While searching for Kulan Gath, one of Marvel’s Savage Avengers tangled with a dark god and picks up a veteran supernatural hero ally.
WARNING: The following contains major spoilers for Savage Avengers #22 from Marvel Comics, on sale now.
While every member of the Savage Avengers wants to see the ancient, evil sorcerer Kulan Gath crushed under their collective heel, things are a bit more personal for Conan the Barbarian. The hero of the Hyborian Age has been at odds with Kulan Gath for ages, and he’s ready to deal with the resurgent threat of the villain. But when Conan is trapped in a literal nightmare, he finds a new ally through Johnny Blaze’s Ghost Rider, the Spirit of Vengeance.
The breakout of a strange, sleep-based, mass possession called both heroes to action, and the stain of Kulan Gath on Conan’s symbiote ensured that he would be a target for the Spirit of Vengeance. While the heroes are really on the same side, they had an explosive confrontation that ended with the Ghost Rider targeted from his own powers and the Cimmerian transported back to his world.
In his own era, Conan is faced with the Hyborian Age’s Ghost Rider atop a massive spider with a flaming skull. The beast’s bite sends Conan into a deep sleep, and when he finds himself caught in the spider’s web alongside the similarly trapped Johnny Blaze when he wakes up in Gerry Duggan, Patrick Zircher, Java Tartagilia and Travis Lanham’s Savage Avengers #22.
When a pack of werewolves arrives to tear the heroes into shreds, they are instead ripped away from that grim fate to another, discovering horses beneath their seats and nooses around their necks. They soon realize that they are in the dark Marvel god Nightmare, who brought the two heroes together specifically to get a hold of Conan.
This impossibly powerful villain makes a point of proving to the Cimmerian that there are indeed fates that even a warrior like him fears, though he hasn’t come to simply intimidate anyone. As it turns out, all three have a shared enemy in Kulan Gath, since the mad sorcerer has been consuming Nightmare’s power. To that end, Nightmare lets Conan know that he is Kulan Gath’s own personal nightmare, since he is the one man to have ever slain the supposedly immortal fiend.
With that and the suggestion to check up on Doctor Strange, Nightmare is off, and Conan and Johnny Blaze are returned to the real world, where they finally make a formal introduction to each other. When Conan offers to relay the events of the evening to Doctor Strange, Johnny speeds off into the night, but not before making a point of offering his help to Conan whenever Kulan Gath or Nightmare rear their heads again.
The fact that Kulan Gath has apparently usurped Nightmare’s realm is all the more reason to have Ghost Rider on his side, yet it is just another avenue of attack that Conan will have to be constantly vigilant about going forward. Nightmare’s remarks about Conan being Kulan Gath’s greatest fear are certainly a good sign, but his seeking out of the Cimmerian itself should ultimately serve as a warning to how powerful the mad sorcerer has become. With any luck, Johnny Blaze will be right alongside the Savage Avengers whenever they do catch up to Kulan Gath.
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