"Why are you all so relaxed?"
Bo Bo walked up the dune with a black line above his head. Of course, due to his fur color, this helpless emotion could only be revealed through his eyes.
While he was cleaning the fine grains of sand from his long fur, he saw the three of them, holding their teacups in sync, raising them to cover their faces, making the sound of drinking water.
"Hiss... Hoo..."
The animal detective let out a deep sigh, looking at the last glow of light on the horizon, while the rest of the Shadow Contract Team looked just as bedraggled, following behind him.
From the primordial rainforest to the great desert, who can handle all this?
Su Ming gently put down his teacup, the cup and the saucer making a crisp clinking sound: "Hmm? Finished working?"
"Yes, the array with the Eternal Rock is connected. Now there's only the last pivot left..." Bo Bo sat down beside Su Ming without hesitation, picking up a snack set on the cloth: "Can I have some of that black tea and snacks, too?"
Su Ming, of course, wasn't stingy. Not only did Little Fortune Ape get a share, but everyone in the Shadow Contract Team did too. They completed the construction of two Holy of Holies, which was commendable.
"There's only one last location left. I'll leave it to you to set it up later. Wonder Woman, Green Arrow, and I plan to split up."
Bo Bo adjusted his detective hat, the brim blocking the heat, making his vision a little blurry: "Did something happen?"
"It's just that something might happen. We're just going to check it out." Su Ming handed him a crab cake, pondering: "The location of the last Holy of Holies needs a bit of adjustment. I always feel Old Olympus there isn't too reliable, since the Primordial is sealed there. Do you have a suitable place?"
Bo Bo scratched his head, blowing over the hot tea with his thick lips, his coarse hand holding the white teacup forming a strong contrast.
"I do have a suggestion, the Lonely Fortress."
Upon hearing about the Primordial, Diana couldn't help but frown. That guy is always a troublemaker, everyone knows that seal isn't the end of the story. Maybe it'll take another 1000 years for him to break out, or it could be the next second.
She sat sideways in the sand, spinning the teacup in her hands, deep in thought, while Su Ming only thought briefly about Bo Bo's suggestion before nodding.
"Has the Cosmic Tuning Fork returned there now?"
He asked the gorilla, pouring tea for the Shadow Contract Team at the same time. The 'Black Christmas Tree', once standing in Gotham and covered by a great group of superheroes, was gone, supposedly returning to that Superman stronghold.
"Yes, though it once infused dark power from all parallel universes, making it still black now, but magic is also a form of dark energy." Bo Bo calmly ate the cake, realizing this wasn't crab meat, but he didn't care: "What Barbatos did to it saved us a lot of effort. At least we don't have to carve the connection circuit ourselves."
"And the Lonely Fortress is very sturdy," Oliver added. He liked solid and reliable shelters.
"Yes, just like you said." Bo Bo exhaled long. The food that Deathstroke provided had flavors he had never tried before. Indeed, drinking tea in the desert felt good.
Su Ming stood up, stretching his neck: "Then it's up to you. If the Lonely Fortress doesn't work, consider the sub-plane Mia, I think the Magic Realm is quite hidden."
"Got it," Bo Bo nodded, looking at the Shadow Contract Team beside him: "After the mission is done, we'll head back to the Eternal Rock and proceed as planned. Be careful, everyone."
"You stay alert too. Alright, let's set off, Robin Hood and Her Majesty the Queen." Su Ming extended his hand, taking a few steps to the side: "Teleportation Gate, off the coast of Washington, D.C."
The twisted and distorted purple teleportation gate opened once more, the three of them stepped through in single file, and the gate closed instantly in front of Bo Bo.
Bo Bo looked at where they disappeared, quietly contemplating for a moment, then shook his head, bringing the cup to his lips.
In the current situation, it's no longer something a harmless gorilla like him can be a part of. It seems his task this time is to be a rear guard, taking care of the Shadow Contract and Teen Titans, the young ones.
.............
"Oh my God! What on earth happened here!?"
The exit of the teleportation gate was right over the sea. Green Arrow almost stepped off and fell into the sea, Su Ming grabbed his arm, stabilizing the three of them above the surging waves, standing over fifty meters high, like a tsunami.
But Green Arrow had no mood to complain about arriving on top of a tsunami.
Their gaze swept over the boiling sea surface, witnessing desolation before them. The city that once stood is now just a massive pit.
Yes, a super crater. In his understanding, only a comet hitting Earth could create such a mark, because the former Washington downtown now looks like a basin filled with lava, glowing red in the night.
Billions of tons of seawater are pouring into the pit, creating a mist that veiled a large section of the starry sky.
