Adam Warlock (Earth-12041)

Warlock's past has been surrounded in legend throughout the universe. According to Gamora, he was the one being Thanos feared in all universe. According to Groot, Warlock was once the savior of his entire race. Although according to Drax, he was a being who only brought destruction.^[1]

Warlock had a group of followers who wore the black Nova Centurion helmets with the task of protecting him and/or destroy him should he ever turn evil. Whenever Warlock goes through a metamorphosis stage within a cocoon, he would be protected by the Nova Centurions for he could not fend for himself, that is until Thanos had attacked the Centurions ship and wiped out every Nova on board in attempt to capture Warlock (while still as a cocoon) and left him inside a sarcophagus with other powerful items at his Sanctuary for the time being.

^[2]

Powers[]

Much of Adams's powers derived from his unique biology in which grants him vast capabilities and powers. These powers are also subject to various changes with each rebirth and development from his regenerative cocoon on a subconscious level and can develop powers depending on the situation at hand.^[49] According to Thanos, Adam is also a unique being like himself and is described to be apart of the "cosmic norm".^[50] During his time as the Magus, the Xandarian Worldmind stated that Adam's power was beyond Dark Quasar and labelled him being powerful to a degree that made it impossible for it to measure against Richard Rider, who was a Nova-Prime.^[5]

Avatar of Life: Originally destined to become the Avatar of Life by the In-Betweener, Adam was designated as the Avatar of life by the aforementioned entities in order to oppose the then-Avatar of Death, Thanos, and keep a cosmic balance between life and death.^[26] After re-inserting the inactive timeline involving the Magus, Adam was officially recognized as Earth-616's Avatar of Life again.^[3]

Summoning: The first iteration of Magus was capable of once summoning the In-Betweener by saturating his past counterpart in a harmless special radiation that acted as a beacon. It's unknown if this capability can only be done via the Soul Gem or that being an Avatar of Life allowed it to be possible.^[51]

Superhuman Physiology: Adam Warlock possesses a number of super-human properties and powers derived from his artificially determined genetic structure. This is owed due to possessing a perfect, genetic template. This perfection was noted by Ultron and the High Evolutionary, who even cited his being was something he could not quite replicate easily.^[52]

Energy Consumption: His new body, according to Thanos, has made him a more direct consumer of energy much like that of Galactus' heralds and even Thanos himself. This, in turn, allows him to even sustain himself without food or water like the Mad Titan. This can be done via contact with a energy conductor or the energy itself.^[47] Prior, he was able to absorb magical energies and life energy as well as other kinds.
Superhuman Strength: Warlock possesses super-human strength, though its exact level is unknown. Previously listed at class 4, he could once enhance his strength, enabling him to reach class 40 for less than one hour. However, Adam Warlock has been able to fight hand-to-hand, and injure, beings such as Wonder Man, Thor, and Ulik.
Superhuman Speed: Warlock is capable of running and moving at speeds much greater than even the finest human athlete. He was able to dodge an attack Galactus made at point-blank range and reappeared above him. It is not known whether he did this by teleportation. He has also been able to move at speeds Drax was unable to see.
Superhuman Stamina: Warlock's musculature generates less fatigue toxins, during physical activity, than the musculature of a human being. While not employing his energy to enhance his natural physical strength, Warlock can physically exert himself at peak capacity for several hours before fatigue begins to impair him.
Superhuman Durability: Warlock's bodily tissues are much harder and more resistant to injury than those of a human. He is capable of withstanding tremendous impact forces, falls from great heights, exposure to temperature and pressure extremes, the vacuum of space, and powerful energy blasts without sustaining injury. His body is also specially adapted to withstand the physiologically debilitating effects of moving and running at high rates of speed without sustaining injury. Adam has survived punishment from Thor, a Thanos clone, Drax, and the Man-Beast, despite them all outclassing him physically.
Superhuman Agility: Warlock's agility, balance, and bodily coordination are enhanced to levels that are beyond the natural physical limits of even the finest human athlete.
Superhuman Reflexes: Warlock's reaction time is similarly enhanced, enabling him to react at a level that is beyond the natural physical limits of the finest human athlete.
Evolutionary Cocoon: Adam Warlock is able to spin a cocoon-like enclosure around himself at will in a matter of seconds. He has done so infrequently during his life-span, usually to protect himself from mortal harm, and usually, though not always, he will emerge from the cocoon at a further level of physical or mental maturity. It is not known what the substance of the cocoon is, where it comes from, or where it goes after he has emerged from it.
Flight: Adam Warlock can also employ cosmic energy to negate the force of gravity beneath him, enabling him to fly. In an Earth-like atmosphere, Warlock is easily capable of reaching the speed of sound, roughly 770 miles per hour. While in outer space, however, Warlock has been shown to have been capable of attaining supraluminal (faster-than-light) velocities.
Immortality: While Adam can be killed, he never truly dies. This is due to the fact his soul is so strong, even Death herself cannot claim his soul. As such, he can be reborn.^[23]
Cellular Regeneration: Adam's regenerative and restorative abilities are extremely advanced.

