Barbatos Leaves the World Forge for the First Time, and the World Forger Invades

You see.

The stars on the horizon were false. They did not truly exist.

They were merely... illusions created before the timeline had yet condensed.

Illusions from before that perfect timeline condensed.

That was what I was chasing.

I was Parallax Hal. I knew that was what they called me, but in truth, I preferred to call myself Hal... that was my real name.

I possessed the power of 3,600 power rings, exactly matching the number of Green Lantern Corps members I had slaughtered.

I had mastered all the light energy drawn from the Green Lantern Central Power Battery. That was also the reason OA had once been destroyed.

I knew I was burdened with grave sins. I knew I had already strayed from the heroes' original ideals, but it was all for the greater good.

So... please, I couldn't fail.

I could undo everything I had done. Only by clinging to that belief could I continue moving forward, but the farther I went, the less capable I became of turning back.

I could never stop trying to forge a perfect world. Otherwise, everything I had done before this would have been meaningless.

I had killed my friends and destroyed everything I loved, because as long as my power was strong enough, I could restart the entire world according to a perfect plan.

I could only succeed, and forever... I could only succeed.

Blood.

Hal could feel his veins throbbing, forcing blood to gush from his wounds.

Energy burned across Hal's body like flames, reducing him to a cornered beast with nowhere left to retreat.

He was very strong—strong enough that if he made up his mind, the final result would certainly be the Anti-Monitor Dragon's death, while he himself would only be injured.

But that would come at the