"Empyre" is a comic book story arc published in July 2020 by Marvel Comics. This storyline follows the events of Incoming! with the genre of superhero crossover.
Premise
The Avengers, the Fantastic Four and various other heroes of the Marvel universe come together to fight and prevent the incoming invasion of the Kree/Skrull armada being led by Hulkling, who has been crowned as "Dorrek VIII".
Editorial history
The first comic of the story arc, Road to Empyre: The Kree–Skrull War, was announced in December 2019. It was to be published in March 2020 and included references to older Marvel stories, Kree–Skrull War and The Celestial Madonna from the 1970s, and the 2019 comic Meet the Skrulls. It had previously been set up in the Incoming! comic as well.
Plot
Lead-up
Teddy Altman is made a mysterious offer at the cost of leaving Billy Kaplan. He accepts the offer which was to become the new ruler of the Kree–Skrull Alliance, adopting the mantle of "Dorrek VIII," and beginning the preparations of invading the Earth for "the final war".
Stamford, Connecticut's Warners are Skrulls in disguise. General G'iah sends Skrull High Command an encrypted message about Project Blossom. Colonel Klrr's wife goes by the name of "Carl Warner," and together they have three daughters named Alice, Ivy, and Madison. Unfortunately, Moloth, who was once a trusted member, betrayed the family and took the lives of both Klrr and Ivy. However, before his passing, Carl was able to discover that Ivy was still breathing, and her blood was later used to identify and eliminate Skrulls. As a result, Moloth was brought to justice and met his demise.
After rescuing Ivy, they returned to their goal and began going after their enemies. G'iah and her daughters locate a Kree–Skrull War sample in a lab. G'iah tells his girls how the Skrulls were peaceful during Emperor Dorrek I's rule. When he came on Hala, the Kree were brutes and the Cotati dwelt there. Whoever created the most with their gifts became Hala's ruler. The Cotati created a garden on Earth's moon while the Kree built a Skrull monument. Morag killed the Cotati and Skrulls with Dorrek I, turning the Kree into the greatest fighting force ever.
The Kree–Skrull War raged all the way to Earth. After the story, G'iah reveals that the sample the Kree have is a piece of the Cotati as they planned to make sure the Cotati become extinct. At a motel, G'iah and Madison work on decrypting the recent sub-space transmission. Ivy and Alice talked about how the Kree couldn't obtain peace as well as a prophecy of a Celestial Messiah.
A group of Kree called the Priests of Prama found the Cotati that did not get wiped out by Morag and planted them on different planets including Earth. The Cotati on Earth lived undiscovered until the day they encountered Mantis. She and Swordsman bonded with a Cotati which led to the birth of Sequoia (also called "Quoi"). Thanos sent his warriors to look for them causing the Avengers to intervene. Sequoia was last mentioned to have been in an area of outer space called the Rot undoing the damages caused by Thanos.
As Madison finds something, their motel is blown up by an unnamed Kree operative. Thanks to her shapeshifting being perfected, Ivy turned into an indestructible creature and preserved her family inside her until she got to safety. While driving, G'iah resumes listening to Madison's discovery that there is a transmission to the Kree by Hulkling. They learn that Hulkling is the result of a union between the Kree Mar-Vell and the Skrull Princess Anelle who fell in love after Super-Skrull captured him and delivered him to Emperor Dorrek VII. Anelle had a handmaiden spirit him to Earth where she continued to raise Hulkling who would later help form the Young Avengers and fall in love with Wiccan.