Stormfront was undoubtedly incredibly powerful.
Besides her supercharged plasma blasts, she also had Super Strength, Super Durability, Self-Healing, and, most importantly, Immortality.
In terms of strength alone, Stormfront, who had been injected with Original Compound V, was no match for anyone except Homelander and Soldier Boy.
But she still lost.
From the moment she had confidently joined forces with Edgar to scheme against Ryan, hoping to separate Ryan from Homelander and create an opening for her to rise to power, she had already been put at a disadvantage by the information gap.
Caught up in the situation, she had no idea what was going on. Even when death finally came for her, she still didn't know where she had gone wrong.
Stormfront died with her eyes wide open, her head and cervical vertebrae torn from her body.
Homelander, holding her wide-eyed head, suddenly snapped out of the strange, deeply uncomfortable emotions that had taken hold of him.
He was about to toss aside the remains in his hand, but the next moment, his arm dropped limply to his side instead.
Stormfront's cervical vertebrae dragged along the ground. When Homelander turned around, his expression shifted into a complex mix of lingering anger and helpless confusion.
"Son... Daddy killed the person who hurt you."
Ryan just stared at him, dazed.
Homelander thought he was frightened. He hurriedly tossed the head away and strode over, his angry expression fading completely as he approached.
All that remained was apprehension and unease.
It was just like it!
It was exactly like that scene from the original story in his memories.
Joy erupted in Ryan's mind.
In the original story, it was the dramatic scene where his mother, Becca, died and Stormfront was left crippled.
After discovering that someone had stolen his son, Homelander had furiously slaughtered an entire squad of soldiers inside the cabin.
Then, when he went to find his son, he hadn't even cleaned himself up. He'd had time to leisurely kill people, so how could he not have had time to wipe off the blood?
So Homelander had done it on purpose in the show.
He'd used his confusion and helplessness to win his son's sympathy, making his bloody slaughter seem justified.
The unspoken message was that he wasn't a bloodthirsty killer; they'd been trying to harm him and his son, so he'd had no choice but to act. He'd been protecting Ryan.
He desperately wanted his son on his side, to accept that his violence was meant to protect his family—to protect Ryan.
That was why he wanted his son to see what he looked like after killing.
So was this scene now just like the one in his memories?
"Dad..."
Ryan's voice trembled slightly as he glanced nervously at Stormfront's head.
Ever since he realized that someone had been manipulating Homelander's emotions, he'd been thinking about how to restore him to the way he'd been before.
He also wanted to undo the influence Edgar had exerted on Homelander—the idea that "your son is different from you"—which had first triggered Homelander's deepest fear.
So how could Ryan accomplish both?
During the two weeks he'd spent working on the script, Ryan had thought long and hard about it. For a while, he'd even believed it was impossible.
Until Stormfront had unwittingly given him an idea.
He remembered Raven telling him that Stormfront harbored deep malice toward him.
It was only after that that he'd planned to kill Stormfront, and the key to his plan had been the Dad Pager he'd been waiting for.
That was when an idea had naturally occurred to Ryan.
Why not let Homelander kill someone in front of him?
Why not rip away Homelander's disguise?
And why not reveal part of himself to Homelander, too?
Going back to the original story, when Homelander had brazenly appeared before his son, covered in blood, he might well have been testing him, in a way.
He wanted to use that bloody, disheveled sight to test his son's limits.
To see whether the sight of blood would make the boy despise him.
If the Ryan in the show showed even a hint of sympathy, that would mean his son accepted Homelander's logic of violence. After that, he could keep Ryan tied to him with even more extreme methods.
So Homelander longed for love, but didn't know how to love.
All he knew was how to destroy everything, and himself, with his obsession and madness!
Wasn't that version of Homelander just like the Homelander standing here now?
Both were covered in blood in front of their sons. Both had frantically tested them after killing someone. Both were equally uneasy, terrified that the only family they had would cast them away forever.
The only difference was...
In the show, Homelander really had been rejected by his son, and then he'd gradually descended into destruction.
But the person standing before Homelander now was Ryan, who had crossed into this world and truly felt the depth of his father's unconditional love.
Who wouldn't want a father who was invincible, feared by the whole world as a tyrant, yet doted on no one but them?
Especially Ryan, who had been an orphan in his previous life.
"I-I'm not scared!"
Even as he said it, Ryan glanced nervously at Stormfront's wide-eyed face, then quickly turned his head away.
He didn't even look at Homelander.
In a trembling voice, he said, "Dad, I... I'm actually really smart."
"I told you, I figured out a long time ago that the place I lived in wasn't real."
"Of course, son. I know. What... what are you trying to say?"
Homelander was already crouching in front of Ryan. He stared intently at his son, eager to hear what he would say next, yet afraid of it, too.
Ryan finally turned to face him. "I'm really smart. I figured out that Stormfront was a bad person who had really, really awful plans for me. I also figured out that your assistant was secretly trying to sabotage you."
"You had a really bad temper back then. You never got angry at me, but sometimes you looked so scary. Ashley was always secretly losing her hair, and her heart was always beating really fast, thump, thump."
Ryan paused to give Homelander time to take it in. Then he continued, sounding a little dejected. "So I didn't tell you. I wanted to investigate in secret. I thought I could catch all those bad people for you, so I even deliberately brought Maeve along."
"I had Mitchell check. Maeve and Starlight both like me. They'll protect me."
Homelander's expression stiffened for a brief moment.
Maeve? Starlight?
One was his ex-girlfriend, the other his on-screen girlfriend.
What they had in common was that he bullied them both.
Ryan pretended not to notice Homelander's expression. Instead, he abruptly changed the subject. "Dad, I'm not scared!"
"Huh?"
"That's right, Dad. I'm not scared that you killed someone, because they were bad people who wanted to hurt us!"
His son's words were childish, but their meaning couldn't have been clearer.
Homelander's whole body relaxed instantly, the tension draining away. Genuine joy flickered in his eyes.
And now Ryan began to put a leash on him.
Ryan met his eyes with a firm gaze. "But I don't like you killing people, either! Dad, can you promise me that you'll spare people who haven't hurt us?"
"Of course. I will."
Homelander answered without giving it a second thought, clearly not taking it seriously.
But that was enough.
Ryan wasn't asking for much. As long as, in the future, there was a moment when Homelander thought of this promise before killing whoever he pleased, that would be enough.
The same principle still applied: Ryan didn't expect Homelander to become a good person, just not so bad that everyone abandoned him.
At this point in their conversation, Ryan finally said what he'd most wanted to say.
"Dad, I have one more thing to tell you, and you have to promise me one more thing."
"Something else? All right, son. Go ahead. Whatever it is, I'll promise."
Ryan's eyes crinkled. It was the first time he'd smiled since summoning Homelander.
He said, "I saw Mom on the set. Promise you'll let me have dinner with her. I miss her."
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