The Tastement
Ignoring every oath he had ever sworn, Kal-El's voice dropped to a chilling whisper. "Do you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to make you watch, as I kill every single one of your so-called 'friends,' and you won't be able to stop me. I'll kill them all. I will!"
...He had known all along.
Kal-El knew exactly how to wound Soren.
He knew what would be the most severe punishment for him.
He would use the very dagger Sore had handed him, to slowly carve out Sore 's heart.
Just as Soren had stabbed his.
Their painful and hopeless lives had become entangled the moment their fates intertwined.
Like two quantum particles from opposite ends of the universe, they had once been inseparable—starting as childhood friends, their feelings growing deeper, until they finally stood on opposite ends of their beliefs.
They now stood on the shores of destiny's river, each thrusting a dagger into the other's heart.
Angemon quietly listened to Superman's raging accusations.
There was nothing left to explain.
Even if he tried, Superman, in his fury, would never believe a word.
After a long silence, Angemon softly spoke, "There doesn't need to be more bloodshed, Clark."
He listened intently to the sounds inside the base.
The Wonder Woman from another world was battling with the Injustice Wonder Woman, while Batman and Iron Man had returned to the launch site, barely holding their broken bodies together as they tried to repair the damaged device.
"How many more people will you kill?" Angemon asked, his voice filled with confusion.
Raising his great sword, he declared, "I will protect them, Clark."
Superman's eyes turned a vicious, blood-red hue.
He charged toward Angemon, fists clenched, fully intending to tear his wings off—
But just as he neared, he heard Angemon's soft voice, an apology.
Angemon extended his hand, palm open toward Superman.
"I'm sorry, Clark. I deceived you again."
A brilliant white light shot from Angemon's palm, instantly enveloping both of them in its blinding radiance!
Seraphimon's final attack <<Testament >> was a move that sacrificed his own life and convert it into a cataclysmic energy explosion or big bang.
White light radiated outward from Angemon's body, as though he had swallowed a seed of pure light.
Beams of energy burst from within him, causing tiny cracks to appear all over his body.
The sheer magnitude of the power rippling from him made Superman realize what was happening—but it was too late to stop him.
Angemon held Superman's hand tightly.
"We'll go to hell together, Clark."
In the blinding brilliance of the light, <<Testament >> detonated into a colossal explosion, the heavens and earth consumed in a radiant blaze, like the force of the Tunguska Event unleashed in the sky.
The energy of billions of tons of TNT stopped even Superman in his tracks.
In the blazing white light, Superman let out an anguished scream, "Soren!!!"
Soren, however, smiled—a smile of release, of finality.
The shockwave from the <<Testament >> explosion sent Superman hurtling through the air, like a hammer falling from the sky, slamming him into the ground.
He plunged a hundred meters into the Earth, creating a massive crater a kilometer wide.
But even that wasn't enough to keep Superman down.
The skies, torn open by the explosion, revealed the rays of the yellow sun, shining down through the clouds.
Bathed in the intense equatorial sunlight, Superman's power would soon recover.
The only thing that could stop him now was the kryptonite missile!
Finally, the kryptonite device had been repaired by Batman and Iron Man.
As the countdown ended, the missile launched from the base, carrying the last stockpile of kryptonite on Earth—pieces collected by the people Superman loved most.
It soared through the sky, targeting the temporarily incapacitated Superman, and detonated, releasing a towering mushroom cloud over the land.
Three thermonuclear bombs detonated the kryptonite.
The kryptonite was shattered into its elemental form, and the lethal radiation mercilessly attacked Superman.
He tried several times to rise amidst the smoke of the explosion, only to fall again and again.
The ash from the explosion blanketed the entire land.
Before the kryptonite blast erupted, the Superman from another world—Clark Kent—had already regained his strength under the yellow sun.
He had quickly evacuated everyone near the blast center.
... Everyone except for the one who had sacrificed his life to trigger <<Testament >>—Angemon.
After the blast wave from <<Testament >> faded, Angemon returned to his original form.
All the streams of digital code were withdrawing from him, turning into faintly glowing numbers that vanished into the air.
He fell from the sky, crashing into the dust not far from the massive crater created by Superman's impact.
... He was still breathing.
In the final microsecond before the kryptonite detonation, Clark Kent had wrapped him in his arms, shielding him.
Even though they were already some distance from the epicenter, the kryptonite radiation still affected this Clark Kent.
His forehead was drenched in cold sweat from the pain, but he continued to hold Soren tightly in his embrace.
—No, even if this wasn't Soren, even if it had been an ordinary, weak little girl, Clark Kent would have made the same choice.
Because the name "Clark Kent" stood for unyielding, unwavering protection.
In the distance, the severely injured Superman—still inside the massive crater from the explosion—refused to give up.
The kryptonite radiation had rapidly corroded his once impenetrable skin, causing it to peel off in chunks.
His eyes had been destroyed by the radiation, the eyeballs rotting, leaving only two blood-red, hollow sockets.
Two lines of bloody tears slowly trickled down his face.
He could no longer see the world around him, yet he still stretched out his hands in vain, groping at the scorched earth beside him, screaming hoarsely over and over again.
"Soren!"
"Soren!"
"Soren!"
He knew Soren was going to die.
He knew that Soren's life would soon slip away, not far from him.
Such a powerful explosion—of course, it had required a sacrifice of life—