The track fell into instant silence, only to explode into even more terrified screams.
People in the stands rose one after another, trying to see the carnage within the thick smoke.
Reporters in the media area, like sharks smelling blood, aimed their cameras at the accident scene, the sound of shutters clicking filling the air.
Kara anxiously used her Super Vision to pierce through the thick smoke and twisted car body, locking onto the cockpit—fortunately, Tony was not inside.
He had escaped in the chaos.
At this moment, Kara struggled internally.
If she transformed into “Supergirl” now, her identity would inevitably be exposed—there were too many high-speed cameras on the track, and even using Super Speed, she might be caught in the act of changing; after all, a person could not simply vanish into thin air.
But if she didn’t act, Tony would likely lose his life.
She had rescued Tony several times before, whether for a purpose or just as a convenience, and even agreed to his requests with the premise of not affecting her own life.
But this time was different; the area around the track was covered in cameras and reporters, providing no place for a secret transformation.
Once exposed to the public eye, the quiet life she had worked so hard to build would collapse, followed by endless pressure from all sectors of society.
“Is it worth taking such a risk for a ‘friend’ I’ve only known for a short while?” Kara debated within herself.
When she first gained her powers, she was driven by fear of the unknown; but now, possessing a stable life, she did not crave to be a hero.
A hero often meant danger and responsibility.
Kara knew that previously only S.H.I.E.L.D.
and Tony knew her identity, but now, once exposed to the public, she would never be able to return to her life as a reporter…
Just as she struggled internally— A screeching sound of tires, sharp enough to pierce the eardrums, exploded from the perimeter!
Immediately followed by the roar of an engine and the thunderous sound of metal crashing into barriers!
Everyone, including the man with the whips, looked over involuntarily.
A black modified sedan, like an out-of-control Beast, brazenly smashed through the final barrier, executed a sharp drift at the edge of the buffer zone, and slammed into the man with the whips, pinning him against the roadside chain-link fence.
The passenger and rear doors then swung open violently.
It was Pepper and Happy.
They had actually driven through layers of obstacles!
Kara did not waste this precious opportunity.
Taking advantage of the two of them stalling the enemy, she quickly turned and walked briskly toward a secluded restroom on the outskirts of the track…
By the track, Pepper’s face was as pale as paper, her lips bitten until they bled.
She tightly clutched a silver-red streamlined metal suitcase in her arms; it was exceptionally heavy, yet her arms were surprisingly steady.
Happy kept slamming on the accelerator, crazily ramming the enemy.
Pepper threw the suitcase with all her might.
Tony on the road quickly activated it, and the suitcase unfolded in mid-air—the Mark V armor covered his entire body like liquid.
Tony kicked away the car shielding Pepper and Happy.
Without a word, he forced himself to endure the intense pain and dizziness throughout his body and engaged in a fierce battle with the man with the whips.
In shock and anger, the opponent whipped back.
Tony didn’t even dodge completely; he just turned slightly, letting the whip graze his armor, sparks flying.
The man with the whips knew he had to finish this quickly—the Police could arrive at any moment.
He swung with all his might, the energy whip wrapping around the Mark V’s head, the powerful current causing the display inside Tony’s mask to flicker violently.
Tony was electrocuted and fell to one knee.
Just as the opponent was gloating, Tony suddenly grabbed the whip and actually wrapped it around himself!
Using this crazy method, he rapidly closed the distance and slammed a heavy fist into the weak point marked by Jarvis—the connection between the crude reactor and the man’s body under his left ribs.
Bang!
A dull thud mixed with the sound of metal and bone shattering.
The man screamed, his left side visibly collapsed, and the energy whip fell to the ground.
But Tony also paid the price.
Forcibly enduring the strike from the other whip while completing the heavy blow made his already severely injured body worse.
Inside the armor, he spat out a mouthful of blood, his face under the mask as pale as a ghost, his vision increasingly blurry, nearly fainting.
At this time, Kara, having run to the restroom stall, was observing the situation on the field remotely with her Super Vision.
Seeing the man with the whips subdued, she breathed a sigh of relief—Pepper and Happy had arrived in time, and she didn’t have to struggle over whether to risk exposure by intervening.
However—the man with the whips had pressed a button.
It was a device he had secretly installed on the car when he was hit by Happy.
Kara reacted the fastest, her gaze instantly locking onto the car carrying Pepper and Happy—an activated time bomb, countdown started: three seconds.
