Bruce woke up with a sudden jolt, the morning sun slicing into his room through the half-open blinds. His heart was beating faster than usual, and it took him a second to push away the fog of sleep.
The dream clung to him, stubborn and heavy. He could still see it when he closed his eyes: a dark chamber lit only by a glowing magic circle, humming with power. Seven golden cards floated above it, each one etched with strange, otherworldly symbols. The image burned with such clarity it felt more like memory than imagination.
Bruce rubbed his face and sat up, muttering under his breath.
"Probably just a dream."
He stood and moved into his morning routine, forcing his mind back into order the way he always did. Today wasn't a day for distractions.
He had a rare lunch date scheduled with Professor Athena Pallas of Gotham university, and unlike most social or business obligations, this was one he actually looked forward to.
He'd never admit it aloud, but she was more than an acquaintance. And from her demeanor, it was clear she was also interested. Bruce enjoyed how she was smart and beautiful and always knew the right words to say without holding back. He made sure to never miss their meeting.
As he dressed and left his room, his eyes didn't catch the faint markings that had appeared on the back of his left hand. Three small crimson symbols glowed faintly, intricate and sharp, almost like they had been carved directly into his skin. Bruce never noticed, and by the time he locked his penthouse door, the glow had already faded into his flesh.
***
Meanwhile, across the ocean in New York, the mood was entirely different.
The dining table was crowded, voices overlapping in a mess of warmth and chaos that only a family could create.
Diana sat among them, surrounded by faces that belonged to people she called family: her father Edward at the head, her mother Hippolyta seated beside him with quiet confidence, Hera across with her wry composure, Death serene and untouchable as ever, and even Grail, who still shifted awkwardly in her seat like someone who wasn't sure she belonged. Her siblings were also chattering excitedly on the side.
Diana leaned back, her eyes narrowing slightly at her father with a teasing smirk. "So… Father, you have no self-control it seems. Hooking up with the enemy's daughter? What kind of twisted power play is that?"
Edward chuckled, unbothered, reaching for his wine glass. "Almost like stealing your dad's wallet and building a company with that money, Daughter."
The table erupted.
Cassie burst into laughter, pointing a finger at Diana and almost falling off her chair. Alphonse slapped the wooden table so hard it rattled the plates, wheezing as he tried to breathe. Even Soph let out a rare, quiet chuckle, glancing sidelong at his blushing sister.
Diana's face turned red instantly. "I was going to return the money!" she snapped, her voice climbing in pitch as she tried to defend herself.
"Do you really want your daughter begging on the streets for survival? And I only took about five million worth of things!"
Alphonse choked mid-laugh and stared at her. "Five million? Did you just say only? Big sis, that was the 1980s! Do you know what that's worth now? Thirty, maybe fifty million. I only get ten million in research funding and you—"
Cassie cut in, nodding furiously with mock seriousness. "Yeah, sis, you shouldn't complain. Because of you, Dad tells us to get jobs to cover our own hobbies.
Do you even know how much the latest weapons cost? And the antique ones? I begged Dad for weeks to get me Billy the Kid's Colt. It costs Six million!"
Soph shook his head, unimpressed. "You're all so spoiled."
Everyone turned to him instantly, their expressions the same unspoken thought: Really? Coming from you?
Soph didn't flinch, folding his arms and staying calm under the collective stare. Death chuckled from her seat, her hand waving lazily. With a small tug of power, Soph was pulled off his chair and floated straight into her lap. He sighed, resigned, while she cradled him with gentle affection.
"So, honey," Death asked softly, brushing his hair back, "read anything interesting lately? Are you sure you don't want to go to school like a regular kid?"
Soph frowned. "I know everything they'd teach me, mom. I could teach them. It's pointless."
Edward leaned closer from his seat, voice calm but insistent. "School isn't about the lessons, Soph. It's about the experience. Friends, mistakes, all the things you can't learn from a book. You could use a different kind of life—it'd be like a social experiment."
Death smiled faintly, looking down at their son. "Listen to your father. We only want you to be happy. But we also want you to live a little. Try new things. Have adventures. Maybe find a cute little girlfriend."
From the other side of the table, Cassie groaned loudly, flopping onto the surface with her arms spread. "I don't care about school! I just want to fight someone. This is so boring!"
Alphonse's eyes caught something on her hand and he froze mid-bite. "Uh, Cassie? Since when do you have a tattoo? And… it's glowing."
The whole table turned.
Edward's head snapped around, his eyes narrowing. Cassie instantly pulled her hand back, but the glow couldn't be hidden. Three bright red marks, intricate like runes, glimmered on the back of her hand.
"What did I say about tattoos, young lady?" Edward's voice dropped, sharp and firm.
