"A game?"
Jerome slowly raised his palm, as if he had just heard the most ridiculous joke imaginable.
In the center of his palm was a terrible scar. The wound looked old and ugly, the mark of a steel nail that had once been driven straight through his flesh.
"After Jesus was crucified on the cross," Jerome said slowly, his voice hollow and cold, "he carried all the sins of the world and ascended to heaven."
Stab!
Before the last word fully left his mouth, a blinding surge of electricity exploded from his palm.
The fierce current crackled through the air like lightning. The mechanic's eyes widened instantly as the electric charge raced across his body, making his hair stand on end.
"Seventeen years later," Jerome continued calmly, his palm still glowing with violent energy, "I returned to this world."
"God gave me this ability so I could wash away your sins."
The mechanic trembled uncontrollably as the electricity surged through him again.
Jerome slowly stepped closer, his thin figure emerging from the shadows like a ghost approaching its prey.
"Since you enjoy games so much," he said quietly, his voice carrying a chilling calmness, "let's play another one."
Jerome continued walking forward, each step deliberate and slow.
It felt less like a man approaching—and more like death itself closing in.
"Ahhh!"
A scream ripped through the garage as bright arcs of electricity flashed across the windows.
The violent light flickered again and again, accompanied by desperate cries of agony.
Ten minutes later, the screaming stopped.
A thin figure quietly pulled up his hood and walked out of the repair shop without looking back.
Inside the garage, a body lay curled on the ground.
The once-arrogant mechanic had been tortured until his flesh was burned black. His body was twisted into a tight, unnatural shape, no longer mocking or contemptuous.
He looked small.
Curled up like a baby.
…
Creak.
Jonathan Kent slowly pushed open the heavy wooden door of the barn.
A musty smell drifted up from the ground, mixed with the damp scent of rotting grain stored long ago.
Victor already knew exactly what was about to happen.
This was a classic moment in Clark's life—the moment he would finally learn the truth about where he came from.
Victor rarely restrained his usual relaxed expression, but now his gaze rested on Clark with a hint of concern.
He wasn't sure how Clark would react.
Because Victor existed in this version of the story, things had always been slightly different. When Clark had first appeared as a baby, Jonathan and Martha already had their own biological child.
They had no obvious reason to suddenly adopt another infant.
So the couple had quietly raised Clark in secret and simply told the world that the two boys were brothers.
"What are you talking about, Dad?" Clark asked uneasily.
A strange sense of panic tightened around his heart. Suddenly he regretted losing his temper earlier.
His parents had only been trying to protect him.
He knew that.
So why hadn't he controlled himself?
Why had he exploded like that?
"This is something your parents left for you, Clark," Jonathan said slowly.
He opened an old, inconspicuous box tucked away in the corner of the barn.
His expression was heavy, and there was a faint sadness in his eyes as he reached inside.
Jonathan carefully took out a long black object and turned to hand it to Clark.
It looked like a stone key of some kind. The material was dark and unfamiliar, and an embossed symbol resembling the letter S stood at its head.
"Parents?" Clark repeated in disbelief.
His face drained of color.
He stared at the object in Jonathan's hand but didn't dare reach out to touch it. It felt like he was looking at something fragile—like a bubble that would burst the moment he tried to grasp it.
If that happened, something precious might disappear forever.
"Dad… this joke isn't funny."
Even as he said the words, Clark felt something strange in his chest.
His father was clearly lying.
So why wasn't his heart racing in anger?
Why did the fear in his chest feel so real?
Victor narrowed his eyes slightly as he looked at the black key.
"The key to the Fortress of Solitude," he thought.
Then he glanced toward Clark again.
Seeing Clark's shaken expression, Victor felt a flicker of worry. For most people, learning in a single day that the parents who raised them weren't their biological family would already be a devastating shock.
If Clark learned he was an alien on top of that…
Victor suddenly remembered something a certain pale-faced madman once said.
"All it takes to drive someone insane is one bad day."
Victor's eyelids twitched slightly.
"If Clark actually snapped and turned into some kind of Joker-style Superman… that would be a disaster."
Creak.
Jonathan opened the cellar door beneath the barn floor.
He gestured for both boys to follow him down.
