Chapter 88: H'el's Limit

Earth was plunged into terrifying darkness without sunlight. Ruthless machines roamed the cities, clashing with the remnants of the human military. Smoke, flames, and blood filled human cities as doomsday arrived faster than anyone could have imagined.

In just over half a month, electronic communication systems had failed, and the fabric of civilization crumbled. The sky, devoid of the sun, was replaced by a massive sevenfold repeating golden barrier.

The other light source was a beam of light emanating from deep within the Pacific, heading toward the distant Cybertron in outer space.

The sevenfold golden barrier absorbed all light within 30.21 kilometers of Earth's outer space. The radiance, filtered and regulated layer by layer, converged like vortexes. Each layer of the sevenfold golden barrier began gathering light, all focusing at the central point, creating a sunbeam of energy with a temperature exceeding 30,000 degrees Celsius and a diameter of two meters. It aimed downward at H'el.

H'el wore black battle attire, arms outstretched, hovering about thirty meters above the ground, receiving this baptism like a god.

"Swoosh!"

The sunbeam, with a temperature of over 30,000 degrees Celsius and a diameter of two meters, descended from the sky, engulfing H'el's black figure.

The energy flowed like water through pores, docile and under H'el's control, circulating through predetermined cells.

The cells behaved like eager beasts starving for beauty, hastily shedding their metaphorical pants and joyously receiving the gathered high-temperature solar energy, directing it into their core.

In an instant, H'el felt the first wave of immense fullness and saturation. Under this overwhelming sensation, the cells began to divide and absorb even more solar energy, evolving into solar energy specific to H'el's physique, with their division syncing in functionality.

Sunlight was the key to unlocking Kryptonian genetics. It wasn't mandatory for Kryptonians to absorb sunlight to gain power, but sunlight was the most direct and efficient source they could utilize. Thus, Kryptonians chose to absorb it.

This sunlight key was absorbed by Kryptonian cells and evolved into energy within H'el's body, far more versatile and potent than the original sunlight key. H'el sensed his cells, under the abundant sunlight, evolving into even more powerful forms, a transformation he felt deeply within himself.

Focused on absorbing this energy, H'el lost all sense of external time.

During the time H'el absorbed solar energy, he began to sense the spatial nodes of this world. Under the overwhelming energy feedback, these spatial nodes gradually revealed themselves to him.

"This is..."

Countless nodes with immense energy fluctuations were discovered one by one through H'el's keen eyes.

He saw the distortion point at the massive star center in elliptical galaxy E6 type NGC205, the gravitational point of the whirlpool galaxy SBc type NGC3992 in Ursa Major, and even peculiarities in barred spiral galaxy SBc type M58 in Virgo, among countless other trigger points spread across the universe.

Across billions of light-years in the cosmos, gravitational waves, singularities, and the strings of waves connecting points and lines were all perceived by him.

His keen vision was filled with undulating points and lines, as if distance no longer mattered, and everything was within arm's reach.

With precision, H'el operated within his cells, gently tearing open a space-time rift smaller than an atom. Instantly, the distortion point at the massive star center in elliptical galaxy E6 type NGC205 in Andromeda tore open a space-time rift, streaming into the opening within his cells.

H'el came to understand the process of absorbing energy.

Next, utilizing the spatial nodes he observed with his keen eyes, he selected points abundant with stellar energy and opened spatial rifts within his cells.

In just a few minutes, he had opened over a quadrillion spatial rifts inside his body, allowing stars from distant corners of the universe to charge him.

The sensation of being charged by stars from different corners of the universe almost made H'el suspect he would explode.

Each second, space-time rifts, each capable of destroying the Earth, filled his cells with energy.

This gradually increasing feeling was intoxicating and addictive.

H'el gradually lost himself in this burgeoning power.

The ability to change size had awakened silently within him, powered by the overflowing energy.

His body suddenly enlarged in mid-air, gradually becoming a five hundred-meter giant. The high-temperature solar energy column, two meters in diameter, descended from the sky, striking his forehead and barely affecting him.

H'el welcomed this transformation with open arms, paying it little mind.

However...

Suddenly, this gradual transformation of his body reached its limits, and further enhancement became impossible.

"Is this my limit?" H'el opened his eyes, still finding it hard to believe.

He could calculate clearly that absorbing solar energy and infusing his cells with stellar energies from the farthest reaches of the cosmos had taken only the equivalent of around two thousand years of super-sunning.

In a mere half-year, H'el had absorbed the energy equivalent to what Superman would acquire from sunbathing for twenty thousand years, and now his body had reached its limit.

"Is this really my limit?" H'el had an instant crisis of self-doubt.

Superman became a Fifth-Dimensional Golden Superman after sunbathing in the sun for fifteen thousand years, and here he was, H'el, having absorbed over twenty thousand years' worth of sunlight, only to reach his limits.

He didn't even come close to becoming a Fifth-Dimensional being.

At the very least... well, he couldn't even think of what the "at the very least" was, and he was plunged into deep self-doubt.

Everything has its limits.

Since H'el started traveling through universes, he had been relentlessly chasing after greater power, constantly getting stronger with every moment.

This constant growth had given him a sense of security and happiness that came from feeling strong all the time.

Now, he suddenly realized he had reached a limit, and that realization left him feeling like he had lost something. He struggled to accept that he had reached his limit.

In this moment of feeling the limits of his physical body, H'el became overwhelmed.

"I don't believe it!" H'el's face grew heavy with disbelief. He didn't want to accept that he had reached this limit. He continued to open space-time rifts within his cells, pouring in more stellar energy and various cosmic radiations, but even with all this additional energy, it didn't fundamentally change anything.

He could only store more energy but lacked the capacity for a fundamental transformation.

H'el was unwilling to believe that his power had peaked, that he had reached this point, and he didn't even fully awaken his abilities. Yet, there he was, at his limit.

Even as Quintessa's maniacal laughter echoed from space, as she attacked and destroyed the seven-fold golden barrier, H'el remained trapped in what felt like a limitless dream.

"Is this really it for me?"

°°°

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