Transcending the Black Robe World: Starting by Tearing Homelander Apart
Chapter 1: Transmigrating into The Boys, Starting with a Kryptonian Bloodline
"Get lost! You stinking yellow-skinned piece of trash!"
A gravelly voice cracked through the air, and Leon snapped his eyes open.
The ceiling was moldy, and the fluorescent light tube flickered on and off in spasms.
His entire body ached to the bone; his joints felt stiff and unmovable, and any slight movement brought pain.
This was not his place.
Leon propped himself up with his arms, but the movement tugged at a bruise on his lower back, causing him to hiss in pain.
A rental apartment, barely ten square meters.
Large patches of wallpaper were peeling off, the curtains were yellowed and brittle, and the air was thick with the sour stench of instant noodle seasoning mixed with the smell of stale sweat.
An employee ID card rested on the nightstand.
He reached out to grab it, his gaze landing on the front.
His eyes were pinned to it, unable to look away.
A red and blue eagle wing logo: Vought International.
The very logo he had stared at countless times on screens in another world.
The photo showed an Asian man with skin stretched tight over his cheekbones, eyes deeply sunken, his face so thin it was nothing but a skeleton.
Name: Leon Li.
Position: Archives Administrator.
The next second, a massive flood of memories forced its way into his skull.
Leon gripped his temples with both hands, his teeth grinding together audibly.
Fragments of images smashed into his mind without warning.
New York, Manhattan.
Vought International Building, second basement level.
The Archives, where he worked seventy-two-hour shifts under pale, sickly lights with zero overtime pay.
A scrawny Asian youth held a stack of file boxes in his arms, walking down the corridor, when three white men approached from the other end.
The blond man in the lead lifted his foot, kicking the file boxes over and sending papers scattering across the floor.
"Pick them up."
The blond man spat out the word.
As the Asian youth bent down to pick them up, he received a slap on the back of his head.
The laughter in the corridor was loud and hollow; no one reached out to help, and no one spoke up.
The corridor surveillance cameras were broken.
They had always been broken.
In the final frame of memory, the Asian youth finished his third all-nighter, dragged his feet back to this rental apartment, and collapsed onto the bed.
His heart stopped.
Twenty-six years old, having endured bullying and exploitation, he had been nothing more than a disposable commodity while he was alive.
Finally, he died in this room that even rats couldn't be bothered to visit.
No one called the police, and no one asked after him.
The memory integration ended.
Leon slowly released his grip, cold sweat streaming down his forehead, sitting on the edge of the bed, motionless.
Thirty seconds.
It took him thirty seconds to digest the entire life left behind by the corpse.
Confirmation complete: he had transmigrated.
Target world: the TV series The Boys.
Vessel: Vought International low-level ArchivesAdministrator, Leon Li.
He knew the underlying logic of this world perfectly well.
Superheroes were products on Vought International's assembly line.
The Seven were an idol group built on scripts and public relations.
And the one standing above everyone else, possessing the power of flight and Heat Vision, the invulnerable Homelander, was essentially a beast raised in a laboratory petri dish.
He craved love but did not understand it.
When rejected, his choice was destruction.
The consequence of annoying him was having every passenger on a commercial airliner vaporized by Heat Vision.
He had done such things.
More than once.
Justice had a price tag in this world, and heroes performed diligently on stage.
The dead were nothing more than a decimal point casually wiped away from a financial statement.
Ordinary people didn't even count as ants.
And he was one now.
Leon looked down at his hands; his knuckles were prominent, and his nails were ragged with hangnails.
Lifting his shirt, his ribs were countable one by one, and his chest and sides were covered in dark purple and light blue bruises.
The autographs left by those so-called colleagues.
He picked up the phone from the nightstand again; the screen was cracked from the top left corner to the bottom right.
Unlocking it, the text message list popped up.
"Finish the report by working overtime tomorrow. If you can't finish it, don't bother coming to work. Johnson"
"Leon, help me sort this week's files, thanks. I have a date with my girlfriend. Ryan"
"Did you use the lounge coffee machine again? One more time and I'm reporting you to HR. Samantha"
The latest one was sent two days ago.
Two days.
No one from the company called to ask where Leon Li had gone.
The landlord didn't come to collect rent.
Not a single message asked if he was dead or alive.
Leon put the phone back, his expression remaining unchanged.
Those humiliations belonged to someone else.
But since he had moved into this body, someone had to collect the debts owed.
He stood up, walked to the window, and pushed aside the brittle curtains.
In the dead of night in Manhattan, neon lights shattered into patches of light across the street.
In the distance, Vought Tower pierced the skyline, its massive rooftop LED screen looping advertisements for The Seven.
Homelander occupied the center spot.
His Stars and Stripes cape was blown open by the wind, the camera shot from below his feet looking up, his smile so brilliant it looked distorted.
Six large characters of the slogan.
Homelander is watching over you.
Leon stared at those words, the corners of his mouth twitching.
Watching over?
In this world, no one watches over anyone.
He needed power.
Now, immediately.
A buzzing sound suddenly echoed deep in his brain, low and long, making his skull resonate.
Immediately after, a mechanical voice devoid of humanity cut directly into his consciousness.
[Host consciousness replacement detected.]
[God of Mankind System activating...]
[23%, 47%, 81%, 100%.]
[Activation successful.]
[Host physique detected, result: Ordinary Human, Comprehensive Combat Power: F-rank.]
[Current state is below the minimum standard for system operation; initial gene fusion procedure about to execute.]
Leon stood before the window, motionless.
His heart rate accelerated, his temples throbbed and bulged, and the corners of his mouth couldn't help but curl up.
System.
The standard transmigration package had arrived.
He knew it; it was impossible to throw someone into hell empty-handed.
[Fusion target locked.]
[Gene source: DC Universe, Kryptonian civilization.]
[ID: Gene Sequence-001.]
[Name: Steel Body.]
A half-second pause.
The next line of text popped up, and Leon's eyelid twitched.