Ultra Senses: After taking the memories of the Magus from his soul and some of his own abilities as a result, he gained superior senses in which allowed him to locate space anolomies such as black holes Adam was later gifted with enhanced perceptions from his rebirths, allowing him to see the auras, the souls and states of others as well as examine others genetic structure.^[53]

Cosmic Awareness & Mystic Senses: His multi-compartmental brain bestow Adam cosmic senses. Adam has the ability to detect or produce wormholes and other irregularities in space on a cosmic scale.^[8] After one of his recent rebirths, He also has the ability to sense whenever someone is teleporting.^[52] Adam possess profound mystical senses in addition to his cosmic awareness capabilities that is capable of sensing mishaps on a spiritual level such as irregularities.
- Time Freeze Resistance: Adam is capable of resisting the Time Gem's time freeze capabilities when utilized on him by Rune.^[54]
- Reality Warp Resistance: Due to his firm grasp on reality, Adam is highly resistant to "reality warping." He was unfazed by Maya's "Dance of Unreality."^[55]

Matter Manipulation: According to Adam himself, he can convert energy into matter and has absolute control over the process in addition.^[47]

Telepathy: While formerly possessing powerful telepathic capabilities as Him, he has since lost most of the high level of telepathic power, retaining a fraction of telepathic power he once possessed. However, the exact level of capability in his Telepathy is unknown.^[56]

Telepathic Defenses: His defenses have been described by renown and extremely powerful Moondragonto be intense and even was able to throw out Moondragon from his mind^[57] as well as dispel Mantis's intrusions.

Empathy: Because of his connections to the usage of souls overtime, Adam has later gained emapthic capabilities from sensing souls. Such capabilities allowed him to feel the billions of souls killed in the Annihilation Wave.^[58]

Energy Manipulation: Adam is a capable energy manipulator, with such power having been augmented by the Soul Gem for the majority of his life, although was somewhat capable of doing so independently until his recent resurrections. His latest resurrection has allowed him greater capability with his manipulation, now capable of "short-circuiting" even other energy manipulators such as both Silver Surfer and Quasar.^[8][59][47]

Energy Constructs: Adam has been seen employing various kinds of energy into constructs. Whether the use of it comes from his metaphysical quantum energy or other kinds of energy, he has been shown capable of creating swords, pieces of armor, and shields.^[60]
Magic: True to his naming of Warlock and among his energy manipulation capabilities includes manipulating mystical energy for a variety of purposes.^[61] He relayed much of his mystical powers, however, from the Soul Gem instead of his own independent energies during his extended time with the Infinity Gem. However, he still displayed some independent powers without it's reliance. Much of his mystic powers includes exorcism,^[62] body transmutation,^[63] and astral projection.^[64]

- Time Travel: Adam can use his mystical powers to travel into the future in his astral form.^[65]
- Soul Anchoring: As a master of his own soul, he can render himself immune to individuals who are capable of draining other's soul.^[66]
- Spell Casting: Adam can cast spells for a variety of effects. He was able to use a spell to expunge both Drax and Silver Surfer from the Soul World with an incantation.^[67]
- Mystic Portals: Adam has displayed capability in creating mystic portals.^[64]
Quantum Magic: To counter the future dilemma of the Fault expansion into the Cancerverse, Adam's subconscious allowed his resurrected form to gain the power to heal repairing space and reality itself.^[8][49]Dubbed "Quantum Magic" and also referred to as "Metaphysical Quantum Energy Manipulation", this allows him to perform magical feats in which are performed from available power around him and "conjured psi-llables".^[68]

- Spell Casting: He is also capable of performing large scale and complex spells capable of manipulating the timeline and insert a previously "unused" future in place of the current timeline. Such a feat, however, can only be performed If properly energized by a tremendous amount of energy and cannot hear others during it's preparation and casting.^[3] He can even cast spells for healing,^[69]magical energy blasts,^[8] telekinesis,^[70] magical lightning,^[5] teleportation,^[71] transmutation,^[71]materialization,^[58] and force field generation.^[72]

- - Timeline Manipulation: Adam can use his Quantum Magic to create an enchantment capable of manipulating timelines in order to overlap an "unused" future. Such a capability, however, requires Adam to be sufficiently energized.
  - Reality Transmutation: During his time as Magus, Adam was capable of transmuting even reality itself to create an illusion to fake his death at the hands of a Cosmic Cube.
  - Spiritual Powers: His current powers derived from his newfound "Quantum Magic", allows him to seemingly continue his usage of his spiritual powers the by manipulating the energy from souls to imbue them to items or to use offensively as beams.^[59]
Cosmic Energy Manipulation: Among his body's special adaptations are an enclave of cells able to tap and transform cosmic energy for personal use such as projecting blasts of cosmic energy, locate and enter natural space warps, and augment his own physical capabilities.^[47] He can use his cosmic powers for healing purposes.^[73]
Thermal Energy Manipulation: Warlock shown the ability to generate intense thermal energy.^[18]

Existence Camouflage: According to Lord Chaos and Master Order, Adam is outside the loop of destinies and as such is capable of deeds in which cannot easily be seen or tracked by even those with cosmic senses (such as Quasar) wielding the Infinity Gauntlet and exclusively using their cosmic senses granted from the gauntlet. This also extends into supernatural powers, with those unable to gather intelligence on Adam Warlock through magical means.^[74][75]

Abilities[]

Genius-Level Intelligence: Adam possess a profound amount of knowledge from his first-hand experiences dealing with cosmic dilemmas and is considered intelligent in which own right to the point he is considered a genius by Thanos.

