Ascending to godhood through the Anti-Life Equation...
That idea had already gone far beyond Joey's understanding.
Not the concept of becoming a god itself—
But the method.
For a mortal species to leap upward and become a race of gods standing above the universe sounded impossibly difficult.
And in practice, it really was.
Strictly speaking, Kryptonians were not entirely mortal to begin with. They were remnants of the Sun God Rao's lineage.
Even so, they were still unimaginably far from reaching the level of true gods.
Across billions of years, only a tiny handful of beings had ever successfully forged divinity from an originally non-divine species and ascended into New Gods existing beyond time and space itself.
And even then, those ascensions had only been possible because they inherited the immense legacy left behind by the Old Gods.
The most iconic example was naturally Darkseid, the dark ruler of Apokolips.
The Omega Effect had elevated Darkseid to the apex of all New Gods.
And now...
Jor-El intended to use the Anti-Life Equation as the staircase by which both he and Krypton would ascend into godhood.
Joey was now one hundred percent certain that the descriptions of his father as a mad scientist had not been exaggerated in the slightest.
A normal person simply could not come up with something this deranged.
That was the Anti-Life Equation.
The force capable of controlling every intelligent lifeform in the universe.
How could something like that possibly be discovered and mastered so easily?
Even in the completely unhinged Dark Multiverse, you could not just 'believe really hard' and expect this kind of thing to work.
If it spiraled out of control, Earth would become the fuse, the universe itself the fuel—
And the result would be one colossal cosmic explosion.
"What your father seeks is no simple thing."
Batman stepped closer.
As a second-playthrough veteran who had once defeated Darkseid himself, his understanding of the Anti-Life Equation ran far deeper than most.
"The Anti-Life Equation is more than merely a weapon. It is—"
"I know."
Joey spread his hands dramatically, looking one step away from pulling out an accordion.
"No one understands the Anti-Life Equation better than me."
Batman might have cleared this level before—
But Joey had literally read the script.
And besides the Anti-Life Equation, he understood Kryptonians even better.
Pointing at his own ears, Joey quietly reminded Batman:
"Now is not a good time to talk."
If Jor-El wanted to, he could overhear their conversation at any moment.
At this point, every whisper was basically a loud conspiracy.
Until Cyborg finished creating proper isolation layers, they really should avoid discussing anything sensitive.
"Running system diagnostics... sigh..."
Nearby, Cyborg let out a weary groan while focusing on repairing the damage the Watchtower systems had suffered during the latest intrusion.
"Can somebody help me out here? No? Yeah, alright...."
The once-undisputed king of cyberspace on Earth was genuinely starting to lose his mind after getting repeatedly bullied by cosmic-level entities.
Honestly, the Watchtower's systems were supposed to be virtually impregnable by design.
This underground space station should never have become the kind of place where people could casually walk in and out whenever they pleased.
Unfortunately, after Doctor Fate's helmet distorted time and reality earlier, it triggered a cascading failure throughout the Watchtower's internal timing systems.
To restore the damaged communications and teleportation systems as quickly as possible, Cyborg had temporarily connected the Watchtower's internal network directly to external internet channels.
Back in the day, that would not have posed any real danger.
After all, Earth's internet had basically contained only one truly advanced super-intelligence:
Cyborg himself.
To him, the entire digital world had been his backyard.
Who could have predicted those Kryptonians would play so dirty?
Sneaking in and jumping poor little Cyborg—a cybernetic rookie with only two and a half years of modification experience.
It was basically the equivalent of suddenly shoving a giant alien brute directly into Earth's internet backyard.
And the bastard had chosen the perfect moment to break in—right when Cyborg was preparing for a large-scale teleportation operation—leaving him with absolutely no room to resist.
The good news was that Joey and Bruce still had things they could discuss while waiting.
The bad news was that every single topic available to them was terrible.
Joey planned to head to the medical bay with Hawkgirl to check on the three injured patients still recovering there.
Batman, meanwhile, intended to visit old Thomas and Martha first, both of whom were being held in the detention sector.
Yes.
