I still think the incursions were caused by (spoilers for Fantastic Four #605.1)I could be wildly wrong, but after rereading Hickman's Fantastic Four, it made me think. In addition,Nazi Reed losing control of the Infinity Gauntlet.the place he forms the council of Reeds also looked similar to a Black Swan library. I wonder if that's related...
Yeah I love that theory. Reposting for those who missed it:
DrTraveler from CBR said:I think that we have our answer now. Fantastic Four 605.1 has us witness the destruction of an Earth, and a whole Universe, when a Reed/Doom hybrid loses control of an Infinity Gauntlet while under assault by that world's Avengers. That would probably be the destroyed Earth.
On it's own, that wouldn't have caused the incursions, but it almost certainly would have shocked the hell out of the Ivory Kings. We've seen Earth at the center of events that could have resulted in the death of everything before (Marvel 1602, Age of Apocalypse, possibly Age of Ultron). The 616 Earth even beat the Beyonder (one of their child units). It is likely that the Ivory Kings decided to heck with this. They decided to tear down the multiverse and build something better using the Map Makers to ensure they get everything.
Doom in Fantastic Four 611 finds a gauntlet and creates a Universe in his image in the place of the destroyed universe. As the Multiverse had already contracted, the forced in Universe could have caused the first Incursions by pushing together Earths "close" to each other. Thus starts the Incursions thanks to Doom.
Meanwhile, during Time Runs Out, Owen Reese the Molecule Man hints to Doom that he has a bigger role in what is happening than even he realizes and takes Doom back "to the beginning." There Doom learns two important things: His role in what happened and the fact the Ivory Kings have started to work towards destroying it all.
Doom realizes that even with Owen to back him up, he can not take on the Ivory Kings alone. He barely survived alone against 4 mad Celestials and so Doom sees an opportunity with the Incursions. Using the Swans (who he recruits using the Library of Worlds built by the Ivory Kings), Doom starts the great Game. The Swans will find each Universes Manifold, use the Manifold to CONTINUE to ensure Incursions happen, and build up an army of heroes and villains as the Incursions play out. Each destroyed Earth will leave behind a small trace on the victor allowing them to pick up rements of each Universe as they travel through the Incursions. Doom can then build Battleword, and his army, using those remnants.
This is where Val and Franklin come in. Franklin will do the actual building of Battleworld using the Rogue Planet he helps ensure goes back in time. Val is doing a lot of the planning behind the scenes to make this plan come to fruition. Once Doom, Val, Franklin, and Owen build the Battleworld, they can use the army of heroes and villains to take on the Ivory Kings.