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6: Marvel's Green Lantern, Muspelheim pt.2
🕑 Added 2025-05-20 14:59:53 +0000 UTCOdin grabbed Max by the arm and hauled him to his feet, his grip firm. The heat in the throne room was unbearable now; the very air rippled with it.
Surtur approached, his massive footsteps sending tremors through the black-stone floor, each step punctuated by the deep, rumbling echo of his laughter.
“Grænlaðr,” Odin said quickly, turning to Max with both weapons drawn, “take flight! Strike him from above—I will meet him head-on!”
Max nodded, wincing as his armor re-formed in a flash of green light, sealing the cracks and burns from Surtur’s previous strike. The Halo-like plating clicked into place sleeker now, reinforced by his sheer will.
Above them, Surtur let out a deafening roar.
The Twilight Sword ignited fully, engulfed in wild, golden flames its blade wreathed in the pure essence of the Eternal Fire. The air around it shimmered, warping with power.
“Damn it all,” Odin muttered under his breath, eyes wide.
Surtur raised the sword high, then brought it down on the black stone of the throne room.
The impact was like a volcanic eruption. The entire fortress shook; stone cracked, and flame spilled through the seams of the floor. A wave of fire exploded outward, sending ash and molten debris flying.
High above, Jade’s voice rang in Max’s ears.
“Warning: do not engage at close range. Surtur’s current thermal output exceeds 5,000 kelvin.”
Max’s eyes narrowed behind his visor. “Copy that.”
Below, Odin roared and charged, spinning Mjolnir with one hand and wielding Gungnir with the other. “FOR ASGARD!”
He met Surtur head-on, swinging Gungnir to intercept the sword. The spear struck with a crack of divine metal, parrying the molten blade just enough to avoid being cleaved in half. Odin followed with a blast of lightning from Mjolnir that struck Surtur square in the chest.
Surtur barely staggered.
The fire giant retaliated with an earth-shaking swing, forcing Odin onto the defensive. He retreated with heavy steps as sparks and flame burst from every clash. He fought ferociously like the warrior he was born to be but Surtur’s sheer strength was monstrous, each strike threatening to crush him outright.
Above, Max began his assault.
Missile ports opened along his shoulders and back constructs locked on and launched. Dozens of glowing-green projectiles screamed down from the sky, slamming into Surtur in rapid succession. The explosions hammered the dark fortress like fireworks.
Surtur only growled in annoyance, his molten eyes turning upward.
With a single swing of the Twilight Sword, he swatted Odin aside like a toy. The Asgardian prince crashed into a pillar and slumped to the ground with a pained grunt.
Surtur turned his smoldering gaze toward Max.
“Come here, Elder,” he rumbled.
The Space Stone on his crown flared bright blue.
Suddenly, space warped Max’s body jerked violently. He tried to resist, pouring will into his ring, but the pull was too strong, too fast. Gravity and space bent inward, and he was yanked from the air, spiraling helplessly into Surtur’s massive, waiting hand.
Surtur caught him like a child snatching a fly.
Max screamed as the heat hit him. The armor construct around him began to sizzle, bubble, and melt; panels of emerald light peeled away like wax, evaporating in the inferno of Surtur’s grip.
He raised an arm and tried to fire a point-blank blast—but it fizzled as Surtur’s magic overwhelmed the construct.
The fire god laughed—a deep, terrible sound.
“This?” he mocked, holding Max close to his ember-lit face. “This is the power of a mighty Elder of the Universe?”
“I have heard your kind are immortal. Let’s test that, shall we?”
Max couldn’t answer.
He couldn’t even hear him—the pain was too much.
A thunderous crack echoed through the throne room as Mjolnir streaked through the smoke, slamming into the side of Surtur’s face. The fire god stumbled back with a guttural snarl, embers and molten sparks flying as he clutched his flaming jaw.
Before he could recover, Gungnir shot forward, striking him square in the chest and knocking him back another step.