Cassie raised her hands defensively, panicking. "It's not a tattoo, Dad! Look, I didn't get this done!" She held her hand out, showing the symbols.
Edward's face sank into his palm, muttering under his breath. "You've got to be kidding me. Who the hell chose her as a Master? What kind of wish would—" He stopped himself, realization dawning as he looked back at Cassie. "Wait. You were wishing to fight someone, weren't you?"
Cassie's eyes lit up instantly. "Yes! Daddy, I'm so bored. Are you gonna take me to fight some bad guys?"
Death's lips curled into an amused smile. "Those aren't just marks, Cassie. You've been chosen for a secret war between magi for a wish-granting cup. Your father invented it when he was bored. The Holy Grail War."
Cassie nearly leapt out of her chair, clapping her hands in excitement. "Daddy has an underground magical fighting ring? That's so cool!"
Edward groaned, rubbing his temples. "Of all people… why her? Does the Grail want to destroy a country or something?"
Hippolyta leaned forward, studying the marks with a frown. Her tone was firm, the kind of voice that left no room for argument.
"I don't know what madness your magus society is playing at, husband, but if our daughter is chosen, you're going to oversee it. She will not be left alone with this. And if she causes damage, she will not go at all."
Edward sighed, defeated, though a faint smile tugged at his lips. "Yeah, yeah. Might as well see what they've been up to. Come on then, let's take a look."
Cassie threw her fist in the air, grinning from ear to ear. "Yes! Finally, some action!"
The dinner table broke into mixed reactions—Alphonse muttering about the sheer stupidity of it, Soph shaking his head in silence, Hera chuckling under her breath, and Grail quietly watching, still trying to figure out how exactly she fit into this chaos .
And in the center of it all, Edward leaned back in his chair, already thinking of what mess his daughter was about to drag him into.
*****
Hall of Justice
The Hall of Justice had only just begun to settle into its new role as headquarters. The main chamber was still raw around the edges—steel beams exposed in some corners, screens humming with half-calibrated feeds, scaffolding tucked in behind the polished surfaces.
Batman stood near the central table, his usual posture: shoulders square, cape draped, jaw set. The others trickled in, their conversations filling the cavernous hall with a mix of levity and unease. It wasn't often he called them together without Diana present, but this time, he hadn't had a choice.
Superman arrived first, his cape brushing the floor as he landed. "You said it was urgent," he said, eyes narrowing.
"Urgent enough," Bruce replied flatly.
Green Lantern strolled in with a casual grin. "Urgent enough for a morning roll call? Must be serious. Or maybe Bats just missed us."
"Not likely," Flash said, zipping to his chair with a blur of red. "What's going on, Batman?"
Shazam flopped down beside him, leaning forward. "Yeah, what's up? You look like you swallowed something sourer than usual."
(I removed the E, hope you are happy lol)
Batman didn't respond right away. Instead, he lifted his left hand and pulled off the glove.
Three glowing red symbols gleamed across the back of his skin. They pulsed faintly, as if alive, shaped like a sequence of runes none of them recognized. The hall went quiet.
Superman stepped closer, eyes hardening. "When did that appear?"
"This morning." Bruce's voice was calm, deliberate. "I woke up with it."
"Does it hurt?" Flash asked.
"No."
Hal leaned back in his chair, arms crossed. "Okay, so glowing magic tattoos. Not really your style, Bats. I'm guessing this isn't just body art."
"I wouldn't have called you here if it was."
Cyborg tapped the side of his head, his tech eye glowing faint blue. "Hold still. I'll run a scan."
A beam of light flickered across Bruce's hand as Victor's systems hummed. After a moment, his expression tightened. "Huh. That's… interesting."
"Spit it out," Hal said.
Victor's voice shifted into the careful, measured cadence he used when something truly didn't add up. "These aren't just random marks. They're magical seals. Command seals, to be exact.
I cross-referenced their structure with mystical archives and a few black sites that catalog the weirdest stuff we've seen. They're connected to something called… the Holy Grail War."
The words hung heavy in the air.
Flash blinked. "Okay, pause. Did you just say Holy Grail? Like… knights of the round table, Indiana Jones, Monty Python?"
"Yes ," Victor replied. "The cup that was touched by the blood of Jesus. This is… a little different however. It seems it underwent some changes." He turned, projecting a holographic display above the table. The seals expanded in glowing red, rotating as data scrolled alongside them.
"From what I can piece together, the Holy Grail War is a ritual. A summoning system. Seven magi are chosen as 'Masters.' Each is marked with three Command Seals, like what Batman has.
With them, they summon powerful spirits called 'Servants'—warriors pulled from history, myth, or legend. Heroes. Monsters. Gods. Then… they fight."
