Marvel: Raising — Chapter 146 - Azu vs. Ghost Rider
"When I came here, I'd already heard the legends about both of you."
"Unrestricted free Celestials, walking among mortals, crushing the Shi'ar single-handed, masters of entire planets... the heavenly realms generally consider you to possess Beyond-Skyfather-class power."
Gabriel, wreathed in holy light and water elements, said, "But now that I see you in person, the legends undersold it."
"The power you two hold goes well beyond what any story says, doesn't it?"
"Pops is obviously way stronger!"
Hearing that, Azu looked smug for half a second, then turned nasty. He sneered, "What the hell does that have to do with you?"
The so-called Archangel Gabriel.
In the Marvel universe, that name honestly carries less weight than the notorious troublemaker Odin's son, Thor, blah blah blah, long list of titles.
Pops being a beast is Pops being a beast.
Why are you bird-people crawling out of nowhere to talk big?
Definitely up to something.
Azu thought.
Turns out he was right.
Gabriel pivoted and said, "Heaven and Hell are on the verge of war. It's not what we want, but it will inevitably bring trouble to the mortal world."
"We hope the two Celestials won't take offense."
Azu: "Why can't we take offense?"
"Uh!"
Gabriel said, "Because this is a holy war between justice and evil."
Azu: "Which side are you?"
"Uh!"
Gabriel glared. "I'm an angel..."
"Bird-person."
Azu said flatly. "Tear off those chicken wings and you're nothing."
Gabriel: "..."
She went quiet.
A long moment passed.
Gabriel tried again. "The Ghost Rider's loss of control will destabilize the power balance between Heaven and Hell."
"That will bring an even greater catastrophe."
"To prevent the disaster, war is unavoidable."
"The two Celestials should understand this principle. For the sake of cosmic order, war and death are perfectly normal."
"Yeah." Azu listened, and grew even more indifferent. He grinned. "So if I just kill you and sweep through Hell and Heaven..."
"Doesn't that achieve balance too?"
"You can understand that, right? Archangel."
Gabriel went silent again.
She looked toward Guan Fuyun with a pleading gaze.
"Azu's right."
Guan Fuyun said approvingly. "What Spirit of Vengeance? Does this planet even need something like that?"
"Your own 'weapon' loses control, and your solution is to start a war on someone else's turf."
"Are you people brain-dead?"
!
"Did you hear that? Pops said I'm right!"
Azu got even more insufferable. His eyes lit up, heat vision smoldering. "Get back to Heaven, tear off some extra wings, and bring them as a gift when you come back."
"Do that and we'll call it even."
"Otherwise, I'll personally come catch bird-people, rip off chicken wings, and put your entire divine kingdom on the KFC deluxe combo."
The words were savage.
And carried a childish edge.
Like The Homelander telling Starlight he'd level America — hilarious.
Except Azu actually had the power to back it up.
And from a Celestial's perspective, balance was all that mattered anyway. The disappearance of Hell and Heaven, the survival or extinction of a few dimensions, planets, species, none of it worth a second thought.
Same way a person doesn't lose sleep over the microorganisms that die every time they take a shower.
Life below the Celestial level is, to a Celestial, roughly equivalent to bacteria.
Azu was already a Sequence Celestial. And everyone had long since decided that Guan Fuyun was one too.
The attitude of the two of them.
Seemed to indicate that the bird-person race was about to be reclassified as "harmful bacteria."
"That's not what I meant."
Gabriel's eyes went clear in an instant.
"If the Celestials are willing to lend their aid..."
"We would be delighted to offer our angel wings. As many as you want."
She shed her wings on the spot, went back, and returned with dozens of pairs, hanging them in the kitchen like smoked chicken wings. They swayed and swung. The feathers still dissolved into swirling flurries of snow-white light.
Actually kind of pretty.
Guan Fuyun wondered if they'd make a decent infusion wine.
He was still mulling it over.
Meanwhile, without her original wings, Gabriel was a step above wingless Thor, but she'd lost her Sub-Skyfather-level power along with them.
Now she was roughly equivalent to an ordinary mutant.
That creation-aura, those divine special effects she radiated, gone. She felt grounded now. Human, almost.
Gabriel said, "Going forward, I'll be taking a position at the Celestials' company, serving as the divine envoy from the divine kingdom stationed on the Blue Planet."
After that.
She committed fully to the ceremony, working through a series of hand gestures, bowing, prostrating, and presenting herself before Guan Fuyun with complete formal reverence.
Then, mission in hand.
She went off like a pilgrim heading to a holy site, straight to the company to find Ashley and start her career as a streamer.
It didn't take long.
Guan Fuyun pulled up the company's newest recruit: female streamer Gabriel, mid-live-stream shopping show.
"6."
Around the same time, he also caught the short video of Thor and the Hulk getting hard-CC'd by the Ghost Rider, then collapsing into each other, bawling their eyes out, after being judged.
Deadpool had filmed it himself, laughing the whole time, and posted it personally.
The comment section was lit up,
"Superheroes did nothing wrong. We expected too much of them. We're the ones at fault. Shouldn't we be reflecting, apologizing, and buying merch?"
"Hulk baby tries SO hard!"
"Thor is so handsome even when he cries!"
"Through wind and rain, Hulk-stans and Thor-stans will always be here, never leaving, burning bright forever!"
"Can someone please kill Deadpool before he films again."
All brain-dead fans.
"6."
Guan Fuyun laughed and quietly typed another 6.
......
Meanwhile.
WHOOSH!
Black combat suit. Hair flowing silky smooth. Eyes glowing. The hometown hero Azu descended on the hot-spot accident scene.
His streaking silhouette hit like a planet-cracker cannon.
He smashed straight through Stark Tower in an instant, and just that pigeon-toed landing was enough to make the specially reinforced floors and walls crumble to pieces like foam.
The Ghost Rider had been tearing through everything on his hellfire motorcycle. Now he lost his footing entirely.
The gale Azu kicked up on landing swept gravel, cake, and steel into a wall of debris that slammed into the Ghost Rider head-on, sending him staggering.
He went down, rolled sideways. The hellfire motorcycle spun across the ground and ground out a spray of gleaming sparks.
"!"
The Ghost Rider looked up.
Through the storm, Azu stepped out, sipping Wangzai milk, and looked down at everyone with total calm.
The hell!
On MY set, someone is out-coolly-posing me?!
The Ghost Rider was furious. He kipped up, raised one hand into a signature pose, pointed at Azu, and with flames blazing in his eye sockets, roared, "Judgment! You — are GUILTY —!"
Then nothing happened.
The skull burned with hellfire for a good long moment. Then Azu was right in front of him, fast as a teleport.
"That Penance Stare of yours just now."
"Let me relive every slaughter from my childhood with Pops all over again. That was good stuff."
"Do it again."
Azu said, looking thoroughly pleased.
The Penance Stare judges sin. But the pain it delivers comes from the target's own wrongdoing.
Which means.
If someone genuinely believes, down to their core, that they've done nothing wrong, then they have no sin to judge.
That's exactly why the elderly Thanos could keep a pet Hulk and Ghost Rider and treat himself to a daily dose of the Penance Stare like a morning routine.
Now Azu was enjoying it too.
......
Am I off parole? Can people search for this now? Hey hey hey, brothers, drop a comment and let me know.
➤ Next: Recruiting the Ghost Rider