Max collapsed to the ground, gasping and scorched but alive. His skin ached, his armor was cracked and dim, yet his will was unbroken.
Above him, Odin was a blur of fury, repeatedly hurling both Mjolnir and Gungnir in flawless rhythm. Each time one returned, he launched it again.
But Surtur quickly adapted.
With a grunt, he raised the Twilight Sword and slashed—a wide, flaming arc through the air. The blade intercepted both weapons mid-flight, sending them spinning off course to crash in two different parts of the throne room.
Surtur roared, his body pulsing as he lifted the Twilight Sword high and channeled the Eternal Flame through it. The blade ignited with searing power, then swept downward, hurling a massive crescent of molten fire and raw force directly at Odin.
Max, still coughing and barely standing, saw it coming.
He pushed off the ground, ring flared.
In one desperate motion, he raised both hands and cast a vast green barrier, a translucent dome that wrapped around Odin just as the flaming crescent struck.
The impact rocked the entire hall.
The dome cracked, rippled, and hissed under the weight of the flame…but it held.
Max dropped to one knee, panting. “Still… here…”
He gritted his teeth and summoned his strength, pushing past the pain.
From behind them, ten towering fire-giant constructs emerged green-tinted doppelgängers of Surtur’s own kin, each one massive and armed with emerald axes and hammers. They swarmed around Surtur’s legs and back, climbing, hacking, and dragging at his limbs.
At the same time, Max formed drill constructs: immense, spiraling tools aimed at the pressure points in Surtur’s body shoulders, hip joints, knees. They spun violently, boring into him and trying to pierce his molten armor.
Surtur stumbled, roaring in rage and swatting at the constructs. The Space Stone on his crown flashed, and in bursts of blue light he blinked phasing between positions in rapid succession to evade and counterattack.
“Are you all right?” Odin asked.
Max pushed himself upright. “I’m fine…but what the hell are we going to do against this monster?”
“We’re just annoying him right now,” he added, watching Surtur crush another construct with a single step.
Odin’s eyes narrowed. “Then we take the Space Stone from him… strip him of his advantage.”
Max nodded. “Exactly what I was thinking. Take it and use it against him.”
Odin raised Mjolnir. “We bring him low. We take the Stone.”
He met Max’s gaze, fierce and resolute. “We fight together.”
Max’s armor flared back to life with a green glow. “Let’s do it.”
Surtur, having finished tearing through the last construct, turned to face them—his blade burning brighter than ever, the Space Stone pulsing on his crown.
Max and Odin moved as one.
Their strikes came from every direction, synchronized and relentless. Odin unleashed blow after blow, wielding Mjolnir and Gungnir in perfect rhythm—lightning crashing with each impact. Surtur swung the Twilight Sword in wide, flaming arcs, blocking and parrying with brute force, yet he was being pushed—cornered for the first time.
Hovering above, Max’s ring hummed. He fired concentrated energy blasts, forcing Surtur to shift and guard low. Then, with a surge of green light, Max summoned a colossal construct fist twenty feet across, glowing like molten jade and drove it into Surtur’s chest.
The fire god stumbled, flames bursting from his mouth as he lost his footing.
Max didn’t let up.
He conjured a crackling tether, a chain of thick emerald links that lashed forward and wrapped around the base of Surtur’s crown. The tether snapped tight, yanking toward the Space Stone embedded at its center.
Below, Odin saw the opening and unleashed a vicious combination: Mjolnir arced through the air to hammer Surtur’s temple, followed immediately by Gungnir, the spear launching straight at his head and forcing him to guard high.
“Now, Grænlaðr!” Odin roared. “The Stone …take it!”
Max narrowed his eyes, pulling hard on the tether and streaking toward Surtur’s crown but Surtur’s flames erupted outward. He roared, a sound that shook the ground, and the Space Stone flared blindingly bright.
“Let’s take a walk,” Surtur growled.
In a flash of searing blue light, he seized both Max and Odin—and space folded in on itself.
