Opening the Passage to Hell!

Earth had entered the seventh day of the New God era.

After the two earth-shaking events of Doomsday's arrival and Superman's death, the entire world had settled into an eerie calm.

Every day when people woke up, they could see Link on the news.

Sometimes he appeared before an impending tsunami, quelling the raging waves single-handedly; other times, he froze the lava of an erupting volcano with his Absolute Zero breath.

He had become the busiest and most versatile firefighter on the planet.

Absolute power had brought absolute peace.

But it had also brought absolute... fear.

At that moment, high above in near-Earth orbit, the planet's New God floated silently against the pitch-black backdrop of space.

Below him lay that beautiful blue planet, now held in the palm of his hand.

The space agencies and military command centers of every nation on Earth, and even the heroes confined aboard the Watchtower space station, had every camera and sensor locked firmly onto him.

No one knew what he intended to do.

Since the battle in which he had "purified" Doomsday, Link had not once left Earth's atmosphere.

Today was the first time.

Ignoring the scrutiny coming from every direction, Link calmly regarded the tiny, palm-sized metal container in his hand.

Inside the container was a thin enclosing energy field.

At the center of that field, a tiny pinch of gray, nearly invisible powder greedily absorbed energy, undergoing the most primitive forms of proliferation and reconstruction in defiance of the fundamental laws of life.

Doomsday.

The "gift" he had carefully prepared for the Dark Lord at the other end of the universe.

"It's time for you to perform on a new stage."

Link murmured to himself. His voice could not travel through the vacuum, yet it seemed to carry an unquestionable will.