MD-Chapter 379 The Weird Turn of Events!

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Tony looked genuinely puzzled by the question but answered without hesitation. "Banner once tried giving Hulk a crash course in manners, complete with picture books for kids. Hulk wasn't exactly thrilled at first, but... he seems to have come around. Why do you ask?"

Arthur wasn't sure what expression to wear as he watched Hulk thunder across the battlefield, his seismic footfalls shaking the Kree warship, barreling straight toward a squad of Kree soldiers.

The soldiers unleashed everything they had, but Hulk's reinforced suit shrugged it all off like water on metal.

His current outfit had been engineered to withstand not just ballistic trauma but Hulk's own massive transformations. No more shredded pants, every component resized dynamically, held together by a tech-weave mesh linked to his biometrics. Knowing Banner, it was built to last a decade, at least. Efficient. Sustainable. Brutally over-engineered.

Then Hulk's fist, roughly the size of a serving tray, or maybe even a satellite dish, connected with a Kree soldier's face. The impact was so savage that Arthur actually looked away.

"That's... excessive," Arthur muttered, wincing.

He summoned Abomination, and suddenly the two giants stood side-by-side, four massive fists like twin battering rams. The Kree didn't even have time to be scared.

They were already dead.

Hulk casually flicked blood from his knuckles and glanced at Abomination. His eyes rolled twice before he grunted, "You again. You annoy me."

Abomination blinked slowly, not reacting at all. Nobody seemed to find that weird. Except Arthur, who nearly choked.

'What the hell kind of team dynamic was this?'

Hulk jogged over to Arthur, about to say hi, until he spotted Gamora.

The two green-skinned titans locked eyes. Gamora's expression twisted into something between confusion and disbelief.

She'd met Banner before. A calm, soft-spoken scientist. Reasonable. Mild. A man who apologized when he bumped into people.

Now here was this... transformed into a towering brute.

Was he mutated? Or... could he be some offshoot of her own species?

Hulk stared for a long moment, then grinned. "Pretty."

Star-Lord's face turned the exact shade of envy. "Hey, big guy. I'm gonna need you to cool it with the compliments."

Hulk ignored him completely and scooped Arthur up with one hand, lifting him like a favorite action figure to perch on his shoulder.

Unfortunately, he forgot about the warship's corridor height. Arthur had to duck fast or his head would've punctured the ceiling and introduced itself to the deck above.

Sighing, Arthur lightly tapped Hulk on the head. "You've been staying out of trouble?"

He'd never been great with kids. Especially ones taller than SUVs.

"Yes!" Hulk replied eagerly. "Been learning new fighting moves!"

That's mildly terrifying.

Even Steve Rogers visibly shuddered. Hulk learning martial arts? That felt like giving a wrecking ball a black belt.

"My little fists are strong!"

Everyone watched Hulk attempt a cutesy pose. It was... sort of adorable. But also terrifying. Somewhere between a teddy bear and a tactical nuke.

For a moment, they all forgot they were on a Kree warship in the middle of a mission.

Arthur slapped himself back to focus. "Alright. Time to get serious. We've got a job to do."

"Okay." Hulk nodded, and noticing how Arthur had nearly broken his neck earlier, he helpfully started punching the ceiling to give them some breathing room.

Star-Lord's jaw hit the floor. So did most of the others'.

"I feel like... the team dynamic's taken a weird turn," He mumbled.

Gamora stared at the unfolding chaos, completely deadpan. "Why does everything get so absurd the moment we board Ronan's ship?"

Arthur cleared his throat, snapping the group back into action. "Let's go. There's a junction up ahead with three corridors. Kree squads are lying in wait at each one. They already know we're here."

There was no way they wouldn't know.

They'd announced their arrival with the subtlety of a fireworks finale, blasters, hammer strikes, and Hulk's 'little fists' punching through bulkheads like party poppers.

Ronan had already spotted them through the warship's internal surveillance system, tech cobbled together from Kree military networks and salvaged enhancements, some even reverse-engineered from a captured Stark drone.

His attention zeroed in on Arthur's face.

The mask was different, but there was something uncannily familiar about him.

Still, Ronan was preoccupied with far larger concerns. Whatever odd aura this group carried didn't warrant more than a glance. His focus was fixed on grander goals, like wiping Xandar off the star map. He couldn't afford to waste time on a few stowaways scurrying around his ship.

That said, there was something… off. Just enough for him to instruct one of his lieutenants to investigate how these so-called infiltrators had boarded undetected.

Naturally, the search turned up nothing conclusive.

He turned back to oversee the assault. But when he glanced again at the monitor, Arthur and his team were charging directly toward him.

"It's happening again," he muttered, his voice low.

Ronan's brow furrowed, unease curling at the edges of his otherwise rigid control.

A thought took shape. His eyes narrowed.

"Instructor…?"

------

Meanwhile, Arthur's team was plowing ahead with overwhelming force. Ronan's elite guards were crumbling like cardboard before a storm.

They weren't just powerful, they were unpredictable. A chaotic ensemble of misfits and monsters, each one more unconventional than the last.

The fighting style wasn't coordinated, yet their synergy was devastating. Members rotated naturally through combat, each taking a turn to unleash mayhem.

Hulk, for his part, was eager to show off what he called his "training progress", specifically, the new fighting techniques he'd been working on.

But he rarely got more than a move or two in before the enemies were already flattened.

After a while, Hulk noticed Arthur wasn't reacting much to his demonstration. So, he gave up on showing off and decided to just talk.

He started chatting mid-battle, talking about the lessons Banner had set up for him.

"I can do multiplication tables now," He announced proudly. "Banner said I'm almost ready for kindergarten. But I told him I don't wanna go. There are tiny people there. Too squishy. What if I step on them by accident?"

He rambled on, casually smashing through Kree barricades between sentences. Arthur listened patiently, nodding as though speaking with a very large, very dangerous kindergartener.

The sight was surreal. Their conversation was oddly wholesome… disturbingly so, given the bloodied battlefield they were standing on.

"This is officially the weirdest mission I've ever been on," Star-Lord muttered, genuinely baffled.

Everyone silently agreed.

Even Drax's unexpected bursts of laughter only deepened the oddity of the moment. The contrast between destruction and casual conversation was… disorienting.

The Kree soldiers were stunned. Not just by the strength of the assault, but by the tone of it. It was as if they were being attacked by a family having a picnic… while leveling a city block.

One soldier, bald, compact, and hiding in the shadows, had been waiting for the perfect opportunity to ambush them as they advanced.

But instead, she heard them talking.

She paused, her expression tightening in confusion. Were they dragging a child into combat? The voice sounded like a child's… but rougher. Like someone had jammed a toddler's dialogue through a gravel filter.

Curious, she risked a peek.

Then she blinked. Hard.

Nope. That wasn't a child.

She leaned back behind the wall, rubbing her temples.

Did I hallucinate that?

(End of Chapter)