====
When the flash of blue and the sensation of falling vanished, Max realized that Surtur had dragged him and Odin into another world.
They slammed into it…Max striking the roof of a towering skyscraper.
As he regained his bearings, he saw an endless alien megacity stretching in every direction: spiraling towers lit by neon, anti-gravity highways crisscrossing the sky, translucent spires piercing the clouds. Sleek air-ships zipped past like silver insects.
Surtur crashed through one of the tallest buildings, laughing wildly. Glass exploded, debris rained, and flames rolled from his body, setting everything ablaze with his mere presence.
“NO!” Max roared, conjuring a vast, interlocking web of emerald barriers to shield civilians and arrest falling rubble. Shrapnel ricocheted harmlessly from the constructs—but he was too late. Thousands had already died in their catastrophic arrival.
Screams echoed terrified, alien cries in an unfamiliar tongue. Green-skinned citizens fled as the skyline burned behind them.
Odin hurled Mjolnir through another skyscraper; the hammer threaded between floating transit lanes and burst out the far side, smashing into Surtur’s jaw and sending the giant spinning.
Max followed with a barrage of missiles that blossomed in emerald fire across Surtur’s chest.
The fire god only laughed harder. The Space Stone pulsed again, and he vanished—dragging them once more into the void.
The cold hit first.
They landed in a frozen wasteland: jagged ice peaks beneath a blood-red sky. Snow whipped around them, winds shrieking through shattered glaciers yet the chill lasted only moments. Surtur’s presence melted the very ground. Ice hissed and cracked, steam billowing as frozen lakes boiled.
Before Max or Odin could react, the Stone flashed again and space folded once more.
They tumbled through a vortex of light—Max, Odin, and Surtur locked in chaotic freefall. The blue glow finally dimmed as they broke through the clouds of a new world.
Max blinked, stunned.
Below stretched a realm of breathtaking beauty: lush emerald forests, crystalline rivers threading through trees that shimmered like glass, and structures of living light floating in graceful arcs above the canopy.
“By the Norns,” Odin muttered, eyes wide. “Alfheim.”
Surtur burst into raucous laughter, his molten form blazing brighter as they descended. He raised the Twilight Sword high and slashed downward, unleashing a colossal crescent of flame and raw force.
Max reacted instantly. Will surging, he threw up a massive green barrier in front of himself and Odin. The fiery arc slammed into the shield, slowed for a heartbeat—then hurled them backward through the air and crashed into the forest below.
The explosion was catastrophic.
The blast tore through the verdant forest, incinerating entire groves of glowing trees. Buildings of light shattered into beams and ribbons, collapsing to the earth like falling stars.
Odin’s eyes blazed with fury. “You will pay for that!” he bellowed.
He hurled Mjolnir, a lightning-charged hammerhead colliding with Surtur mid-air, throwing sparks and molten fragments as the fire god roared.
Surtur slammed into the ground, the impact rippling through the forest. Trees splintered and fell while a fresh burst of flame rolled out from his body, torching everything nearby.
Max and Odin dove after him, attacking in perfect sync. Max unleashed focused blasts of willpower and conjured spinning saw-blade constructs to assault Surtur’s limbs; Odin struck high, Mjolnir and Gungnir flying in deadly rhythm. For a moment it seemed they were gaining the upper hand.
But Surtur’s strength had not waned.
With a brutal overhead swing, he brought the Twilight Sword crashing onto Odin, hurling the prince through a glowing archway that detonated in a burst of radiant shards.
Snarling, Surtur pivoted and blasted Max with a torrent of flame and force. Max raised a shield, but too late the blast shredded the construct and seared the armor beneath.
He cried out, spiraling through the air.
“Shield integrity compromised,” Jade warned, her voice sharp. “Initiating emergency healing—brace for override. Prioritizing limb function.”
Before Max could answer, the Space Stone flared again.
A blinding flash of blue swallowed him whole—and the world twisted once more.