[Warning: The gene fusion process will cause intense pain, lasting approximately 30 minutes. The host must remain conscious during the fusion. Loss of consciousness equals fusion failure, which equals host death.]
[Execute immediately?]
Outside the window, the advertisement screen atop Vought Tower changed frames; Homelander hung in mid-air, his cape fluttering violently, his gaze overlooking the entire city.
Homelander is watching over you.
Those six words were still shining.
Leon tore down the curtain, ripped off a strip of cloth, stuffed it into his mouth, and bit down hard.
He returned to the bedside, sat down, and clenched his fists until his knuckles turned pale.
"Execute."
Chapter 2: The Arrival of a God
Pain.
Fire was seeping out from between his bones.
Every pore was puffing out heat, and millions of ants seemed to be breeding under his skin, gnawing their way from his extremities to his spine.
Leon's body curled up on the bed like a shrimp, the cloth strip in his mouth bitten through, and blood with a metallic, rusty taste seeped from the corners of his mouth.
He could feel his bones decomposing—every single bone was shattering, and new tissue was growing wildly in the cracks.
Fibers, periosteum, joints, cartilage—everything was disassembled to the molecular level by some force and reassembled according to a strange blueprint.
Muscle fibers proliferated amidst the ruptures, their density becoming terrifyingly, unrealistically high.
His heart expanded by a size, each beat dull and heavy; the vibration in his chest cavity spread out along his ribs, making even his back tremble.
Something was burning on his retinas.
Something was reshaping deep within his cochlea.
Throughout the process, his consciousness could not lapse for even a second.
The system stated it clearly—losing consciousness meant death.
Leon tore the bitten-through cloth from his mouth and replaced it with the corner of the quilt, his teeth sinking into the fabric, fibers snapping one by one between them.
He clenched his fists hard, his fingernails digging into his palms, relying on this pain to nail himself to the edge of consciousness.
Fifteen minutes.
The middle part was the hardest to endure.
His spine was being pulled and lengthened, segment by segment; the full five-centimeter increase wasn't instantaneous, but stretched out inch by inch.
The gaps between his vertebrae were expanding, filling, and hardening, with every millimeter corresponding to a total overload of his nerve endings.
Leon almost bit his tongue off.
But he didn't scream.
From beginning to end, he didn't make a sound.
Roaring wouldn't alleviate the pain, it would only lead the neighbors to call the police.
He didn't need anyone to disturb him right now.
Only one thought kept cycling in his mind: Hold on.
If he held on, he would become a different species.
Twenty-eighth minute.
The cellular rewriting was nearing its end.
The pain receded like a tide, replaced by a sensation he had never experienced before—a continuously burning energy core in his chest, warm, vast, and endless power pouring through his blood vessels into his entire body.
Every muscle fiber was expanding.
Every bone was hardening.
His entire body was a fortress that had just finished being cast, still radiating residual heat.
Thirtieth minute.
Ding—
"Genetic fusion complete. Fusion rate: 100%."
"Kryptonian physiological structure modification complete. The following abilities have been unlocked:"
"Super Strength, Super Speed, Flight, Heat Vision, Freeze Breath, Super Hearing, X-Ray Vision, Steel Body."
"Current combat power assessment: SSS-rank."
"Note: Under the radiation of a yellow star, the host will continuously absorb solar energy, and abilities will continue to grow over time. No upper limit."
When the last three words slammed into his consciousness, Leon opened his eyes.
The world had changed.
His senses had undergone a complete leap.
He could see the shape and trajectory of every dust particle floating in the air.
He could precisely perceive the distance and direction of the vibrations of taxis rolling over the road on the street below through the floor.
The sound of the weak current flowing through the copper wire behind the old-fashioned television in the room next door was as clear as someone whispering right into his ear.
He looked down at his hands.
His joints were symmetrical, his fingers slender; his muscles, firm and powerful, covered bones and tendons harder than steel, with a metallic texture faintly visible beneath his skin.
He stood up.
His head almost hit the ceiling.
The original body was 1.68 meters tall.
Now, he estimated he was 1.85 meters tall.
Leon turned to the cracked full-length mirror in the corner and saw a completely unfamiliar person.
Broad shoulders and a thick back, a tightened waistline; his entire frame was a full size larger than the original.
His face still had the foundation of an East Asian, but it was much more angular, with a rugged jawline and deeper eye sockets; his black eyes held something indescribable.
He casually grabbed the iron bed frame beside him.
It was an iron frame bed the original had slept on for over two years, welded from two-centimeter diameter steel pipes.
Leon closed his five fingers.
The steel pipe collapsed silently in his palm, the two-centimeter-thick welded steel twisted into scrap metal by his five fingers.
There was no resistance throughout the process; his fingertips couldn't even feel the hardness of the metal.
He let go, and the deformed scrap metal fell to the floor, leaving a dent in the wooden boards.
Leon turned his palms over.
There wasn't even a red mark on his palms.
He walked toward the door.
The door was an old wooden board door, and the frame was crooked.
He didn't use his hand to push, but tapped it lightly with his shoulder.
The entire door, along with the frame, flew off the wall and smashed into sawdust against the wall across the hallway.
At the end of the hallway, a bald middle-aged man in pajamas poked his head out, presumably woken up by the noise.
When he saw Leon walking out of the doorway, his eyes almost popped out.
"Hey... Leon? What the f*ck... is going on?"
Leon ignored him.
He turned and walked toward the stairs, leaving shallow footprints on the floor with every step.
The bald man watched his back disappear around the stairwell corner, then poked his head out again to look at the smashed door frame and the door-shaped dent on the opposite wall.
"Sh*t..."
He retreated into his room and locked the door.
Eighteenth floor, rooftop terrace.
Leon pushed open the rusty iron door and stepped out.
The cold wind of the late autumn early morning blew into his face, but his skin didn't react at all.
At the height of twenty-six floors, the Manhattan skyline spread out before his eyes.
He took a deep breath.
He pushed off with both feet.
His body left the ground instantly.
Zero run-up, zero transition; the distance between his feet and the rooftop was opened in an instant.
