The sky was dyed red as the setting sun dipped halfway below the horizon.
The clouds, tinged in crimson, drifted thinly, unable to completely shroud the sky.
Half bathed in a rosy glow, half edged with dark white rims, they created a stunning three-dinsional beauty, a seamless transition from day to night.
Below, icy mist and cold air blanketed the ground. Rocks stood frozen and brittle, while alternating streams of black and white hot air rose and solidified under the extre chill.
Even near the outer edges of this place, where it wasn't the coldest point, the temperature had already plunged to an astonishing minus 80 degrees.
Anyone who wasn't careful here could easily freeze solid—their ears, nose, and fingers turning to ice. If a man were to relieve himself here, his urine would freeze midair, turning into an icicle attached to his body. Even his most sensitive parts would beco so frozen and brittle that a re movent could break them off.
This was an unimaginably frigid environnt, capable of freezing and destroying nearly all known materials on Earth.
The dense mist drifted slowly, hazy and tinged with a faint blue hue. At the very center, the temperature had dropped to an almost incomprehensible level.
Towering five-ter icicles jutted from the ground like frozen spires, encasing a grotesque, tumor-like mass—Bardi's 3.5-ter mutated form, completely immobilized. His distorted features, frozen solid, exuded a terrifying and oppressive aura, as if he were the last remnant of a hellish demon, manifesting the will of sothing monstrous and sinister.
This was no ordinary creature. It was a nightmare struggling to unleash its full power.
A truly horrifying sight.
Jor-El's eyes narrowed as he clenched his fists. His short white fur barely concealed the tense muscles on his chest.
Suspended in midair, he watched closely.
Crack.
A thin fracture ford down the center of the icicle.
Through the translucent ice, he could faintly make out Bardi's twisted smile—slowly writhing.
Suddenly, as if startled, the surrounding cold mist shuddered and recoiled, dispersing rapidly from the vicinity of the icicle.
Jor-El's expression darkened instantly.
Sothing had changed.
His thod, based on the most advanced scientific principles, should have worked. The extre cold should have slowed Bardi's cellular and molecular activity to a near standstill, disrupting the delicate energy balance within his body. The imbalance should have forced an uncontrollable energy overload, triggering a cataclysmic self-destruction akin to a nuclear detonation.
It should have been an imdiate, devastating explosion not just a crack in the ice.
But instead, Jor-El found himself staring at Bardi's grotesque, frozen face—twisted into a chilling, knowing grin.
At the mont he saw the crack, he realized.
He had made a mistake.
The correct choice… was to grab Clark and run.
But instead.
Jor-El inhaled sharply, expanding his chest as he drew in vast torrents of air, attempting to thicken the ice once more, desperate to completely freeze Bardi again.
BOOM!
A deafening explosion erupted.
The fractures in the ice multiplied in an instant, shattering outward in all directions. Jagged shards blasted through the air as an enormous shockwave rippled outward, sending turbulent waves of cold mist surging across the ground.
A circular sonic boom burst forth at the point of impact. The already brittle ground beneath them cracked violently—then collapsed. A massive crater, nearly 100 ters wide, caved into the earth, its deep fractures spiderwebbing outward like an earthquake tearing through the land.
A dark figure shot into the air.
Fast.
A massive, tumor-ridden hand, its grotesquely large fingers outstretched pierced through the thin veil of a sonic boom barrier. The five fingers, glowing red-hot from friction, descended like flaming teors.
It reached for Jor-El—
Just as he was inhaling.
"You? You think you're worthy of fighting ?!"
Bardi's enormous form lood over Jor-El, his face a monstrous grimace of rage and cruelty. His blood-red eyes burned with fury as his bellowing voice echoed across the sky.
Jor-El's pupils contracted.
His vision filled with nothing but the grotesque mass of Bardi's tumor-covered body, a towering nightmare glaring down at him.
His breath caught.
How had it co to this?
Even with every ounce of top-tier Kryptonian combat genetics encoded into his being, facing a monster like Bardi at this proximity sent a primal terror through him.
His body froze.
For the first ti in his life—he felt fear.
And in that instant.
Bardi's massive hand clamped onto Jor-El's muzzle, prying open his jaws, forcing his mouth wide.
Then slamd him downward.
BOOM!
Jor-El's body tore through the air at supersonic speed, his back igniting from the friction of his rapid descent.
Bardi's twisted grin widened as he drove Jor-El into the earth.
The impact cratered the ground beneath them—nearly 100 ters deep. Jagged rock and debris exploded into the sky, forming a chaotic storm of shattered stone.
In the midst of the airborne rubble.
A brutal clash erupted. A nightmarish battle between a monstrous abomination and a Kryptonian werewolf.
Bardi's massive fra bore down on Jor-El with overwhelming force, his every movent radiating sheer, unrelenting power.
Then—
BOOM!
Another impact.
The already devastated ground caved in further, shattering as the crater widened. The earth trembled as shockwaves rippled outward, expanding the pit to 150 ters in an instant—then beyond.
Jor-El barely had ti to react.
Before Bardi's other hand struck his abdon.
Hard.
CRACK!
Jor-El's insides wrenched.
The combined force of his own inhalation and the brutal external impact triggered a violent internal spasm. His eyes twisted in agony.
He couldn't even scream.
Bardi's grin stretched wider.
BOOM!
The deep crater collapsed further.
And expanded.
100 ters. 150 ters. 200 ters. 300 ters. 400 ters.
With each successive blow, the ground fractured further, unable to withstand the relentless onslaught.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Bardi's fists beca a blur, striking so fast that sonic booms rippled in endless circles. The air itself could no longer fill the vacuum between his attacks.
With a sadistic smirk, he unleashed a storm of blows.
Jor-El beca nothing more than a ragdoll beneath the onslaught. Every punch landed at his weakest points, leaving him no chance to resist, no chance to even cry out. Each strike sent pain ripping through his body like a thousand electric shocks.
The pit deepened. The fractures spread.
The once-solid ground was now a crumbling wasteland, continuously breaking apart under the force of Bardi's unrelenting assault.
500 ters. 600 ters. 700 ters.
The battlefield beca a nightmarish, expanding abyss.
The relentless barrage drove Jor-El deeper into the earth—further and further—until the two of them plumted thousands of ters underground.
The impact sent shockwaves across Kansas.
The ground trembled violently, rippling outward for hundreds of miles. Even a city 600 kiloters away felt the disturbance, the vibrations causing water in cups to ripple, furniture to shake, and dust to rise from the floors.
Nearby farms suffered worse.
The very earth beneath them trembled, sending people stumbling as the sheer magnitude of the battle between monsters unfolded in the heart of the land.
(To be continued.)
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