====
When Max opened his eyes, he was lying on soft grass, the cool dampness clinging to his back.
Cold. That was the first thing he felt a pleasant, crisp cold. The air was fresh and clean, tinged with the scent of pine, damp earth, and distant smoke.
He sat up slowly, groaning as pain lanced through his arm. Glancing down, he saw the spot where Surtur had burned him: the flesh still throbbed, red and angry beneath the cracked remains of his armor.
Then he noticed them.
A dozen humans stood in a wide circle around him, primitive folk dressed in furs and leathers, their faces painted with streaks of ochre and charcoal. Their hair was tightly braided; their eyes were wide and wary. Spears and stone axes trembled in calloused hands, though none of them stepped forward.
Max pushed himself to his feet, and the circle widened. Murmurs rippled low and anxious in a language he didn’t understand.
Instinctively he looked up, and his breath caught.
The moon.
It hovered low in the sky, pale and massive against the deepening dusk.
His heart pounded. “…No way.”
Realization jolted through him.
Earth.
He was back on Earth.
He scanned his surroundings more carefully. A wide, calm fjord stretched to his right, its surface glinting silver in the moonlight. Mountains rose in jagged silhouettes along the horizon, dense forests hugging their slopes and valleys.
“Northern Europe…” he muttered.
One of the elders taller than the rest and wrapped in a fur-lined cloak took a cautious step forward and spoke in the same unfamiliar tongue.
Jade translated calmly in his ear: “He asks… are you a god?”
Max opened his mouth, unsure how to reply…
Boom.
The sky behind him exploded with light.
He spun around, eyes widening.
A colossal silhouette loomed in the darkening heavens Surtur, blazing like a walking inferno, molten body towering over the land. Rivers of flame cascaded from his form like molten waterfalls. And streaking toward him like a comet…
Odin.
Lightning arced across the sky as Mjolnir crashed into Surtur’s chest, splitting the clouds with a blinding flash. Thunder rolled after, beating the earth like a war-drum.
Fire and lightning clashed overhead, painting the twilight in searing orange and brilliant white. The two titans tore through the heavens above Earth.
The villagers screamed and fled, panic surging as they pointed to the warring gods.
Max’s expression hardened.
He raised his hand, and a dome of shimmering emerald light expanded around the people.
“You will be safe in there,” he said quietly.
Then he turned, powered up his ring, and launched into the sky a green streak trailing behind him toward Odin, toward Surtur.
Max shot through the cold evening air like a jade comet, slicing the clouds with speed born of pain, rage, and resolve. Ahead of him the battle burned like a second sun, Odin and Surtur clashing in mid-air, lightning and fire ripping the heavens apart.
“Surtur!” Max roared, his voice echoing across fjord and forest.
He summoned everything every ounce of will he possessed and the ring answered. Emerald light erupted from his body, rippling outward in jagged waves of pure energy.
Armor assembled around him: shoulder plates locked into place with metallic finality, followed by glowing, angular gauntlets and a towering chest-plate. The iconic V-fin helmet materialized last, snapping over his head in a flare of green fire.
Within seconds he sat at the heart of a thirty-foot construct—the RX-78-2 Gundam, forged of will.
Encased in the mech’s frame, Max angled upward—straight for Surtur.
The fire giant barely had time to react before the Gundam’s massive fist crashed into his chest, hurling him from the sky like a meteor. Surtur struck the ground hard, carving a trench through the earth and flattening trees in his wake.
Max did not relent. He dove, landing with a titanic crash that sent shockwaves racing across the fjord. The Gundam’s foot slammed into Surtur’s side, flipping the fire god onto his back.
“Get up,” Max growled, hauling the giant to his feet by the shoulder.
Before Surtur could fully rise, Max hammered him with blows that echoed like thunder, driving him backward—deeper into a nearby mountain. Rock shattered; peaks collapsed.
