Boasting over defeating Thor in battle, the Absorbing Man fails to realize that the Thunder God was merely stunned and not defeated. With his back turned "Crusher" Creel fails to see Thor reviving, and launching a counter attack. The Absorbing Man is caught off guard, giving Thor the upper hand. Watching this from Asgard, Loki believes that the Thunder God will be able to defeat his minion and decides that the Absorbing Man would be better used by his side and uses an attractor beam device to transport the Absorbing Man from Earth to Asgard in mid-battle, leaving Thor puzzled about the sudden disappearance of his foe.
However, Thor's attention is taken away when Jane Foster (Who has been watching from a nearby building) causes a fire in order to attract Thor's attention since she's become a prisoner of a strange hooded man. Coming to her rescue, Thor finds that Jane has passed out from smoke inhalation and changes back into Donald Blake in order to administer medical aid. This plays into the hooded man's hands, who photographs the transition. The masked man then reveals himself as the Affiliated Press reporter Harris Hobbs.

While on Asgard, the Absorbing Man materializes in front of Loki, who subdues the Absorbing Man into subservience with his superior mystical powers and convinces him to help him overthrow Asgard. When Loki brings Creel into the Imperial Palace, they are stopped by the guards, however the Absorbing Man is able to make short work of them casting them off easily.

Back on Earth, Donald Blake has brought Jane Foster to a hospital where she is expected to make a full recovery in time. He receives a message to meet with Hobbs, who organized a secret meeting of the two that afternoon. Before he goes, he assures Jane that he will not leave her again. Going to the roof, Blake decides to confront Hobbs as Thor, and changes into his Godly identity and travels to their meeting place. Naturally, Harrison attempts to blackmail Thor into giving him a full story about his origins, using the photographic evidence and the fact that Thor is pledged never to harm a mortal as a means to extort the information out of the Thunder God. Furious at the reporters audacity, Thor instead decides to use his vast powers to travel Hobbs from different time periods and other worlds to the point where Harris concedes and agrees to destroy all photographic evidence linking Thor to Donald Blake -- under one condition: That Thor brings Harris Hobbs to fabled Asgard, so that he can write a report about the mythical land. Impressed with Hobbs' ability to maintain his sanity through these travels, Thor agrees to bring him.

While back on Asgard, the Absorbing Man fights all the way into Odin's throne room. There the All-Father attempts to destroy the Absorbing Man with a blast from his sceptre, however all he succeeds in doing is causing the Absorbing Man to absorb the properties of the blast, and in turn turn the energies against Odin himself.

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