The Broken Power Ring

The image appeared.

In the night sky of Gotham, Chu Men hovered, a dark red beam sweeping across, a living hell.

The scene cut away to the Metropolis docks, where Chu Men kicked down, snapping Superman's sternum, and raised his middle finger at a global live broadcast camera.

The fishermen looked at the image on the wall, their expressions varying.

"Take a good look at this monster." Bruce's voice was colder than the sea wind outside.

Arthur's brow furrowed tightly.

He sensed the terrifying destructive power contained within that man's body.

"He has already controlled Gotham. Enslaved Lex Luthor. His army was completely wiped out." Bruce turned off the projection. "You think hiding in the ocean makes you safe? When he finds the land boring, those eyes of his can boil the waters of the entire Atlantis into a pot of fish soup."

Arthur fell silent, his chest rising and falling violently.

He glanced down at the fishermen kneeling on the ground, then back at the black card on the table.

Arthur snatched up the black card, shoving it into the pocket of his worn-out jeans.

He turned and walked toward the corner, where a dark gold trident exuding ancient oppression leaned against the wall.

Arthur scooped up the trident in one motion, turning to look at Bruce.

"If that asshole named Chu Men dares to come and pollute my waters," Arthur gripped his weapon tightly, "I'll shove this fork right into his eye socket. Count me in."

"Wait for my word."

Bruce turned and walked out of the tavern, stepping into the howling wind and driving rain.

He pulled open the hatch of the Invisible Batwing, climbing into the pilot's seat.

Just as he started the engines, a sudden anomaly erupted in the sky.

A sickly green meteor tore through the heavy rainclouds, carrying a pungent burnt odor and a shrill tearing sound through the air.

The meteor streaked across the sky above Port of Mercy, plunging straight into a wild forest less than three kilometers away from the fighter.

Bruce stared at the tactical screen.

The radar indicated that an extremely high-intensity radiation source existed at the center of the forest three kilometers ahead.

The fighter hovered mid-air.

Below was a gigantic meteorite crater over thirty meters in diameter.

The originally dense coniferous forest was completely flattened, and the surrounding tree trunks lay in a radial pattern of scorched black.

The soil at the bottom of the crater was completely vitrified from the high heat, its surface covered in a layer of eerie, sickly green radioactive dust.

Bruce pressed a button on the console, and a spare set of Bat-Armor rose from behind the cockpit.

He quickly finished donning it, fastened his mask, and activated the thermal imaging and radiation filtration systems.

The hatch sprang open.

Bruce leaped down into the deep crater.

His boots stepped onto the vitrified scorched earth, producing a crisp, shattering sound.

The surrounding air was searingly hot, and the rain falling into the crater instantly evaporated into billowing white mist.

Bruce pushed aside the white mist, walking toward the center of the crater.

A person lay there.

A man wearing a green tactical jumpsuit.

More than half of his body was buried in a pile of rubble, his jumpsuit heavily damaged, exposing large areas of mangled, bloody flesh.

The most fatal injury was on his chest, where a terrifying thirty-centimeter laceration sliced directly through the muscle layer, exposed fractured rib fragments jutting out into the air as fresh blood seeped outward along the scorched earth.

The man's right arm was limply twisted.

On the middle finger of his right hand, he wore a green ring.

The surface of the ring was covered in fine cracks, flashing with a faint green light at an extremely high frequency.

"Energy below three percent." A synthesized mechanical voice emanated from inside the ring, intermittent and broken. "User vital signs critical... failed to initiate forced hibernation protocol... warning... energy loss..."

Bruce stepped forward, dropping to one knee.

Ignoring the alarming ring, he pulled a can of high-concentration medical gel spray directly from his Utility Belt.

Hiss--

The ice-blue gel sprayed onto the laceration on the man's chest.

A chemical reaction occurred instantly; the gel rapidly hardened, forcefully sealing the ruptured blood vessels and tightly bonding the everted flesh together.

Under the stimulus of the intense pain, the man snapped his eyes open.

They were a pair of bloodshot eyes, pupils dilated, filled with extreme terror.

The man suddenly raised his intact left hand, grabbing Bruce's bracers in a death grip.

His strength was astonishingly great, causing the Kevlar coating of the bracers to emit a harsh frictional screech.

"The universe..." The man's Adam's apple bobbed, coughing up a mouthful of blood mixed with visceral fragments, his voice raspy to the extreme. "There are monsters... gathering..."

Bruce counter-gripped the man's wrist, his helmet's electronic voice cold and merciless: "Who are you? Where is your craft?"

"No craft." The man gasped heavily. "I'm Hal Jordan... Green Lantern. Protector of Sector 2814. Listen to me... Apokolips... the Parademons army..."

Hal's body trembled violently as he attempted to raise his right hand.

The green ring, covered in cracks, lit up once again.

Green energy spilled from the fissures, laborantly outlining the silhouette of some horrific creature with giant membrane wings and a hideous face in mid-air.

Bruce stared at the semi-finished green phantom.

Hal's mental state was extremely poor, his willpower collapsing on all fronts.

The green phantom in mid-air lasted merely two seconds before emitting a crisp sound like shattering glass, dissolving into countless green light dots in the curtain of rain.

"Pfft!"

The backlash followed immediately, and Hal coughed up another large mouthful of blood, his head listing to one side as he nearly passed out completely.

Bruce grabbed Hal by the collar, hoisting his upper body up.

"Look at me." Bruce stared into Hal's unfocused eyes. "No matter what monsters are out there in the universe, there's one right here on Earth. He just crushed the sternum of this planet's most powerful warrior."

Bruce let go, pulling a metal syringe from his belt and plunging it directly into Hal's carotid artery.

The specialized stimulant was injected.

Hal drew in a sharp breath of air, his scattered pupils refocusing as he looked at the man clad entirely in black armor before him.

"Save your willpower, soldier." Bruce heaved Hal onto his shoulder, turning toward the edge of the crater, his tone leaving no room for negotiation. "I need you."

The engines roared, and the fighter tore through the night sky, flying back at full speed toward Gotham.

At the same time.

Tens of thousands of kilometers above Earth, in near-Earth orbit.

In the boundless, silent vacuum of space, there was no sound. The absolute zero cold was enough to shatter steel.

Clark Kent's tattered body was hurtling straight toward the very center of the Solar System at a terrifying speed.

The Superman suit on his body had long since been completely incinerated in the previous battle, leaving only a few scorched strips of cloth hanging around his waist.

His eyes were closed, his cheeks deeply sunken, his skin taking on an ash-gray, withered look.

The closer he got to the sun, the more violent that pure stellar radiation became.

The light of the yellow sun, spanning tens of millions of kilometers, poured unreservedly onto Clark.

This was the most primitive and massive energy source in the universe.

"Click... click-click..."

Faint sounds of skeletal growth echoed within Clark's body.

Clark hovered in space.

His body was completely enveloped by the yellow sun's light, slowly drifting toward the sun.