One second had already passed.
Her pupils contracted.
The restroom she was in was secluded and empty, almost never visited.
With no more worries, Kara instantly entered the Super Speed State.
The nano-suit covered her body in an instant, and accelerating with full power, she turned into a blue shadow, shot through the ventilation window above the stall, and darted toward the track.
The second second.
Kara had reached the bomb.
Everything around her was nearly frozen: Tony’s rigid posture, the open mouths of the crowd, the dust that hadn’t yet settled.
She ripped the bomb out along with that piece of the car body and threw it into the high sky with all her might.
The third second.
Under Kara’s immense strength, the bomb had reached an altitude of over a thousand meters.
The countdown hit zero.
Boom—!!!
The high-explosive detonated violently in the air, the firelight painting the sky over the track a deep red.
Kara exited the Super Speed State.
The flow of time around her resumed, and the crowd, as if just awakened, screamed in terror at the loud explosion high in the sky.
The man with the whips glared at Kara in disbelief—he didn’t understand why the bomb had exploded high in the air.
Tony angrily tore off the opponent’s reactor and crushed it in his hand.
The Police immediately stepped forward and arrested the attacker who had lost his power.
“Thank you!” Tony signaled toward Kara’s direction.
Kara nodded slightly, her figure flashed, and she vanished without a trace.
The cheers on the track receded like the tide, replaced by even sharper siren wails, the roar of rescue vehicles, and the clamor and discussion of the crowd surviving the aftermath.
When the man with the whips was handcuffed and taken away by the Police, he was still roaring incoherent Russian curses, but no one paid him any mind.
Pepper and Happy crawled out of the car, still shaken, and rushed toward Tony, who was surrounded by medical personnel.
The Mark V armor had been partially removed, revealing Tony’s pale, bloodless face, though he forced a weak smile.
Kara’s figure had already vanished, so fast it was as if it were just an afterimage left on the retina by the sunlight.
Only Tony knew, and only he understood, what that bomb thrown high into the sky meant—once again, at the most critical moment, she had used a way that defied common sense to save everyone, including himself, and his most cherished Pepper and Happy.
A quiet seaside promenade somewhere in Monaco.
Kara had changed back into the linen dress from her bag, wearing a sun hat and sunglasses, leaning against the railing.
The sea breeze, carrying a salty, damp scent, brushed through her hair but could not blow away the chaos in her heart.
She hadn’t been exposed.
Her actions in the Super Speed State, the deliberately chosen unmonitored stall, the moment everyone’s attention was drawn to the track and the explosion—theoretically, she was safe.
But psychologically, that split-second decision had stirred up even greater waves.
The moment she saw the bomb’s countdown, her body reacted before her reason.
The suit covered her, the Super Speed activated—this made it impossible for her to avoid that question any longer.
She asked herself: What if the bomb’s countdown wasn’t three seconds, but 0.3 seconds, or even instantaneous?
What if Tony had completely lost the ability to fight?
Would she still hesitate?
Could she still convince herself to stand by with excuses like “inconvenient to change” or “might be exposed”?
The answer, she did not know.
The Kryptonian power was like a pebble thrown into the lake of her once-peaceful life.
She had finally managed to let the ripples subside, yet, in the crisis moment when the bomb was about to detonate, that instinct to rush out and stop the disaster was so strong it almost overwhelmed all fear of having her peaceful life shattered.
That was not the admonition of Kryptonian memories, nor the call of heroism, but something simpler and more primal—she could not watch people she knew, watch innocent lives, be blown to pieces when she had the ability to stop it.
“A hero often means danger and responsibility…” She repeated her previous thought in a low voice, a complex curve appearing at the corner of her mouth.
Perhaps, from the moment she decided to use this power to help Tony clean up weapons, from when she saved the bus the Hulk was about to destroy on the streets of New York, or even earlier—from the moment she chose to exist under the name “Kara Zor-El,” that “life of an ordinary person” had already drifted further and further away.
Power itself is a kind of responsibility.
Whether she admitted it or not, it was there, quietly influencing every choice.
Perhaps she didn’t necessarily have to become “Supergirl,” but the existence that was “Kara Zor-El” could no longer fully retreat back into the shell of “college student Kara.” The two were slowly and irreversibly merging into one.
It might not seem tempting right nobut who knows what the future holds?
“And If you’re enjoying it, drop a Power Stone for me!”