Web of the Multiverse - 188 (Patreon)

Chapter 188: I’m Not Like the Spider-Man You Know

It wasn’t until Carnage and Peter smashed through the door one after the other and disappeared down the hallway that Venom Captain America and the others finally snapped out of their daze.

Venom Captain America immediately snatched up the Vibranium shield beside him and rushed to the shattered doorway, only to realize that Peter was already too far ahead for him to catch up.

Frustrated, he drove a fist into the wall, sending bricks and chunks of masonry flying.

He quickly turned back to Venom Doctor Strange.

“Doctor, just what kind of monster did you summon this time? Why is this completely different from your previous summons?”

At that moment, Venom Doctor Strange’s face was deathly pale, as though he had suffered a devastating blow both physically and mentally.

His eyes had lost focus, leaving him with a vacant expression as he muttered under his breath, barely loud enough for even himself to hear.

“The timeline is completely messed up... We can’t continue the summoning... Otherwise, even more serious problems will arise...”

Venom Captain America could only make out a few scattered words, but even that was enough for him to realize that the severity of the situation was probably beyond anything he had imagined.

Still, now was not the time to dwell on it. He had something more urgent to do.

He spun toward Venom Rocket Raccoon and shouted.

“Rocket! Stay right here and don’t go anywhere. Keep an eye on the Doctor. I’m going to rally some reinforcements to help Spider-Man!”

Venom Rocket Raccoon understood how serious the situation was and immediately nodded, not daring to joke around like he normally would.

The next second, Venom Captain America charged out through the doorway, contacting the other Venom Superheroes as he raced after them.

...

The plains of Krakoa were scorching beneath the blazing midday sun.

Even the air above the ground appeared slightly warped by the heat.

Suddenly, a blood-red figure shot out of Blackstone City like lightning, racing across the sweltering plains at incredible speed.

A moment later, a red-and-blue figure burst out after him, staying hard on the blood-red figure’s heels as the two launched into a high-speed chase.

Both were moving so fast that their outlines were almost impossible to make out. Even by a conservative estimate, they were traveling at more than 200 kilometers per hour.

The blood-red figure in front was especially striking. Dark red light churned around his body as he ran, leaving afterimages of the Carnage Symbiote behind in the distorted air.

Carnage had pushed himself to the greatest limits of his life just to reach this astonishing speed.

His legs had swollen grotesquely, becoming almost as thick as an elephant’s, their surfaces covered in countless black, vein-like patterns.

The Carnage Symbiote had reduced the enhancement devoted to his upper limbs and redirected it entirely into strengthening his legs.

Even so, the red-and-blue figure pursuing him continued to accelerate at a pace that filled Carnage with despair.

Several young mutants who happened to be passing nearby were so frightened that they dropped into crouches and curled up on the ground.

The two figures tore past them one after the other. The gale in their wake sent the young mutants’ hair standing straight up, terrifying them so badly that they scrambled away in panic.

Before long, the red-and-blue figure had surpassed Carnage’s speed, and the distance between them rapidly began to shrink.

Then, in a single instant, the two figures collided on the plain.

BOOM!

A visible Shockwave erupted outward, blasting stones and dirt into the air under the force of the impact as though a high-explosive grenade had gone off.

Peter had aimed his punch at Carnage’s still-intact right arm.

However, the astonishing potential Carnage unleashed in the face of death still exceeded Peter’s expectations.

Carnage’s right hand swelled and stretched wildly in an instant, transforming into a vicious blood-red dragon that met Peter’s fist head-on.

Peter’s fist struck nothing but the Carnage Symbiote’s rubber-like, resilient cells.

Peter’s overwhelming destructive force was rapidly weakened as layer after layer of Symbiote cells deformed and stretched, preventing the blow from inflicting fatal damage on Carnage.

That alone was enough to show just how terrifying Carnage’s combat instincts truly were.

After suffering badly from Peter’s attack once, Carnage had instinctively developed the perfect way to counter it.

