A gentle yet irresistible force pushed against him.
Mark drifted backward three or four meters, his body swaying briefly in the air before he instinctively adjusted the invisible field supporting him and quickly regained his balance.
“I really hope this doesn’t turn into my experience learning to ride a bike.”
Mark laughed as the memory resurfaced.
“I crashed so many times.
The worst one scraped a huge patch of skin off my knee and thigh.
That hurt for days.”
Nolan laughed heartily, the sound carrying through the night sky.
“Don’t worry.
Flying is much safer than riding a bicycle, at least for you now.”
A grin spread across his face.
“As long as you don’t fly into the Sun.”
After making the joke, Nolan shifted his posture and stretched both arms forward, striking the classic superhero pose recognized by virtually everyone on Earth.
“Come on, fly higher!
Let’s see how high and how fast you can go!”
His smile widened.
“I believe in you, son.
You can do it.”
Before the last word fully left his mouth, the air around him rippled slightly.
In the next instant, Nolan shot straight upward like a launched missile, ascending into the night sky with incredible speed and complete control until he became nothing more than a distant blur.
Mark looked toward the spot where his father had disappeared and shook his head with an amused smile.
His father could be surprisingly enthusiastic at times.
Perhaps after years of being Earth’s greatest hero, Nolan had become quite comfortable embodying that image of the invincible protector people admired.
Mark took a deep breath.
Simply hovering no longer felt satisfying.
Mimicking his father’s posture, though with significantly less elegance, he leaned forward awkwardly, looking more like someone trying to swim through the air.
He focused.
The muscles in his legs tightened slightly, and the power inside him responded instantly.
Whoosh!
The sound of rushing air exploded around him as a powerful force propelled him upward.
Wind roared past his face.
The houses, trees, and neighborhood lights rapidly shrank below him.
Weightlessness and acceleration merged into an exhilarating sensation unlike anything he had ever experienced.
He tore through the lower atmospheric currents and continued climbing.
Higher.
And higher.
The temperature dropped.
The air grew thinner.
Off in the distance, he spotted a commercial airliner cruising steadily through the clouds, its navigation lights blinking rhythmically.
From his current altitude and speed, the enormous aircraft seemed strangely slow.
Strangely fragile.
A young girl sitting beside one of the windows happened to glance outside.
Her eyes widened in shock.
Mark grinned and gave her a casual wave before continuing upward.
The cold never came.
Not even slightly.
A thin yet incredibly effective layer of energy seemed to surround his body automatically, isolating him from the freezing temperatures.
Finally, he burst through the final layer of clouds.
The view opened before him.
Beneath him stretched an endless sea of silver-white clouds illuminated by moonlight.
Above, the deep violet sky revealed countless stars.
A crescent moon hung brilliantly overhead, appearing larger and clearer than ever.
The world was astonishingly quiet.
Only the distant whistle of high-altitude winds remained.
Nolan was already waiting there.
He hovered motionlessly against the backdrop of Earth’s curved horizon.
As he watched Mark arrive, somewhat unpolished but entirely successful, satisfaction flashed through his eyes.
“It looks like we’ve reached the stratosphere,” Mark said, staring at the breathtaking scenery with genuine admiration.
“And I still don’t feel cold.
That’s incredible.”
“Of course you don’t.”
Nolan floated closer.
His voice carried clearly despite the thin atmosphere.
“Your body is far stronger than you realize.”
“Even as a hybrid, you can survive in the vacuum of space for a considerable amount of time.”
“There is far more power inside you than you’ve discovered.”
Under the glow of the moon and stars, Nolan’s expression softened slightly.
Mark’s performance had exceeded expectations.
His control during takeoff, his steady ascent, his adaptation to flight, all of it confirmed Nolan’s assessment once again.
The boy possessed exceptional talent.
In terms of fine control, he might even surpass Nolan’s own performance at a similar stage.
A worthy son of Viltrum.
The exact limits of Mark’s strength, endurance, enhanced vision, and other abilities would require proper testing later.
There would be plenty of time for that.
Tonight’s objective had already been achieved.
As Nolan watched Mark alternate between studying the endless cloudscape below and the stars above, the gears of his long-hidden plan turned silently once more.
Training would need to progress faster.
Before everything changed, Mark needed greater strength.
More importantly, he needed understanding.
At the very least, he had to be capable of understanding the choice Nolan would eventually make.
Above the clouds and beneath the stars, the night stretched on.
Father and son hovered quietly in the sky.
Each carried entirely different thoughts.
Yet from the outside, they looked like nothing more than a father teaching his son.
The awakening of Mark’s Viltrumite powers had become the key inserted into destiny’s lock.
Turning it was only a matter of time.
And while Mark appreciated the limitless possibilities that came with his new abilities, he never forgot the threat hanging over his future.
He couldn’t afford to place his hopes entirely on the possibility that paternal love would outweigh everything else.
This training had always served two purposes.
The next day…
“Faster, Mark!
How do you expect to become a hero moving like that?”
A red-gloved fist wrapped in a fierce gust of wind came hurtling toward him.
Mark couldn’t evade in time.
The punch landed squarely on his chest.
A dull burst of pain spread through his body, as though a sledgehammer had struck him.
Grinding his teeth, he used the momentum to twist midair and redirect much of the impact to the side.
Even then, the force rattled his entire body.
His blood churned.
He took several deep breaths before stabilizing himself.
When he looked back at Nolan, stubborn determination burned in his eyes.
One of Nolan’s eyebrows lifted slightly.
Today, he was wearing the iconic Omni-Man suit.
The red, white, and silver uniform fit his powerful frame perfectly.
Subtle Viltrumite technology woven into the material reflected faint glimmers of light, giving every movement a sense of effortless authority.
“Interesting.”
Nolan smiled.
“That’s a clever way to redirect force.”
There was genuine approval in his voice.
“I didn’t realize those Taekwondo classes you took could teach something that useful.”
“Dad, those were Tai Chi classes, not Taekwondo.”
Mark wiped the corner of his mouth and sighed.
“You can’t just assume every black-and-white uniform is Taekwondo.”
“The instructor always talked about balance and proper control.
I never fully understood everything he meant, but I did learn how to use an opponent’s force against them.”
He brushed bits of grass and dirt from his clothes.
Even after redirecting most of the impact, the remaining force from Omni-Man’s punch still left his chest aching.
Every breath felt slightly restricted.
Mark understood his current situation very clearly.
At present, he was merely a newly awakened Viltrumite hybrid.
His body had not yet reached its true potential.
The only paths forward were relentless training or genuine life-and-death battles.
That had always been the nature of Viltrumites.
The Smart Atoms within their bodies possessed extraordinary adaptive potential.
Every intense battle pushed them to grow stronger.
What made Viltrumites even more terrifying was their recovery ability.
As long as the brain and heart avoided fatal damage, even devastating injuries could gradually heal.
It was one of the reasons the Viltrum Empire had remained such a dominant force across the galaxy.