Godhood Unlocked: I Choose Sci-Magic Dual Cultivation

Dane ignored the blast of air rushing at him. Without a second thought, he raised his leg high and viciously kicked Superman in the abdomen.

The tremendous force made Clark's back arch as he shot straight into the sky.

The ground sank again. Dane's foot had buried itself in the earth, and he yanked it free.

Looking up at Clark in the sky, Dane saw that he still seemed dazed.

How could Dane miss such a good opportunity? He immediately flew up and drove a Rising Dragon Fist into Clark's chin, giving him another boost in altitude.

Clark's raised head suddenly snapped downward. His eyes glowed red, and beams of Heat Vision shot from his pupils once more.

Dane did not take them head-on this time. He turned sideways and let the beams pass.

Then he pointed with his left hand, and a bolt of lightning instantly struck Clark.

Unlike before, when he had shrugged off Dane's punches, Clark went rigid the moment he was hit. Then he plummeted headfirst and crashed into the ground with a deafening bang.

Huh?

Dane quickly landed and walked toward Clark.

"That one really hurt!"

Clark took the hand Dane offered and got back to his feet.

Dane fell into thought. It seemed Clark's resistance to magical lightning was not particularly strong.

Shazam's lightning came from Zeus's divine Lightning of Zeus. It was an extremely high-level form of energy, the foundation upon which the Old Gods stood.

And Zeus was the king of the gods. In DCEU lore, Zeus was not only the ruler of the gods, but also humanity's creator.

His divine status was therefore extraordinarily high, completely different from the one on Marvel's side.

Big Supes' resistance to magic was not actually weak. It merely seemed lacking when compared to his physical resistance.

Even so, ordinary magical power could not harm his body. Yet Zeus's lightning could injure him, which meant Shazam had a trump card specifically effective against Kryptonians.

But that was not enough. Zod had an entire group of Kryptonians. Dane needed more cards up his sleeve.

"Let's call the sparring match here."

Their sparring session ended just like that. If they kept going, it would be easy for things to become genuinely heated.

That would defeat the original purpose.

He had roughly figured out where his current strength stood. He was about on par with Big Supes when he had first encountered the Kryptonian survivors: absurdly high base stats, but poor means of dealing with opponents.

He and Clark were evenly matched. If they traded wild punches, neither could gain the upper hand, but Dane should have had a slight edge in energy projection.

After all, Kryptonians were weak against magic.

Unfortunately, there was no Kryptonite yet. According to the DCEU's development, Kryptonite would only appear on Earth when Zod activated the World Engine and began transforming the planet.

Even if Dane wanted to collect some now, he had no way to do so unless he could visit the ruins of Krypton, where there would be more Kryptonite than anyone could ever pick up.

But his magic had not reached the level where he could travel between stars, so that was only wishful thinking.

Back at The Rock of Eternity, Dane found Clark another set of clothes. It seemed Clark did not even know how to use his Bio-field to protect his clothes.

After thinking for a moment, Dane asked, "Clark, when were you born?"

He only knew that Superman had landed on Earth sometime in the eighties. But with Kryptonian technology, the trip from Krypton to Earth probably took only a few months.

Clark shook his head. "I only know that Jonathan and Martha found me in October 1980."

Dane nodded. Then Clark had probably been born around 1980. It was now 2005, which meant he was only twenty-five. No wonder he was so green.

Dane felt that if he worked a little harder, he might even be able to suppress him.

When Zod invaded Earth, it would already be 2013. Superman would have just begun his career then, already in his thirties, with his physical condition essentially at its peak.

If not for his severe lack of combat experience and the fact that he had been holding back, he should have been able to beat a warrior like Ophira senseless.

In the movie, Superman had been beaten around mercilessly by the female Kryptonian warrior, but honestly, he had not even broken skin. Not even a single hair was out of place.

Ophira probably knew her attacks could not break through his defenses at all. That was why she kept running her mouth during the fight, trying to crush him psychologically.

"Do you want to see your father? I mean your biological father," Dane asked after giving it some thought.

Clark froze for a moment, then looked at him in confusion.

"You should have the key to the ship that brought you to Earth back then, right?"

Clark nodded, then suddenly realized something.

"How do you know?"

Dane tapped his temple. "That key will be an important tool against Zod in the future."

Clark understood. He truly believed Dane's nonsense about being able to see the future.

Dane felt guilty for one second before continuing.

"That key is also a storage device, something like a USB drive. It contains your father's digital consciousness."

"So as long as there's a suitable port, he can appear and speak with you."

"And as it happens, I know there's another Kryptonian ship hidden on Earth."

Clark fell silent for a while before suddenly asking, "Why are you helping me so much?"

"Because I hope that when Zod invades, you'll stand on Earth's side."

Dane told the truth.

"I don't know if I can do that."

Clark showed the confusion any young man would feel. He still could not decisively choose Earth and humanity like Big Supes in the movie.

Dane understood, so he merely patted Clark on the shoulder.

"You don't need to say more. I understand. There's still time, and it's not a bad thing to see more and think more."