One foot, three feet, ten feet.
The wind whistled past his ears, and the entire apartment building seemed to plummet—or rather, he was rising rapidly.
Leon hovered three hundred meters above Manhattan.
The lights of New York spread out beneath his feet to the edge of his vision.
The surface of the East River reflected millions of lights, the light strips of the Brooklyn Bridge stretched across the river, and the traffic on the bridge was still moving slowly.
He turned his body, facing southwest.
Vought Tower.
That ninety-nine-story glowing giant tower pierced the night sky, and the huge LED screens on all four sides of the rooftop were playing the latest promotional video for Homelander.
In the footage, Homelander was flying out of a fire with a little girl in his arms, his smile so bright it looked distorted.
At the very top of the building, a thirty-meter-tall full-body portrait of Homelander overlooked the entire city.
A Stars and Stripes cape, a smile perfect to the point of being fake, and a gaze forever directed upward.
The god of this city.
The most powerful existence in this world.
Everyone feared him.
Everyone had to smile at him.
Because he could kill anyone at any time, and no power could stop him.
Until now.
Leon hovered in the air, his gaze calmly fixed on that thirty-meter-tall face, and he clenched his fist slightly.
The air emitted a faint sonic boom between his fingers.
Then he smiled.
The smile was faint, short, and carried a sense of relaxation that comes with having victory in his grasp.
"The god of this world," Leon said in a low voice, "is nothing but a giant baby in a spandex suit."
The wind wrapped around his voice and scattered it into the night sky; no one heard it.
But that didn't matter.
Because soon, everyone would know.
He withdrew his gaze from the direction of Vought Towerand listened intently.
Super Hearing automatically amplified the sound pulse of the entire city—sirens, arguments, screeching brakes, a woman forty-seven streets away screaming for help.
Then, further away.
The eighty-second floor of Vought Tower.
A voice he had heard countless times in the series was passing through soundproof glass and several kilometers of distance, clearly entering his ears.
"...I am the guardian of America, the greatest hero in this country. Everyone should love me. If they don't love me..."
The voice paused for a moment.
Then Homelander's tone became light and soft, with a kind of sweetness that made one's hair stand on end.
"...then I will let them know what the price of not loving me is."
In Vought Tower three kilometers away, Homelander stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling window, his cape hanging down, his gaze disdainful.
Leon hovered in the night sky, across the entire Manhattan, and looked in that direction for three seconds.
He withdrew his gaze and slowly landed back on the rooftop.
The system panel automatically popped up in his consciousness:
"Detected SSS-rank threat entity—'Homelander'. Distance from host's current location: 3.2 kilometers."
"Hint: Based on the host's current 100% Kryptoniangenetic fusion strength assessment, Homelander's combat power level is—C+."
"Suggestion: Does not constitute a threat."
C+.
Leon stood on the edge of the rooftop, his clothes flapping loudly in the wind.
Homelander.
The strongest superhero created by Vought Group with all their resources, the nightmare of everyone in this world.
C+.
He looked at the city that never sleeps beneath his feet, his breathing steady.
No rush.
He needed to first figure out the current timeline of this world, understand the power structure within Vought, the movements of The Boys, and the distribution of compound v.
Then, step by step—take all the pieces on this chessboard into his own hands.
Starting with Vought Tower.
Chapter 3: System Panel
Leon returned to his rental apartment from the rooftop, stepping over the wooden debris of the door shattered all across the hallway, and crossed into the room that didn't even have a door frame left.
It was 3:47 AM, and the noise of Manhattan poured in through the thin walls.
He sat on the edge of the bed, and the bed frame let out a groan of twisting metal as the two front legs buckled instantly.
Leon looked down, then shifted his center of gravity backward.
He had to control his strength; with this body, a simple toss and turn could shatter the entire bed to pieces.
The system panel in his consciousness was still lit, and as he focused his attention, the Translucent text floated back up.
[God of Humanity System v1.0]
[Host: Leon (Leon Li)]
[Gene Fusion Sequence: 001 - Kryptonian · Steel Body(Completed · Fusion Level 100%)]
[Divine Might Value: 0]
[Available Functional Modules: Gene Fusion / Divine Might Value / Heavenly Eye]
Three modules, three lines of text.
Leon clicked on them one by one.
First, Gene Fusion.
[Currently Unlocked Gene Sequence: 001 - Kryptonian. Subsequent gene sequences must be unlocked by completing tasks assigned by the system. Task List: None. Trigger Condition: Have a substantial conflict with a Superhuman in this world.]
He scrolled down, and there was another line in the notes section.
[Note: Multi-gene fusion is not a simple stacking process; it is optimized and integrated by the system through compatibility compilation. The host need not worry about gene conflict.]
Leon read this line twice, and the corners of his mouth lifted slightly.
It meant that there were other genes he could stack onto himself later.
The Kryptonian gene was already SSS-rank; what kind of concept would it be to stack even more on top of that?
He didn't waste any more time on this module and swiped to the second one.
Divine Might Value.
[Ways to Acquire Divine Might Value: Defeat Superhumans (10-10000 points awarded based on opponent's rank); Destroy Unjust Forces (100-50000 points awarded based on scale).]
[Uses for Divine Might Value: Exchange for targeted enhancements of unlocked abilities (e.g., Heat Vision · Penetration Upgrade, Super Speed · Limit Breakthrough, etc.).]
[Current Divine Might Value Balance: 0.]
Leon flipped through the redemption list; every enhancement had a price tag next to it, with the cheapest being five hundred and the most expensive being one hundred thousand.
Beat up Superhumans to earn points, exchange points for upgrades.
Simple and brutal.
The third module.
Heavenly Eye.
[Heavenly Eye: Can scan any Superhuman target to obtain their ability rank, core ability descriptions, and known weakness information. Scanning Range: Unlimited (but accuracy decays with distance).]
This was interesting.
Leon closed his eyes, pulled up the Heavenly Eye function in his consciousness, and pushed his sensory range toward the southwest.
