Superman saw a crack spreading across the shimmering crystal wall. Liu A'dou had been holding on for over twenty minutes, and he could tell A'dou was reaching his limit. But this wasn't the time to rest, so Superman spoke into his earpiece, "Kid, hold on a little longer."
Liu A'dou was trying—really trying—but this energy felt like boiling water. Not just boiling, but constantly boiling, never cooling. It was like being thrown in naked and scalded alive. The pressure was unreal.
Superman hadn't been idle earlier. He'd tried blowing on the energy stream, hoping to cool it. It worked—barely. He eventually realized his lung capacity wasn't as great as he imagined, especially in space. This wasn't like thirty years later, when he could extinguish the sun. Superman was still growing, after all.
It wasn't that Liu A'dou didn't want to keep going. He just couldn't anymore. His Microcosmos had nearly burned out. It was like being rolled around in a global nuclear detonation for twenty straight minutes. With that kind of power, he could've destroyed a whole planet. "Superman, I'm done," he said.
Superman nodded. "I'll take it from here." He activated his bio-magnetic field and moved to intercept.
The moment a crystal wall shatters is always beautiful—but the result is never good, since anything strong enough to break through is definitely terrifying.
Superman's bio-magnetic field kicked in just in time, taking over from the broken crystal wall and blocking the solar flare.
Liu A'dou's chest rose and fell. Even without breathing, he couldn't help the motion. He was completely drained. Fighting was usually simpler—destruction is a chain reaction. Break one key point and the whole thing collapses. Like wrecking Earth: just destroy the core, no need to shatter the crust.
"I should've gone all out from the beginning," Liu A'dou muttered. It would've been risky, but maybe he could've dispersed the energy completely. Too late now—he had no strength left.
Superman was struggling too. There was just too much energy. He didn't say anything about A'dou's regret. No point crying over lost chances—they needed to focus on new ones.
Liu A'dou took off the pendant hanging around his neck—the Quantum Earth. It was the key to crossing universes, and he always kept it on him. "Maybe we still have a shot."
The Quantum Earth worked by absorbing energy to open a portal. As long as energy kept coming in, the portal would expand without activating. Only when the energy stopped would the portal begin to function.
It was worth a try. Superman probably wouldn't have time to escape anyway, so they'd have to cross together.
No time to hesitate. Liu A'dou brought the Quantum Earth close to the energy stream. It immediately found this new outlet and surged into the pendant.
A massive portal burst open, growing larger and larger.
By the time it stopped expanding, only about one-third of the energy had been absorbed. But the gate was already as big as New York. More energy kept pouring in.
Something wasn't right. Liu A'dou had no idea what was going to happen next. This was totally out of control. And this didn't feel like a standard portal. It looked more and more like… a lake?
This wasn't a portal anymore. The huge wave of energy had punched open a stable tunnel!
As Liu A'dou suspected, there wasn't going to be a jump. The excess energy had torn through the teleport gate and created a wormhole in the middle of space—stable, too. The wormhole could draw in ambient cosmic energy to keep itself open, so even if Liu A'dou removed the Quantum Earth, it wouldn't matter anymore.
After about five minutes of turbulence, Liu A'dou and Superman drifted like boats in a spatial rift. Things finally calmed down. Superman stared at the wormhole in disbelief. He hadn't expected this outcome at all.
If that thing led to a dangerous region, Earth wouldn't be safe anymore. And the wormhole was massive.
"This was still to save Earth," Superman told himself. No one could've predicted this outcome. "Looks like we've got more work ahead of us," he sighed, staring at the shimmering lake-like surface of the portal.
"No idea what's on the other side." Both ends of the wormhole looked the same—like calm water, barely half a meter thick. How it stayed stable was beyond Liu A'dou. His understanding of physics wasn't enough to explain it.
"We're gonna need backup," Superman said. He figured they'd better set up a Justice League space station here to monitor things until they could safely shut the wormhole down.
"How about we let Bunny keep watch for now and go back to Earth first?" Liu A'dou suggested.
Superman agreed. Asking Bunny to help was the safest option. So that was the plan.
It didn't take long for Bunny to arrive, and soon she had transported the entire Justice League to the scene. Everyone stared in awe at the beautiful, mysterious cosmic lake.
"Whoa… this isn't some sci-fi movie, right? What is this, Stargate?" said Flash, clearly a fan of the classic show.
"I'm afraid this is a real wormhole, not some TV prop," said Batman. "Do you know what's on the other side?"
Superman shook his head.
Batman wasn't surprised. He went back to scanning the area. Then he suddenly paused, pulled something out of his utility belt, and tossed it to Liu A'dou. It was the Pandora gem.
"This is the gem you've been looking for."
Even Batman stole things sometimes. "It's the source of this whole disaster."
"You guys actually found it," said Wonder Woman, who took the gem from Kid's hands.
It belonged to Themyscira, so Kid had simply returned it to its rightful owner. He added, "I forgot to mention—the one behind all this was Vandal Savage, a primitive man who's been alive for 80,000 years. He should still be hiding in the bunker he built."
"Iron Man has already gone to arrest him," said Batman. Before leaving Earth, he'd already deduced the culprit's identity. No matter how cautious Vandal was, he couldn't cover all his tracks. Even someone who'd lived 80,000 years would leave traces. Batman found him by analyzing subtle details in the equipment at Mount Rushmore.
"Honestly, luck played a big part this time. If Queen Hippolyta hadn't made that request, I wouldn't have found Vandal, and definitely wouldn't have caught onto his evil plan."
Flash realized just how close they had come to disaster. If Kid hadn't stumbled upon the plot, Superman might not have had enough time to stop the solar attack. It came so fast—like a lightning strike. Just a fraction of a millisecond and Earth would've been scorched.
Chills ran down Flash's spine. Even Batman, who'd been calm the whole time, felt a wave of lingering fear. He'd trusted his team, sure, but listening to Kid's account still made his heart pound.
Everyone discussed things for a while, then all eyes turned to the massive portal floating in space. For a moment, no one said a word. This was uncharted territory. If an alien fleet flew out of that wormhole now, they wouldn't be able to stop it.
Based on the Wugang's speed, it would take a little over a month to get back here from Earth. But traveling from here to Earth would take less than five minutes.
A month—that's how long it takes a cruise ship to cross the Pacific. A month—that's how long it takes the Wugang to reach the wormhole. It just showed how far technology had come. As distances shrank, if the enemy's ships were more advanced and faster, they wouldn't need nearly that long to reach Earth. That made Earth incredibly vulnerable.
And the more serious problem? Neither Batman nor Superman had any idea how to close the wormhole. That meant Earth was now completely exposed—vulnerable to whatever danger might emerge from the other side.