"Barmulodi!"
Jor-El clenched his fangs, grinding his teeth with such force that his gums began to bleed with salty, crimson blood. His eyes narrowed to sharp slits. His canine nose and face twisted with rage, contorted in feral, wrinkled hatred.
His face warped in a frenzied snarl, fists clenched so tightly that the bones turned white. His sharp, curved claws dug straight into his palms.
His body's cells erupted in violent turmoil, like a thousand needles stabbing inward. Every moment, the presence before him emitted a chilling light like a blade at his neck, a sensation of death.
Deep in his heart, he felt an icy dread. The fierce pounding of his heart roared in his ears.
His adrenal glands surged instantly, flooding his body, coursing like wild dragons through his tendon-like rivers.
The shock of Bardi's reappearance sent him into a frenzy of hatred!
Why won't you die?!
He had sacrificed everything.
Even now, reduced to a beast.
All to defeat him!
And now?
That which had been defeated, stands again!!
He had nothing left to defeat Barmulodi! Nothing to overcome this sinner again!
"Why won't you die!!"
Jor-El roared. His claws withdrew from his palms, his white knuckles bent, limbs outstretched, chest heaving as he let out a maddened roar. Thunder exploded within him, shaking every cell in his body.
His body trembled with fear. His snow-white fur bristled like needles. But the fury in his chest overwhelmed his reason, his bloodshot eyes erupting with rage. The blood vessels in his eyelids burst with fury, blood flowing freely.
Caught between physical terror and overwhelming rage.
At this moment, he became a true beast, void of reason. His eyes burned red, gums cracked with blood, and his fangs shimmered with a cold, crimson glow.
"You should have died!! Sinner of Krypton!"
He dropped to all fours. His raised head twisted grotesquely, and his crimson eyes glowed with the fury of an unwilling beast.
In a flash, he vanished from sight.
A massive crater burst into the earth where he had stood, and the air tore like fragile plastic wrap under his charge.
A sound barrier cloud erupted behind him, and the sonic boom didn't hit until the next moment.
He had become a beast, charging on all fours in a blur of fury. A long, blazing streak tore across the ground, ripping through the night. In an instant, he had crossed a thousand meters, his body glowing with fiery heat. The white-edged shockwave cloud reappeared before him, fueled by escalating rage and madness.
Each of his limbs struck the ground like those of a primal wolf, tearing the earth apart as his feral form streaked across heaven and earth.
Bardi's cloaked figure stood still. Beneath the shadowed hood, only a rugged chin was visible. His eyes glowed with terrifying darkness beneath the cloak.
At Jor-El's furious cry of "Sinner," something inside Bardi ignited. Rage flared in his chest, and his blood began to burn.
Those hopeful eyes lingered in Bardi's mind.
A tragic, sacred memory returned:
An elder who sacrificed himself to shield Bardi from searing heat.
A woman of faith who handed over her infant, choosing death so Bardi might live.
A girl with bright eyes, burning herself to light his path.
A young man who saw Bardi as his last hope, kneeling and clearing thorns before him.
Wherever his gaze turned, there were people willing to give their lives for him, without hesitation.
He had raised the banner in the darkness, in the gutters, in the filth.
He was hope. He was light. He was their faith!
He was the beacon and belief of all untouchables.
Behind him burned a madness of hope that none could comprehend.
All looked up to him, believing in him. He had become the most radiant and prominent god beneath the crimson sun at its end.
They!
They were meant to be his people, those who would witness his glory, watch him stride across the stars, and carve out new territories.
If there is a sin.
His sin was... failing on Krypton!
No one else could rule them!!
AHHH!!
Pain and fury erupted in Bardi's heart. The grief and rage surged through his blood, burning away his pain. The hopeful eyes, the sacrifices made for his ambition, now all buried under his failure.
His sin—
Was simply that he failed to become the brutal king who ruled Krypton!
'PONG!'
From beneath the cloak and hood of shadow, two black-hole-like rays, deep, dark beams like light from the abyssal void.
Everything in existence paled before those beams of darkness.
Jor-El's figure twisted sideways mid-charge. The dark rays bore down on him with suffocating pressure, a deathly presence like a blade across his neck.
The black light tore past him. His body instinctively reacted, cells tensed, goosebumps erupted.
He dodged purely on reflex, like lightning, and charged forward again.
However.
The twin beams of darkness seemed sentient, bending midair, arcing from behind, pursuing Jor-El and locking onto his hind leg joints.
In an instant, his hind legs were corrupted, Kryptonian genes twisted and atomically rearranged.
Like molten sludge, his hind leg joints splattered with a strange, thick texture, like melting chocolate. As he moved, the 'chocolate' melted again, filling the air with a nauseating scent.
He snapped back to awareness, eyes wide. His body collapsed forward, face slammed into the ground, rolling at supersonic speed and kicking up waves of shattered soil and dust.
During the roll, he instinctively adjusted his position and launched upward from the ground.
Bardi's massive figure suddenly loomed before him.
That dark, cloaked silhouette blotted out his vision.
A massive arm, with thick, defined muscles wreathed in a haze of dark mist, suddenly extended from the cloak and slammed into Jor-El's dog-like face.
"Did you save Krypton?"
Beneath the cloak, Bardi's rock-hard chin moved. Rage thundered from the depths of his throat.
His fist struck Jor-El's canine face directly.
Magical energy flooded the impact. Jor-El's cells withered and weakened instantly. His cheeks twisted. His fangs shattered at the roots. Other teeth erupted from his gums, blood splattering as his eyeballs shrank, trembled, then popped from their sockets. Blood burst from his eye sockets, and his face collapsed inward.
Under the power of the blow, he was blasted backward faster than the impact itself, sand and dust billowed in his wake.
He tumbled across the ground, claws and legs digging into the earth, carving out four deep trenches.
His body hit the ground hard. He coughed up blood. His face was sunken, corrupted by magical power, unable to regenerate for now.
He rose again in the dust, body twisted and blurred in the swirling debris. He looked broken, tragic and furious. His rage surged through his pain.
"If it weren't for you, starting that war, draining Krypton's last trace of vitality..."
"Letting Krypton die in nothing but wailing!"
"I could have saved it all!!"
(To be continued.)
***
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