Chapter 188: The Lost Super Heroes
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Inside the ruins of an abandoned area of New York at the outskirts of the city’s walls, several peculiar-looking people wearing colorful clothes and even capes gathered together; all of them had their own distinct backgrounds and personalities and originated from a world not like this one, one that was, actually, perhaps more dangerous and insane in some areas, although that still was called “Earth” and, in essence, had their entire history being the same as this one.
Where did the differences lie? Where could they draw a line and see where the point of history diverged to give birth to people like them and where the line diverged to create a world like this?
The group of superheroes, people that worked to protect humanity, discussed this with one another as they finally took a breather after a very long day of catching rogue villains and evading this world’s new order.
“It’s insane, man, this whole thing... I just don’t even know what to do anymore; should I just run fast enough that I out speed space and time and reset everything maybe that way…” Wingspeed suggested jokingly.
“NO!”
However, his companions all screamed at the same time, probably fed up with him having done this thing once before, only creating an even worse future than what he had tried to change.
“Okay, okay! I was joking, man; I promised I wouldn’t do it ever again!” Wingspeed sighed, waving his hand as if trying to calm them down; he was the least serious of a group full of incredibly grumpy people, very old people at that. “Jesus Christ, I’m just trying to make a joke; everyone’s so serious…”
“I know you had good intentions, but the very thought of you doing that thing again scares me, Wingspeed; please keep your powers at bay,” sighed Galaxy Man. “And yes, I also understand why you would joke like this... Honestly, I would usually laugh at such jokes, but right now, I guess I can’t really do so."
“Even if we had the method to return home, we really can’t; several of our friends and foes are all scattered across this world,” said Nightman, crossing his big, burly arms, making a serious frown barely visible beneath his black mask. “We have to first find them, stop them, then find a way back home, and that’s not going to be quick, even with you helping us, Galaxy Man.”
“I know…” Galaxy Man nodded, sighing. “I wanted to apologize for a while now; if it wasn’t for me, none of this would have happened. It’s my fault… I was the one that ended up growing so weak that I was unable to come help you out when Mechanicus and the villains created that Time Distortion Machine. I should’ve taken care of Mechanicus myself, but after that fight against the Galaxy Tyrant, I had almost died.”
In their original world, the entire Justice Alliance had battled a powerful intergalactic conqueror that traveled across the cosmos called the Galaxy Tyrant, someone that even called himself an Ancient God of War, or its Avatar.
A powerful foe that held equal, if not superior, strength compared to Galaxy Man, being both incredibly tough and also smart, with a massive planet-sized spaceship that traveled across the cosmos.
His plan was to conquer Earth and add the planet to his ever-growing amount of conquered planets, becoming part of his massive intergalactic empire, even if it had to be by force.
This ended up becoming the spark of an immense war, where both heroes and villains had to team up to protect their planet, although there were also many traitorous villains that joined the conqueror.
Ultimately, Galaxy Man managed to defeat him with the help of the entire Justice Alliance’s forces after he unleashed his Hyper Charge form by diving deep into the plasma of their sun until his body absorbed all of its radiation, increasing his power but at the same time destroying his body internally.
Galaxy Man had to go against his own morals and kill the Galaxy Tyrant to stop this madness once and for all. The battle took down half of the moon on its wake, and eventually, Galaxy Man went into a coma for several months to recover. Because of this, the Earth became unprotected from intergalactic threats, and that’s where old enemies, such as Dark Matter Man and Mechanicus, appeared again.
“No, you shouldn’t be held responsible for what happened,” said Nightman. “You almost died to protect everyone, and you had to rest for all those months, as you were on the verge of dying. If anything, it is us, the heroes from Earth, that failed you…”
The most prideful and often emotionless of the heroes, the Vigilante of the Night and a powerful Exorcist such as Nightman, ended speaking his heart for once, surprising his friends.
“Nightman…”
“Yeah, I agree,” nodded Wingspeed. “Sorry… You had always been my hero since I was a kid, Galaxy Man; if anything, we failed you. We were unable to coordinate, and we ended up fighting against one another too much. We let the villains get the best of us, and... this is what ended up happening.”
“Wingspeed…”
“Hahh… I guess I have to join in and say that yeah, it’s our fault,” nodded a fourth person in the room, her feminine voice contrasting with the three other men here.
She was a slender, tall woman with a muscular body, long blonde hair, and sharp golden eyes, with tanned brown skin and wearing a skin-tight leotard with gold and white colors and armor, showing a bright star in the middle of her chest. She wore white boots and also carried a sheathed sword and a shield with her.
“Marvelous Woman, I’m glad we were able to find you at the very least,” Galaxy Man smiled. “Though it’s disheartening that I have yet to pick up on the presences of Jade Star and Martian Man. It’s as if they’re completely gone from my radar.”
“Most likely the things you used to find us broke in the way here,” said Wingspeed. “After all, they’re just these tiny little bracelets. They can get broken or easily lost while traveling within a damn wormhole.”
“Right…” Galaxy Man nodded. “Any ideas where they could have gone to?”
“I could probably find them if I can use my Odysseus Compass,” said Marvelous Woman. “But I’ll need some time to amass the necessary Divine Power.”
