Accompanied by a strong, light-polluting glare and a fierce wind, Clark saw the spaceship, originally hidden in the cellar, floating in mid-air, spinning continuously.
The spaceship emitted dazzling golden light from all around its body.
Clark, awestruck by the strong light and wind, raised a hand to shield his eyes and cautiously approached the spaceship.
"Don't be afraid, Kal."
A mature male voice emanated from within the spaceship.
Clark looked at the activated spaceship, hovering in mid-air, with a mix of surprise and uncertainty, and asked loudly, "Who are you?"
"I am Jor-El, your father."
"I thought you were dead!"
Clark said with disbelief, his clothes flapping wildly in the strong wind.
"I am his memory, his will, I am here to fulfill his promise and to guide you in your life. You are the last son of Krypton, and as you journey across the cosmos, you carry the hopes and dreams of your people. They now depend on you, Kal."
As Jor-El spoke, the spaceship transformed, becoming a massive, transparent egg shape.
"It's time!"
In an instant, the transparent egg-shaped spaceship transformed into Earth.
The strong light it emitted turned into a slightly softer blue light, and as the "Earth" rotated, the blue light and shadow also rotated continuously.
"Time for what?"
Clark asked the other party loudly.
"The moment to accept your destiny!"
Clark was not as easily fooled as before; he shook his head, "I don't know what you have planned for me, but I—"
His words were cut short before he could finish.
"When the sun sets, you will return to my side, and your destiny will be fulfilled!"
As he spoke, a light appeared before him.
Clark turned around and saw several people standing behind him.
Eric stood at the front, followed by Jonathan and Martha, all three smiling at him.
Their sudden appearance startled him.
Clark, enduring the strong wind, reached out to touch "Eric" who was smiling at him in the front.
"I am well aware of your thoughts, but these people have served their purpose; it is time to leave them!"
Ignoring Jor-El's words, Clark reached out and touched "Eric's" arm.
Whoosh!
Like ripples on a disturbed lake, "Eric's" body rapidly dissipated like a mosaic.
Jonathan and Martha, standing behind him, also vanished.
Clark watched helplessly as his brother and parents dissolved into mosaics and disappeared, his heart immediately filled with fear.
He suddenly felt that everything he cherished was being taken away from him.
Although he knew these were not his real family, he still couldn't help but feel fear and panic.
"No!"
Clark took a step back, his face filled with resistance and anger.
"Everyone and everything I love is here, in this small town. This is my home! I will never leave here!"
Jor-El's voice remained calm, "Kal, you must abandon your past and look towards the future; the future has already changed. I sense the first life energy born in an unknown hazy world, a lantern burning with green flames illuminating the universe. That is both protection and destruction, and for this, I must hasten your steps!"
"Are you talking about Green Lantern?"
Amidst the whooshing wind, Clark asked Jor-El loudly, "Who is he?"
"His identity is not important, but this indicates that some things have exceeded expectations, whether it's Eric or Green Lantern."
"Eric?"
Clark walked against the strong wind towards the "globe" that the spaceship had transformed into, continuing to ask loudly, "Eric is my brother; he came to Earth with me on the spaceship. Why? Why are you fixated on me? Is it because of my curiosity about you, or because I seem like someone easily manipulated by you?"
"No, Eric is different from you. He is Kryptonian, and yet not Kryptonian. He represents another direction for you. His desires are confined by family and kinship. If you wish, he can become your enemy; if you don't, he can become your aid. Regardless, you will one day go to war over your differing ideals. But I believe he will not be the enemy who destroys you."
"He is my brother, not my enemy, nor my tool!"
Clark roared at the "giant Earth" and retreated against the strong wind.
He wanted to leave here!
"I will create my own future; you cannot dictate my life!"
As he retreated, Clark roared at the other party.
"You have no choice, Kal!"
After Jor-El finished his last sentence, the "giant Earth" shattered with a crash.
A shockwave rippled outwards, and Clark was nearly knocked backward.
After the shockwave dissipated, the light and shadow in the cellar immediately vanished.
The strong wind and intense light disappeared in an instant!
The entire cellar immediately returned to tranquility, as if the moment that had just occurred was merely an illusion.
"I have no choice!"
Morning, Coast City.
Green Lantern Hal Jordan stood outside the picket fence of a residence, quietly observing everything in the yard, and murmured softly.
This was his home; everything inside was intimately familiar to him.
The rusty, green-painted mailbox outside the courtyard with a cuckoo bird model on top; white and pink anemones blooming in his mother's carefully tended garden, emitting a faint fragrance.
Everything was so familiar, yet so strange.
Hal placed his hand on the nearby brick wall and lowered his head.
He suddenly remembered someone once asking him a question—"Is there anything you're afraid of?"
When the person asked him, they had a smile on their face, as if they already knew the answer, as if they expected him to say "no."
Most of the time, Hal would accommodate them; that was the answer they wanted.
But he was not born fearless.
It wasn't, as they believed, the ring that gave him power; before he was bestowed with the universe's most powerful weapon, before he wandered among the stars in the sky—
Hal looked up, gazing at everything in the courtyard, and murmured to himself:
"My father gave me the power to achieve anything; he told me I could be anyone I wanted to be!"
Hal Jordan had a lifelong fascination with airplanes since childhood; he admired his father, who was an aerospace test pilot.
But during a test flight, he witnessed his father's death in an accident.
From then on, his mother forbade him from having any contact with aviation.
Although he promised his mother, Hal always kept his father's old leather jacket and never forgot his original aspiration.
Just after midnight on his eighteenth birthday, Hal ran away from home and joined the U.S. Air Force.
He believed he had no choice.
Between his dream and his family, he chose his dream.
