"Sergeant Coburn, the neural interface is going to be… painful."
Red alarm lights flashed across the laboratory as Dr. Irons spoke in a hurried voice. Sweat glistened on his forehead while technicians rushed around the room preparing the final stage of the operation.
On the experimental platform, John Coburn was being fitted into the massive combat armor.
The armor was constructed entirely from silver-gray metal, sleek and powerful in design. Most of his body was already encased within it, leaving only his head exposed for the final neural connection process.
Coburn carried the presence of an elite soldier. His posture was rigid, disciplined, and confident, but there was also a clear trace of arrogance in his expression. After all, he had been personally selected and trained under General Sam Lane's command.
Among elite special forces soldiers, he was considered the best of the best.
"Do you have any idea what these past five years have been like for me, Doc?" Coburn said with a crooked grin.
Dr. Irons wiped the sweat from his temple and forced a small nod.
"Yes… I do."
In truth, he had helped design the brutal training program himself.
Those five years had not simply been about strengthening Coburn's body. The real purpose of the program had been to forge his will into something unbreakable.
Under relentless physical stress, psychological pressure, and destructive endurance trials, Coburn's mind had been hardened like steel.
Only a person with that level of willpower could survive synchronization with the armor.
"Then let's get started," Coburn said eagerly.
The technicians activated the neural interface devices.
One by one, thin metallic probes extended and pierced into the back of Coburn's skull. His body jerked violently as the connections were established.
He groaned twice from the pain, but instead of fear, a wild excitement appeared on his face.
"I've been waiting five years for this moment," Coburn muttered with a ferocious grin. "I can't wait to feel the power of Zero Armor."
He licked his lips slowly.
"I heard Lois has been chasing that Superman around Metropolis, interviewing him nonstop."
Coburn's expression twisted with undisguised hostility.
After all, he and Lois Lane had grown up together. For years he had secretly admired her, yet lately all her attention had been focused on the mysterious hero flying above the city.
"Well," Coburn sneered, "after tonight, Superman will just be a shooting star that briefly crossed the sky. Nobody will remember him."
"Power systems ready," a technician announced nervously.
"Begin energy transfer."
At Irons' command, the base's stored electricity began flowing into the armor.
Massive amounts of power surged through the Zero Armor.
Coburn's eyes widened as electric arcs flashed across the helmet frame. His body trembled violently as the neural network fused with the armor's control system.
The sensation was like being electrocuted alive.
"God… his heartbeat is climbing!" one technician shouted while staring at the monitoring tablet. "One hundred and fifty… two hundred…"
The numbers continued rising.
"His heart is going to explode!"
"Shut down the system!" another researcher yelled as several staff members rushed forward.
"No… wait…"
Coburn suddenly stood up.
His face twisted with a mixture of pain and exhilaration as he slowly raised his arms. The armor moved perfectly with him, responding like it was part of his own body.
He flexed his fingers slowly.
The metal gauntlet followed every motion with flawless precision.
"I can feel it…" Coburn whispered.
His voice trembled with excitement.
"I've never felt better."
An overwhelming sense of strength filled his body. Power surged through every nerve, every muscle, every fiber of his being.
Prometheus.
That was the internal codename for the project.
Coburn remembered the myth.
"If I were Prometheus," he muttered darkly, "I wouldn't steal fire from the gods."
His grin widened into something almost manic.
"I'd kill Zeus and take mankind's divine fire for myself."
"Hahahaha!"
Coburn burst into wild laughter.
With a sharp movement, he sealed the armor's helmet over his head.
The next moment—
Boom!
The Zero Armor blasted upward.
The reinforced concrete ceiling shattered like a fragile eggshell as Coburn shot straight through it, propelled by blazing energy jets beneath the armor's feet.
In seconds he reached nearly one hundred meters above the base.
Wind roared past him as the helmet display flickered to life.
A tactical projection appeared before his eyes.
Target locked.
The system highlighted a figure surrounded by glowing purple energy deep inside the base.
Coburn's lips curled.
The thrusters roared again.
Like a missile, he shot downward toward the battlefield. The metal muscle-bundles along the armor's limbs expanded as power surged through them.
He raised one armored fist.
"I don't know what kind of monster you are," he said through the combat system.
"But you'll be the first alien bastard defeated by Zero Armor!"
"Be careful."
Clark suddenly stiffened.
Even with his eyes closed, his super hearing picked up the incoming object immediately. His ears twitched as the sound barrier shattered high above them.
