dmims Chapter 288 The Mite of Meditation Believes in Darkseid
Chapter 288 The Mite of Meditation Believes in Darkseid
Chapter 288 The Mite of Meditation Believes in Darkseid
My name is Albord Swann, and I am Reverse-Flash, but I will soon become The Flash.
I'm sprinting right now, against my greatest rival, my closest friend, my most hated enemy, and my most admired idol: Barry Allen.
"Swann... let me go! Now is not the time for us to fight!"
During the high-speed run, Reverse-Flash noticed that the Flash's voice was somewhat hoarse, a sign that the Flash was exhausted.
The Speed Force is supposed to accelerate anything the Flash touches without reason, which is why the Flash doesn't burn others to a skeleton by friction with the air when he's carrying them.
Therefore, the sounds emitted by the opponent under the Speed Force should have been clearly audible. However, at this moment, the sounds began to blur and tremble, meaning that the Flash's Speed Force was being plundered and absorbed by the Reverse Speed Force he controlled, and he was getting slower and slower, while in contrast…
I'm getting faster and faster.
"You'll ruin the whole planet... Swann! You'll ruin your own future! You're—committing—suicide—"
The voice of Barry the Flash seemed to grow increasingly distant, as if coming from the horizon, while in contrast, Reverse-Flash's sinister laughter echoed:
"Barry...oh, Barry! Look at you, poor, helpless Barry!"
The surrounding scenery seemed to fly past him in fast-forward, and two figures, one red and one yellow, raced along the sea, the splashing seawater like a curtain across the sky.
At the edge of the horizon, the warm sunlight began to shine on the two of them. At this moment, they had suddenly left the Darkseid landing battlefield in the American metropolis at night and had run to the other side of the earth.
"If the Earth is destroyed, you'll get nothing!"
When Reverse-Flash's face appeared beside Barry, running alongside him, the crimson figure anxiously reached out and grabbed Reverse-Flash's shoulder in the midst of their high-speed run:
"What do you want, Swann? To kill me? To have the entire planet sacrificed for me? No! The Justice League still needs my help. I am a vital fighting force within the League. We must hold off Darkseid in order to—"
"You can shake off Darkseid's Omega Rays, but you can't do any damage to him at all. Can you still be considered a significant combat force?"
Reverse Flash scoffed mercilessly, "Save your breath, great hero. It's our turn now. You have no idea how excited I am for this moment, or how much preparation I've made."
Strands of black and red reverse speed force climbed up the Flash's body, gradually corrupting the original yellow speed force throughout his body.
"What are you doing—"
"I'll devour you, baby, devour you. But that's just one of the things I'm doing," Reverse-Flash said. "There's something else."
"You..." Barry clutched his head.
He felt countless pieces of knowledge erupting from the Reverse Speed Force, which was forcibly entering his body through Reverse Lightning, and shooting into his mind.
"Using the Speed Force to create unstable parallel universes... thereby exiling the enemy..."
"That's right, Barry, that's right. This is a technique invented by your future self, and its damage to the timeline is no less than that of time remnants."
(Note: Time Residue is an advanced technique of using the Speed Force, where the Flash intentionally creates a time paradox, such as traveling back one minute to help his past self fight. However, this also prevents him from traveling back one minute, creating a paradox where his past self disappears after the timeline corrects itself. But before disappearing, he can still fight as a combatant.)
The Flash clutched his head, feeling his movements sluggish—the Reverse-Flash was influencing him through the Speed Force he'd channeled into him. "What do you mean, Swann? What are you trying to do?"
"Oh, Barry, Barry, poor Barry. Isn't what I'm going to do obvious enough?"
Then he heard Reverse-Flash's sinister laughter ring in his ears, and the next moment the Flash felt himself being shoved hard by Reverse-Flash. The Flash, who was running at high speed, lost his balance and fell.
He spun like a top, tumbled, jumped, and fell, then crashed headfirst into a large tree that would take one person to encircle, landing on the muddy ground. This appeared to be some remote, secluded mountain forest, surrounded by trees.
Thanks to the Speed Force's protection, Barry was unharmed—well, that's probably not the case.
He looked down at his forearm, which had just healed.
He had just broken a bone there when Darkseid struck him, and he had just managed to set the broken bone and let it heal completely thanks to his self-healing ability and his own skills. But now it twisted into a strange arc again, and it was clear that it had broken again.
But Barry had no time to pay attention to that. He watched as Reverse-Flash rushed towards him like a whirlwind. After a few brief exchanges of afterimages in the woods, the red shadow was quickly pinned to a tree by the yellow Reverse-Flash. Reverse-Flash's fists rained down on the Flash, and Barry could only cover his head.
He keenly noticed that Reverse-Flash didn't intend to kill him. After all, if Reverse-Flash really wanted to kill him, a supersonic hand chop would obviously be more dangerous than this painless punch.
Therefore, although Barry was thinking of a countermeasure, on the surface he still appeared to be holding his head and letting Reverse Flash attack him.
"I want you to die a heroic death in the battle against Darkseid!"
Reverse Flash grew more and more excited as he fought, as if he had gathered all his hopes and grievances from the past few years into his fists.
"Then I will take your place! I will erase you from history! I will make your name unknown! I will make your relatives and friends, everyone, forget you!"
"I'll make everyone forget your deeds, your achievements. When history books are opened, everyone will only remember that Alberd Swann was the later, renowned Flash!"
"In the history I created with my own hands, no one will remember you, Barry Allen. You will be lost in the annals of history—"
He stopped the beating, then grabbed Barry by the neck and lifted him off the ground.
"I hate you, Flash, I hate you. This is my goal! I'm going to make you disappear!"
The Flash simply looked at him indifferently.
