Chapter 615: Wisdom and Power (4)
Retaliation in the Colosseum
As a well-educated, model young man, Clark strongly disliked solving problems with brute force. Unfortunately, reality offered him few other choices.
Galileus's behavior enraged both Clark and J'onn. They could sense the arrogance in his words, as if a God high above was condescending to look upon mortals, where even his laughter or anger was a form of charity.
"I hate this guy."
J'onn said with a blank expression. Before he finished speaking, he had already flown into the air.
"How dare you!"
Galileus's eyes widened in fury. A Holy Light Spear materialized in his hand, aimed directly at the rapidly approaching figure.
J'onn did not dodge.
Bang!
His fist shattered the spear. Without losing momentum, he struck Galileus heavily in the chest.
The force was so immense that Galileus instantly lost his breath. His body flew straight upward, where the speeding Clark struck him in the back.
Crack!
Galileus's spine broke, folding his body to a one-hundred-and-fifty-degree angle. In that moment, he finally remembered: humans were the ones who sealed him.
Clark kicked him back to the ground. Diana held her sword to his neck.
"Now, it's my turn to ask the questions."
Luke's Ultimate Test
In the Fourth Layer of the Rock of Eternity.
To find precise data, the team conducted hundreds of experiments. Each experiment was different, and the requirements were bizarre, wearing the team out mentally and physically. Luke, however, was enjoying himself immensely.
He was like a dedicated gamer challenging a high-difficulty level, and everything he did was aimed at defeating the final boss.
After the initial thread distance measurements, Luke began testing sound.
Sound was different from thread; it was a wave frequency, easily affected by space, and the easiest thing to detect folded spaces.
At Luke's request, the team had to walk and shout random noises. The sound was intermittent—sometimes coming from a great distance, sometimes echoing right beside their ears, clearly audible.
Luke sat in the center, a virtual screen floating before him. He calculated the location of the spatial folds based on the four members' movements and the sound they made. The calculation method he used was completely incomprehensible to ordinary people, even top-tier mathematicians.
This test lasted a full forty minutes. The team's throats were dry from shouting, and even Linda, a Kryptonian, felt waves of exhaustion.
Physical fatigue was nothing; the key was the mental strain.
She simply didn't have the energy to continue this ordeal.
Barry gasped for breath, asking helplessly,
"Boss, how much longer?"
Luke didn't speak, concentrating on his calculations. Seeing this, the four had no choice but to sit down and sigh.
Hasshett clenched his fist. Various malicious thoughts flashed through his mind. He was utterly fed up. He would rather die trapped here than continue being ordered around by Luke.
He was a court priest from the Ancient Egyptian era, a powerful wizard with seven lives. How could he be toyed with like a puppet?
Rage compressed in his heart, gradually turning into murderous intent. Hasshett turned sideways, casting a spell while watching the others from the corner of his eye. Soon, a poisonous snake made of black mist formed in his hand.
The Curse Snake, a black magic from Ancient Egypt, could silently steal a person's life.
Hasshett released the snake, controlling it to approach Luke.
The others failed to notice the anomaly. The snake slowly slithered: twenty meters, ten meters, five meters, two meters... Hasshett wore a sickly smile. The next second, his expression instantly froze.
The snake vanished. Without any warning, it simply disappeared piece by piece.
Luke turned and looked at him indifferently. That one glance nearly killed Hasshett. Fear rooted itself deep in his soul, and his body began to tremble uncontrollably.
His face was as pale as paper, like a patient recovering from a serious illness.
Carter Hall asked skeptically,
"What's wrong with you? Are you sick?"
Hasshett quickly shook his head. "It's an old problem. I'll be fine soon."
Luke sneered inwardly. If not for the sake of the alien spaceship, he would have killed him already.
After this interlude, Hasshett became completely compliant and dared not harbor any further ill intent.
A Breakthrough and a Setback
Soon after, a new round of testing began: energy. Luke activated his power armor and fired energy beams. The beams traveled through the void, beginning to curve when they reached a certain point.
Luke adjusted the position and had the team hold metal plates. The beam struck a plate, reflected in another direction, and suddenly split into several segments when passing through a folded space before returning to normal.
Everyone was already used to this phenomenon.
As before, Luke measured and recorded the data. This time, it took longer, and the data was more complex. His mind operated at an incredibly high speed. Vast amounts of data converged in his mind, classified, organized, and calculated. He identified the anomalies and performed a deep analysis.
This was what differentiated Luke from mere geniuses. The power of his soul brought not only incredible sensory abilities but also unimaginable computational and cognitive power.
His brain was the world's most sophisticated smart CPU.
Time slowly passed. After an indeterminate period, Luke suddenly stood up, his eyes closed. He walked around in a peculiar rhythm. After five minutes, he stopped and said to Linda, who was thirty meters away,
"Walk towards my location, and move fast."
Linda did not doubt him. She pushed off the ground, rushing forward at supersonic speed with a gust of wind. When she reached the three-meter mark, the light and shadow shifted. Following a dizzying sense of disorientation, the girl arrived in an unfamiliar place. The figures were gone, leaving only the endless gray mist.
"What is this place?"
"Luke, where are you?"
She called out a few times with no response. Linda chose a direction and walked straight ahead. Before long, she bumped into Barry, who was sitting on the ground, staring blankly.
"What are you doing here?"
"The same as you," Barry explained. "The boss told us to walk forward, and then I just disappeared."
"This is absolutely incredible."
"It feels like a teleportation portal."
"Stop talking nonsense, let's go back first."
The two walked one after the other and, without realizing it, returned to the starting point. A few minutes later, Hasshett and Carter Hall also returned. The four exchanged glances, unable to hide their shock.
Luke turned off the virtual screen and said, word by word,
"One piece of good news, and one piece of bad news."
"The good news is that I have figured out the operational rules of the Void. By walking in a specific pattern, we can bypass the folded spaces and move in the correct direction."
"The bad news is: the exit location is still a mystery. To find it, we'll have to grope our way forward, little by little."
Hasshett and Carter Hall immediately breathed a sigh of relief. Being able to leave was enough; the time didn't matter.
Linda, however, was anxious.
"How long will that take exactly?"
Luke shook his head. "That depends on luck. If we're lucky, we can figure it out in half an hour. If we're unlucky, it will take at least three days."
Three days?
That was far too long.
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