusual chill on the other side of the fire, as if the distant river had frozen over, and a damp, icy wind slowly approached with an irresistible force.

If it weren't for the Imperial Guard's requirement that they only fire upon receiving orders, coupled with the long-standing strict discipline and the courage emboldened by the Imperial Guard's formidable strength, the ordinary soldiers would have already opened fire. "We can't get through to the radio, sir," a platoon leader said, his face pale as he took off his receiver. The sound coming from the receiver wasn't static, but a muffled roar. He could vaguely hear the voice calling his name. But he didn't tell the other soldiers, because that would only increase their fear.

"I know."

Hammurabi watched the massive, dark figure slowly crawling through the fog warily, not even turning his head while speaking to the expeditionary soldiers. Unbeknownst to the mortal soldiers, the eyes behind the ruby-lensed glasses of the Royal Guard were also watching intently. He knew these things in the fog well; they lurked behind the veil of reality, sucking the soul from this world. Every war, with its psionicists and mass deaths, easily triggered extradimensional anomalies. This fog, and what resided within it, couldn't truly harm humanity, but the mental pollution it left behind was enough to drive a normal human insane.

"Stay here, find cover, and build a fire."

"The fog is thick everywhere, sir, and our campfires won't be able to dispel it."

"They fear fire and light, Kaspar." Hammurabi held his garrison spear upside down, watching warily as the massive black shadow slowly passed through the thick fog. Before the time jump, since the Emperor took control of Kamar-Taj, the Guardian Order's capture and management of psychics had extended across the entire planet, regardless of country or region.

During the capture operations, there were very few instances of psionic beings causing extradimensional anomalies or extradimensional spiritual entities crossing borders. Only the demon-possessed spaceship "Louise and Clark" and the lunar Attilan energy base achieved true extradimensional invasions. However, in this era, the Guardian Order frequently encountered genuine extradimensional invasions during their psionic capture operations in the Mesopotamian plains. Demonic possession, or rather, extradimensional spiritual entities possessing psionic beings, was far more frequent and severe than in later generations. It was as if the boundaries between reality and illusion were very thin in this era. Monsters in nightmares could easily escape from dreams and enter reality. In this era, casually uttered curses could become reality, and monsters under beds, given enough fear, could extend their slimy claws towards a child's neck.

Hammurabi did not believe that the extradimensional beings who arrived were the will of an evil god, but rather some strange flora and fauna living in an extradimensional world. Although they were not driven by the will of an evil god, they still craved the souls of the material world. If they were the will of an evil god, then they would have sent more than just these minions into the material universe, since their greatest enemy was in this spacetime.

"Sir?"

Hammurabi walked straight into the thick fog, his golden armor blurring into a halo of light.

The halo rushed toward the enormous black shadow. In the thick fog, the zombie-like humanoid figures fell in droves. The giant monster, which supported itself with only a few slender legs, stretched out several tentacles to try to stop Hammurabi, but a few seconds later, the slender legs were cut off. The monster fell with a mournful cry, and the earth began to tremble as it fell.

Kasper gritted his teeth and gave his companion a look.

After a few seconds of hushed discussion, Kasper and another companion picked up a still-burning piece of firewood from the campfire and followed Hammurabi into the thick fog. The firelight pierced through the fog a few steps ahead of them. The expeditionary soldiers saw nothing where the colossal beasts and tall, thin zombies had been; the shadows seemed merely to be reflections in the light, like exaggerated shadows cast by a child fiddling with his fingers in a lamplight.

"There's something here." Kasper looked around warily. They couldn't see Hammurabi, and even the gunshots and footsteps had disappeared. They only felt something unseen lurking around them, its limbs twitching, and a supernatural stench permeated every inch of the air, making them even more certain of the danger they were in.

"Forward! We need to find the Imperial Guard!"