Shazam leaned forward, his face lighting up. "Wait, so you're telling me it's like a magical battle royale? With history's greatest warriors? That sounds awesome!"
"Not awesome," Batman cut in. "Lethal."
Flash nodded. " A battle like that can destroy cities. But why haven't we heard of them before!"
Superman folded his arms, frowning. "So these Servants… they're forced to fight to the death?"
Victor nodded. "That's the system. The last Master-Servant pair standing claims the Holy Grail itself, which supposedly grants a wish. Any wish."
Hal raised his eyebrows. "That sounds… insanely dangerous. You're saying someone just stamped Bruce into this thing without his consent?"
"Seems that way." Victor shrugged.
Flash rubbed the back of his neck. "Okay, but—how did you of all people get chosen, Bats? You don't exactly scream 'wizard material.'"
Bruce didn't flinch. "I don't know. It probably resonated with a wish of mine."
Shazam smirked. "Maybe they saw your resume and thought: 'Yeah, this guy broods hard enough to summon King Arthur.'"
Hal snorted. "More like the Grim Reaper."
The joke didn't land. Everyone could see Batman's hand, glowing brighter as if the seals themselves were listening.
Superman's tone stayed even. "If this is real, it's not just your problem, Bruce. It's a global threat. Seven beings of unimaginable power, dropped into the world, fighting across cities, maybe countries. The collateral…" He shook his head. "We can't ignore it."
Victor swiped through more data, pulling up scattered reports. "There are already spikes in magical activity across the planet. London, Tokyo, Istanbul. Something's stirring."
"Meaning I'm not the only one marked. Perhaps others like me." Bruce narrowed his eys
"yes," Victor confirmed. "There are others. Six more. And apparently a Ruler servant to oversee the war."
Flash leaned back, whistling. "So somewhere out there are six other poor souls with the same magic ink, and they're all about to call up their own Hercules or Achilles or whoever? That's… terrifying."
Hal raised a hand. "Hold on. If they summon people from history, do we get to pick? Like, could Bats pull up a friendly wizard or something?"
Cyborg shook his head. "Doesn't work that way. The system chooses. Each Master summons a Servant tied to their own soul and circumstances. It's random… and it's binding."
Bruce finally pulled his glove back on, covering the seals. "Whoever orchestrated this knows what they're doing. It's not random I was chosen. That means there's a design here—and I intend to find out whose."
"Question is," Flash said, "what do we do about it? Seven demigod death matches sounds like a bit much even for us."
Superman looked around the table, his voice carrying that quiet weight that drew them in. "We do what we always do. We stand together. If this war is spilling into our world, we make sure it doesn't destroy it."
Hal groaned. "Great. Another crisis. And here I thought we'd earned a week off."
Victor glanced at him. "The seals won't wait for a week. Once the summoning starts, it escalates fast. We'll need to track energy spikes and contain the fallout. And we'll need to figure out what kind of Servant Batman's going to end up with."
Shazam's eyes gleamed. "Can I just say—this is the coolest thing that's happened since we fought Darkseid? I mean, come on, summoned heroes from the past? How is that not cool?"
Flash elbowed him. "Cool until one of them decides to level Metropolis."
Batman cut across their banter, his tone final. "We don't waste time. Victor, build a monitoring system. Try to track the others. Clark, Hal, coordinate with your contacts—if you see unusual magical signatures, flag them. Flash, Shazam—you're backup. We keep this quiet until we understand it."
"And Diana?" Superman asked, glancing at the empty chair.
Bruce hesitated. "She's with her family. Leave her out of this—for now."
The table fell into silence again, the weight of what they'd just learned sinking in. The seals pulsed faintly beneath Batman's glove, a reminder that whether they liked it or not, the Grail War had already begun.
*****
LexCorp Tower, Metropolis — late afternoon
Lex Luthor stared at the hand that didn't belong to the moment. He had felt the tick, the small, impossible prick under the skin as if some precise instrument had been pressed into him.
Now three red sigils gleamed along the back of his hand, neat as if stamped by a practiced clerk. He did not flinch. He set the palm flat on the polished glass of his desk and watched the city tilt away beneath him.
He had been taught not to be surprised by the impossible. He had learned to catalog it, to turn it into proof and leverage. This, whatever it was, would be the same. He flexed his fingers once and the marks shimmered. He smiled — thin, practiced — and reached for his private line.
Within an hour, a small, carefully curated circle of occult consultants, antiquarians, and a few less savory "friends" had arrived at LexCorp under sealed NDA and legal disclaimers. They brought grimoires bound in dust, fragments of reliquaries, and a cautious respect that bordered on fear.
