After five days of fruitless searching, Linda had no choice but to stop and consider returning.
She had searched the entire Kryptonian star system, along with five surrounding star systems, but still hadn't found any survivors.
Since conventional methods weren't working, she'd have to go to the Phantom Zone. The Phantom Zone prison held Krypton's most dangerous criminals, so there were bound to be survivors there.
This thought was immediately dismissed.
The people in the Phantom Zone were all insane. One Zod was troublesome enough, let alone the others. Going there was no different from seeking death.
On the afternoon of the sixth day, a frustrated Linda went to Luke's room. Upon seeing the pigsty-like environment, she inexplicably lost her temper, scolding him fiercely before turning and leaving without waiting for a reaction.
Luke: "?"
Such a fiery temper! Could she be on her period?
After dinner, the girl reappeared, her face etched with loneliness.
"Do you have any alcohol? I want a drink."
Luke pointed to a wooden box in the corner.
"Red wine, white wine, fruit wine—take whatever you want."
Linda grabbed a bottle of brandy and drank it in sips, her gloomy mood almost visibly written on her face.
She had come with excitement and was returning in disappointment! That perfectly described her current feelings. To return to her homeland, she had gone to great lengths, almost falling out with her cousin. She had originally hoped to reunite with her compatriots on Krypton and share her homesickness, but instead, things had turned out this way.
And then there was that scoundrel Luke Shaw, who spent all his time cooped up in his room studying, studying, studying, and was no help at all. She regretted bringing him along.
The more she thought, the more upset she became; the more she drank, the more dissatisfied she felt.
Why am I busy all day, exhausted like a dead dog, while you hide in your room drinking and reading?
It's not fair! Not fair at all.
The Kryptonian girl, her cheeks flushed, tossed the nearly empty brandy bottle and stumbled over to Luke, giving him a hard shove.
"Hey! Earthling, have you passed Level Five yet? Do you want your big sister to teach you?"
She let out a hiccup, reeking of alcohol, and leaned in, grinning, "Don't worry, big sis doesn't charge. Just call me 'teacher,' and I'll teach you everything I know... um... everything."
Luke: "..."
He casually pushed her aside, but the girl, like a dog-skin plaster, stuck to him again.
Her flushed cheeks looked as if they were smeared with rouge, her eyes shimmered with a hazy glow, and her lips were moist. A slight parting of her lips released an alcoholic scent. Her body was curled up, with all the right curves in all the right places, and her waist-to-hip ratio was astonishingly exaggerated... An eighteen-year-old girl in the bloom of youth, her unintentional actions exuded an astonishing allure.
Unfortunately, the occasion was truly inappropriate.
Luke glanced at the camera on the ceiling and cursed angrily.
"Damn you, smart butler!"
He couldn't understand why the Fortress of Solitude's AI held such hostility towards him, constantly monitoring him, not missing any minor detail.
Just like now, if he made any improper move, in the next second, the robot guards would rush in to educate him on Kryptonian criminal law.
"Damn AI!"
Luke indignantly raised his middle finger.
"What are you looking at? What's there to see? Haven't you seen enough already! Come and take her away!"
A few seconds later, the hatch opened, and two robot guards entered, carrying a stretcher, clearly prepared for Linda.
Luke placed the girl on the stretcher and asked El, the smart butler nearby,
"When are we returning to Earth?"
"That matter is for Kara to decide."
Luke frowned slightly. "Is she not planning to go back?"
"I apologize, I cannot answer that question."
Luke sneered, then suddenly asked a strange question,
"If Linda and I have a son in the future, will you call him master?"
Smart butler: "..."
"You call my son master, so as my son's father, shouldn't you also address me as master?"
"I apologize, the issue you're raising doesn't exist. There's no data indicating that Earthlings and Kryptonians can produce offspring through normal means."
"Is that so?"
Luke gave it a meaningful look, his peculiar gaze causing the newly self-aware smart butler to feel an inexplicable sense of dread... After sobering up, Linda seemed to have come to terms with many things.
She abandoned the idea of continuing to search for survivors. After leaving a video message at a certain space station, she initiated a space jump. This time, Luke didn't read; instead, he stood by the moon window, quietly experiencing the various changes as the spaceship entered dimensional space.
As the light and shadows vanished, the world suddenly spun, then fragmented into countless pieces. The sensation of tearing and distortion spread to every cell. Although it was an illusion, his body reacted honestly.
Luke hugged the trash can and threw up everything he had eaten last night and that morning.
"Damn it, I'll never watch that again."
After throwing up, he lay on the bed to rest for half a day, then resumed his studies.
He had already broken through Level Five of Kryptonian nine-level education and was striving for Level Six. Earth's current scientific knowledge was at Level Four, which meant that if he wanted to, Luke Shaw's name would appear on the Nobel Prize every year.
It was so pleasant to enjoy the shade while standing on the shoulders of giants.
The modifications to Ghost One were complete. It looked the same on the outside, but its interior had undergone a radical transformation.
Luke had used parts from the spaceship to fully upgrade it, replacing the original processor and energy core with an evolving AI made of fluid metal and Kryptonian energy crystal panels. Both its endurance and data analysis capabilities had increased tenfold.
Its dual weapons also changed. Lasers and blue lightning were fast, but their damage and energy consumption were weaknesses, especially the laser, which was completely outclassed by Kryptonian energy cannons in every aspect.
Luke simply dismantled it and replaced it with an energy hand cannon. Testing it against a wall, a single shot produced a thunderous boom, creating a circular hole about a meter in diameter in the tungsten alloy-strength wall.
"This is too powerful. No wonder a single energy blast could send me, wearing the Ghost battlesuit, flying dozens of meters."
Luke secretly clicked his tongue, then unhesitatingly replaced the right-hand weapon with an energy cannon as well, giving it the ability to automatically adjust its power. Afterward, he installed a levitation device on his feet.
Once everything was complete, Luke put on the battlesuit. Blue flames erupted from his palms and soles, and the downward thrust slowly lifted his body, just like Iron Man once did.
"I'm flying! I'm finally flying!"
The young man opened his mouth wide and let out a hearty laugh.
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