Surtur roared and raised a hand. With a burst of flame the Twilight Sword snapped into his grasp, and he swung it in a wide arc, fire trailing from the blade.
Max reacted instantly, willing a green sword into the Gundam’s hand. The weapons met with an explosive shockwave that flattened trees for miles.
Surtur’s strength was monstrous; each strike shattered Max’s blade yet every time it broke, Max conjured another. Will met flame again and again. Mountains crumbled beneath their duel, ridges splitting under the titanic force.
Above them Odin spotted his chance. He hurtled downward, lightning streaming in his wake, and arrowed toward Surtur’s flaming crown. Mjolnir spun in his hand, and with a war-cry he smashed it into the glowing Space Stone.
Surtur screamed as a surge of blue energy erupted from the gem; the Stone tore free from his brow in a violent pulse. A shockwave of space-warping force rippled across the battlefield, engulfing Odin, Max, and Surtur.
They were swallowed by the light by the pulsing brilliance of the Space Stone.
The world folded around them.
In an instant the fjord, the mountains, and Earth itself vanished.
====
Max blinked, the searing blue glare of the Space Stone fading from his vision as reality snapped back into focus.
They were in Muspelheim again back in the throne room, or what remained of it.
The once-mighty fortress was a ruin: columns shattered, molten stone pooled across the cracked obsidian floor, and the sky glared through gaping holes in what was left of the ceiling. The very realm seemed ready to tear itself apart.
Max still occupied the glowing green frame of his Gundam construct, though half of it was falling to pieces.
Across the chamber Surtur raged in a crater of his own making, bellowing into the smoke-choked air.
“YOU DARE STEAL FROM ME?!”
His crown was gone.
No glowing blue gem remained.
The Space Stone had been taken.
Max saw his chance. Clenching his jaw, he forced the battered mech upright.
“Time to end this,” he muttered.
He patched the suit as best he could, then broke into a sprint, the floor cracking beneath the Gundam’s massive feet. Missile ports snapped open along its shoulders, unleashing a full salvo emerald warheads streaked across the hall and hammered into Surtur with thunderous force.
As smoke and flame swallowed the giant, Max conjured a fresh energy sword in the Gundam’s right hand and raised it for the killing blow.
Surtur stepped through the smoke unfazed.
He lunged faster than anything so huge should move and slammed a fist into the mech’s torso, denting the armor inward.
BOOM.
Another punch.
BOOM.
And another.
BOOM.
Each strike tore pieces from the construct arms, shoulder plates, chunks of hull shattering what remained of the throne room. Pillars collapsed, walls splintered, the sky yawned wider overhead.
Max tried to counter, but he couldn’t land a single hit. Surtur’s fury was inexhaustible.
With a final roar the giant raised his hand, summoning the Twilight Sword in a burst of flame. The molten blade burned longer and brighter than ever.
In one brutal motion he drove it through the Gundam’s chest.
Max screamed.
“HRRAAAAGHHH!”
The construct shuddered, then disintegrated in a storm of green sparks.
He fell, the sword having pierced both armor and flesh. Agony lit every nerve; his body refused to respond.
“Warning,” Jade whispered in his ear. “Multiple internal injuries detected. Initiating stabilization protocols.”
Max hit the obsidian floor hard, coughing violently blood splattering across his forearm.
Through the haze he heard it:
“Grænlaðr!”
Odin’s voice panicked, furious.
Max turned his head just enough to see the Asgardian prince soaring into view, a trail of lightning behind him, Mjolnir crackling in one hand and Gungnir glowing in the other. Odin slammed into Surtur first Mjolnir to the jaw, then Gungnir to the chest—knocking the fire giant backward in a massive eruption of lightning and golden light.
Max watched the clash through blurry eyes, the world dimming and brightening by the second. He coughed more blood. His limbs felt heavy, cold.
“…Fuck,” he muttered, trying to push himself up on shaking arms.
His body screamed in protest. He collapsed again, knees striking broken stone with a dull crack. Every breath razored his ribs; his fingers clawed at the ground, his legs refused to obey. The ring’s glow flickered, pulsing irregularly.
