Smallville Town, Highway 5.
The inky blackness of the late night was so thick you couldn't see your hand in front of your face. The occasional mournful caw of ravens, roosting in the woods lining the highway, added to the chilling atmosphere.
A beam of light pierced the darkness. "Vroom!"
A red SUV roared down the road, startling the ravens into an uproar of cawing.
"Whoosh!"
Before the poor birds could recover, another massive shadow swept past. Sensing danger, the ravens scattered, flapping their wings in a flurry.
Inside the SUV, the wind howled, blasting in from all sides. Chloe had to shout at Pete to be heard, "Call Gino! Clark's not answering!"
The girl knew that whenever Clark was around Lana, his IQ took a nosedive.
Time was of the essence, and between Clark and Gino, Chloe chose Gino without hesitation.
Her past experiences had taught her that Gino was more reliable. After all, Gino didn't seem to have any girls he liked, and he wouldn't be distracted by a woman and miss a call.
Pete's trembling fingers finally found Gino's number. As he dialed, Pete's peripheral vision caught the dense woods behind them, where a flock of ravens scattered in all directions.
"That thing is still following us," Pete said, a look of despair on his face. He put down the phone and, shivering, took out paper and a pen from the SUV's storage compartment.
Chloe pursed her lips, accelerating the SUV while looking curiously at Pete. "What are you doing?"
"Writing, writing a will," Pete sniffled, then asked Chloe, "Do you want me to write one for you too?"
Chloe's face darkened. "Shut your mouth, Pete!"
"We are not going to die here!" Chloe gritted her teeth.
"Why?"
"Because I believe in Gino!"
Luthor Manor.
Gino, the object of Chloe's hope, was sitting in a chair, making quick work of the pastries on his plate.
Well, girls kept coming up to him every minute, asking him to dance, and Gino could only use the excuse that he was "eating" to turn them down.
"Young master."
The old butler hurried over, holding a flip phone: "You have a phone call. The caller is your high school classmate, Pete."
"Thank you." Gino thanked the old butler with a smile, took the phone, and answered, "Hello? Pete, where did you and your dance partner go?"
Pete on the other end of the phone was instantly moved to tears when he heard Gino's voice.
"Thank God you finally answered!"
Pete shed tears of excitement (and fear), speaking at a rapid pace. "Come save us, Gino! My dance partner turned into a bat monster and is chasing me. It looks like it wants to eat me."
"Bat monster?"
Gino slowly stood up, thinking to himself that it was indeed as he had guessed. Pete's dance partner was probably also turned into a metahuman by kryptonite.
This was a good experimental subject. Gino remembered that Lex's research was only missing one last test subject. If they could capture it alive, it might help his cheap older brother's research.
"Where are you now?"
On the other end of the phone, Gino heard Chloe's voice. The girl shouted at the top of her lungs, "On Highway 5 in Smallville Town, about to leave the town."
The girl hadn't even finished speaking when a hideous noise erupted from the phone, followed by Pete and Chloe's terrified screams and the screech of tires against the road as a vehicle overturned.
Gino stood up and strode towards the manor's exit, instructing the butler as he went, "Butler, the dance will end at midnight. If I haven't returned, you are to organize the dispersal."
"Yes, Master," the butler said with a slight bow, watching Gino navigate through the crowded partygoers. He reached a secluded corner, and in the next second, the young master vanished, as if erased from the world with an eraser, or as if the world had glitched and he had simply disappeared.
Witnessing this astonishing scene, the old butler paused briefly, then quickly regained his composure, turning and walking away. He had worked for the Luthors for over twenty years, and the most important qualities were discretion and understanding.
Breathe, breathe.
At a speed no one could perceive, Gino darted through the forest like a bolt of lightning.
Boom! Boom!
To save time, Gino didn't bother avoiding the trees in the dense forest. Like a savage beast, his steel-like body easily smashed through the trees, leaving human-shaped impressions in the trunks.
Finally, after choosing to take a shortcut, Gino reached the highway Chloe had mentioned in just one second.
Gino looked around and quickly saw the scene not far away.
A hideous bat monster was perched on a flipped-over SUV. The tattered red dress it wore suggested that before the transformation, it was probably human.
The monster was now waving its large claws and pounding on the SUV. Underneath the vehicle, Pete was screaming in terror, and Chloe was panicking.
Its crimson eyes were filled with madness, and countless drops of saliva dripped from the monster's mouth, hitting the ground and emitting a foul odor.
Just by looking at the monster, Gino easily deduced that it had lost all basic rationality; only madness and hunger drove it.
Clark would be heartbroken to see this.
Gino shook his head with a smile; the scratches on the car would cost quite a bit to fix.
Turning his gaze back to the monster:
"But, it's gotten so ugly. Is there any hope of it changing back?"
Gino didn't think there was any hope, but he suppressed the thought. The young man clasped his hands around a large tree beside him.
"Up." Gino tugged upwards lightly, his expression unchanged.
"Boom!"
The deeply rooted tree was uprooted, easily cradled in the arms of a creature many times smaller than it.
"Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!"
Gino twisted his waist, causing the giant tree to spin. The leaves rustled in the wind, making a sound that successfully caught the monster's attention.
"Roar!"
It opened its huge mouth and roared, staring at the small person waving a tree not far away, its gaze filled with confusion.
But the next second.
"Whoosh!"
Gino suddenly released the tree, and the tree, losing its traction, shot out like a cannonball thanks to inertia!
The short distance of a few hundred meters vanished in an instant. By the time the monster saw the giant tree coming and tried to flap its wings to escape, the tree had already approached its body.
"Bang!"
Without the slightest suspense, the giant tree knocked the monster away. The remaining force propelled the monster and the tree together out of the highway, slamming heavily into the dense forest beside the road, kicking up a large cloud of dust.
Gino stared at the dense forest, his handsome face full of disdain.
In the dense forest, the bat monster was easily pinned beneath a giant tree, unable to move, only managing to open its mouth and roar incessantly.
This lowered Gino's opinion of the monster even further. Jeremy, Grey, and Watt, though useless, at least knew how to use their brains. But the opponent he faced today was nothing more than a mindless beast.
Gino sighed, walking unhurriedly to the off-road vehicle and saying, "There's no sense of accomplishment in defeating something like this."
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(End of Chapter)