Marvel: Incursio

He stood on a small hill overlooking the town. Buildings were ablaze on both sides, half of them completely destroyed and leveled to the ground. Crashed and burning cars were everywhere through the streets, their doors ripped off, and windows shattered.

Liam ran down the hill towards the town. Once he arrived, he began searching for any survivors he could find. But it was all in vain.

From the broken glass, doors, and wrecked buildings, he figured that the townspeople had all been taken. As he continued his search, he came across trails of blood, bloodied knives, wallets, and other scattered belongings, most likely dropped while they struggled.

After passing a car with its hood ripped off, he found what appeared to be an elementary school.

As he looked inside one of the classrooms while walking past the building. He saw nothing but blood, claw marks, and unfinished drawings on some desks.

'I have to hurry and keep going,' Liam thought after finding no signs of life anywhere in the town.

As he ran towards Mount Ida, the reality of the situation began to sink in.

For the first time, he truly understood how dangerous dimensional tears were for ordinary people—and how desperately the world needed an organization, not just for convenience but because there was no way to stop these events from happening worldwide on his own.

'Earlier, I kept brushing it off as something that could wait since I thought I could likely handle most of them myself,' Liam thought bitterly. 'But this...'

Just as he was about to leave the town, he detected a massive wave of thinly spread energy approached from the distance. Liam quickly climbed onto a nearby building to get a better view of what was happening.

'A landslide,' he realized. 'And it's not a natural one—dimensional energy is mixed into it. That must have been the loud rumbling I heard.'

In the distance, he saw a massive wave of rocks, earth, and trees storming down from Mount Ida. His eyes tracked the front of the wave as it was about to hit the town's buildings.

The landslide was about two or three miles in length, with a height of nearly 90 feet. It was more than enough to engulf the entire distance between the mountain and Anogeia, burying everything in its path and eventually Anogeia too.

Liam knew that if he wanted to reach Mount Ida without waiting for the wave to subside, he would have to act immediately.

Without hesitation, he opened a portal behind him and leaped through. Now that he was certain the tear was on top of the mountain, he could get closer using the portal.

As soon as he disappeared, the landslide struck the town, swallowing it whole. Buildings, cars, and everything else were obliterated and carried away with the destructive wave as it continued, slowly losing height as it moved past this town.

Liam jumped out of the portal a few miles to the left of the landslide and halfway up the mountain. He didn't want to go any closer since getting too close could cause the tear to grow even further.

He glanced back at the devastation below before turning and continuing his climb up the mountain. With Neontote drawn, he sprinted up. It wasn't long before loud screeches echoed from above.

'Harpies aren't supposed to be capable of creating landslides,' he thought. 'Something else must be up there along with them.'

As he continued going up, his eldritch sight picked up a dense concentration of energy at the mountain's peak.

'That's it,' he thought, accelerating to his top speed. Even when the terrain became too steep to run, he used his spear or created constructs for footing, throwing himself higher with each leap.

When he neared the top, the harpies flying in the sky began growing numbers. He moved carefully, hoping to avoid detection, but when he was about 500 feet from the flat area with the tear on top of the mountain, the harpies spotted him.

They stopped mid-flight, flapping their wings to hover in place. Then came the screeching—extremely high-pitched shrieks that made the rocks around Liam tremble as the creatures directed their sonic attacks towards him.

'What is this? Some kind of sound attack?' Liam wondered, continuing going up the mountain. He felt no effect, thanks to Incursio's protection.

When he showed no change to their sound attacks, the harpies that had seen him dove down, with their talons aimed towards him.

Liam raised his spear. As the harpies closed in, he swung in a clean horizontal arc.

Three harpies fell in a single strike, his weapon cleaving through limbs and torsos with ease. Blood and intestines splattered onto his armor as he charged up the mountain.

When he glanced at the sky again, harpies filled the sky after hearing the screams from their companions. Thousands of them darkened the sun, creating a thick, brown blur. Yet strangely, they held their positions, not attacking just yet.

At last, Liam reached the summit. The sight before him was nothing short of horrifying.

A massive stone figure stood ahead, its mouth wide open towards the sky. Harpies swarmed around it, dropping screaming humans from their claws into the creature's mouth.

The mouth snapped shut, and the sickening crunch of bones filled the air. The screams faded into silence.

All the remaining harpies hovered in the sky, their eyes fixed on Liam, who now stood alone in his armor.

He scanned the harpies carefully but saw no more humans in their grasp. His fists clenched as he realized the truth—he was too late.

He turned his attention to the giant stone figure as he had some idea about what it was. Its body was entirely composed of rock, hardened earth, and veins of gold and silver. The creature stood at 150 feet in height and spanned 40 feet in width.

'If I'm right, this tear is linked to Petroklasta, the Mountain Shaper from Greek legends,' Liam thought. 'It would make sense if it was him or anything closely related to it.'

Beside the creature, a massive dimensional tear was glowing. Through it, Liam saw green mountains and a normal blue sky. Before he could study it further, a deep roar shook the air.

His gaze snapped back to the stone giant and the harpies, now gathering more tightly in formation. Two or three thousand of them hovered as if preparing for something.

The stone giant raised one massive arm and pointed at Liam.

After doing so, a small group of harpies flew down. The stone gaint was most likely sending this group to test Liam's strength.

'It has high intelligence.' Liam thought.

Liam switched Neontote into its other form and channeled a small bit of energy into the weapon, unleashing a low-temperature flame that engulfed the first wave of thirty harpies.

Blackened corpses flew through the smoke, slamming into the ground beside him, their body features charred beyond recognition.

The stone giant let out an even louder roar. In response, thousands of harpies opened their mouths and gathering energy. After doing so, they unleashed an extremely high-pitched sound attack, all aimed directly at Liam.