In the direction of Vought Tower.
Three kilometers away, clusters of blurry energy signals emerged from the darkness, varying in size and brightness.
The brightest one was on the 82nd floor, its signal strength making all the surrounding points of light look like fireflies.
[Scan Target: Homelander]
[Ability Rank: S]
[Core Abilities: Flight, Heat Vision, Super Strength, Super Speed, Super Hearing, Steel Body]
[Known Weakness: Extremely poor psychological stability, extreme reliance on public approval, significant drop in judgment when emotionally unstable. No known physical weaknesses.]
[Evaluation based on host's current strength: Can be suppressed head-on.]
Leon opened his eyes.
Can be suppressed head-on.
The nightmare of everyone in this world had been casually labeled by the system as "can be suppressed head-on."
He didn't have any particular expression, just rubbed his chin with his thumb.
The Heavenly Eye continued to scan downward, and other signals within Vought Tower successively popped up labels.
An A-rank, labeled Queen Maeve.
A B-rank, labeled The Deep.
And another B-rank, with a flickering signal, labeled Translucent.
Members of The Seven, yet several still hadn't gone home at 3 AM.
Leon retracted the Heavenly Eye, and the signals dissipated.
He stood up from the edge of the bed, walked to the window, and picked up the phone with the cracked screen from the nightstand.
Unlocked, calendar.
November 14th, Tuesday.
Tomorrow—no, wait, it was already today.
Today was a workday at Vought International.
He had to go back to work.
Leon flipped through all the alarms, schedules, and email records on the phone.
The previous host's life trajectory was pitifully clear.
Arriving at work at 6:40 AM every day and not being able to leave until after 10 PM.
The workstation was in the farthest corner of the Archiveson the second basement level, where the sun never reached.
His direct supervisor was named Mark Johnson, the director of the Archives and Information Management Department at Vought International.
A white man in his early forties.
Leon found the email correspondence between the previous host and Mark, scrolling from beginning to end.
Every email the previous host had sent to Mark was respectful to the point of being servile.
Mark's replies were always one of three templates.
The first, one word: "Redo."
The second, two words: "Not enough."
The third, publicly humiliating the previous host by CCing him in mass emails with the subject line: "ArchivesDepartment Work Efficiency Warning," and in the body, Leon Li's name was singled out, bolded, and highlighted in red.
Leon scrolled down and found a passage of text in the phone's notes app.
No title, no date, all lowercase letters, punctuation omitted.
"He hit me three times. The first time was in the breakroom; he slapped the back of my head and said it was a joke. The second time was in the hallway; he kneed me in the waist, pushed me into the wall, and laughed, saying, 'Don't you Chinese people know kung fu?' The third time was last Friday; he pushed all my file boxes onto the floor and made me kneel to pick them up. I went to HR, but HR said they couldn't process it without surveillance evidence. He was the one who had the cameras turned off."
There was nothing after that.
This was the last written record the previous host left in this world.
Leon closed the notes app, the screen went dark, and the cracked glass panel reflected half of his face.
He placed the phone back on the nightstand with a gentle motion.
The skyline outside the window showed a hint of gray-white toward the east; there were still two hours until dawn.
Leon opened the previous host's only closet, which contained two wrinkled shirts and a pair of trousers washed until they were faded.
Not enough.
He checked the previous host's wallet; there was three hundred and seventy dollars left on the card, the scraps of last month's salary.
Enough to buy an outfit suitable for going out in public.
Manhattan had 24-hour affordable clothing stores.
Leon changed into a clean shirt and went out, returning twenty minutes later.
He had a paper bag in his hand.
A black slim-fit suit, a white shirt, and a dark gray tie.
He put them on one by one in front of the cracked full-length mirror, buttoned his collar, tied his tie, and finally fished a pair of gold-rimmed glasses from the bottom of the paper bag and perched them on the bridge of his nose.
The person in the mirror straightened his back, his shoulders filling out the silhouette of the suit, and the tie knot was tied neatly.
He had nothing in common with the skinny Asian guy huddled in the corner of the Archives yesterday.
Leon adjusted his glasses and looked at the mirror for three seconds.
"Since I'm going to be undercover, I might as well warm up by dealing with this dog first."
He tugged at his cuffs, his tone as casual as if he were commenting on the nice weather.
The phone screen lit up.
An alarm, exactly 6 AM.
Vought Tower was waiting for him.
Chapter 4: Return to Vought
Vought International Building, lobby.
At 7:15 AM, there was a long line in front of the turnstiles in the employee passage.
When Leon swiped his card to pass through the turnstile, the blonde woman at the reception desk, wearing exquisite makeup, looked up and swept a glance over him, her gaze lingering on him for two extra seconds.
The photo on his predecessor's ID badge still showed that face with skin stretched tight over cheekbones, a far cry from the person standing before her.
She opened her mouth, then swallowed her words.
Thousands of people enter and exit Vought Tower every day; it wasn't the receptionist's place to comment on changes in appearance.
Leon entered the elevator and pressed B2.
Second basement level, Archives.
The moment the elevator doors opened, the smell of mold and the dust of aged paper rushed to meet him.
The fluorescent lights still had that pallid, greenish hue, casting a deathly aura over every face.
Leon walked in, the sound of his leather shoes hitting the concrete floor echoing back and forth between the rows of iron shelves.
At the workstation in the corner labeled "LeonLi," four stacks of files were piled on the desk, the highest one leaning precariously as if about to topple.
He unbuttoned his suit jacket and sat down.
The swivel chair creaked.
Across two rows of iron shelves, a young woman with short brown hair poked her head out, holding a file box in her hands.
Jessica Miller, the only person in the Archives who had ever said hello to his predecessor.
Her first reaction upon seeing Leon was to blink three times.
"Leon?"
Leon turned his head.
"Morning."
Jessica put down the file box, walked over, and circled him halfway, her eyes widening more and more.
"What have you been eating? Did you grow taller? Did you change your style? You... what's going on with you?"
"Working out."
