Chapter 58:

She Just Turns on Cheat Mode? Where Is the Fairness?

DC: The Infinite Villain

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Damon watched Diana rise from the rubble, glare at him, and charge Eris again.

He shrugged innocently.

Future Diana would be powerful, one of the Justice League's top fighters, a peer to Superman. After she killed Ares, she would even take his divine office and become the new god of war.

But right now, she really was weak.

Eris, goddess of discord, might not be a combat-focused deity, but she was still not someone the current Diana could defeat easily.

Damon watched Diana attack Eris again and again, refusing to give up. Then he looked toward Artemis, who had already helped their people shake off Eris's influence.

"How bad are the losses?"

Artemis's expression was complicated.

"A third of your slaves are dead, Master. These slaves belonged to you, and now..."

"You want me to act?"

Damon smiled as he asked.

"Yes."

Artemis dropped to one knee.

"Diana is no match for Eris. I beg you to avenge the slaves who died."

Seeing Artemis kneel and make that request, Antiope and Menalippe wore conflicted expressions.

Hippolyta looked at Artemis, then Damon, then Diana, who was clearly losing. After taking a deep breath, she too slowly knelt on one knee as Artemis had.

She said nothing, but her meaning was obvious.

Damon and Eris had both killed many Amazons, but Damon had killed in battle after conflict broke out. Eris, by contrast, had used a shameless trick to make Amazons slaughter one another, and more of them had died because of her.

Instinctively, the Amazons could accept dying because they were defeated in combat more readily than being controlled into murdering their own sisters.

And Hippolyta had also learned some things about Damon from Artemis.

That he had twice tried to gain Diana's forgiveness.

That he had no real interest in ruling Themyscira forever.

Eris was different.

No one knew what she wanted.

As queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta was not as purely black-and-white as Diana. She did not fear death, and she did not fear battle, but she had to consider her people.

So by kneeling, she accepted Damon's enslavement and rule.

If the queen had knelt, what else needed to be said?

The remaining Amazons went down on one knee across the square.

Bang.

At that moment, Diana was knocked down again. Eris's body gradually grew enormous, and she raised one foot, stomping down on Diana again and again.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

Diana did not submit. She did not retreat. She was not afraid.

But she could do nothing.

"Master!"

Artemis cried out anxiously.

"Ahem."

Damon suddenly coughed theatrically and called to Diana, "Need my help?"

Bang.

Eris's foot came down again.

Diana suddenly gritted her teeth, caught the foot with both hands, and released a surge of divine power.

Boom.

Divine force burst outward. Eris swayed, apparently losing her balance. Diana rolled aside, sprang up, and charged in, kicking Eris's other leg.

Eris's massive body crashed to the ground.

Dust billowed.

Damon waved the dust away and looked at Artemis.

"All I did was ask whether she needed help, and she got so irritated she exploded with power? She just turns on cheat mode whenever she wants? Where is the fairness in that?"

Diana's breakthrough came as abruptly as bad driving on a clear road.

After knocking Eris down, she pressed the advantage and seemed determined to release all the anger she had been carrying.

Bang, bang, bang.

Her attacks fell like rain.

"Regretting it?"

Damon suddenly smiled and asked Hippolyta.

Hippolyta shook her head.

If they had not submitted, perhaps Diana would not have erupted like this. That much, she understood.

"Enough!"

Eris roared, grabbed Diana, and hurled her away.

Diana threw out the Lasso of Truth, wrapping it around Eris's hand to steady herself. But then Eris vanished.

As if she had disappeared entirely.

In the next moment, Eris appeared behind Diana and punched.

Bang.

Diana crashed down from the air.

Eris planted one foot on Diana's back, picked up the Lasso of Truth, looped it around Diana's neck, and pulled upward. The weakened Diana's head was dragged back, pain showing on her face.

"Ares cares about you so much," Eris said coldly. "But it seems you are not much after all."

She tightened her grip on the lasso.

Diana's breathing began to fail.

"That is not very nice, is it?"

Damon's voice suddenly came, cheerful and calm.

"That belongs to me. Give it back, or I will kill you."

Eris looked at Diana, then at Damon, and laughed softly.

"She is only an Amazon. There are many more here. Killing one should not matter, should it?"

"There is only one of that," Damon said, shaking his head.

Diana looked at him with complicated eyes.

So he meant...

"You want it? Then come take it."

Eris's voice turned cold.

"Gladly."

Damon smiled.

Golden divine power and blue lightning appeared around him at once.

Infinite Stacking, twentyfold.

Boom.

The light that had been circling him shot upward into a pillar that pierced the sky. Eris stared at the divine power, now several times stronger than hers, and unconsciously loosened her grip on the Lasso of Truth.

"How... how can you have divine power that strong?"

"Ask God."

Damon flashed in front of Eris and punched.

Thunder and divine force struck her and detonated.

In the next instant, the air cracked like a shattered sound barrier. Eris's chest was punched through as if she were a wall hit by artillery.

She lowered her head in disbelief.

Then there was a boom.

Wind screamed.

Sand and stone flew.

Eris exploded.

Her body became countless fragments, scattering in every direction before raining down across the ground.

Damon caught the Lasso of Truth and spoke faintly.