Mystical Knowledge & Occult Expert: Adam possesses an extraordinary amount of information regarding the mystical and cosmic items among within the universe such as the Soul Gems and the Quantum Bands, the understanding of the universe and it greater powers, and information on the supernatural in which seemed superior to that of Magique and the capability of the Shi'ar Empire.^[6]
Navigation Skills: Thanks to the knowledge he possessed from absorbing Autolycus's soul with the Soul Gem, who was a skilled pilot, Adam gained his navigational skills enough to enable him to find a black hole.^[76]
Hacking: Adam was capable of hacking into the Avenger's enemy files records in his leisure time to learn more about the various enemies fought by the Avengers.^[77]
Master Tactician and Strategist: Adam is an accomplished strategist and tactician. His capability has been noted and even garnered respect from the likes of Thanos, who once remarked him to being a "Tactical Genius". He was capable of even devising a plan to separate Thanos from the Infinity Gauntlet successfully.^[78]
Master Manipulator: Perhaps what makes him most formidable is his capability of manipulating others. His level of manipulation has caused him immense dislike from the Silver Surfer because of his renown capability of manipulation. According to both him and Mephisto, this is attribute due to the fact that while he had split himself of his good and evil self, he was a being who didn't considered good or evil relevant to decisions made for the best of the universe.^[79][80]
Xeno-Multilingualism: Adam is familiar with alien language, though how much is unknown. He was capable of writing and understanding the names of each of the Kree killed during the Annihilation Wave.^[58]He was capable of also learning the language of High Izzau from being around them after being pulled into the Ultraverse.^[41]

Martial Arts: Warlock has gained a great deal of first-hand experience at hand-to-hand combat over the course of his life, and eventually became quite formidable. It's possible some of this is owed due to Adam absorbing the skills of Autolycus, a Black Knight who received combat training from the Universal Church of Truth and Gamora, an assassin trained by Thanos. Some of these skills include capability of using nerve strikes.^[81][30]

He has been able to best beings who exceed him in strength such as Triax,^[82] Nobilus, and Wonder Man,^[83] and he has been successful in holding his own with Olik, even though, physically, he is no match for the likes of Thor,^[84] Thanos, or Hercules.^[85]

Having used the Karmic Staff, Adam was capable of battle other beings with it as a weapon. While the Magus, he also shown capability in using a sword (and later Captain America's Shield) against Martyr, Gamora, and Major Victory.^[86]

Accomplishments In Philosophy: Warlock also is an accomplished self-taught philosopher.

Strength level[]

Class 10 (Un-augmented): Little is seen of Adam truly un-augmented though his strength is still considered superhuman to the point he was able to fend off Vulcan and cause him pain, a capability in which left the former angered.

Class 50+ (Augmented): While much of Adam's strength is unspecified, he is considered an extremely strong being within his own right. Whether augmented by cosmic energy, the Soul Gem, or his Quantum Magic, he's been capable of fighting powerful Class 100+ opponents as Thor, a Thanosi who's strength exceeded Thanos himself, Drax the Destroyer (previous incarnations), Nobilus and Ultron.

Weaknesses[]

Inner Darkness: After the re-inserting of the old timeline in which Adam turned into the Magus to prevent the Fault from expanding with his Quantum Magic, this has caused him to gain a evil personality in which his future evil self can manifest should he be weakened enough. Although his Magus transformation enables far more greater power, it's assumed Adam suppresses his evil personality.^[3] If killed while in his normal state, this will enable the possibility of the Magus taking his place.

It is unknown, however, if this condition still exist after Warlock was ressurected since both Magus and Warlock now co-exist.

Magical Weaponry Vulnerability: Magical weaponry has been known to bypass his base, un-augmented defenses. Some examples include the Godslayer sword made to kill his future self as well as Phyla-Vell's sword.^[86]

Construct Limitations: For unknown reasons, there's a level of limitation in which Adam can create a construct. The exact limits are unknown, though he is unable to create shields from thin air or full armor according to Thanos.^[50]

Paraphernalia[]

Equipment[]

Psychic Link: Like all of the former Infinity Watch members, Adam possesses a private Psychic Link with each members capable of enabling private conversation as well as sensing their general location. This capability remains even after it's disbandment.

Flight Tech: Adam was capable of using some sort of technology to assist him in flight.^[47]

Weapons[]

Karmic Staff: Warlock has also employed a "Karmic Staff" in the past. This staff was said to be an extension of Warlock's own life-essence, and its properties made it seemingly unbreakable. Warlock could also focus mystic energies through his staff with greater accuracy than he could by other means.