DC: Chapter 207/208

Chapter 207: Sorry

The island of New Guinea—fractured, broken into countless pieces, sinking—was collapsing. High-rise buildings toppled, seawater surged, and the ruined cities were swallowed. The cries of millions in an instant made Barry's heart ache to the point of suffocation.

A golden flash of light darted back and forth without pause, evacuating civilians. Entwined in golden arcs, The Flash moved with desperation. The arcs looked like a vast net, sweeping through a doomsday scene to rescue scattered lives.

Even The Flash himself didn't know how many people he had saved. In a short span of time, the island cracked, the tectonic plates ruptured, a massive earthquake struck, and coastal cities were struck by tidal surges. All of this erupted at once.

The Flash ran over the fractured ground, getting faster and faster, a yellow arc trailing behind him, leaving a long afterimage of electrical current. He ran over water, over crumbling buildings, shattered debris, and chunks of stone midair.

He saved lawyers, police officers, criminals, janitors, gardeners, politicians, businessmen, men, women, and children... all humans, without distinguishing between who was worthy.

Because all of humanity was within the range of his salvation.

Even a man committing robbery was scooped up by The Flash and carried to safety on another landmass in an instant.

The situation was too urgent to judge or hesitate.

In this apocalyptic city, he could only unleash his speed, flickering yellow arcs behind him, spreading golden light, bringing hope to the people and saving lives.

With a fearful child clinging to each of his arms, three women on his back wrapped in the Speed Force, and a suited man hanging from his chest, he darted across the Australian outback, dropped them off, and dashed back again.

To him, the entire world slowed to a crawl at the divine speed he was now reaching. In his eyes, time dragged, and he was saving it all.

By the time he reached the next ragged vagrant—

He had already saved 4,802,391 people. He hadn't counted carefully, but it was certainly that number.

Boom!

The sky suddenly erupted.

At the same time, Bardi's eyes gleamed coldly in the sky. A massive sonic boom exploded above. His imposing body dived straight down, friction igniting fiery red heat across his forehead. The wind swept back his black hair, exposing a sharp face with a broad forehead and high nose, like a god descending with power.

He arrived before The Flash.

After seventy trillion deductions, Flash's speed and behavioral patterns had been completely predicted.

No errors.

The Flash and Bardi arrived at the vagrant simultaneously. Their eyes locked.

Gravel burst into the air. The ragged vagrant was struck by the force of Bardi's descent and instantly hurled into the air. His organs ruptured, his body crushed and paralyzed.

A large hand, like a serpent striking from a hole, shot forward. The white palm radiated intense heat as it grabbed the Flash by the neck and clamped down, lifting him off the ground.

The move was flawless. Not a single miscalculation.

From the data gathered through Flash's previous rescues of 4,802,391 people, Bardi had modeled his action patterns and calculated his maximum burst speed. In a blink, he had seized The Flash by the neck and lifted him up.

The Flash's eyes widened in horror. In his back-and-forth rescues, he hadn't been able to keep track of Barmulodi. His movements had become more focused and linear. No one could keep up with his speed. He was only getting faster.

Yet Bardi appeared before him.

Fear gripped his heart. In an instant, his breath caught, his neck tightened, and his feet left the ground.

"Caught you."

Bardi's face was expressionless. He gripped The Flash's neck with one hand and raised him effortlessly.

The whites of The Flash's eyes turned red. The blood vessels expanded outward, his face filling with red lines. He was suffocating.

The sun slanted across The Flash's back, casting a shadow over Bardi's face. From the Flash's view, he looked like a merciless demon. His hands and feet trembled in fear as Bardi held him aloft, seemingly ready to tear him apart.

A surge of yellow arcs burst violently from The Flash's body.

"Ah!"

The Flash groaned in pain, his neck still held tightly. The yellow arcs expanded instantly, even engulfing Bardi.

His figure began to blur with the rapid motion of the arcs, struggling within Bardi's grasp.

Speed Force Vibration!

A vibration strong enough to phase through matter and space.

His heart trembled. Countless arcs sparked as he tried to shake free, because… millions more were still waiting to be saved.

He clenched his teeth and roared in pain.

But Bardi simply puffed his cheeks slightly and blew a powerful cold breath down at The Flash's legs.

The vibrating arcs slowed instantly. The extreme drop in temperature, exceeding minus one hundred degrees, created inertia and resistance.

The yellow arcs grew sluggish, dragging The Flash's body weakly, no longer vibrating at high frequency.

In the end, as if Bardi exhaled a freezing breath, he blew the high-frequency arcs away. His breath covered The Flash's legs in freezing air that dropped below minus one hundred degrees.

Instantly, Flash's legs froze. The icy chill penetrated his thighs, muscles, and cells, freezing and necrotizing every part of them, down to the bone marrow. His bones turned brittle and white as the cold reached their core.

His legs became translucent, pale white, encased in spreading frost.

Boom!

Like shattered porcelain.

The Flash's legs shattered. Frozen shards fell from his body all the way to his hips. His legs were completely gone, with only the frozen stumps trembling and dangling.

Bardi remained cold and ruthless. Arctic air rose around him. He stood bathed in a frozen domain, like a merciless ice demon.

His fingers tightened around The Flash's throat, embedding deep into his neck.

"Ah!"

The Flash screamed in agony. His body became clear, no longer vibrating. The yellow arcs on his body faded with a mournful whimper.

He hung there, horrifically suspended in the sunlight.

His legs were gone, frozen and destroyed. His face turned red from being choked, his tongue began to protrude, and his eyes bulged with red veins, as if they would burst.

"Still want to travel through time?"

