Concerned that they have not heard from Black Knight, the Avengers go to his English castle, only to discover that Dr. Strange erected a mystic barrier around it. A tribe of brutish Troglodytes subdues the heroes and takes them to the Troglodytes’ subterranean cave. Blaming the Avengers for the barrier that prevents them from raiding the castle for food, the Troglodytes cast the heroes into a pit to be killed by an insectoid cave creature. The Avengers defeat the creature, and Black Panther, whose enhanced night-vision helps him fight in the subterranean darkness, forces the Troglodytes to surrender. Learning from the sub-humans that other costumed beings took Black Knight away, the Avengers ponder the identities of their teammate’s abductors. Meanwhile Dormammu forges an alliance with Loki, who was blinded in battle with Thor. Dormammu plans to trick the Defenders into gathering the six pieces of the Evil Eye, a device he can use to merge his Dark Dimension with Earth.
Thor and Iron Man fight Magneto (Av #110, ’73). The Black Panther attempts to contact the Black Knight (1, see NOTE). Dr. Strange mystically seals Garrett Castle (2). The Troglodytes are unable to raid Garrett Castle for food (3). After being hunted by English soldiers hundreds of years ago, the Troglodytes’ ancestors go into hiding in subterranean caves, and centuries of inbreeding make their descendants dim-witted and hideous (4). Loki is transported to Dormammu’s dimension (5).
The flashback with the Black Panther is incorrectly depicted as occurring during rather than after Av #110, ’73. Loki was blinded in Thor #207, ’73. This issue reveals that the Evil Eye was not entirely destroyed in FF #54, ’66, but shattered into six component parts. The last three pages are the prologue to the Avengers-Defenders War, a 12-chapter crossover epic chronicled in Av #116-118 and Def #8-11, all ’73.
