Shadow Monarch in DC,Chapter 277: A General Reforged,FrenzyAren,Luo Lush

Chapter 277: A General Reforged

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The torn hull of the Kryptonian vessel screamed as Arthur punched through it like a meteor of night.

Metal warped and peeled away from his passage, sparks spitting across the narrow corridor he landed in.

Three armored Kryptonian soldiers were already waiting for him, rifles drawn and humming with lethal energy.

They didn’t shout warnings. They didn’t even waste time.

They fired.

Arthur didn’t bother raising a hand.

The violet glow behind his eyes sharpened and their shots curved with Ruler’s Authority. Bolts of plasma bent in mid-flight, rerouted by sheer force of will. The redirected blasts screamed past Arthur and slammed back into the walls behind the soldiers, turning pristine metal into molten craters.

For a fraction of a heartbeat the Kryptonians froze confused, their training failing to account for this kind of magic.

Arthur moved.

A burst of shadow and muscle his elbow smashed into the visor of the first soldier. Armor dented inward with a sickening crunch.

The second swung a fist, but Arthur caught his wrist and twisted shadows coiling around bone then slammed him through the ceiling panel above, leaving the body hanging lifelessly.

The third soldier tried to back away, hands shaking but Arthur didn’t give him the chance.

He delivered a single kick to the chest armor caved like wet cardboard and the Kryptonian crumpled, breathless, unmoving.

Bodies hit the floor in a stuttering chorus of metal on metal.

Arthur exhaled once, controlled and focused.

"They’ve clearly spent some time under our sun," he murmured to himself, stepping over the broken forms. "A little stronger than they are supposed to be, otherwise these hits would have been even more brutal."

He continued deeper, the ship groaning around him as emergency systems failed one by one.

Flashing lights strobed against his cloak.

"This ship won’t stay airborne much longer," he muttered, pace quickening into a silent blur. "I need to find her now."

He slipped through the corridors like a shadow, then stopped.

There.

A containment vault, its door warped from the earlier impact.

Inside, a pod stood anchored at the center, frost gathering across the surface. Within it a girl suspended in stasis, golden hair like silk.

Arthur’s breath left him in relief he barely allowed himself to feel.

"There you are, Kara."

His hand pressed against the pod shadows curling protectively around the surface when a pulse of killing light flashed behind him.

He moved an instant before a hit should have struck.

The blast scraped the wall ahead, sizzling on impact.

Arthur turned slowly.

Faora-Ul stood at the far end of the chamber, rifle still faintly smoking, gaze sharp.

"You are strong," she admitted, voice a cool blade. Her stance shifted a warrior who found joy in worthy prey.

Arthur didn’t dignify it with a reply.

He launched.

Faora discarded her gun and met him with bare fists a punch like lightning, a kick like a cannon.

Their blows collided, the shockwave rippling.

Arthur’s brow lifted, surprised despite himself she earned that moment by refusing to fold under his strength.

Her expression remained unreadable but her eyes shone with challenge.

"Are you here for Zor-El?" she asked through the clash of fists. A probe. A test.

Arthur’s expression flattened no patience for games.

He drove a brutal kick into her midsection the sound echoed down the entire ship. Faora flew back, armor denting as she crashed through a reinforced wall.

She staggered upright, clutching her abdomen and smirked.

"I got my answer."

Two more Kryptonian soldiers dropped from above, boots hitting the deck hard ready and eager.

Arthur clicked his tongue. "Tsk."

He raised his hand.

From the tear in reality behind him, Doom emerged.

The Doomsday shadow, his Marshall towered with monstrous presence, violet eyes burning.

Arthur jerked his chin toward the pod.

"Take her away. Now."

Doom didn’t hesitate. The giant seized Kara’s containment pod with both hands and leapt through the torn hull.

The sky outside swallowed them as the behemoth plunged into open air, freefalling toward the ground like a meteor.