Su Ming glanced at Diana, who was floating beside him with the same look of surprise, and sighed, "We're currently off the eastern coast of Dover, and as you can see, the explosion centered on the Hall of Justice... the mushroom cloud hasn't dispersed yet, has it?"
"...The Justice League members should be fine, we've merely lost some money, which isn't a big deal." Oliver quickly calmed down, confident in his teammates' abilities.
Diane was panting heavily, "Who did this? I want to kill him."
"Besides the Laughing Bat, who else could it be?" Su Ming provided the answer, even though it was an obviously apparent question.
"What should we do now?" Diana looked at Deathstroke without hesitation, hoping he'd come up with a plan, as he always did.
Su Ming pulled the two of them back a few more kilometers, the once-bright mushroom cloud now darkened, with radioactive dust beginning to fall continuously like black ash rain.
"There's nothing we can do; this high level of radiation makes it impossible for any of us to enter the city."
Oliver understood the meaning behind Su Ming's retreat: nuclear radiation is the fundamental reason for the power of nuclear weapons, and it seemed the explosion hadn't happened long ago, meaning Washington would be a dead city for at least a few days.
Diana frowned, placing her hand on her sword hilt, "Why would the Laughing Bat do this? Blowing up the Hall of Justice doesn't give him any advantage, it only intensifies my desire to slice him apart."
"Maybe he has a way to move through hell filled with intense radiation, allowing him not only to take whatever he wants but possibly to defeat some members of the Justice League to gain an advantage.
Afterwards, Su Ming roughly explained his previous analysis, idly stroking his mustache with his free hand.
Diana wondered why Deathstroke didn't immediately relay the news of the Hall of Justice's destruction and could leisurely drink tea with the two of them. But even if they learned about it sooner, there was nothing they could do upon arriving, so she swallowed her words.
Actually, Su Ming's aims weren't that simple; he was buying time for Cindy.
.................
Time rewinds to a few minutes ago.
Despite still not distinguishing between Cindy and Su Ming, Barry's past experiences led him to trust Deathstroke's command, placing the heroes rescued from the Hall of Justice in the hills 70 kilometers west of Washington.
Considering the blast's calculated range, this should be a relatively safe zone. But the only issue was that he and Clark, running back and forth within the city, never caught sight of the Laughing Bat.
The mastermind seemed to have vanished into thin air, and the full extent of what the Hall of Justice lost couldn't be accounted for.
Among those so-called exhibits, some were indeed terrifyingly powerful artifacts, and now all of them were unaccounted for.
The nuclear bomb can't solve all problems because several real items couldn't be melted even by the sun.
He didn't notice that while he led Deathstroke in a desperate escape, within the Bullet Time Domain, Deathstroke directed him while secretly snatching something resembling a drawing board.
And in the woods, aside from Barry and Superman, the others could only stare blankly at the mushroom cloud.
"Looks like rest time is over; we must proceed to the next step!" Star Hero didn't even have time to change clothes, his uniform was still torn and tattered.
Hawk Woman took a look at the Green Lantern Hero behind her. To prevent nuclear radiation, he'd already expanded a green shield, like a turtle shell enveloping everyone beneath it.
"What should we do?" Megan scratched her red hair. She'd just tried to extend the tendrils of the Mind Network to locate the enemy, but a sudden dark laughter echoed in her mind—there was something wrong with this nuclear bomb.
Looking around, she still felt that the steady-looking Star Hero seemed more reliable, though Deathstroke was also present, he appeared to just go with the flow, the kind of hired mercenary who completed tasks for money, following the boss's orders.
"Originally, I hoped to wait for the Mars Hunter and Batman to return, and for the Sea King and Sea Queen to be free, so we could discuss further. But that's clearly not an option now; we must immediately begin to repair the Origin Wall."
Megan's small mouth gradually widened, her green skin set off by conspicuous red lips: "Repair... the Origin Wall?"
Star Hero looked at her, his head full of white hair now nodding, "This universe has many origins, but only one endpoint; in such a place, everything starts to lose the distant view, and all paths leading to origin are blocked."
"You're talking about the Origin Wall?" John slid a bead of sweat down his black skin. He hadn't imagined being attacked by a nuclear bomb inside the Hall of Justice.
If the nuclear bomb had detonated externally, the Hall of Justice's energy shield would have completely withstood it. But the prior explosion point was clearly inside the hall, which implied things he dared not think deeply about.
Star Hero crossed his arms, looking at the massive mushroom cloud, something an old man like him had never witnessed, yet he had related knowledge in his mind, a very nuanced feeling.
"No, I'm talking about the things beyond the Origin Wall, a place known as the Eternal Universe."