"In two days? You took two days off and came back like this?"
"Genetic awakening, a second growth spurt for Asians, it's perfectly normal."
Jessica stared at him for five seconds, the expression on her face oscillating between confusion and suspicion.
"You're joking."
"What do you think?"
Leon pushed up his gold-rimmed glasses, showing no intention of continuing the explanation.
Jessica bit her lip, lowered her voice, and leaned in a step closer.
"You haven't been here for two days. Mark sent three emails to the department group chat calling you out, saying you were absent without leave and that he was going to deduct your entire month's performance bonus."
"Hmm."
"That's all you have to say? Leon, just last Friday he made you kneel to pick up files; the whole floor heard about it. Now that you're back, he's definitely going to..."
The sound of leather shoes hitting the floor came from the end of the corridor, the rhythm unhurried, carrying that specific, dawdling air typical of management.
Jessica's words stuck in her throat; she stepped back and lowered her head, pretending to flip through the folder in her hands.
Mark Johnson walked over through the aisle of iron shelves.
He was in his early forties, had a beer belly, and his hair was slicked back with so much gel it shone.
His face always wore that smile of a superior bestowing favor upon a subordinate, the curve of his lips precise to the millimeter.
He held a stack of new files in his hand and tucked a kraft paper envelope under his arm.
He paused when he reached Leon's workstation.
His gaze slid from Leon's gold-rimmed glasses to his suit collar, then down to the hands resting on the desk.
He paused for two seconds.
"Well, well."
Mark slammed the files onto Leon's desk.
The sound of paper hitting the desk exploded in the Archives.
"Chinaman, you haven't been here for two days, but you're dressed quite like a human being. Who gave you the guts to be absent without leave?"
Leon didn't move.
His gaze fell on the cover of the new stack of files, his fingers resting on the armrest, his posture relaxed.
Mark leaned forward half a step, braced his hands on the edge of the desk, and stooped down.
This was his usual stance, looking down from above, using his size and proximity to create pressure.
Whenever his predecessor was subjected to this, his head would shrink down, his shoulders would hunch, and his voice would become as thin as a mosquito's buzz.
But today, the person sitting in the chair looked up and glanced at him.
Just one glance.
Mark's smile didn't change, but the hairs on the back of his neck stood up for a split second.
He attributed this reaction to the air conditioning being too cold and continued speaking.
"These files, I want them all archived before you leave today. I want the classification labels handwritten with index numbers, and every single one cross-indexed. If you don't finish, don't even think about leaving. Your performance score for this month has already been marked as zero by me, and if you are absent without leave one more time, I will have HR fire you directly. Do you hear me?"
The three white colleagues at the row of workstations against the wall looked up, familiar smiles hanging on their lips.
The act of watching the show knows no borders in any workplace.
"Do you hear me?" Mark repeated, his voice raised by half a degree.
Leon nodded.
"Okay."
Two words, his tone calm, his enunciation clear.
Mark was satisfied.
He straightened his back, tugged at the hem of his shirt, and turned to walk away.
His leather shoes tapped out a triumphant rhythm on the concrete floor.
He walked three steps.
A hand pressed onto his right shoulder from behind.
Mark's first reaction was to turn around.
But he couldn't.
Because the strength of that hand caused his right shoulder blade to emit a crisp crack.
Not the sound of a fracture.
It was the sound of bone being precisely compressed to its critical point in the face of some irresistible force.
Pain.
So painful that Mark's knees lost support within 0.3 seconds, and he knelt down straight.
His right knee slammed into the concrete floor, and the dull thud of his kneecap hitting the ground made Jessica gasp.
"Hhh... ah..." Mark's mouth was open, unable to utter a complete syllable.
He wanted to raise his hand to pry off the hand pressing on his shoulder, but his right arm was completely unresponsive.
Leon stood behind him, his five fingers resting on Mark's shoulder, the pressure looking light as a feather.
He bent down.
The lenses of his gold-rimmed glasses reflected the pallid light from above.
His lips were almost touching Mark's ear, his voice gentle and polite, as if chatting with an old friend about a weekend golf game.
"Mind your language in the future."
Mark's eyes rolled to the side, wanting to see the expression of the person behind him clearly.
He saw it.
In those eyes, there was no anger, no pleasure of revenge, no emotion at all.
So clean that it made one's spine chill.
Leon's voice continued to be delivered into his ear.
"Next time, I will twist your shoulder off your body, like twisting off a bottle cap."
The five fingers loosened.
Mark's upper body pitched forward, his hands braced on the floor, his right arm trembling violently.
His forehead was covered in sweat, his complexion turned from flushed to ashen, his lips trembling, unable to say a single word.
Leon retreated to his workstation, pulled at his suit cuffs, sat down, and opened the first page of the stack of files on the desk.
The Archives were so quiet that one could hear the buzzing of the ballast in the fluorescent lights.
The three colleagues against the wall pulled their heads back behind the partitions, their smiles vanishing completely.
Mark knelt on the floor for about ten seconds, then used his left hand to hold onto the iron shelf to stand up, his right arm hanging by his side, the entire arm trembling.
He didn't look back at Leon.
Step by step, holding onto the wall, he shuffled toward the end of the corridor.
His leather shoes dragged a faint scraping sound across the floor; that triumphant rhythm could no longer be tapped out.
Jessica stood between the two rows of iron shelves, her knuckles turning white from gripping the folder in her hands, her mouth open, unable to close it for a long time.
Leon turned over the first page of the file without even raising his head.
"Jessica, his brother-in-law is in the Legal Department? What's his name?"
Jessica was stunned for two seconds before she reacted.
"Brian Coleman, Deputy Director of the Legal Compliance Department."
"Deputy Director."
Leon casually wrote down the name on the blank space of the file cover.
"Thanks."
Chapter 5: The Secret of the Archives
After Mark disappeared at the end of the corridor, the Archives were silent for a full four minutes.
During those four minutes, no one spoke, no one walked around, and even the sound of keyboard typing quieted down significantly.
