Thea had no intention of using a specialized drug to manipulate Luthor. She was planning to gain reputation anyway—giving it to anyone was the same. Her moral baseline wasn't so low that she'd watch a little girl suffer and die while using a few pills as leverage.
Clinical trials proceeded extremely quickly. She had many follow-up plans and didn't want to waste too much time here. She ordered several departments to accelerate production. Luthor could see the drug's composition clearly, but he didn't dare give it to his sister directly. He also hoped to see her drug hit the market, with numerous patients providing real-world validation. He wanted to observe—more cured patients would strengthen his confidence.
Quinn Group's PR focused on the new product. Luthor quietly pushed from behind. Both their connections and relationships exerted full force. Various procedures and formalities advanced extremely quickly.
Countless "socially virtuous personages" helped lobby the government about the miraculous nature of these two drugs. The President urgently sought his advisors' help, nearly thinking the entire nation had contracted these two diseases.
Learning that very few people actually had these illnesses, he breathed a sigh of relief. Elite figures' goodwill must be reciprocated. Even if it were poison, approval was required. Skipping layers of review, he directly signed approval for the drugs' market release.
For modern medicine, these were terminal illnesses, but in the genetic field, not a big deal. Just slightly adjust internal genetic structures. Within a week of Thea's drugs hitting the market, these two painful diseases were downgraded from terminal to common cold level.
Watching countless patients cured with no aftereffects or complications, Luthor also bought a pile of medicine for his sister. Three days later, the girl who'd been confined to a wheelchair regained basic mobility. Five days later, completely normal.
The little girl Lena Luthor didn't have her brother's reservations. She personally visited to express thanks.
The two politely complimented each other briefly. Factional opposition meant they wouldn't discuss much.
However, from Lena's few words, Thea still discerned that Luthor's Doomsday research had made progress.
Supergirl's uncle-in-law, old comrade Non, and those three Kryptonian "elite"—unsurprisingly, Luthor had already killed them. Simple Kryptonians scheming against Earthlings resulted in them contributing their bodies and all knowledge. This gift delivered to his doorstep took Luthor considerable time to digest. Now the seed was planted. What remained was watering and waiting.
With Kryptonian corpses and cobbled-together genetic technology, independently researching the remaining Doomsday genes wasn't difficult.
After all, this was originally a super bioweapon developed by Kryptonian scientists using themselves as the foundation. Bioweapons' characteristic was wide transmissibility. Structurally not too difficult. With Luthor's intellect, brief research would reveal the enormous potential breeding in Kryptonian cells.
This timeline lacked the pseudo-AI from Kryptonian ships to remind him. He likely wouldn't know the name "Doomsday," but just knowing this bioweapon could harm Superman was sufficient.
Unlike the movie, the military was now also intensively researching Kryptonian genetics. They lacked Luthor's high intelligence but had geographical advantage. General Zod's ship had broken into three sections back then—they'd gathered all the wreckage. Various reverse engineering, back-deduction, plus the ship's remaining scraps of data. With manpower and resources, they'd also achieved preliminary results.
What surprised Thea more was that the military had forcibly conscripted the mad scientist Professor Ivo. Under spare-no-expense conditions, they'd initiated Project Amazo. Massive human and material resources were poured into this project. They were playing with fire on an unprecedented scale.
Thea could stop Luthor's side, but the military was more troublesome. These people wouldn't stop until they saw disaster firsthand. Only letting them witness Doomsday's power would extinguish their delusions.
Thea's plan was to watch Doomsday wreak havoc, then emerge to clean up the mess.
This matter wasn't her scheme nor her support. From every angle, she had no connection to Doomsday. The scales of order would only commend her for heroically stepping forward at the critical moment, not censure her.
But she wasn't just sitting around waiting. Some basic preparation work still needed doing.
She'd collected plenty of Kryptonite early on. Enough to forge several weapons with ease.
However, she didn't completely trust her memories either. Reality had changed too much. Acting on fixed thinking would cause big problems.
She began cautiously researching Doomsday cells. She'd studied them intermittently several times before. Regarding Doomsday—this DC world's equivalent of a Saint Seiya where the same move couldn't work twice—she was extremely puzzled. Doomsday could later tank Darkseid's Omega Beams, and Omega Beams represented the "Source."
Doomsday's body could evolve infinitely. Each time it was killed, upon resurrection it would be immune to the previous lethal damage. This ability wasn't inherent to its main body but provided by constant cellular evolution.
Thea's research showed each of its cells was actually a micro-individual. Doomsday was more like a collective consciousness. Its body relied on special energy to pile all cells together, forming the powerful individual the world saw.
Looking at cells individually—did this thing have a soul? From a one-sided view, it shouldn't have a traditional soul. But the group consciousness formed by numerous cell consciousnesses was chaotically disordered. This made it immune to most control magic in the world.
Thea attempted to replicate several cells. She found they fused quickly but devoured each other evolving. The madness revealed made her somewhat fearful. This absolutely shouldn't be a creature existing in the world.
Kryptonian scientists hadn't figured out a countermeasure in tens of thousands of years. She didn't plan to eliminate it through science.
The benefit of having all six attributes complete was that Thea could cast any spell and release some higher-powered combination spells.
The cells' absorption efficiency for earth, fire, water, and wind was absolutely top-tier. It loathed light. It also disliked dark attributes.
Thea repeatedly experimented with light and dark magic, finally finding a spell with some effect: Aging Curse—a spell combining dark, wind, and water attributes.
The affected cell's vitality visibly decreased. To resist spell erosion, the cell would instantly release all life force within. Short-term cell vitality would spike, then continue increasing magical power output. The cell would rapidly fall silent after depleting its foundation.
After completing spell experiments, she also tried emotional energy. Fear emotion versus the death-destruction consciousness within cells was basically fifty-fifty. Doomsday couldn't replicate fear emotion—this contradicted its fundamental existence form. But fear couldn't overcome it either.