Dust drifted into the air as he stepped forward and pulled away a large canvas sheet covering something on the ground.
When the cloth was lifted, the object beneath it was revealed.
A small spacecraft.
The ship had a smooth, streamlined shape and was roughly the size of a cradle. It clearly wasn't designed to carry adults.
At most, it could hold a single baby.
"No…"
Clark stared at the spaceship as if he had been struck by lightning.
"This can't be real."
He staggered back two steps.
"Dad… please don't do this to me."
His expression had gone stiff, almost pleading. He looked at Jonathan like a frightened child who thought he was about to be abandoned.
"Clark," Jonathan said quietly, forcing himself to continue despite the pain in his chest, "you are actually the adopted son Martha and I took in."
Seeing Clark's reaction hurt him deeply, but he had already begun telling the truth.
There was no turning back now.
Sometimes long-term pain was worse than short-term pain.
"You came from another planet," Jonathan said firmly. "We found you during the meteor shower more than ten years ago."
Clark felt like the ground beneath his feet had turned to clouds.
Everything around him seemed to spin.
The barn.
The cellar.
His father's voice.
It all felt distant and unreal.
"What about Victor?" Clark suddenly asked.
He turned toward his younger brother as if grabbing onto the last lifeline available to him.
"Don't tell me…"
"Victor," Jonathan said slowly, "is the biological son of Martha and me."
Jonathan noticed something strange then.
Victor didn't look shocked.
He seemed far calmer than Jonathan had expected.
Jonathan assumed Victor must still believe this was some kind of joke, but he didn't have the energy to question it right now.
Clark's world, however, shattered completely.
"No… no!"
"This isn't real!"
His teeth clenched as a roar burst from his throat like a wounded animal.
"I won't accept this!"
Clark spun around and bolted toward the cellar exit like someone fleeing a nightmare.
He had to escape.
Escape this lie.
Escape this crushing reality.
Whoosh!
Moving faster than the speed of sound, Clark shot out of the cellar and vanished across the fields.
"Clark!"
Jonathan hurried forward instinctively.
But he stopped at the doorway.
How could an ordinary human father possibly catch a son born from the bloodline of Krypton?
All he could do was stand there helplessly, staring at the empty barn.
The emptiness felt painfully similar to the hollow ache in his chest.
"Clark will figure it out, Dad," Victor said softly.
Seeing the devastated expression on Jonathan's face, Victor felt a wave of sympathy. He had never seen the stubborn farmer look so broken before.
Victor stepped forward and gently helped Jonathan sit down.
"I don't believe he would abandon this family."
"Victor… why aren't you surprised at all?" Jonathan asked tiredly.
Victor shrugged lightly.
"We only have a few houses on this farm," he said. "And Clark has always been… unusual."
In truth, Victor had always wondered how Clark hadn't discovered the spaceship sooner.
Especially when Clark had been a curious kid who loved climbing and exploring every corner of the farm.
Victor himself had sneaked down here years ago just to take a look.
After all…
It was a real spaceship.
"I see…" Jonathan murmured.
He suddenly looked much older, as if several years had been carved into his face in a single moment.
Jonathan sat down slowly on the cellar steps.
He wasn't even sure whether telling the truth had been the right choice.
Then, unexpectedly, he reached out and patted Victor on the shoulder.
"Victor, my son… you did well."
His voice was hoarse, but his eyes were filled with relief as he looked at the child who had always been mature far beyond his years.
"It doesn't matter where Clark came from. It doesn't matter if he's an alien."
"What matters is that he's our family."
"And he's the brother you grew up with."
Jonathan paused for a moment before continuing.
"Don't blame him for reacting like that. He just needs time to accept it."
Victor frowned slightly as he watched Jonathan speak almost absentmindedly.
"I'll go find him," Victor said, standing up.
Jonathan hesitated before responding.
"If—" he paused briefly. "If Clark doesn't want to come back right now… don't force him."
He had already received two devastating blows in a single day.
The entire life Clark believed in—being a Kent—had just been overturned.
Jonathan could only imagine how deeply that must hurt.
"I understand," Victor said, nodding.
But his thoughts were completely different.
"If talking doesn't work…"
Victor narrowed his eyes slightly.
"In the current situation, I might have to give Clark a solid punch to the face just to calm him down."