A staffer rushed into the command center, making Batman's eyes narrow. What he'd been waiting for had arrived.
"Sir, the positron cannon target deviated by seventy degrees! Someone changed our targeting parameters!" the staffer reported urgently. Unfortunately, no one was listening anymore.
A pure white energy beam shot toward the Martian Manhunter in the sky. This pure energy attack posed no threat to J'onn—he simply entered his intangible state and dodged. Before he could process what happened, two more missiles streaked toward him. Superman glanced back and detonated them with heat vision.
Thea looked down at the ground and instantly understood the situation. She turned to the Grand Warlock DeSaad with a light tone. "You're quite skilled at manipulating hearts and minds. It must have taken you considerable time to control these traitors. Impressive—you even managed to block my signals related to trade agreements. With such talent, you can die now."
An arrow of pure soul power coalesced in her palm, faintly echoing with the wails of tortured souls. It trailed a gray-white fiery tail as she hurled it toward the Grand Warlock.
Your attack method looks more evil than mine! DeSaad's face turned bitter. This arrow carried soul fire that could burn away half his life. Normally he'd turn and run, but now he had no such concerns—his master stood right beside his faithful dog.
Sure enough, a massive blue hand caught the soul arrow. Darkseid felt somewhat annoyed that Thea dared strike first. His unmatched strength surged, crushing the soul arrow directly.
Hmm? Something's wrong. In less than a tenth of a second, he realized he'd been tricked. The soul fire had something very problematic inside it.
"Figured it out? Too late!" Thea had long passed the age of easy anger, and she'd anticipated human traitors. She was only mildly surprised that the Grand Warlock had somehow bypassed her trade authority to secretly develop collaborators on Earth. But it was just a minor surprise. As long as she could defeat Darkseid, all problems would resolve themselves.
While studying the divine soul authority, she'd revisited the Primordial Shadow twice. That supremely pure shadow force had given her countless insights, and this move was one of them.
She'd added a little something extra inside the soul fire—something like a corrosion spell in magic, but the effects were worlds apart.
"Cover me!" Thea called out. Her golden hair flew wildly as she bent her right arm, fingers spread wide, remotely targeting Darkseid's left hand. The strange energy with unique corrosive properties invaded the Dark Lord's left hand, and a gray-white vortex connected them.
Diana immediately raised her massive shield, forming a protective barrier around her.
Thea was attempting to drain Darkseid's soul. Of course, that statement only worked on a literal level—actually accomplishing it was impossibly difficult.
One-shot Darkseid? Not even the Spectre could do that, let alone the current heiress.
But whether she could do it was one thing; whether she should try was another. Even if she couldn't succeed, she'd at least annoy the hell out of Darkseid and wipe that smug, hands-clasped-behind-his-back attitude off his face.
She pushed her Soul Siphon to its limit. Even with her soul corrosion technique wreaking havoc inside Darkseid's body, she barely extracted anything.
Darkseid stood like a towering mountain—majestic and immovable. Her siphon was like using a rope to drag that mountain. Despite all her effort, she only pulled away some dirt, leaving the mountain itself untouched.
Thea wasn't discouraged. She'd expected this. If the mountain won't come to me, I'll go to the mountain!
Her right hand maintained the siphon while her left hand used the meager energy she'd extracted to pull up another purple light chain.
Darkseid felt extremely awkward. Initially caught off-guard by her sneak attack, if he'd simply severed his left hand decisively, none of this would have happened. But how could he? Even as an avatar, it was still his body. To publicly cut off his own hand—what about his reputation?
Darkseid chose to endure it. With his powerful divine force as support, Thea couldn't actually hurt him. The gap in their levels was still substantial.
But the heiress had an endless supply of tricks. Her right hand drained his soul while her left performed an alternate version of life drain.
Using the fragments absorbed from Darkseid's soul, mixed with shadow power and a small portion of Darkseid's own life force, a dark creature was slowly taking shape.
Hmm? Darkseid's vision was razor-sharp. One glance told him her intention, and he could no longer care about appearances. He raised a fist several times larger than a pot and struck downward viciously.
Diana wasn't just decoration. Her entire body flashed with golden light as she raised her shield and took the blow head-on.
If this were Darkseid's true form, she definitely couldn't handle it. But this was just an avatar. The goddess of war, relying on her divine equipment and guardian authority, barely withstood Darkseid's assault.
The Dark Lord attacked repeatedly but couldn't break through Diana's defense. In his excessive haste, he even took a sword slash.
"Ahh! Kill them!" Seeing their boss get cut, his two lackeys—Steppenwolf and DeSaad—knew he'd lost face regardless of the actual damage. They charged forward with frantic shouts.
Superman and the Martian Manhunter naturally wouldn't just watch. They each found their opponent and engaged.
Steppenwolf had seen Earth-2's Superman—strong, fast, high endurance, but slightly inferior to himself. With some contempt in his heart, plus fear of Darkseid's post-battle reckoning, his attention wasn't fully focused. After three exchanges, Superman landed a brutal punch squarely in his abdomen.
Facing the Man of Steel who'd trained (slept) in the sun for several months, emerging wiser from his shame, Steppenwolf's divine body couldn't hold up. A large chunk of his armor shattered, and he nearly coughed up blood but forcibly swallowed it down. His axe flailed desperately for seven or eight moves before he finally stabilized.
After getting thoroughly beaten by Batman for three days, Superman hadn't developed some profound martial art—that would be absurd. But his combat talent combined with millennia of refined human martial technique produced results greater than the sum of their parts.
A feint fooled Steppenwolf, and Superman delivered an uppercut straight to his chin. Steppenwolf's countless years of martial experience weren't for show—he retreated slightly to dodge the uppercut while simultaneously swinging his axe toward Superman's waist.
Their fighting styles were similar, both favoring aggression. The difference was that Superman relied more on talent while Steppenwolf depended on experience.
Worried about the shockwaves affecting ordinary people below, Superman intentionally led the battle away from populated areas. Steppenwolf likewise didn't want to witness his boss's misfortune and willingly followed to another location.
He feared post-battle consequences, and the Grand Warlock DeSaad feared them even more. You, Steppenwolf, are at least imperial family, some kind of elder. What am I? Nothing! If the boss hadn't intercepted that soul arrow for me, would he have been ambushed? Darkseid was famous for taking out his anger on subordinates. Thinking of those tragic outcomes, DeSaad felt ready to cough up a lung.
Seeing Superman and Steppenwolf pull their battle eastward, he deliberately lured the Martian Manhunter westward. Bottom line: staying far from his boss couldn't hurt.