The same method of attack would no longer work on him.

Just like that classic anime line...

[The same technique doesn’t work twice on a Saint.]

Carnage instead borrowed the force of Peter’s punch to boost his speed even further, becoming a blood-red blur too fast for the naked eye to follow as he raced toward a massive circular structure on the horizon.

It was West Academy!

Peter’s brow immediately furrowed.

West Academy was full of innocent Mutant students.

If Carnage managed to get inside, it would turn into a horrific disaster with countless casualties.

But just as Peter was wondering how to deal with the problem, a familiar figure suddenly entered his field of vision.

At the far end of his sight, high above West Academy, Pixie Megan hovered in the air, fluttering her magnificent, elfin wings before giving Peter a reassuring gesture.

Peter immediately understood what Pixie Megan was trying to tell him.

He didn’t need to worry about the Mutant students inside West Academy.

It seemed the Mutant leadership had reacted quickly.

They had immediately taken the most appropriate course of action and ordered an emergency evacuation of every Mutant student in West Academy.

Now, rather than being a liability, West Academy had become a true colosseum where Peter could fight Carnage without having to hold anything back.

Three minutes earlier.

The moment Carnage and Peter charged out of Blackstone City one after the other, the commotion they caused immediately drew the Mutants’ attention.

Inside a conference room deep within Blackstone City, Sebastian and the White Queen stood before a holographic screen.

The screen displayed live footage transmitted by drones, showing the high-speed chase unfolding across the plains.

Sebastian had originally been preparing to handle the troublemaker on Krakoa personally.

But just as he stood up, the White Queen raised a hand and stopped him.

Sebastian sat back down, looking slightly puzzled.

“What is it, Emma?”

The White Queen continued staring at the screen, a thoughtful gleam in her eyes.

“Don’t rush. We rarely get a chance to see Spider-Man’s true strength this clearly. Aren’t you curious?”

“When they retreated from New York, Spider-Man chose to stay behind and cover their escape, yet he still managed to come back completely unharmed. That kind of power is far beyond what a Spider-Man should normally possess.”

That was enough to pique Sebastian’s curiosity.

“Then let’s watch. Judging by their route, they’ll reach West Academy soon. Have Megan organize an immediate evacuation and clear the grounds for Spider-Man.”

...

BOOM!

With a deafening crash, the gates of West Academy exploded apart.

Carnage’s body, radiating brutality and bloodlust, burst through the shower of debris and charged straight into West Academy.

Like a blood-red bolt of lightning, he tore through the circular corridor before reaching the enormous round plaza at the very center of the academy.

The entire time, Carnage’s head and eyes darted rapidly around, searching for anyone he could take hostage.

Unfortunately for him, the Mutant students had evacuated at an absurd speed. In just a few short minutes, West Academy had already become completely deserted.

In the end, Carnage had no choice but to give up.

He stood at the exact center of the circular plaza, narrowing his eyes at Spider-Man as he arrived close behind.

“What exactly do you people want? You dragged me into this universe for no reason, and now you want to kill me? That doesn’t sound like Spider-Man. Or are you... just some imposter pretending to be Spider-Man?”

That was the only reasonable explanation Carnage could think of.

No matter how hard he tried, he simply couldn’t understand why a Spider-Man possessed strength comparable to the Hulk.

Or perhaps... was the skin beneath this Spider-Man’s suit green as well?

Peter stopped about twenty meters away from Carnage.

While Carnage studied him, Peter was studying Carnage in return.

Peter remembered that Carnage had indeed appeared in the original comic storyline, although his role had been fairly brief.

In the comics, Carnage had barely crossed into this universe before being ambushed by the Poisons.

As a result, most of Carnage’s battles in the comics had been against the Poisons.

With his astonishing strength, Carnage had caused the Poisons no small amount of trouble.

But the current storyline had already changed completely.

There were no Poisons on Krakoa, which made Carnage an extremely dangerous presence here.

Someone this dangerous had to be brought completely under control.