Marvelous Woman was similar to Wingspeed and, at the same time, very different. While Wingspeed was the long-lost descendant of the Greek God Hermes and was born and raised in New Jersey until he suddenly awakened his powers after being struck by lightning, Marvelous Woman was raised on a small island, made up of the last descendants of the God of War Ares.
With hard Spartan-like traditions, she was rigorously trained as the one that could hold and wield the many divine artifacts her family was made to protect, as a hero that would protect the world from the new threats.
Aside from such Divine Artifacts inherited from the other God Families, she also naturally possessed the greatest strength amongst the warriors of her tribe and had awakened the Brand of Ares, destined to become the new Goddess of War.
Yet, to her, most of these things didn’t matter. War wasn’t something good, and she didn’t want to become a goddess that would love and promote such a thing.
“You haven’t harnessed much yet?” Galaxy Man wondered. “What could we do to help you out?”
“Hm, this world is strange; perhaps I could probably use this strange System that popped out of nowhere,” Marvelous Woman said. “It says something about… accumulating Faith? Maybe that could help, but I have no idea if we could trust this thing or not.”
“It is yet another of the strange phenomena of this world,” said Nightman. “And it is what’s giving even the shittiest villain out there the power to go against us now. It’s strange too; it incentivizes killing things so you can gain strength and magical abilities. In all my life, I have never seen such a wicked sorcery before. Whoever set this up worldwide must be an Ancient Demon of Sorcery or something similar to the Accursed One, which I guess I can name here, Mephistopheles.”
“I agree, this thing is imbued with tremendous amounts of powerful sorcery and magic power,” nodded Marvelous Woman, sitting down again. “But it doesn’t seem threatening at all; despite its incentivization to kill, there’s nothing saying we have to kill people. I guess it simply synergizes well with villains and psychopaths that have no problem doing so. We could hunt, for example, monsters or animals instead.”
“Animals? For the sake of it? That’s cruel,” said Wingspeed. “But monsters…? I mean, if they’re dangerous to the people, we might give it a try…”
“I suppose so; I always have to hunt down alien creatures and monsters when I’m patrolling the Galaxy,” said Galaxy Man. “So I am kind of used to hunting down beasts.”
“Hmm, I don’t think we should be hunting monsters right now,” Nightman sighed. “We have to find more villains and apprehend them quickly, before the people of this world just kill them.”
“And you want to defend those terrible people that have killed so many?” sighed Marvelous Woman. “I wouldn’t kill them either, yes, but there’s nothing that’ll make me stop those that want to bring greater justice to them, even if they have to taint their hands red.”
“If you simply stand and do nothing, then you’re simply not a hero,” said Nightman.
“I think I am a much better hero than what you could ever be, Nightman,” said Marvelous Woman, crossing her arms. “You alone are managing a whole city full of criminals, always letting them escape after a week in an asylum that is clearly also controlled by the underworld. The only way to clean that city of yours is by executing those people, but strangely enough, even the government of that state is against that. Haven’t you ever realized a single thing about the place you live? And how unsustainable is it to let these psychopaths go all the time? No, have any of you ever begun to think for a single second about this?”
She confronted all three of them, sighing; they didn’t respond, remaining in silence, looking elsewhere. The idea of a hero for them was different than what she believed, as she was raised away from modern society, and in a harsh, spartan society, she was a bit more ruthless.
“Look, let’s not start fighting between one another again,” said Galaxy Man. “Okay, we won’t start chasing them around however we want; that’s a waste of time, honestly. But we should at least check on them too, to confirm what happened to them, at the very least. There’s some villains that I’m sure aren’t weak or stupid enough to get caught so easily… Like Jester, Mechanicus, or Dark Matter Man.”
“Hmm… fine,” Marvelous Woman nodded. “Nightman, you better stop your stupid romanticization of what a hero is; even our kindest member here has already accepted that we can’t simply keep up this stupid ideology anymore. It is simply not sustainable. Or were you hoping for Galaxy Man to spare the Galaxy Tyrant?”
“I never suggested anything,” said Nightman, groaning angrily. “Let’s do what we must do…”
There was a lot of tension in the air; conflicting emotions and ideals clashed, and the heroes were on the verge of collapsing as a team.
“Come on, let’s go hunt some—woah!”
BAAAM!
Before Wingspeed could even speak, suddenly, the ruins where they were trembled as a massive creature broke in, roaring ferociously.
“ROOOAARR!”
It was a massive, green-scaled tyrannosaurus, with sharp red spikes across its body overflowing with a golden aura within its gigantic body; several more of them followed it from behind, glaring at their prey.
“Dinosaurs?! Really?” Wingspeed laughed, smiling in disbelief. “This world’s nuts!”
“I guess we won’t have any more time to just discuss,” said Galaxy Man, beginning to float in midair.
“Fighting dinosaurs, huh… I guess I never thought I would be doing this, for fuck’s sake,” Nightman sighed.
“Ah, a good prey to test if the sharpness of my blade hasn’t gone dull!” Marvelous Woman unsheathed a golden sword.
As the heroes battled the huge horde of giant dinosaurs, from the distance, leading another gigantic army, a group of strange-looking beings glanced at them in silence.
Their reptilian eyes detecting their movements, and the powerful auras exuding from their bodies, which brought their attention.
“It seems we’ve finally found some worthy vessels for our God.” The being spoke, smiling viciously. “Immediately report this to Lady Bloodclaw.”
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New Cover!!!
Orion (Future) VS Bing Xue