Jessica walked over carrying two cups of coffee and placed one of them on the corner of Leon's desk.
She stood beside his workstation, glancing at him several times as if wanting to say something, before finally lowering her voice to a level only the two of them could hear.
"Leon, have you lost your mind?"
Leon took the coffee and took a sip.
It was instant coffee, with a cheap, burnt, bitter taste.
"What's wrong?"
"What's wrong? You just forced Mark to his knees! In the Archives! At least five people saw it!"
"Six. You didn't count the one hiding behind the shelves at the end of the aisle peeking."
Jessica's mouth twitched.
"You still have the heart to count heads? Do you have any idea that Mark's brother-in-law is Brian Coleman? From the Legal Department! If he sues you for assault, not only will you lose your job, but you'll also face a lawsuit!"
"He won't sue."
"How do you know?"
"Because he'd have to explain to everyone first how he ended up on his knees, pinned down by a 130-pound Asian archivist."
Jessica was stunned for a moment.
Leon set down his coffee cup and used his thumb to wipe away a drop of liquid from the rim.
"A 200-pound middle-aged white manager, pinned to his knees with one hand by an Asian subordinate he's been bullying for half a year. Jessica, who do you think would be more embarrassed if this got out?"
Jessica stopped speaking.
Her expression slowly shifted from anxiety to a sense of relaxation she hadn't even realized herself.
"Of course he won't make a scene. He'll pretend nothing happened, or at most, find another way to cause trouble, like using his brother-in-law's connections to apply pressure from the Legal Department. But that's a problem for later."
Leon picked up the files on the desk and turned a page.
"As for later, we'll deal with it later."
Jessica stood where she was, clutching her own cup of coffee with both hands, watching him for a long while.
"You've changed."
"Hm?"
"You weren't like this before. In the past, when Mark yelled at you, you wouldn't even dare to lift your head. Last week, when he knocked your file boxes all over the floor and you were kneeling on the ground picking them up one by one, your hands were shaking. I remember."
Leon's hand, which was turning the pages, paused for a moment.
He looked up and glanced at Jessica.
"That was before."
After saying those three words, he lowered his head and continued flipping through the files, with no intention of continuing the conversation.
Jessica wisely didn't ask again.
She returned to her own workstation, and every few minutes, she would still glance toward Leon's direction from across the two rows of iron shelves.
After waiting for the atmosphere in the Archives to return to its normal state of numbness, Leon set aside the public files in his hands.
He swiveled his chair to face the row of iron cabinets behind him that were sealed with red tape.
In the original body's memories, there was a key.
Although an archivist is the lowest-ranking job at Vought Tower, it has a privilege that no other position possesses.
Physical access to original files.
Vought has two systems for top-secret files.
Electronic versions are stored on encrypted servers and require Level 4 clearance or higher to access.
But according to federal archival laws, a copy of the paper originals must be kept in a physical archive and managed by a dedicated person.
The original body was that dedicated person.
Mark, that shrewd man, knew nothing about file classification and retrieval. The reason he arranged for the original body to manage these alone was purely because someone needed to do the dirty and tiring work, and the original body never refused.
Leon retrieved the key ring from the original body's private drawer and walked to the row of iron cabinets at the very back.
Third row, seventh column. The red seal was stamped with Vought International's eagle-wing logo and a line of small text: Internal Confidential, unauthorized access will be prosecuted under federal trade secret laws.
He inserted the key and turned the lock half a circle.
The cabinet door opened, revealing dozens of kraft paper file boxes neatly stacked inside, arranged by number.
Leon started flipping through them from the first box.
V-0001, Phase I clinical trial records for compound v.
The date was 1971.
Subject numbers from 001 to 047.
Survival rate: 12 percent.
Out of 47 people, fewer than six survived.
For the rest, the cause of death column was filled with technical terms, which, translated into plain English, meant: their bodies exploded.
Leon set this one aside and continued flipping.
V-0012, internal handling memorandum for superhuman crime incidents.
One after another, the victims' names were blacked out, while the perpetrators' names were all members of The Seven.
A-Train broke into a private residence in Miami after taking drugs, resulting in the deaths of a family of three.
Vought's handling method: Compensate the family with 2 million dollars in hush money, and rewrite the press release to say A-Train bravely raided a drug den.
The Deep sexually assaulted a female staff member at a cruise ship party.
Vought's handling method: The victim signed a non-disclosure agreement plus a 500,000-dollar settlement, and all related posts on social media disappeared within 40 minutes.
Translucent's voyeurism records inside Vought Tower.
Vought's handling method: There wasn't even a solution plan on this memorandum. Only a line of handwritten notes in messy handwriting: Acknowledged, no action to be taken for now. The signatory's initials: S.E.
Stan Edgar.
The personal handwriting of the CEO of Vought International.
Leon flipped through these files one by one, reading very quickly.
With super vision combined with the information processing capability of a super brain, he only needed 0.3 seconds to memorize all the content on every page.
On the bottom shelf of the last row of iron cabinets, he found a file box.
File number V-0037.
The red confidential stamp on the kraft paper cover was one size larger than the others, and a yellow label was pasted on the top right corner: Level 6 clearance only.
The original body shouldn't have had the key to this box.
But it was right here.
Either Vought's file management was rotten to the core, or someone had deliberately left this thing in the regular Archives.
Leon opened the file box.
Cover title: Subject Zero Rearing Program.
Subtitle: Complete Growth Record of Homelander.
He flipped through it page by page.
Birthplace: Vought International Third Experimental Complex, Basement Level 6.
Date of birth: April 15, 1981.
Biological mother info: Subject F-0009. Died within 48 hours of the subject's birth due to complications from compound v.
Rearing plan: No kinship care, no legal guardian. Managed by the laboratory team on a rotating basis. All growth stages of the subject were completed inside the experimental complex.
Following that were dense test data and psychological evaluation forms.
Three years old, first displayed flight ability, crashed through the laboratory's concrete ceiling.
Five years old, Heat Vision awakened, accidentally burned through a researcher's right arm. Note: The researcher has signed a non-disclosure agreement and was transferred.