"So, do you want to go take a look? Remember to bring the key. That ship needs it to start."

"Of course. But I left the key at home, so I need to go back and get it first... Oh, right. Why don't you come over to my house too?"

For Clark to invite him like that meant he truly regarded Dane as a friend now.

"Would that be convenient?"

"Of course. Martha is very hospitable. You'll see when you meet her."

"Then I'll take you up on that. By the way, where do you live?"

"Smallville, Kansas."

Magic stirred around Dane, and the environment surrounding him and Clark changed in an instant. Clark recognized his home state of Kansas at a glance.

"You know," he said wistfully, "I suddenly envy your ability. Going home wouldn't be such a hassle."

Before he had learned to fly, he would often sprint through uninhabited areas to get home faster.

Even then, people often caught him on camera, turning him into an urban legend.

"It's fine. You can fly now, can't you? That's not a problem anymore."

Clark smiled at that. "That's true."

Laughing and chatting, the two rose into the air. There was no one nearby, so naturally, they flew straight there.

What Steps Are Needed to Form the Justice League?

The Kents were an ordinary farming family in Kansas.

No matter how well farmers like them did, they could only maintain a middle-class income. Before the harvest came in, taking out loans to plant their fields was the norm.

In the movie, after Martha lost both her husband and son, the farm's crops suffered due to a lack of labor.

Later, the farm's income was insufficient to repay its bank loans, leaving her with no choice but to file for bankruptcy protection.

In the end, the bank had to repossess the farm to settle the debt.

Do not assume America's highly mechanized agriculture made it easy to earn money. In fact, precisely because mechanization was so advanced, each person had to manage an enormous amount of farmland.

So much that Martha could never handle it alone. Labor was expensive, combine harvesters had to be rented, timing mattered, and when prices fluctuated, she might not even have been able to afford fuel.

If Martha could have kept the farm under those circumstances, then she definitely had Kryptonian blood too.

But Clark was still around now, so the farm work was no problem at all. He could finish it in the blink of an eye, and Martha was living quite comfortably.

She looked to be in pretty good spirits.

"Hello, Mrs. Kent. My name is Dane, and I'm Clark's friend. It's my first time visiting, so please accept this small gift."

After speaking properly and politely, Dane offered her a bottle of red wine with both hands.

The brand was neither too good nor too bad, and the price was neither too high nor too low. It was just right as a housewarming gift.

He had already changed out of his red bodysuit. It had been simple enough—just a small clothing-changing spell.

Clark had originally said there was no need for a gift, but Dane had insisted on buying one.

No one would fault you for being overly courteous. That saying applied in America too.

Martha had already taken a liking to Dane because of his appearance. When she saw the wine, she liked the young man even more. He was polite and knew his boundaries.

"You don't have to be so formal. Just call me Martha. Come on in."

"Honestly, Clark, you should have told me earlier that you were bringing a guest. Then I could have prepared a little."

Martha sounded as though she were complaining, but it was clear she was happy that her son had brought a friend home.

In her memory, Clark had pitifully few friends. Even Lana, whom he had known since childhood, rarely took the initiative to come over and visit.

Clark took Martha's hand. "Mom, I met Dane while I was traveling. He helped me, and... he's like me!"

Martha quickly understood what Clark meant by "like me." She looked at Dane with curiosity in her eyes.

Dane was happy to satisfy that curiosity. He looked around.

Then he pointed, and an arc of electricity tore through the air and struck the charging port of the phone on the table.

Its battery, which had only twelve percent remaining, was instantly fully charged.

"Oh. My. God!"

Martha covered her mouth with both hands, her face filled with shock.

What a pure-hearted person. A tiny trick like that had completely won her over.

Dane sighed over how innocent people were these days. In a few years, they would be used to such things.

Clark's face darkened. He knew that the lightning just now was the same thing that had struck him earlier and hurt him so badly he had wanted to die.

It could charge phones too?

Wasn't that a little disrespectful?

Knowing that Dane was special like her son put Martha even more at ease.

She was delighted and insisted that Dane stay to try her cooking.

Ignoring Clark's attempts to stop her, she got into the pickup parked outside and drove to the supermarket to shop for ingredients.

"All right, why are you in such a hurry? That ship has been under the Arctic ice for twenty thousand years. It can wait another day or two."

Hearing that, Clark's impatience eased.

"But before we go, we need to agree on something. The moment you insert the key, you'd better have the AI block the ship's signal to prevent Zod from learning about it too early."

That was only sensible. Clark nodded, then asked curiously, "What do you plan to do after that? Keep hiding forever?"

Clark did not know that Dane was actually only fifteen years old. Shazam's power had aged up his body.

Dane looked mature, and the way he spoke and acted carried a sense of experience.

Combined with Dane's claim that he was a "god," Clark thought he had lived for a very long time.

As for Dane's previous words about having only recently become a god, Clark automatically interpreted them as the vague sense of time possessed by a long-lived species.

So he subconsciously assumed that Dane, like himself, had been hiding among human society all this time.

Dane nodded, then shook his head.