Luthor watched them sift artifacts and mutter half-recognized phrases over the seals. He let them work and listened.
When the explanation came, delivered in a voice that tried too hard to be neutral, Lex's lips curved. Someone used the old phrase — a "summoning system" . then another, less careful scholar said, "The Grail War. Seven Masters. Command seals. Servants."
They tried to hide their own nervousness with academic phrasing; he could see the panic beneath their erudition.
"How interesting," Lex said softly, and the words were dangerous in their calm. He tasted opportunity.
Wish-granting relics; legends that bent reality; seven human nodes directing avatars of history and myth. The equation was not about mythic poetry for him. It was leverage, control, profit, power.
He thought about insurance policies and contingency funds, about the patents he would file and the factions he would manipulate. Most of all, He could finally take down Superman and Superwoman.
He closed his hand into a fist and imagined the shape of advantage. The world would change — and it would change under his influence.
London, dusk
A pub on the edge of the Thames smelled stale and honest; cigarette smoke, wet wool, cheap beer. John Constantine sat alone in a corner booth, the light from a neon sign washing half his face green. He was not a hero and didn't pretend to be. He was a man who'd met demons over cheap whiskey and had the teeth to prove it.
He cupped his glass in both hands and glared at the three red seals on his knuckles. He had met a lot of things he wished he hadn't. This felt new and obscene. He muttered and spat, then poured a slug of his drink right over the marks as if that could burn them out.
"I don't want to be bloody part of a murder-kill ritual with ancient heroes," he said to the empty booth, voice raw with the edge of a man who had seen enough of other people's deaths. He scrubbed at his skin with the heel of his palm, grimacing when they didn't fade.
On instinct, he checked the street outside, as if looking for someone who might have signed him up for this without his consent. No one. Just rain-slick pavement and the neon spill.
He was a reluctant player. He swore under his breath, then reached for his phone. If this was a war that dragged others into myth for the sake of a wish, he'd find a way to cheat the rules.
He'd first call in favors, then make enemies. Constantine made plans like other men breathed. He cursed the world into motion.
Tokyo, night
In an alley that smelled of ramen steam and exhaust, a girl stood under a single shuttered streetlamp, a white half-mask tied to the side of her head. In the neon glare she looked like a ghost from an old play. The red marks on her hand were almost austere against her pale skin.
She watched them for a long, silent beat.
"Is this another chance?" she whispered, not sure whether she asked fate or herself.
The mask hid part of her face, but the tilt of her head carried something else — hunger or resolve, perhaps both. In Tokyo, opportunity often wore the same face as risk, and she had learned to accept that.
She slid the sleeve of her jacket down to hide the sigils from passersby and pushed her hands deep into her pockets.
Her life so far had been a string of half-moves: the odd job here, the night shift there, training in shadows and on rooftops to stay alive. The idea that some force had chosen her felt like a damage and a promise; a new doorway opening where all she'd known had been walls.
She looked down at her hands again, fingers flexing. Her voice was softer, private.
"Maybe." She wanted to say: yes, absolutely, bring it on. But caution lived in her soul. Still, her mouth curved into something like a smile. A chance to change everything, to step out of the small fights into something that mattered, If it could be won.
Istanbul, evening
The streets of Istanbul were a braid of old and new: minarets cut the sky, satellite dishes pooled on roofs, bazaars smelled of citrus and spice.
A boy in a black hoodie moved through the crowd with the casual attention of someone who learned how to vanish into a city. He never stayed long in one spot. He liked movement. Not to mention he was on the run.
He glanced at his hand more than once, the three sigils bright as a warning beneath the fabric of the cuff. He didn't want to be special. He just wanted to be left alone.
He muttered to himself, voice brittle with resentment. "Are they trying to track me or something? Why can't they just let me live?" The words tasted like an accusation he didn't always have the right to make.
A vendor shouted somewhere about coffee. A tram rattled. He kept walking, trying not to feel the eyes of the world, because in his experience the world saw you and then it labeled you as good or bad. Few would care about the circumstances.
A continuous steady stream of information flowed into his mind magically. The thought of fighting for some cosmic prize in which wishes were the currency felt ludicrous and threatening in the same breath.
He slipped into an alley, arms wrapped tighter around himself, and practised breathing like someone taught to survive.
Each moment was separate: different cities and voices and small private panics. Yet they shared the same ridiculous, red reality binding them.
Whether it would make them pawns, kings, saints, or monsters depended on who or what answered their summons—and on what they were willing to become.
The world, meanwhile, had begun to collect strangers. Their seals pulsed faintly, a distant heartbeat that none of them could yet name.
****
As always. Give up your stones, or lube up for Diddy. 💀