"S...so… sorry… please… please save… them."

(To be continued.)

Chapter 208: No Idea

Bardi froze for a moment, and the hand gripping the Flash's neck loosened slightly, allowing the Flash to gasp for air, coughing as he struggled to breathe.

Shouldn't a superhero act like a superhero? Even in a life-or-death situation, he was still worried about saving the innocent people caught up in it.

No wonder the Flash was loved by so many. That pure heart truly lived up to the conscience of the Justice League.

Just… foolish.

Bardi flipped the Flash around, grabbed the back of his neck with one large hand, and enveloped them both in his magnetic field. Then he soared into the sky, taking the Flash with him and floating midair.

From high above, the island of New Guinea had already fractured, with seawater pouring through the cracks and washing away the humans on the island. The entire landmass was gradually sinking.

A tsunami was rising offshore, about to engulf the island.

The Flash was suspended in the air, gripped by the back of the neck by Bardi, forced to watch the apocalyptic scene below. The people screamed and struggled to survive.

"Save them! You have the power to do it!"

The Flash clenched his fists, trembling, and shouted with a heart full of sorrow, "Save them. You could gain international recognition, become a global hero. It would make your path to conquest easier, and the people… they would love you even more."

"You think I caused all this?"

Bardi glanced at the Flash's pained expression with indifference, then looked back at the ground.

Humans were like ants, battered by the surging ocean, constantly pummeled, drowning as they struggled against the current.

In the distance, the tsunami rose hundreds of meters into the air, churning the blue sea into chaos.

In the face of such destruction, humanity seemed unbearably small and powerless.

Guilt, sorrow, and regret spread across the Flash's face. His lips trembled.

If he hadn't tried so hard to return to the past, if he hadn't changed the timeline, Barmulodi wouldn't have gone to such extremes to capture him. The island of New Guinea wouldn't be sinking, and tens of millions of lives wouldn't be on the brink.

All of this…

"It was me."

Bardi's face was cold.

He could have chosen to chase the Flash down. He could have fought a brutal battle to defeat him.

But he didn't.

He chose the simplest method. Without any resistance, he lifted the Flash by the neck and captured him.

He chose the most extreme path—capturing the Flash and sacrificing tens of millions of lives.

"Have you ever considered what would happen to the more than four million people you saved and relocated to Australian cities?"

Bardi suddenly asked.

The Flash was stunned. It wasn't hard to imagine.

"Australia has a population of only 24.13 million."

"When the tsunami hits, Australia will focus its efforts on the coastline and disaster relief, which is projected to cost the lives of around three million residents."

"This will plunge the entire Commonwealth of Australia into a nationwide crisis—financial strain, food shortages, refugee resettlement. All priorities will go to local citizens."

"Isn't that what you think too?"

Bardi's tone remained calm.

The Flash bit his lip, saying nothing. His figure trembled slightly, and his legless body sagged.

"And the sudden arrival of more than four million people will only worsen the disaster in Australia. No country would dare take on so many victims at once."

"Do you know what more than four million desperate people will do just to survive?"

"When survival is on the line, human nature shows its darkest side. Even cannibalism could become commonplace."

"Australia has 20 million people scattered across the country and fewer than 300,000 regular troops."

"Adding in the defense against the tsunami, there's no way to protect those four million refugees."

"In the end, they'll be confined to chaotic urban areas, the same cities where you placed them. One city, originally home to 1.5 million people, would have been safe from the tsunami. But now, because of the refugees, everything is ruined."

"Tell me, those 1.5 million people who once lived in peace, who faced no threat from the tsunami, are now gripped by fear—torn apart by refugees, raped, looted, murdered, and terrified. Who brought that upon them?"

"Eventually, the nation, because of these four million people, will resort to slaughter and violent suppression. Blood will be the only way to control it."

Bardi spoke lightly. His words were already restrained, without describing the bloodiest possibilities outright.

Australia might even collapse into civil war, its entire population of 24.13 million descending into ruin.

Then the rest of the world would condemn Australia's handling of the refugee crisis. Under the guise of disaster relief and international humanitarianism, powerful nations would step in, intervening under various pretenses.

This could lead to the erasure of Australia as a sovereign state.

All of this could be triggered by the arrival of just over four million refugees—enough to drag the entire country into chaos and destruction.

Even in the face of a massive tsunami, even if three million Australian citizens perished, the country might still survive and remain intact.

But the more than four million people the Flash had rescued? They were too many. Enough to destroy a city overnight. Enough to incite riots across multiple cities. And with the tsunami draining all available forces, no one would be left to stop it.

Australia… would be finished.

Of course, that would be the worst-case scenario. But even the best-case scenario involved troops from multiple countries occupying Australia, stripping it of national sovereignty.

To Bardi, superheroes were just reckless.

They act on impulse. In a flash of light, they save lives—and that fleeting brilliance makes people believe they are great heroes. People idolize them.

But what is truly great is a government that provides ordinary people with peace, stability, and security. What's truly great is a team built by humanity itself.

These kinds of superpowered heroes—beyond ordinary men, without funding, without long-term planning, without follow-through—shine for a moment. They save over four million people… only to destroy the peaceful lives of 1.5 million others.

"You saved some… but doomed others. Was it worth it?"

Bardi asked calmly.

The Flash trembled. His fists clenched, his nails digging deep into his palms. His voice was pained.

"All of this…"

"You should have thought it through," Bardi interrupted. "With the Speed Force, you had all the time in the world to consider the consequences."

"Do you still see yourself as a 'hero'?"

"Even now, you still want to save ordinary people?"

Bardi looked at the trembling Flash with a hint of pity.

(To be continued.)