Free Web NovelChapter 8: Chapter 8: Getting the Results
Benjamin looked at him.
At the blood streaks on that young face. At the red veins creeping through those blue eyes.
At this child who had grown up in a laboratory, who had suffered terrible torment just like him.
Maybe there had been a reason for Benjamin’s own suffering.
After all, the original body had bullied his teammates mercilessly first. Black Noir and the others could no longer endure it, and only after Edgar’s persuasion had they chosen to turn on him.
But what about Homelander? What had he done wrong?
From childhood to adulthood, Homelander had endured that kind of terrible pain without ever being given a choice.
It had not lasted long, just one childhood. But Benjamin felt that pain might have been worse than the forty years he had endured.
He was silent for a moment. Then he reached up and pulled a few strands of hair from his head.
The roots still had follicles attached. He handed the strands to Homelander.
"If you can’t find the files, then check somewhere else.
Don’t tell me America’s top Supe doesn’t even know how to go to a hospital for a paternity test."
Homelander’s gaze fell on the strands of hair.
He carefully closed them in his palm, then pushed himself up from the shattered stones.
His suit was covered in cement dust and debris. The wound on his left cheek had stopped bleeding, but the streak of blood still remained on his face.
"After you find out the truth, don’t do anything impulsive."
Benjamin patted him on the shoulder. The force was light, but the moment his palm landed, Homelander’s body stiffened slightly.
"Show the report to Edgar. He’ll know how to contact me. I’ll get my revenge sooner or later, but not now."
Homelander said nothing.
He only clenched the hair a little tighter, turned around, bent his knees slightly, and shot up from the ground.
A blast of air exploded outward. His figure rapidly shrank against the New York sky, turning into a dark red speck of light before disappearing beyond the Manhattan skyline. ƒгeewebnovёl.com
Benjamin watched Homelander leave.
At the same time, a system notification sounded beside his ear.
[You allowed Homelander to experience the heavy fatherly love of a strict father. Although he still isn’t sure you are his father, he has never been personally beaten or disciplined by his biological father before. Now that you have disciplined him yourself, Homelander actually feels something rather different.
Reward obtained: Super Speed Lv1.]
[Current Abilities:
Nuclear Blast Lv3 (Can release high-intensity radioactive energy capable of incinerating everything and removing the Compound V inside a target.)
Super Strength Lv5 (Possesses the super strength of a top-tier Supe.)
Super Defense Lv5 (Invulnerable to blades and bullets; immune to conventional firearms and most superhuman attacks.)
Self-Healing Lv5 (Extremely high cellular activity, capable of rapidly repairing fatal injuries.)
Radiation Resistance Lv5 (Completely immune to nuclear radiation and all harmful rays.)
Super Speed Lv1 (Possesses the speed of an ordinary Supe.)
Ageless Longevity (The physical body remains forever at its peak.)]
To be honest, given Soldier Boy’s physical toughness, his speed should not have been that slow according to normal physics.
And yet his actual speed really had been no different from an ordinary person’s. Any regular person on a shared bike could have run circles around him.
Maybe it was some kind of limitation. Maybe it was a contingency Vought had left behind.
But now, that limitation had been broken.
Benjamin had gained the speed of an ordinary Supe.
He would never be kited around like a dog again.
...
A little after three in the afternoon, New York-Presbyterian Hospital Genetic Testing Center.
A man wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses, dressed in a loose hoodie, walked into the first-floor lobby.
He moved slowly, standing in sharp contrast to the patients and medical staff hurrying around him.
His cap was pulled low, and his sunglasses covered most of his face. But if anyone recognized the face hidden beneath those sunglasses, it would set social media across the entire United States on fire within five minutes.
Homelander had lived nearly thirty years and had never done anything like this before.
He pressed a number at the automated ticket machine in the waiting area, sat on a plastic chair for a full twenty minutes, then said to an exhausted-looking nurse at the front desk,
"I’d like to get a paternity test."
His tone was so polite it felt unfamiliar even to him.
The nurse did not even look up as she handed him a form and two sample tubes.
The sampling process was quick.
He placed Benjamin’s strands of hair into one tube, then pulled a few strands from his own head and placed them into the other. He filled out the form, paid the fee, and sat back down in the plastic chair to wait.
The fluorescent lights in the hallway gave off a low hum.
Across from him sat a young mother holding a child. The child was using a crayon to draw a red flower on the wall of the waiting area.
The smell of disinfectant mixed with the burnt odor from the coffee machine. Everything was so ordinary that it felt unreal.
Homelander stared at the mother holding the child, no one knew what he was thinking.
He waited for two hours.
Maybe longer.
Then the nurse called his number.
Not under the name Homelander, but under the identity he had forged and the name John.
He took the yellow-brown folder, walked into the stairwell, pushed the door open, and only after confirming that there was no one around did he tear open the seal.
The report was not long. Three pages, packed with medical terminology and numerical tables.
His eyes skipped past all the genetic locus analyses and technical explanations he could not understand, landing directly on the conclusion section at the very bottom of the last page.
Three lines, in bold black text.
"Test Result: The probability of paternity between Sample A and Sample B (John) is greater than 99.9%."
"Conclusion: Sample A is the biological father of Sample B."
"Testing Facility: New York-Presbyterian Hospital Genetic Testing Center."