Through the blur he saw Odin hurled across the throne room like a rag doll, slamming into a broken pillar and crumpling to the floor. Surtur, blazing with unrestrained fury, stormed toward him.
“YOU RUINED EVERYTHING!” the giant bellowed, voice like cracking stone. “Where is it, AESIR? WHERE IS THE STONE?”
Odin tried to rise, bringing Mjolnir to bear, but he was too slow. Surtur loomed over him, raising the Twilight Sword for the killing blow.
Max’s fingers dug into the ground. Blood poured from his mouth. One eye was swollen shut; his chest rose in short, painful gasps. He glanced at the ring on his finger—flickering, weak, but still alive.
He closed his good eye and breathed the only words that came to him.
“In brightest day…” he whispered.
The ring sparked.
“…in blackest night,” he forced out through blood-slick lips.
Its glow intensified.
“No evil shall escape my sight…”
His whole body trembled; his legs fought to rise. A faint green aura returned—building, surging from the core of his will.
“Let those who worship evil’s might…” Max growled, louder now, standing slowly, shakily. Light surrounded him again, raw and bright. His ring ignited with new life, and in his hands a sword began to form: long, broad, two-handed, forged of emerald fire—mirroring the Twilight Sword’s shape, but pulsing with pure, defiant will.
“Beware my power…” he roared, sprinting forward, pain forgotten. “GREEN LANTERN’S LIGHT!”
He streaked across the ruined throne room in a blaze of green.
Surtur turned just in time to see Max swing.
SLASH!
The emerald blade sheared through Surtur’s wrist. The Twilight Sword tumbled from his severed hand, skidding across the rubble.
Surtur howled, molten blood spraying as he staggered back, clutching the blazing stump.
“Die, bitch,” Max rasped—and collapsed.
His body hit the stone hard, motionless, while the last flickers of green light swirled above him and faded into the smoky air.
Max lay on the shattered floor, body unresponsive, blood pooling beneath him. His eyes fluttered open and closed, the world a blur of smoke, fire, and fading green light.
Through the haze he saw Odin.
The Prince of Asgard stood tall once more—bloodied and burned, but unbroken.
In one hand he raised Mjolnir to the sky; in the other he gripped Gungnir, knuckles white.
With a cry that split the air, Odin drove the spear into Surtur’s chest, lightning trailing behind it like the wrath of the heavens. The impact sent shockwaves through the stone, thunder rolling across Muspelheim like a war-drum.
As Surtur reeled—howling in rage and disbelief—Mjolnir returned, a crackling comet that smashed into the fire giant’s skull with the force of a dying star.
CRACK.
A sound like the snapping of the world.
Surtur’s molten body shuddered, spasmed.
Then…light. Blinding, radiant light burst from within him, leaking from his eyes, mouth, and joints, gushing flame and brilliance in every direction.
He gave one final roar…
…and shattered.
Fragments of fire and molten armor rained down across the ruined throne room.
Max blinked slowly, a small smile forming on his lips.
Moments later Odin’s face hovered above him, scratched and smeared with ash but smiling.
“We did it, Grænlaðr,” he said, voice hoarse yet proud. “We did it.”
Max tried to speak, but only a soft exhale escaped—barely a breath. Vision blurring, he saw blue light kindle in Odin’s hands—the Space Stone pulsing between his palms.
“Stay with me, my battle-brother,” Odin said gently. “Asgard awaits. You will be well in no time.”
Max looked up at him and, despite everything the pain, the exhaustion smiled.
He had fought beside gods.
He had lived.
With a final exhale, Max let go.
Jade’s voice whispered that he would be fine.
The green light of the ring faded, and darkness claimed him.
Comments
Tyler Karp
Thank you for the chapter
June Soriano
whoooooooo! Awesome fight! Now the pre historic people is gonna think that Max is a god and protected them.
