At dusk, a beat-up pale-yellow RV was cruising at a steady speed down a long, winding highway.
For some reason, a road that usually saw a decent amount of traffic was completely deserted, save for this single vehicle.
The driver was a boy of about sixteen.
He had dark blue short hair and emerald-green eyes.
His features were naturally sharp, but his face looked gaunt from long-term malnutrition.
*Bzzt—*
Suddenly, the beat-up old radio inside the RV crackled to life.
“In recent news, five days ago, the coast of Guam was attacked by a mysterious marine creature that dragged dozens of tourists into the ocean depths.
Fortunately, with the assistance of Aquaman, every single victim was safely rescued.”
“Three days ago, twenty-four bodies washed ashore at Gotham Harbor.
After identity verification by the GCPD, the deceased were confirmed to be from Blüdhaven.
Vigilante Nightwing is suspected to be investigating the case.”
“In Gotham last night, the Bat-Signal shone across the sky all evening, as usual.
All we know for certain is that Batman and his partner, Robin, dismantled seven street gangs in a single night…”
“In Central City, former FBI agent Hunter Zolomon has made a major breakthrough in his investigation into ‘The Network.’ Does this legendary secret black market that has lurked underground in Central City for years truly exist?”
“Additionally, in Star City…
Boston…
National City…
San Francisco…”
“Two hours ago, Mr.
Luthor, CEO of Metropolis’s LexCorp, once again expressed his deep concerns regarding Superman to the public.
But as we all know, Superman has saved countless lives.
He brings hope to this world and inspires us all…”
“Three years have passed since the founding of the Justice League, and there is still no word on them accepting new members.”
“That concludes this week’s roundup of top stories.
Thank you for listening.
The Daily Planet will continue to bring you the latest reports—”
*As expected of the legendary DC Universe.
Danger around every single corner,* Yuri couldn’t help but sigh internally after the broadcast ended.
His full name was Yuri Alperona Sotos.
To be precise, that wasn’t his original name, but the name of the body he now inhabited.
This poor teenager named Yuri was born in Keystone City.
His family had been desperately poor, and both of his parents had passed away when he was very young.
His sole inheritance was this dilapidated, Nth-hand 1976 RV that looked like it could break down at any given second.
Yuri affectionately called it the Old Rustbucket.
For over a decade, Yuri had survived on a meager welfare stipend, barely staving off starvation, which left him chronically malnourished.
The moment he turned sixteen, Yuri went out and got his driver’s license.
From then on, he earned a tiny bit of pocket money by occasionally delivering goods for local ranches.
His job today was to transport a batch of milk to neighboring Central City.
The pay was about $30.
Subtracting the cost of gas left him with $26, which, if he stretched it carefully, was enough to cover five days of living expenses.
That was until a short while ago, when a soul from another universe took over Yuri’s body.
The two souls fused into one, creating the Yuri who sat here now.
Unfortunately, Yuri hadn’t been a DC fan in his past life.
He had barely read any of the comics, had no interest in the TV shows, and had only watched a few of Zack Snyder’s movies.
But this clearly wasn’t the movie universe.
Aside from movie plots and random tidbits he had read online from people flexing their nerd knowledge, Yuri knew very little about this world.
The so-called “foresight of a reincarnator” was virtually non-existent for him.
However, both the movie adaptations and the online debates pointed to one indisputable fact: the DC Universe was exceedingly dangerous!
Metropolis getting rebuilt dozens of times, Blüdhaven getting completely annihilated, Coast City getting slaughtered to the last person…
The sheer volume of news Yuri had heard since transmigrating into this world only confirmed those stories.
Who knew if he might get caught in the crossfire of some apocalyptic battle on any given day?
Some netizens had even claimed that in this world, you could just be taking a stroll down the street when a Flashpoint reset hits out of nowhere, erasing you from existence before you even realized what happened.
It took Yuri several days to reluctantly accept reality.
Not that he had much of a choice.
Now that he was here, it wasn’t like he could just transmigrate back.
He didn’t even know how he had crossed over in the first place.
Life had to go on.
Luckily, Yuri was a resident of Keystone City, right next door to Central City.
As one of the safest cities in America right now, protected by the Flash Family, he should be able to live out a peaceful life without issue.
As long as a certain speedster didn’t mess with time…
Yeah…
It should…
probably…
hopefully be fine?
Shaking off his stray thoughts, Yuri checked his rearview mirror.
His RV was currently the only vehicle on the highway, meaning he at least didn’t have to worry about getting carjacked.
Though he didn’t have anything worth stealing on him, what if a female thief took a liking to his handsome face?
Or worse, what if she wanted his milk?
Yuri shuddered at the thought.
*Too dangerous.
I shouldn’t linger here—I need to get into the city proper, fast.*
Yuri wanted to step on the gas, but after glancing at his pitiful remaining fuel gauge, he abandoned that reckless idea.
After driving for a few more minutes, the silhouette of a bustling city became faintly visible in the distance.
That was his destination: Central City.
As he drew closer, the full view of the city known as the “Jewel of the Midwest” gradually came into focus.
The sky grew darker.
From Yuri’s perspective, the sun was setting directly behind Central City.
The residual glow of the setting sun streamed straight toward Yuri through the city’s outline.
The light wasn’t intense, allowing Yuri to comfortably look straight ahead and take in the entire sunset.
He could even clearly see a tiny black dot on the sun’s surface.
It looked like a round sunspot, but as Yuri watched, the spot grew larger and closer…
Wait!
Closer?
Yuri focused his eyes.
That was no sunspot—it was an unidentified object falling straight out of the sky!
Judging by its trajectory, it was projected to pass about ten meters directly above him.
It was falling at a terrifying speed.
One second it was an imperceptible speck on the horizon, and just a few seconds later, it was only a few hundred meters away from Yuri.
Yet, just as the unknown object was about to streak over the Old Rustbucket—momentarily leveling with the front windshield—its flight path suddenly snapped sharply downward!
*CLANG!*
A normal human’s reaction time was completely useless in a situation like this.
Yuri could only watch helplessly as the unidentified object shattered his windshield and slammed onto the passenger seat.
Only then did Yuri’s body react, his foot instinctively slamming hard on the brakes.
*SCREECH—*
With an ear-splitting screech of tires, the Old Rustbucket ground to a halt right in the middle of the highway.
Yuri frantically checked the passenger seat.
He had expected the object to punch straight through the vehicle, leaving a crater in the seat through which he could see the road below.
Instead, the seat was entirely intact.
Sitting on the cushion was a spherical metallic object…
Well, it looked like metal…
Suddenly, the metallic sphere opened on its own, revealing its payload.
It was an oddly designed wristwatch.
On its face was a green hourglass symbol, flanked by black accents, with four evenly spaced green dots along the outer rim.
Right below the face sat a green button.
Unlike a normal watch, its band was significantly wider than the face.
The entire casing was black, with a single white stripe running along each side of the strap.
Looking at the watch, Yuri’s pupils dilated.
He might not be overly familiar with DC, but he knew *this* thing inside and out!
Level 20 technology from the *Ben 10* universe—the Omnitrix!