Peter therefore had no intention of wasting time talking to him. He loosened up his arms and legs, lowered his body slightly, then crooked a finger at Carnage.

“Kasady, I’m not the Spider-Man you’re used to.”

“So I’m giving you two options. The first is to take off your Symbiote suit willingly, go into the prison here, and spend the rest of your life quietly behind bars.”

“The second is that I take the Symbiote suit off for you. But if we do it that way, I can’t guarantee you’ll make it through without ending up dead or crippled.”

“After all, with a scumbag like you, even New York City’s Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man would have trouble holding back.”

After hearing Spider-Man’s cold response, the dark agitation and violent frenzy in Carnage’s eyes became impossible to miss.

He was now completely certain that the Spider-Man in front of him was anything but conventional.

He had no doubt that this Spider-Man really would kill him.

If not for the unmistakably genuine Iron Spider suit, he might even have suspected that the man standing before him was the Punisher.

There was absolutely no room for negotiation between them.

There could only be one ending. Either Spider-Man died, or Carnage did.

So Carnage chose to strike first.

He suddenly swung his right arm toward Spider-Man, reaching straight for him.

His entire arm expanded wildly in midair and transformed once again into a dark-red Symbiote dragon that lunged forward.

This time, the Symbiote dragon looked even more lifelike, complete with eyes and a mouth.

Its enormous maw was packed with rows of dark-red teeth, making it resemble a real living creature.

Faced with such a ferocious attack, Peter simply bent backward at the waist.

The dark-red Symbiote dragon swept past just a few centimeters above his head.

Then Peter’s hands, planted against the ground, pushed off violently.

His body vanished from where he had been, and the force instantly propelled him directly in front of Carnage.

Both feet slammed squarely into Carnage’s chest, sending him flying like a cannonball. With a deafening crash, Carnage smashed through several concrete platforms built around the circular plaza.

But the very next moment, Carnage burst from the rubble, his face twisted in pain.

He no longer dared to clash with Peter head-on. Instead, he began racing frantically around him in circles.

As he moved faster and faster, his blood-red figure formed a blurred ring around Peter.

Yet Peter, standing at the center of that ring, suddenly closed his eyes.

By cutting off his vision, he pushed his Spider-Sense to its limit.

Without warning, Peter tilted his head slightly aside, narrowly avoiding a dark-red spike by mere millimeters.

The next moment, countless dark-red spikes poured toward him like torrential rain.

Yet Peter moved through them as though there were no obstacles at all, weaving between the spikes at impossible angles and speeds.

Then he threw a single punch and sent Carnage, who failed to dodge in time, crashing to the ground.

Lying there, Carnage felt as though every bone in his body were about to shatter.

But the intense, crazed obsession inside him became perfect fuel for the Carnage Symbiote, allowing him to force himself back to his feet and attack Peter again and again.

Unfortunately, the result was always the same.

Time after time, Peter’s fists sent him crashing back to the ground.

That overwhelming strength, that incredible Spider-Sense, combined with flawless combat skill, finally crushed the last trace of Carnage’s frenzied obsession.

He had lost.

He had been utterly defeated by Spider-Man.

After being knocked down more times than he could count, Carnage finally no longer had the strength to rise.

“Kill me. I’d rather die than go back to prison.”

In a weak voice, Carnage made his final request of Spider-Man.

Unfortunately for him, Spider-Man refused.

“The loser doesn’t get to make demands. First, I’m taking back something that never belonged to you.”

Peter reached out with both hands and, under Carnage’s terrified, resisting gaze, grabbed him by the top of the head.

As Peter gradually increased his grip, Carnage let out an agonized, piercing scream.

A clearly visible crack appeared across Carnage’s Symbiote suit.

The next second, that crack rapidly spread across his entire body.

RIP!

The infamous Carnage Symbiote suit was forcibly torn straight off his body by Peter.

It contracted into a blood-red sphere, writhing continuously in the palm of Peter’s hand.