Chapter 80: The Price of Clark's Wish
As the ring vanished, the surging evil in Clark's heart quickly dissipated, and the ferocity on his face disappeared.
After a few seconds of confusion and bewilderment, panic took its place.
"What... what did I do."
Although the surroundings were still dark, it didn't stop the normal Clark from reviewing his memories, recalling his harsh attitude towards his parents, his rude words to his younger brother, and even their physical fight.
"And those hurtful words..."
David breathed a sigh of relief.
Seeing their elder son return to normal, Jonathan and Martha hurried over.
"Son, are you alright?"
They hugged Clark, their faces filled with urgency and concern, and asked David.
"I'm fine."
Jonathan looked him up and down. His younger son hadn't even torn a piece of clothing throughout the entire ordeal.
In contrast, his elder son's upper clothes were almost shredded, and his eyes were swollen like bruised peaches, tears constantly streaming out from the irritation, making him look quite disheveled.
"Mom, Dad, David, I'm sorry."
Clark heard familiar heartbeats. He hugged his parents, finding solace in them due to his blindness and panic. He felt sad and regretful about what he had done and said.
"It's okay, dear.
We all know that wasn't you."
Martha stopped his confession and comforted her elder son.
"Clark, what happened?"
Jonathan asked about the cause of the incident.
"It was that ring... that ring..."
Clark only knew it was the ring's fault. As soon as he put it on, he went mad, his normal consciousness suppressed, like a personality split. But he couldn't explain the specific reason.
"It must be the meteorite."
David walked over slowly, taking over the conversation.
"Besides the meteorite that arrived on Earth with Clark, I can't think of any other reason that could affect him."
"But..." Jonathan wanted to say that meteorites were all green.
However, just because he hadn't seen it before didn't mean it didn't exist.
Now it seemed that the green meteorite affected Clark's physiology, while the red meteorite affected his psychology?
"David, I'm sorry."
Like a child who had made a mistake, Clark couldn't stop apologizing when he heard David approaching.
"It's okay, I wasn't the one injured anyway."
David said so, but his brow was still furrowed.
He wasn't angry about Clark's actions.
"Clark made a wish. I wonder what the price will be."
"My eyes..."
Clark could barely open his eyes, which were swollen like bruised peaches, and see blurry shapes. But as the sunlight hit them, the injuries began to fade, and his eyes unswelled. Suddenly, his vision went completely dark.
He reached out and touched his face in a panic.
"Clark, what's wrong?"
"I can't see."
"Did your brother hit you too hard?" The couple exchanged a look, a little alarmed.
David frowned.
His energy beams could melt a person's eyeballs, but it was impossible to cause such severe damage to Clark's eyes so easily.
And it was daytime.
"No..."
Clark remembered something. He opened his cloudy eyes and moved his lips. His face held a strange sense of peace, like the calm after receiving punishment for a mistake.
"This is the price for my wish."
As the price for his wish, his eyesight had been taken away.
"What?"
Seeing their son's gray eyes, Jonathan and his wife were greatly shocked and found it hard to accept. "Could it be that Clark, your eyes will be permanently blind?"
"Perhaps this is already the best outcome."
Clark stroked his mother's cool hand, comforting her. Though unsettled by his blindness, he smiled at his family.
He worried his reckless actions might cause the Wishing Stone to claim his parents and younger brother as payment.
"If it's just my eyes, it's not that hard to accept."
"It shouldn't be permanent," David reminded him, frowning.
The Wishing Stone originated from the Greek god of lies. If it were King Zeus himself, his power might surpass Superman's under normal circumstances.
But most other deities wouldn't have the ability to permanently take away Clark's talents.
"It's okay, David. I still have my ears."
The previous method of healing his injuries by simply basking in the sun, which always worked before, didn't work this time. Clark thought his brother was just trying to comfort him.
He had lost one sense, but he still had super-hearing.
"Just give me some time, and I'll be the same as a fully functional person."
It wouldn't affect his life too much.
…
As usual, David cleaned up the traces of their fight, ensuring no exposure.
Clark was true to his word. Though not proficient, he looked no different from a normal person after only two or three days. Aside from the sunglasses he wore and his white cane, hardly anyone could tell he was blind.
It hadn't even significantly impacted his life.
A week later, the two of them successfully finished their exams. Their scores weren't top-tier, just excellent among the general student population.
If they wanted to score higher, it would take no effort for either of them, but there was no need. Doing so would attract attention.
"These scores are good enough."
At home, in front of the computer screen, Jonathan looked at his sons' report cards, a hint of pride on his face as he nodded in satisfaction.
"I know if you were after money, you could easily become sports stars and earn tens of millions a year. Yes, you're much more capable than me, a farmer who only knows how to handle farm tools."
Finally, he nodded with mock seriousness and joked.
"Sons, what are your plans for the holidays?" Martha asked her two sons tenderly, her face beaming. Regardless of other aspects, her sons had never given her or Jonathan any trouble with their studies.
As for university life, the couple had always believed it wouldn't be a problem for their sons.
They were just changing schools. Both sons had applied to Metropolis State University, which wasn't far from Smallville. A normal person could cycle there in under an hour. Exaggerating slightly, it was practically in their backyard.
At most, their university life would involve some youthful troubles. At eighteen, it seemed like it was time for them to date.
"Chloe wants to intern as a reporter at the Daily Planet in Metropolis during the holidays, and she wants me to be her assistant," Clark recalled Chloe telling him earlier.
"A reporter?" David raised an eyebrow. Clark was going to get involved with a future hidden identity reporter so early? It seemed like their connection was long-standing.
"What's wrong? Even though I've lost my sight, I guarantee I'll have more insight into listening," Clark said with a smile, thinking his brother believed he wasn't suited for the job.
Losing his sight made him empathize more with the disadvantaged groups he had never paid attention to before.
"Thinking back, how much I resisted my extraordinary talents…" he said, shaking his head.
Compared to those with congenital disabilities, his troubles were nothing.
"Perhaps, as Dad said, God bestowed upon me unique talents, and I must learn to accept them… even use them for something." Clark murmured, a hint of maturity and seriousness flashing across his face.
Hearing his tone, David looked surprised.
"It seems this blindness, though only for a few days, has brought Clark closer to the path of becoming the Tomorrow Son."
Although Clark was kind before, he was still in middle school, with his own adolescent worries. He hadn't thought much about actively helping others. Was it empathy now?
"Do you want to be like Batman in Gotham, a masked vigilante?" He thought about what the current Clark would be like if he started fighting crime in Metropolis – a super-powered Daredevil?
"I can't say, I haven't thought it through yet," Clark said, scratching his head.
He was still hesitant about vigilantism for now. Revealing his extraordinary abilities to the public, he feared it would implicate his family. However, that might change in the future.
After all, people's thoughts can change.
"What about you?"
Clark turned his head towards where his brother was sitting and asked.
"Me?
I might go travel."
David looked out the window at the distant azure sky dotted with white clouds, his gaze passing over the mountains to the far horizon.
"Travel?"
[Template Fused 59%]
"If I can make an extraordinary race constantly fluctuate in emotion because of me, my ability fusion speed should advance by leaps and bounds!"
Themyscira has at least several thousand, even tens of thousands, of Amazon warriors, and there's more than one extraordinary race on Earth, like the Atlanteans in the ocean
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