WARNING: The following contains major spoilers for Guardians of the Galaxy #8 by Al Ewing, Marcio Takara, Federico Blee and VC's Cory Petit, on sale now.
The most recent issue of Guardians of the Galaxy finds the Guardians embroiled in the middle of a murder mystery to determine who killed both a prominent Kree soldier as well as Stote, the High Emperor of the Zn'rx. While the murderer is eventually revealed to be none other than the Profiteer, this is actually not the most shocking revelation that the issue had in store.
The Profiteer's motives for carrying out the murder are simple: she meant to spark an intergalactic war in order to be the chief supplier of weapons to said war. Now that everyone else in the room knows this, however, she's more than content to let them all die in an explosion. Zoralis Gupa, an alien diplomat of the Galactic Rim Collective, however, is able to save everyone from sure death with a grim revelation.
Gupa reveals that something has literally just turned his home planet, as well as whole swaths of others, into "lifeless husks." This tragedy, as he puts it, renders the Profiteer's entire motivation for wanting to start a war (and by extension wanting to let them all die) moot. If such a tragedy is true, then the entire intergalactic economy will go bankrupt soon enough. So, any war that would be fought wouldn't be fought with any of her weapons -- nobody would be able to afford them. The Profiteer begrudgingly accepts this reality and teleports away, saving the lives of everyone in the room.
Grateful that this worked, Super-Skrull congratulates Gupa for what he believes was a "fine bluff." However, Gupa reveals that he was, in fact, telling the truth.
Everyone is shocked to learn that this wasn't a ruse to get rid of the Profiteer. Nova immediately asks if the threat is that of Galactus, a name that any Marvel fan would know. However, Gupa confirms that it is not Galactus but rather a completely different kind of threat.
Galactus claims he never took any joy in the things he did. That tracks with the characterization that has traditionally been shown of Galactus. Galactus has always been a force of nature, who fed on planets because he needed to sustain himself. It was a primal need that drove Galactus in his actions, not a want or any sort of delight. That is where Galactus and this threat differ.
Gupa then reveals that the threat that has caused this destruction is none other the God of the Symbiotes, Knull.
In the words of Gupa, Knull poses something much "darker" than Galactus. Where Galactus took no joy, Knull delights in destroying these planets t0 feed his "nightmare appetites."
Indeed, in the relatively short time Knull has been around, this is something he's shown repeatedly. Though being hinted at years before, Knull wouldn't make his full debut until 2018's Venom #3 by Donny Cates, Ryan Stegman, JP Mayer and Frank Martin, Jr. Knull is, in fact, older than the universe itself, and floated in the abyss until being awoken by the Celestials creating the universe. Enraged by the disruption to his domain, Knull retaliated against the Celestials by creating a sword of living darkness, the All-Black, and decapitating one of them. The other Celestials cast him out, but Knull would continue to be a terror to gods in the early days of the universe.
Knull would eventually learn that he could create amorphous, parasitic life-forms, which would come to be known as the alien race of the Klyntar, the symbiotes. He used these symbiotes in his ravages across the universe, bonding them to lesser beings as he carried out his slaughters against those who encroached on his darkness.
Now, it looks like Knull is far from done with his slaughter, as he is set to be the starring villain of Marvel's upcoming "King in Black" event. One can only hope the Marvel Universe survives the onslaught that is sure to come.