Then he suddenly asked, "Will this be enough to defeat Darkseid?"
"What...what do you mean?" Reverse Lightning was somewhat bewildered.
The other person's reaction was completely different from what he had imagined.
"My question is, if I can open that parallel universe, I'll be able to defeat Darkseid, right?"
"How stupid. I won't let you return in glory, Barry. Besides, ordinary parallel universes can't contain Darkseid. Unless someone is always there guarding him, it's only a matter of time before Darkseid breaks free."
"So...?" the Flash asked.
"So what I'm teaching you is a suicidal version of using the Speed Force to create a parallel universe," Reverse-Flash said. "You need to be forced to release the Speed Force to reshape that parallel universe, to anchor this parallel universe that you just created, which has no past or future, and is extremely unstable. Only then can you truly trap Darkseid."
He scoffed, "But doing that would be like exposing yourself to the Speed Force. You'd be held hostage by the Speed Force, Barry."
Just like the fate of every Speed Force user, we are all destined to become a part of the Speed Force, either forced or willing to choose to embrace the Speed Force permanently in exchange for the powerful force's short-term favor!
"That would be best."
"What?"
Reverse-Flash was suddenly stunned. He looked at the Flash's face, which was stained with the Speed Force. The face that was originally full of solemnity, worry, and wariness towards him suddenly revealed a smile as blue as the clear sky behind them.
"I mean, that would be best," the Flash said. "I already know how to create a stable parallel universe, I should go save the world."
"Are you deaf? Didn't you hear me? If you do that, you'll be immediately kidnapped by the Speed Force!"
"I know."
"What are you talking about?"
Then Reverse-Flash heard The Flash's voice: "I know the consequences. But sometimes we have no choice."
Reverse-Flash remained silent, listening as the Flash uttered his final words: "I'm all ready."
……
……
……
Meditation Mite.
"Thunderous explosion!"
boom!
"What good would it do you to side with Darkseid, Medusa?"
Wonder Woman swung her Lasso of Truth like a whip, shattering a massive boulder that was hurtling towards her with a single strike. She was then sent flying by a magical explosion hidden behind the Mite of Meditation, and she scrambled to her feet, covered in dust.
"Since you've decided to side with Darkseid, why don't you attack me? Come on, don't hide!"
Unmoved, Mite deftly dodged the attack from behind by Shazam, whose body was now barely larger than a thumb. Even so, Mite easily spotted him.
He loudly mocked Shazam, who was attempting a sneak attack.
"You think you can defeat me? You think you can just cast a shrinking spell on yourself and ambush me, and everything will be perfectly resolved? You think I'm so stupid, having absorbed too much magic, that I won't even notice what you're up to?"
The meditation mite told Billy:
"I am a wizard with over a hundred years of experience."
"No, you're a fake wizard, a bug who always wants to look down on everyone else!"
But his voice was immediately countered by Billy in an even louder voice. Shrunken, Billy leaped up and attacked the Mite's tentacles. Despite his smaller size, Billy had clearly used the correct magic; his strength hadn't diminished at all. The Mite's massive body was sent flying by Billy's sheer power.
"But I will try to have pity on you, because I understand how it feels to be treated roughly by someone taller than yourself, so I'll give you one more chance—surrender!"
However, the evaluation of the meditation mite is as follows.
"Utterly ignorant."
He flipped and tumbled in the air like a dragon.
Shazam instantly returned to his normal size, and a massive bolt of lightning struck towards the Mist Mite, but the experienced wizard created a tremendous burst of light.
"An evil light envelops you, swiftly blinding you!"
In an instant, Shazam's attack went astray to some unknown place.
"Illusory form materializes, a giant hand manifests!"
"Get away from me, you big worm!"
Green Lantern Hal flew behind Mite to help Billy, but was instantly knocked away by Mite. Two enormous, azure magical energy hands emerged from Mite's hairy, writhing body and punched the already weakened Hal away.
Wonder Woman tried to trap Mister Medusa, and she did succeed, but she soon discovered that she had trapped Green Lantern Sinestro.
Throughout the battlefield, the enemy remained in a state of neither slacking off nor putting in their full effort; the Mite used some kind of magic to deflect Wonder Woman's attack.
"Oh no..." Realizing she had tied the wrong Lasso of Truth, Wonder Woman had no choice but to abandon it. She then crossed her arms and slammed her two wristbands together, colliding with Mistman's magical fist amidst a violent explosion. One of the magical fists was instantly shattered, but Wonder Woman was also thrown high into the air by the shockwave.
The Rogues attacked the Mite, but they soon discovered Steppenwolf standing in front of them.
The Mite turned its head and looked at Shazam.
"Now it's just us left."
"For my father, for justice and righteousness..." Shazam endured the pain and stood up again.
He roared at the meditation mite, "I will defeat you!"
"Wait, your father?"
"Didn't Batman tell you that I controlled your father's mind and then sent him to be a spy infiltrated into the Justice League?" Mite said.
Shazam was suddenly stunned.
"What did you say?"
"Oh, so it seems even Batman doesn't completely trust you, Billy."
"I've taken control of your father's mind," said the Mite. "I know exactly what he's thinking. He couldn't possibly have come here on his own conscience. Your father doesn't care about you at all, Billy!"
"No! You're lying about my father!"
"What I said is absolutely true, because I want you to understand that fighting is a waste of energy. If you join my society, I will treat you better than your father ever could."
"Join your society?"
"Although the people on our continent call us monsters, that doesn't mean it's true."
The meditation mite said:
"We are all outsiders like you, abandoned and despised by society, lost and alone. You are too, but I am not alone."
The Mite said, "Therefore I choose to serve Darkseid, because he can give me what I want."
"He can give me everything I want!"
(End of this chapter)