◇ I'll be dropping one bonus chapters for every 10 reviews. comment
◇ One bonus chapter will be released for every 100 Power Stones.
◇ You can read 50 chapter ahead on P@treon of which 10 are free Chapters. if you're interested: patreon.com/Heroicverse
------------------------------------------------
On the screen, a thunderous Hans-Zimmer-style score was roaring—an orchestral surge of low horns and searing strings weaving a symphony of fate.
In the frame, a colossal nuclear warhead trailed flame across the sky, and beneath it, the red-and-blue figure hoisted the weapon of annihilation with a look of absolute resolve, racing toward the wormhole that ripped the heavens open.
It was the final scene of Homeland: Origins.
No long speeches, no Hollywood-style slow-motion sentimentality.
The camera pushed in tight: one second before he vanished into the darkness, Anthony's "Homelander" glanced back at New York below.
On that face—no fear, no hesitation. Only a trace… of yearning for the world he was leaving.
In that instant, he wasn't a god; he was a man walking into death.
"For… home."
He whispered the line amid the howling wind.
Then light swallowed everything.
Nuclear glare burst across the screen, and the entire IMAX auditorium seemed to shudder.
The picture cut to black.
Silence blanketed the three-thousand-seat Dolby Theatre.
No one spoke, no one crunched popcorn; even breathing felt suspended.
A few seconds later, the image returned.
It was a soot-smeared New York street, smoke drifting over the ruins.
A figure dropped from the sky, cradling the alien life-pod in his arms.
Freeze-frame.
A line of white text, etched as if on obsidian, appeared:
"You—are the true heroes." —Homelander
Without warning—
"Whaaa—!!!"
Applause surged like a bursting dam, flooding the hall.
Not polite claps, but raw, cathartic thunder from the chest.
The front row leapt up first, then the middle, then the back.
Thousands rose together, the roar of palms unending.
Some screamed, some dabbed tears from their eyes.
Most of them had lived through the Battle of New York.
Such is the power of "real."
This wasn't a green-screen actor in a motion-capture suit; the hero who had just saved the world on-screen was sitting among them.
That shattering of the fourth wall multiplied the film's emotional punch exponentially.
"Ding! Popularity +10,450!"
"Ding! Popularity +9,110!"
"Ding! Popularity +15,330!"
"…"
Listening to the torrent of system alerts, Anthony couldn't stop the grin on his face. It gave him huge confidence for harvesting global buzz once the film opened worldwide.
"That's it…" he murmured in his mind.
"Cry, shout—and then… fall in love with me."
He stood, turning toward the audience.
At that instant the applause jumped another notch in volume.
Tony Stark rose as well.
The billionaire, usually armed with cutting quips, wore a complicated expression.
He glanced at the frozen frame on the screen, then at Anthony basking in the ovation.
"All right…" Tony skipped his usual sarcasm.
He leaned toward Steve Rogers.
"I hate the guy… but damn, the FX look incredible… feels real."
"It is real, Tony." Steve clapped, eyes shining.
"That's exactly what happened—he just filled in the part we didn't see."
"He caught the feeling, Tony," Steve said softly.
"The one where you know you're not coming back, but you charge anyway to protect the people behind you. In that moment… he was a hero."
Beside them, Natasha Romanoff stayed silent.
The Shield's top spy, Red Room's deadliest Black Widow, never took anything at face value.
Before the screening she'd expected to watch the narcissist glorify himself.
But now… she looked at the man onstage waving to the crowd.
There was a scene where Homelander, imprisoned by "Chaos," huddled in a freezing cell after countless inhuman experiments, clutching a crumpled star-spangled candy wrapper.
It was his only lifeline.
That look—stripped of humanity, treated like an animal, yet still craving light.
Natasha's heart clenched.
She'd seen that same look in Red Room mirrors.
"Maybe…" she exhaled, pushing down the sudden ache.
"Under that perfect mask… there really is a broken soul?"
Watching Anthony's back, her once-icy gaze softened for the first time.
In that instant, his beyond-Oscar performance cracked the spy's armor.
After the screening, the press gauntlet was chaos—
—or a carnival.
A hundred reporters surged like zombies trying to breach security for even a glimpse of Homelander's back.
"Mr. Homelander! Early tracking says 500 million opening weekend—your thoughts?"
"Mr. Starr! Is it true you were locked in that lab for a whole year?"
"Queen Jones! Is Homelander your boyfriend? Are you two really together?"
Anthony kept a flawless smile, gliding through the mob with bodyguards.
He paused now and then to answer a harmless question, every move elegant and airtight.
Then—
"Excuse me! Coming through!"
"Sorry!"
"Ouch—my foot! Sorry!"
A skinny figure slipped like an eel through towering guards and frenzied reporters.
It was a boy who looked barely eleven or twelve.
He wore a faded plaid shirt, a bulging backpack, and thick black-framed glasses. Sweat plastered his messy hair; he looked bedraggled and unremarkable.
But his brown eyes blazed.
Tonight he'd spent three months of saved allowance on the cheapest standing-room ticket, tucked in the farthest corner.
He didn't care.
He'd watched the whole film, heart still hammering in his ribs.
That shock—that someone with god-like power would die for mortals, would suffer to protect the weak—"With great power comes great responsibility…"
The boy repeated the line in his mind.
Lightning split open his ordinary, even timid, young world.