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The Kree's electromagnetic deflection shield exploded under the impact of stellar energy. The light distorted by the shield re-entered the Kree research base, and the spaceship, which was parked for several kilometers inside the base, was seen by humans for the first time. The heat storm caused by the psionic explosion almost overturned the mountain-like steel behemoth.

Beside several experimental bases constructed of composite materials, hundreds of armed and armored Kree headhunters gathered, forming a defensive line against the Emperor's human cavalry. Even with the courage bestowed upon the expeditionary force by the Emperor, using outdated weaponry against an army capable of operating in the space environment came at a heavy price. Bullets fired by the expeditionary soldiers from their lever rifles only shattered into twisted fragments of steel upon hitting the Kree armor; conversely, the Kree's plasma weapons could easily burn through a human soldier and his horse, inflicting heavy casualties on the expeditionary force within seconds.

Within seconds, the expeditionary force suffered over four hundred casualties, and nearly half of the entire assault formation was lost.

The Emperor gripped the reins, urging Pegasus to charge towards the Kree's fortifications, constructed of plasma cannons and low alloy walls. The plasma projectile fired at the Emperor exploded on Pegasus, and then its iron hooves trampled over the Kree soldier. The Kree soldiers' armor, developed to withstand the space environment and weapons of other races, offered excellent bulletproof and high-temperature resistance, but when the multi-ton Pegasus slammed into them at incredible speed and crushed them, even the well-protected Kree soldier was reduced to a bloody pulp.

Once the breach in the defensive line was opened, the Emperor immediately ordered Pegasus and his accompanying Royal Guard to turn and charge the Kree soldiers using plasma cannons in their alloy bunkers. The burning sword, like a scythe, sliced ​​through the Kree armor, weapons, and bunkers; the subatomic hydrogen canisters ruptured and exploded violently. The Kree firepower immediately thinned as they attempted to halt the Emperor and Royal Guard's charge, but more and more Expeditionary Force soldiers broke through the lines, using their spears, laden with explosives, to hunt down any Kree who tried to charge or flee.

Nevertheless, many expeditionary soldiers died at the hands of the Kree in battle. It often took a dozen expeditionary soldiers working together to pierce the lightly armored headhunter elites. These Kree nobles’ assassins were arrogant and disdained to protect themselves. On the contrary, the Kree soldiers wearing full environmental armor had to wait for the Royal Guard to arrive before they could be killed, because the expeditionary soldiers’ weapons could not break through their defenses.

On the other side of the battlefield, the Cree, aboard anti-gravity assault boats, formed a wedge and launched a counter-charge against the cavalry.

The Kree deliberately avoided the Emperor, charging towards the center of the cavalry, which consisted mainly of mortals. Some mortal soldiers who couldn't dodge in time were crushed along with their horses by the anti-gravity generators, leaving only a sticky mass of flesh and blood on the mud and rocks. Just as the Kree headhunters thought they had routed the expeditionary cavalry, they saw a small golden squad rushing towards them at near-sonic speed. Hannibal and four other guards, riding anti-gravity jet motorcycles and wielding garrison spears, formed a mobile force, crashing into the Kree headhunters' counter-charge like a cannonball. Hannibal pulled the trigger, and the twin-barreled bolt-action machine gun mounted at the front of the vehicle spat fire, blasting the Kree anti-gravity assault boats and the alien creatures on them into pieces.

An antigravity assault boat was hit by the Royal Guard's heavy fire, which destroyed its nuclear battery. The violent explosion burned nearby Kree vehicles into molten iron and fragments. The expeditionary soldiers skillfully maneuvered their horses to avoid the falling debris, crossed the low wall, and followed the Emperor's iron hooves to charge the Kree headhunters protecting the research base.

The war could be declared a victory at this point; all that remained was to hunt down the remaining Kree who hadn't managed to escape. Even with the Emperor and the King's Guard joining the effort, the casualty ratio between the expeditionary force and the Kree remained alarmingly high. As the Emperor and the King's Guard halted their advance and ordered the expeditionary force to pursue the Kree, the task of tallying the losses was also underway.