The Kryptonians watched, stunned.

Faora’s eyes widened, voice hushed with disbelief.

"You wield... abominations. You are no Lantern. No human."

Arthur’s gaze cut through her sharpened by certainty.

"No more distractions," he said, stepping forward as the deck trembled. "Now I can bring this ship down without worry."

All three Kryptonians rushed him at once.

Arthur welcomed it.

****

In the command deck of the ship, on the largest display, Arthur a silhouette of shadow and motion, tearing through everything.

Zod watched without rising from his chair. He watched the feed like a man who measures worlds and men the same way, for utility.

Jax-Ur paced at a console, fingers flicking over glyphs with the nervous energy of a scientist calculating probabilities that kept going wrong.

"He will best Faora and the others at this rate," Zod said flatly, eyes locked on the image, the tone not a question but an observation that tasted like annoyance.

Jax-Ur looked up. "We can still take him," the scientist said, then hesitated. "But he.."

"Then what are you waiting for?" Zod’s voice sharpened like steel. "What can be done?"

Jax-Ur’s hand hovered above his console. His face went pale as he toggled through schematics of the ship, motion vectors of Arthur’s lanterns. He swallowed. "There aren’t that many things we can do right now.."

Zod’s lips parted. "Where is H’El?" he asked, voice suddenly brisk.

Jax-Ur checked another feed, watching the Watchtower’s feed and the clash outside. "He is engaged," the scientist said. "Kal and his allies press him, H’El is occupied but not done. He will join us soon enough."

"Not soon enough," Zod answered. He rose slowly. "Launch the World Engine now. Accelerate my suit’s yellow-sun absorption. I will outpace whatever feeble defenses they can muster."

Jax-Ur’s fingers stilled entirely. The color drained from his face. "General..." he began, voice a tremor. "If I increase the absorption rate beyond nominal parameters, the suit systems and your metabolism will face catastrophic thermal loads. The suit’s shielding can be reinforced, but your cells.. the rate of solar uptake it will destabilize homeostasis. You will risk cellular degradation, radiation sickness, organ overload... your life is in serious danger."

Zod stepped forward, closing the distance to the scientist until the heat of his presence became physical. He grabbed Jax-Ur by the collar with an authority that made the console lights jitter. "Do it," he said, low and without mercy. "There is no time."

Fear flickered in Jax-Ur’s eyes, not the fear of death for himself but the calculus of losing a man to power. He trembled for a moment, then nodded because he knew what would happen if Zod’s hand was left idle. He typed as if his fingers were obeying another will; ancient codes and emergency protocols. The World Engine, integrated beneath the mothership’s core after Zod had looted the outpost.

"Launching now," Jax-Ur said, voice thin.

"Accelerating absorption," Jax-Ur announced. he initiated the protocol that would force Zod’s suit matrices into a state of hyperconductivity. The field around Zod’s armor shimmered as if newly forged; lines of yellow-sun feed began to stream into the suit.

For a breath the deck hummed in that terrible music of power rising. Then a scream tore from Zod unlike anything he had uttered before. It was not a plea; it was the sound of a living thing ripped open and sewn with light. His hands clenched so hard, the inside of the suit roared like a sun furnace brought to bear on a single point of flesh.

Zod’s great chest heaved and he let the scream become a roar, a sovereign howl as radiance seared through his being and restructured him. His eyes, already hard as flint ignited into an emberous red, veins of light running up his neck.

"This is mine!" Zod rasped, Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth, and with a small, terrible smile he added, "Cost is irrelevant."

Jax-Ur’s hands trembled as the last of the sequences locked home. He whispered, low and defeated: "It is not merely heat, General. The force is rewriting your cellular uptake! It won’t be long before you..." He stopped himself. Any more words would be meaningless to Zod now.

Zod closed his fist. He had gambled, forced a scientist’s hand, and paid his blood for power. The World Engine also launched.