Seven years old, psychological evaluation, quoting the original text: The subject shows an extreme tendency for emotional dependency and exhibits excessive needs for intimacy toward fixed caregivers. It is recommended to regularly rotate caregivers to prevent the subject from forming uncontrollable emotional bonds.
Those people replaced the only familiar person around him every few months.
Not letting him build a relationship with anyone.
Not letting him learn to trust.
Leon flipped to the last page.
At the bottom of the page, there was a bold conclusion in red font.
Comprehensive assessment: Subject Zero's emotions are extremely unstable, and the need for external validation has reached a pathological level. Any form of public rejection may trigger an uncontrollable violent reaction. It is recommended to manage emotions through a long-term maternal substitute program; for specific plans, see Attachment V-0037-B.
Leon finished reading the last page, closed the file box, and put it back in its original place in the iron cabinet.
The cabinet door closed, and the lock turned half a circle.
He walked back to his workstation and sat down, the lenses of his gold-rimmed glasses reflecting the white light from the overhead lamps.
He tapped his fingers on the desk twice.
"So, your weakness has been written on paper from the very beginning."
His voice was very soft, so soft that Jessica, sitting beyond the two rows of iron shelves, didn't hear it at all.
The stack of files Mark had thrown over was still spread out on the desk, with a name written in the blank space on the top page.
Brian Coleman.
Leon pulled out that page, folded it twice, and put it into his inner suit pocket.
The phone screen lit up with a new email notification.
Sender: Mark Johnson.
Subject line: Notice of disciplinary action regarding your absenteeism (CC: HR and Legal Department).
Leon glanced at the body of the email; it was less than three lines long, the tone stiff to the point of trembling, with every word struggling to maintain the dignity of a manager.
He turned the phone over and placed it face down on the desk.
Jessica poked her head out from behind the iron shelves.
"Leon, Mark sent you an email, right? I got a copy too."
"Yeah."
"He CC'd the Legal Department. His brother-in-law's side."
Leon turned his head and looked at her.
He curled the corners of his mouth upward.
"That's perfect, saves me the trouble of going to find him."
Jessica opened her mouth, then swallowed the rest of her sentence.
She always felt that there was something she couldn't quite describe hidden in the way this Leon looked at people today.
It wasn't anger, nor was it excitement.
It was a kind of confident, satisfied patience, as if the prey had already taken the bait.
Chapter 6: The God Upstairs
Jessica's gaze was still glued to Leon, and she had flipped through the folder in her hand three times without turning to the next page.
Leon ignored her, lowering his head to sort the remaining documents on the desk by number, stacking them into archive boxes. His movements were neither fast nor slow.
The lunch break bell rang.
The few remaining people in the Archives stood up and walked out, their footsteps dragging. They all took a detour, walking an extra five steps, when passing Leon's cubicle.
No one greeted him.
The lingering effect of the morning's incident was still present.
Leon buttoned his suit jacket and stood up.
"Jessica, where can I find coffee in the lobby? I've had enough instant coffee."
Jessica snapped out of her daze.
"There's an employee coffee bar on the west side of the first-floor lobby. But at noon, that place is full of people from upstairs—PR, Marketing, and occasionally the management teams of The Seven. People from our Archives generally don't go there."
"Why?"
Jessica's expression was a bit subtle.
"If you walk in there wearing a B2 access card, everyone will look at you. You know, that kind of look."
Leon glanced down at the ID badge on his chest: Leon Li, Archivist, Authority Level: Level 1.
He flipped the ID badge over, the blank back facing out.
"Let's go, my treat."
Jessica hesitated for two seconds but still followed.
The elevator ascended from B2 to the first floor. The moment the doors opened, the light brightened by three stops.
Vought Tower's first-floor lobby was a completely different world from the basement.
It had a twelve-meter high ceiling, and the floor was polished marble that reflected people's images. On the wall directly opposite hung a huge poster of The Seven, with Homelander in the center, his smile so perfectly standard it looked measured with a ruler.
The glass display cases on both sides were filled with merchandise for The Seven. Homelander figurines sold for forty-nine dollars each, and Queen Maeve's limited edition figures were priced at three hundred.
Leon glanced at them as he passed; the Homelanderfigurine's smile was identical to the one on the poster.
A mass-produced god.
"That coffee bar is over there." Jessica pointed to a semi-open area on the west side, with two apron-clad baristas behind the counter.
As Leon walked over, he activated his All-Seeing Eye in his mind.
His perception instantly covered the entire building.
Energy signals emerged from various floors, varying in size and intensity.
On the eighty-second floor, the brightest signal was still there: Homelander, S-class, not moving.
On the seventieth floor, slightly to the east, an A-class signal, labeled Queen Maeve.
On the forty-fifth floor, a B-class signal was slowly descending.
The system displayed an identification tag.
[Scan Target: The Deep]
[Ability Level: B]
[Core Abilities: Underwater breathing, communication with marine life, underwater super strength (land combat power significantly reduced)]
[Known Weaknesses: Less than 40% of B-class standard combat power out of water, fragile psychological state, extremely concerned about others' opinions.]
Leon retracted his All-Seeing Eye and walked to the counter.
"One Americano, one latte."
The barista took his ID badge, scanned it, looked up at him, then at the photo on the badge. He moved his mouth but said nothing, and began making coffee.
Jessica stood beside him, arms crossed over her chest, her eyes constantly darting around.
"Look over there, the PR people, all wearing Burberry. Then look at us."
"What you wear isn't important; what matters is who signs your paycheck."
"The person who signs my paycheck was forced to his knees by you this morning, so I'm actually quite worried if I'll even have a salary next month."
Leon took the coffee and handed her one cup.
"Don't worry, he wouldn't dare touch you."
"How do you know?"
"Because touching you would mean admitting there's a second person in the Archives who knows what happened this morning. People like Mark are most afraid of witnesses."
Jessica held her latte, her lips resting on the rim of the cup.
"When did you become so calculating?"