The Emperor halted his iron hooves, the golden flames on the holy sword gradually fading, but the air around him remained as hot as a furnace. He stood behind the defensive line, watching the charred, mangled corpses of the expeditionary force soldiers lying in the field of fire of the plasma cannons. Straight lines of blood and flesh testified to the price they had paid for this war; wails and screams of agony were the only sounds on the battlefield. This was merely the escort of a research team; the expeditionary force had still paid the price of hundreds of lives to close the technological gap with the Kree. If the Kree army were to come to Earth, even if the Emperor and the Royal Guard could kill all the Kree, humanity would still suffer extremely heavy losses.

Humans, with their inferior technology, have no ability to resist alien races with advanced weapons.

Nevertheless, humanity possesses courage.

The emperor could sense that the soldiers of the expeditionary force were not afraid.

He didn't need to wait for casualty reports; he knew the name and story of every fallen expeditionary soldier. As he rode across the battlefield, slaughtering the Kree like mowing grass, he recounted every second from the first sweet taste of their milk to the scorching heat of plasma burning their bodies—as if he had experienced it all himself. All of this happened within Planck's timescale; he felt the pain and burning of the expeditionary soldiers. He could sense their longing for their families, their adoration and trust in him, their anger at their fallen comrades, and their hatred for the blue-skinned aliens. All these emotions fueled his soul, sustaining the blazing holy sword.

"Now we have enough experimental equipment, Constantine. I believe the Kree's research on human genes will allow me to skip the initial tedious experiments." The Emperor turned to look at the experimental base engulfed in flames, and the Kree Empire warship several kilometers long (more accurately, an armed research vessel). This was his goal; he had to acquire the Kree Empire's most advanced science and technology. The population, economy, and weapons that Elidu had nurtured over thirty years were all for the purpose of acquiring this equipment and knowledge. It was a gamble, and he had prepared thirty years' worth of chips for it.

Elidu's historical mission is complete; the next plan is to lead the people away from Elidu and build a space experimental station.

The productivity and power granted to Eridu by the Emperor led those in power within Eridu's economic and military sphere of influence to call themselves "Anunnaki," claiming to be gods. The Emperor's purpose in governing Eridu was to build an army to seize the Kree's biological experimental equipment for his own experiments, not to create a group of oppressors. Once the Emperor and his army, representing royal power, leave Eridu, the self-proclaimed gods, will lose most of their ruling power. Eridu, stripped of its writing and knowledge, will return to its historical trajectory. Time will smooth over its minor disturbances, and those behind the veil will be unable to see themselves hidden in the timeline.

According to the plan, the spaceship will leave Earth. However, before departure, he needs to obtain the Celestial experimental data stored in Earth's machines from the Eternals. Therefore, he and the Royal Guard will remain here for a while, while relocating the people in Elidu who are willing to follow him onto this warship. These people will be the first space residents. After they multiply and thrive, he will select suitable young men from among them for training, reserving soldiers for the war eight thousand years from now.

Beside Constantine's boots lay a living Kree, but the Emperor paid him no attention whatsoever. According to Hala's customs, Krees with white striped makeup held high positions in Hala's military aristocracy, and were likely Kree officials sent to supervise the slave soldiers' work. But neither the Emperor nor the Janissaries cared what information or knowledge this Kree could provide. The warship docked before them would take them to the Kree homeworld, where the people trained would become soldiers, and Hala would become their whetstone and armory.

“My Lord,” Constantine said, “I have not received a message from Hammurabi, but the fire support team blocking the Hydra has fired a signal flare, indicating that a psionic phenomenon has occurred there.”

"I know." The Emperor continued to scrutinize the warship. Constantine suspected his master was discussing how to operate this type of Kree warship. However, he wasn't sure of his guess; no one could fully know the Emperor's thoughts, not even the King's Guard. "I will bring Hammurabi back. He has his own mission to complete."