Ever since reclaiming the Helmet of Fate, Batman had personally imprisoned his own parents inside the Watchtower's holding cells.
In his opinion, the security there was far superior to the aging disaster known as Arkham Asylum back on the surface.
Watching the two silently coordinate and prepare to leave the main hall together, Cyborg nearly blurted something out again.
"If there were an award for—"
"Hm?"
The intensely threatening gazes of Superman and Batman immediately snapped toward him.
Cyborg hurriedly slammed on the brakes and wiped sweat from his forehead.
"Nothing. Just talking to myself."
Before becoming half-machine, Cyborg had basically just been a college student—a former quarterback for Gotham University's football team.
Back then, the war between Wonder Woman and Aquaman had constantly crushed him under unbearable pressure.
Now, even though Earth was apparently on the verge of destruction, he somehow felt more relaxed than ever.
Probably because someone else was finally carrying the weight for him.
Maintaining the most advanced systems on Earth while simultaneously dedicating a separate processing thread to surfing the internet, Cyborg came to this conclusion in a strangely peaceful state of mind.
This was what happened when you spent too much time browsing websites you absolutely should not visit.
At this point, whenever Cyborg looked at Superman and Batman, his brain became flooded with nothing but internet garbage and cursed shipping content.
Clear footage of Batman and Superman had only appeared online less than two weeks ago, and they had already become one of the hottest pairing trends on the internet.
What Cyborg had wanted to say earlier was this:
If there were an award for 'World's Best Partners,' Superman and Batman might lose due to not working together long enough.
But if there were an award for 'World's Best Filial Sons,' these two would absolutely win first place.
One was currently trying to figure out how to deal with his alien father.
The other had literally locked both of his parents in prison and still had not let them out.
Fortunately, common sense stopped Cyborg from actually saying such an unbelievably terrible joke aloud.
If he had said it, Superman probably would have immediately abandoned every other problem in existence just to forcibly delete part of Cyborg's database.
As far as Cyborg was concerned, the top priority right now was repairing the teleportation matrix system, which had already been utterly devastated during the previous cyberwar.
If he did not fix it soon, then this so-called top-tier command center and battle fortress would basically become a glorified public toilet.
Right as Cyborg finally allowed himself two processing threads to relax while working at full power on system repairs, the teleportation matrix suddenly lit up again.
The glow instantly interrupted his wandering thoughts.
"Oh, COME ON!"
The moment Cyborg saw it, he completely snapped.
He immediately allocated thirty more processing threads and synchronized five nearby combat drones to fire at the exact instant the teleportation sequence finished.
"You seriously think this place is a goddamn public toilet?!"
Another unauthorized invasive teleportation.
Exactly like before.
All the self-encouragement Cyborg had given himself earlier instantly shattered.
The reality was undeniable:
Under his management, the Watchtower really had become a place where people could come and go whenever they pleased.
The high-powered plasma rounds should have struck the intruder precisely the moment teleportation completed.
But for some reason, the teleportation sequence calculation took slightly longer than normal.
As a result, Cyborg's attack passed harmlessly through the fading teleportation afterimage and slammed directly into the platform itself, making the already overloaded system even worse.
"Shit!"
A red-and-gold armored figure finally materialized within the teleportation beam.
Caught completely off guard, he hurriedly activated the thrusters on his armor and rolled sideways in a panic, narrowly avoiding the shots that had already missed him.
The man landing on the ground was clearly shaken.
Using the scanners built into the Mark VII armor, he analyzed the murderous half-cyborg standing before him and discovered that every single one of Cyborg's readings exceeded the limits of his sensors.
In simple terms:
The guy's power level was completely insane.
After spending billions of dollars reverse-engineering traces of Joey's residual energy signatures, Iron Man Tony Stark had originally expected to arrive in a more technologically advanced world.
But as Tony looked around at the incomprehensible alien metals surrounding him—and then at the T-800-looking monster standing in front of him—he suddenly felt this world might actually be too advanced.
"I get teleported in and immediately attacked by robots..."
"What is this? The set of Terminator?!"