This Earth is seriously screwed.
That was the only conclusion Joey came to after finishing his conversation with the Martian Manhunter.
As one of the founding members of the Justice League from the early days of DC, the Martian Manhunter was practically a Martian version of an upgraded Superman.
Not just in terms of power—but in morality as well.
He had once watched his wife and daughter burn to death right in front of him, and after being accidentally thrown a thousand years into the future, he became the sole survivor of the Green Martians.
After going through confusion and rage, he ultimately chose to settle down on Earth—to help and protect humanity, so that this young species in the solar system wouldn't suffer the same fate as his own people.
But now, he and the hundreds of surviving Martians with him were clearly driven by only one thing: revenge.
Even if it meant following the Kryptonians and burning entire star systems to ashes—spreading the same tragedy that befell their own race to others—they didn't care.
And now, the Martian Manhunter had stubbornly decided to follow Joey's lead no matter what.
For the moment, that wasn't necessarily a bad thing—at least not before the Kryptonians arrived.
Because over a hundred Martians, even without telepathy, would already count as a catastrophe for Earth as it currently stood.
As for what Cyborg had hinted at earlier—killing all the Martians present—Joey had considered it.
The Martians' weakness to fire was simply too exploitable for someone like him, who could use heat vision, and for Cyborg, who had access to a wide range of explosive weaponry.
Wiping out the remaining Martians on the spot might be difficult for Joey alone, but with Cyborg's hundreds of robots, only a few might escape at best.
But what would that make him?
Bringing about a second extinction for the Martians—and then claiming it was 'a small price to pay for the future peace and stability of Earth'?
"Let's go, Cyborg."
Joey first dismissed the hundreds of heavily armed drones scattered across the area, showing a bit of goodwill toward the Martians.
Then he turned to the now slightly relaxed Martian Manhunter and said:
"As for you—keep doing what you were doing before. But this time, do it better."
These Martians had, in reality, already taken control of the military and political power across North America. If Kara hadn't suddenly shown up to stir trouble, Joey might not have realized this until the Kryptonian fleet actually arrived.
"Don't let those pests cause trouble again. I don't have the time to deal with them right now."
Joey looked at the dawn rising on the distant horizon, took a deep breath, and then let out a long sigh.
Four days left.
As time passed, the arrival of the Kryptonian fleet drew closer and closer.
And now Joey had no choice but to face a question he had always avoided.
He had no idea how to win.
In the various Superman stories he had seen before, it wasn't like large-scale Kryptonian invasions of Earth had never happened.
And like every other crisis, they were always resolved by the heroes in the end.
But in those cases, the so-called invaders were merely scraps—tiny remnants of Krypton's former imperial glory.
Joey remembered one particular invasion where Batman solved the crisis by releasing massive amounts of kryptonite dust into the atmosphere, creating a deadly kryptonite rain that took down all the Kryptonians at once.
Methods like that only work against disorganized, undisciplined remnants of Kryptonians. A fully organized Kryptonian army obviously wouldn't be slowed down by tricks like that.
Kryptonite and red sunlight aren't really weaknesses of Kryptonians—just like you wouldn't call blades or bullets a weakness of humans.
One of the key turning points in human evolution—the line between civilization and savagery—was learning to use tools.
It's true that the human body is vulnerable to blades and bullets, but who wouldn't think of making armor or bulletproof vests?
Do Kryptonians look like barbarians to you?
Joey used to think the gap between Earth and Krypton was like the difference between primitive humans and modern humanity.
After encountering Starfire and those Green Lanterns, he realized the gap might be even larger.
But Kara's appearance forced Joey to adopt an even more pessimistic view.
That the difference between humans and Kryptonians might be even greater than the difference between a fruit and a monkey.
That armor she wore didn't just contain lead—it likely also enhanced or even supplied yellow solar radiation.
To the point that, in their very first encounter, she alone was enough to beat Joey until his face was bruised and swollen.
More importantly, her armor even had a serial number stamped on it—no matter how you looked at it, it resembled a mass-produced industrial product.
Even if other Kryptonians weren't as individually powerful as Kara, with that kind of armor, sheer numbers could easily lead to a qualitative transformation.
And that was only the tip of the iceberg of Krypton's military power—Joey hadn't even seen what their space warships looked like yet.
Forget four days—even if Earth had forty thousand years, it might still not be able to rival a civilization like Krypton within the solar system.
The only things that could truly harm Kryptonians—aside from the remaining Kryptonian metal on Kara—were magic.
Doctor Fate? Completely unreliable—a cryptic mystic—and his helmet had already been crushed by Joey.
As for Zatanna or John Constantine? They might be worth reaching out to, but probably wouldn't change the overall situation.
Raven? Right now she was only half of herself—basically useless, unlikely to even help much in a fight like Joey's earlier battle with the other Superman.
Shazam? Joey pictured Billy's clueless face—this one was even more useless.
Speaking of which, Shazam and Black Adam had already started fighting before Joey encountered Kara. What stage had their battle reached now?
Joey swept his gaze across the Earth again and found them in the deserts of North Africa.
At that moment, every punch and every collision between Shazam and Black Adam was like clashing thunder, shaking the entire desert.
Their black and white cloaks whipped violently in the hurricanes and lightning storms they created. The fight had gone from day into night, and neither side could gain a lasting advantage.
Inside Shazam, Billy—after a full night of fighting—was already getting impatient, shouting in his mind:
"What do we do? We have the same teacher—I can't break his moves!"
The power granted to both of them was almost identical—the strength of the six Egyptian gods versus the six Greek gods.
Both possessed equal lightning, strength, speed, endurance, courage, and wisdom. This was essentially an endless battle.
Billy felt like even if they kept fighting through the weekend, there still wouldn't be a result by Monday morning when he had to go back to school:
"Do you think if I tell the principal I skipped class because I was fighting a supervillain in the desert for three days… she'd accept that?"
Billy's complaints caused the slightest lapse in Shazam's focus—and Black Adam caught it instantly.
His fist pierced through Shazam's protective lightning and slammed into the lightning emblem on his chest, sending him flying hundreds of thousands of feet backward.