In his view, it was not only a dream but also the inheritance of his father's legacy.
However, leaving his mother without a word became a lifelong regret he could never mend.
Especially when his mother was critically ill, he was not allowed to take leave, which led to him punching his superior and being discharged from the military. By the time he returned to the hospital, his mother had already passed away.
So, this time, traveling to the early 21st century, the thing Hal most wanted to do was to see his mother again.
Being able to see his mother again, he felt it was worth any price.
Creak!
The door opened, and a brown-haired woman, wearing an apron and holding a watering can, walked towards the flowers planted in the courtyard.
Seeing his mother, she looked exactly as he remembered her.
Hal couldn't help but tear up.
He wanted to go forward and hug his mother, to say "I'm sorry" to her, to express how much he missed her.
But as soon as the thought arose, he instantly suppressed it.
No, absolutely not!
Putting aside Flash's previous warning that history cannot be changed, his current identity alone made it impossible.
His counterpart in this timeline was still a middle school student; if he appeared before his mother, how would he explain himself?
Say he was the future Hal Jordan?
Forget it, if he said that, he would definitely be considered insane.
Sighing, he decided that just seeing his mother from here would be enough.
Silently observing his mother's figure from an unseen corner, Hal stood motionless, countless complex emotions churning within him.
Just as he was about to leave, he suddenly noticed a familiar figure entering the courtyard.
"It's him!"
Seeing Eric enter the courtyard, Hal was immediately dumbfounded.
What was this guy trying to do?
A bad premonition suddenly arose in his heart.
Could it be that Eric saw the three of them bullying his underage self, and so he was returning the favor?
And thus came to bully his underage self in this timeline, which is the present?
Given Eric's personality, it was indeed possible for him to do something like that.
Hal immediately fell into unease.
In the courtyard, Eric surveyed his surroundings.
This was Hal Jordan's home?
The environment wasn't bad!
Eric nodded after a brief assessment.
In fact, just as Hal had predicted, Eric's purpose in coming here was to settle scores with him.
Supergirl Kara and Wonder Woman were hard to find, but here was someone he could vent on.
"Mrs. Jordan?"
Facing the woman who was tending to the garden, Eric asked directly.
"I am."
Jessica Jordan stood up, her eyes casting a surprised glance at Eric, "May I ask who you are...?"
"Eric Kent, I'm from Metropolis."
Eric shook hands with her and introduced himself, "Mr. Jordan and I were friends; we shared common interests and met at a flying club. I never expected such an unfortunate accident to happen to him; it's truly sad and regrettable."
"Ah?!"
Mrs. Jordan was stunned; she hadn't expected her deceased husband to have such a young friend.
"In fact, Mr. Jordan and I had a good relationship. He also helped me when I was in difficulty, so... I came to see if I could be of any assistance."
Eric continued to ramble.
"Thank you, Mr. Kent, thank you for your kindness, but we are doing well."
Mrs. Jordan politely declined Eric's offer of help.
"I heard..."
Eric paused, his gaze drifting towards Hal's direction.
Hal, thinking he had been discovered, immediately pulled his head back.
Eric nonchalantly withdrew his gaze, "I heard, Madam, that you are worried about your children's school choices for graduation. I know that in Coast City, if you cannot pay enough transfer fees to those capitalists, then you will be forced to choose a school with extremely poor teaching quality and full of troublesome students."
"And I can help you!"
Eric said as he pulled out a check.
This was a check he had obtained through Penguin, and it could be used in most banks in Metropolis.
"This..."
Mrs. Jordan saw that Eric was not old and thought he was a flying enthusiast her husband had met at the flying club. She hadn't expected him to know her situation and even be willing to help her.
Her impression of Eric immediately changed.
"Mom!"
Just as Eric was about to say something more, a voice came from behind him.
A boy in a leather jacket, with features somewhat similar to Hal's, walked over.
Thirteen or fourteen years old, he looked like he was still in middle school.
"Hal? It's not dismissal time yet. Don't tell me you skipped school again because you're tired of the lessons?"
Mrs. Jordan asked him with a somewhat stern tone.
"Classes ended a bit early today, Mom."
Although curious about Eric standing nearby, young Hal obediently explained to his mother.
"Mr. Ferris called me; you went to the Ardent Aerospace Company again today and climbed onto the roof of Hangar Three. Don't tell me that wasn't you, Hal!"
Mrs. Jordan's tone was filled with displeasure, "I told you not to go there again, not to go near any place with airplanes! If you would just listen to me, Hal, I wouldn't have to work so hard."
"I'm sorry, Mom."
Young Hal lowered his head and admitted his mistake to his mother, "I just... I just thought the view there was beautiful. There's no place in the world more beautiful than that."
Mrs. Jordan said nothing more, only let out a slight sigh.
Eric, who had been silent, confirmed that the small boy in front of him was Hal Jordan, and then asked him, "You said you really like flying?"
"Yes."
Upon hearing about flying, young Hal's eyes immediately lit up.
"If you try to fly, you must learn to overcome all fear, but right now you clearly don't possess that. Mrs. Jordan, may I speak with him alone?"
"Of course."
Mrs. Jordan was momentarily stunned, then nodded.
"No!"
On the bridge, young Hal was about to ask Eric how to experience flying, but before he could finish his sentence, Eric pushed him off.
Young Hal, struggling in mid-air, let out a terrified scream.
Eric, meanwhile, turned around and let out a breath.
"That felt good!"
Then he prepared to use his super speed to catch the other party.
Although he felt no guilt about killing the other party, there was no need if the other party was the future Green Lantern.
Bang!
Using his innate bio-field and super speed, Eric instantly moved beneath the bridge and caught young Hal.
"See, you've learned to fly, Hal Jordan!"
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