"Something's coming fast," he warned.
"It's faster than a Blackbird."
Victor glanced upward.
"A combat armor?"
To relieve the suffering of several badly wounded soldiers earlier, he had been raising his hand occasionally and sending them "somewhere else." Now he paused and studied the incoming object with narrowed eyes.
The armor wasn't bulky at all.
Instead, it was streamlined, flexible, and incredibly fast.
Judging by its speed and responsiveness, its technological level was easily comparable to the early Iron Man prototypes.
Whoosh!
The armored figure smashed through the sound barrier.
It arrived almost instantly.
Victor raised his fist calmly.
Purple energy gathered around his hand, condensing into a glowing sphere as he stood firmly on the ground.
Then he punched.
Boom!
Victor's fist collided directly with the steel gauntlet of Zero Armor.
The impact detonated like a bomb.
Soldiers standing on the surrounding concrete ground were blown away like straw in a hurricane. Armored vehicles weighing several tons were hurled through the air like toy boxes.
The shockwave ripped across the base.
The earth itself cracked under the force of the collision.
Chunks of concrete exploded outward while waves of exposed soil surged up from below. The ground collapsed inward as if a meteor had struck.
In seconds, a massive crater more than ten meters wide formed beneath them.
The entire base trembled violently.
Dust rained from the ceiling in the underground laboratory.
Dr. Irons crouched on the floor with his hands over his head, staring at the enormous hole where Zero Armor had blasted through the ceiling moments earlier.
A terrible premonition filled his mind.
Coburn had successfully survived the neural synchronization.
But five years of brutal psychological training might have broken something inside him.
Boom!
Clark was thrown backward by the shockwave, slamming into a loading forklift. The impact left him sprawled on the ground in an awkward position.
Victor glanced back briefly.
There was no real reason to worry.
Even weakened, Clark's physical durability remained unchanged.
Satisfied, Victor returned his attention to the opponent before him.
The armor stood nearly two meters tall.
Except for the helmet, chest plate, hands, and boots, the rest of the suit was composed of thick metallic muscle bundles that gleamed under the battlefield lights.
The silver-gray armor radiated overwhelming pressure.
It felt like standing before an immovable mountain.
"When I get a closer look," Victor murmured, "this thing is nothing like Mark II."
He glanced down at the gauntlet that had collided with his fist.
There wasn't even a dent.
Victor raised an eyebrow.
Interesting.
Without hesitation, he lashed out with a lightning-fast kick.
The massive Zero Armor was sent flying backward.
Coburn slammed both hands into the ground as he skidded across the battlefield, gouging deep trenches in the earth before finally stopping.
He looked up slowly.
His eyes gleamed with excitement as he stared at the crater created by their collision.
Then he looked down at his armored hands.
His entire body trembled with exhilaration.
"So this is power…"
Coburn laughed quietly.
"What kind of metal is this armor made from?" Victor muttered thoughtfully.
"It's almost as hard as Amazonium."
Amazonium was the divine metal used by the ancient Greek gods to forge legendary weapons.
Victor knew several of the most powerful materials in the DC universe.
For example, Itronium, the nearly indestructible metal used by the Legion of Super-Heroes in the thirtieth century. Even Kryptonians struggled to break it without using their full strength.
Then there was Kryptonian alloy itself, the material used to construct Kryptonian ships and armor. Its ore veins were so dense that even Kryptonians needed heat vision to soften them before mining.
"But none of those should exist in a U.S. military lab."
Victor also noticed something else.
The energy surrounding his punch seemed to have been partially absorbed by the armor.
Energy absorption.
The phenomenon reminded him of a legendary metal accidentally discovered by scientists in the DC universe.
A substance similar in reputation to Adamantium in Marvel lore.
Promethium.
"Come on!" Coburn shouted arrogantly.
He burst forward, cracking the ground beneath his feet.
"Show me what you've got, alien bastard!"
Victor's expression darkened immediately.
"Idiot."
Coburn thought he was an alien.
Victor stepped forward and threw a punch.
Then another.
Each strike was heavier than the last.
The force of his blows crashed against the armor like a landslide. Despite wearing the powerful Zero Armor, Coburn was driven backward step by step.
The battle looked like a clash between two ancient titans.
Every collision of fists and legs created violent shockwaves that swept across the battlefield and overturned everything nearby.
"Move! Move!"
A group of soldiers holding rifles kept their distance from the terrifying fight. Spotting Clark struggling to stand again, they rushed toward him like a pack of wolves.
....
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