Leon didn't answer.
His attention was drawn by a sound from the direction of the elevator.
The elevator arrival chime dinged, and the door of the third elevator on the right slid open.
A young girl with blonde hair and blue eyes walked out.
Early twenties, wearing a Vought-customized white uniform jacket, hair tied in a ponytail, with very light makeup that barely concealed the dark circles under her eyes.
Starlight.
Annie January.
The newest member of The Seven, having debuted three days ago at a nationally televised induction ceremony, with a sweet smile and perfect lines—a model newcomer polished by Vought's PR Department over two months.
But the girl walking out of the elevator at this moment bore no resemblance to the bright and confident superhero on television.
Leon's All-Seeing Eye automatically displayed the scan results.
[Scan Target: Starlight / Annie January]
[Ability Level: B+]
[Core Abilities: Absorbs electrical energy and releases light wave impact, can temporarily create blinding areas of strong light]
[Known Weaknesses: Ability limit is restricted by surrounding available electrical energy, severely lacking in combat experience.]
At the bottom, there was an additional note, in a smaller font than the main text.
[Emotional State: Extremely suppressed. Detected stress trauma response (early PTSD characteristics), abnormally high heart rate, adrenaline levels continuously at stress threshold.]
Leon held his coffee, his gaze shifting from the system panel to the girl walking across the lobby.
Starlight walked quickly, head down, heading towards the corridor exit on the west side of the lobby.
As she passed the coffee bar area, her shoulder bumped into Leon's arm.
The coffee cup wobbled, and a few drops of Americano splashed onto Leon's white shirt cuff.
Starlight stopped and looked up.
Her eyes were red.
"I'm sorry, I'm really sorry, I wasn't watching where I was going."
Her voice was trembling, and her hands were clasped together, knuckles white.
Leon glanced down at the coffee stain on his cuff, then looked up.
"It's fine."
"I'll compensate you, I can pay for dry cleaning, or I can get you some tissues."
"It's just a cup of coffee, no need."
Starlight bit her lower lip, standing still, not moving.
Jessica leaned over from the side, her eyes wide as saucers.
"Oh my god, you're Starlight? You're Starlight, aren't you? I saw your induction ceremony on TV! You're much prettier in person than on TV!"
Starlight forced a smile.
"Thank you."
Jessica tugged on Leon's sleeve.
"Leon, this is Starlight! The new member of The Seven! Don't you watch the news?"
"I do."
Leon nodded to Starlight, his tone as casual as discussing the weather forecast.
"Welcome to Vought. The coffee in this building isn't great, but at least it's better than the instant stuff in the Archives."
Starlight was taken aback.
She probably didn't expect an ordinary employee to speak to her in such an unpretentious tone, without excitement, without asking for an autograph, without taking out a phone to snap a photo.
"Which department are you in?"
"B2, Archives."
"Archives?"
"Yes, the darkest corner of this building."
Starlight's eyes flickered.
"I also think some parts of this building are much darker than they appear."
Her voice changed as she said this, the end of her sentence very low, and her gaze drifted to the side, falling on The Deep's poster on the lobby wall.
It lingered for less than half a second before she pulled it back.
Leon said nothing, taking a sip of his coffee.
"If you're in a hurry, you can go ahead. Don't worry about the shirt."
"I'm truly sorry."
Starlight repeated, then turned and quickly walked towards the corridor exit.
Her back was urgent, shoulders tensed, her whole body rigid.
Jessica sighed beside him.
"Oh my god, it was Starlight herself. Did you see her eyes, were they red just now? Did she cry? Do superheroes cry too?"
"They do."
Leon finished the last sip of coffee and threw the cup into the nearby trash can.
Jessica was still chattering.
"She looks so different from on TV. She was so cheerful and bright on TV, but just now her whole body was trembling. Do you think she's under too much work pressure? After all, she just joined The Seven, and working with Homelander and the others must be very stressful."
"It's not stress."
"Then what is it?"
After discarding the coffee cup, Leon took out a handkerchief and slowly wiped the stain from his cuff.
"Jessica, the most dangerous things in this Vought building aren't the small fry like Mark in the Archives."
Jessica choked on the coldness in that statement.
"What do you mean?"
"Nothing."
Leon folded the handkerchief and put it back in his pocket, then turned and walked towards the elevator.
"Lunch break's over, back to work."
Jessica trotted to catch up, still muttering about Starlight.
Leon pressed the B2 button, and the elevator doors closed.
The face reflected on the stainless steel door panel, the eyes behind the gold-rimmed glasses, held no warmth.
The All-Seeing Eye's scan record remained on his mental panel.
Stress trauma response.
Three days since joining.
Only a few people in this building could cause a B+ class superhuman to develop a stress trauma response in three days.
He brought up The Deep's ability panel again and re-read it.
Land combat power less than forty percent of B-class standard.
Leon marked a sequence number next to that name in his mind.
Second, after Translucent.
The elevator arrived at B2, the doors opened, and a musty smell wafted out.
Leon walked back to his cubicle and opened the documents to be processed that afternoon.
His phone screen lit up, an email notification.
The sender wasn't Mark.
It was from Legal and Compliance, Richard Webb.
Subject: Inquiry Regarding Archival Department Employee Conduct. Please report to the Legal Department at 3 PM today for questioning.
Leon put his phone down, the corner of his mouth twitching.
He pulled out the twice-folded paper from his inner suit pocket, on which Brian Coleman's name was written.
In the deepest part of the drawer, a palm-sized black USB drive lay quietly.
While going through the Archives this morning, he had conveniently made a copy of the interesting items.
Three o'clock.
Perfect.
Chapter 7: The First Prey
At 2:58 PM, Leon straightened his tie and walked out from the iron-rack aisles of the Archives.
Jessica poked half her head out from behind her workstation.
"Leon, are you really going? The Legal Department? Those people are ruthless."
"It's not like they're eating me."
"Can't you just lower your head and admit you were wrong? Someone like Mark, if you give him a way out, this whole thing would blow over."
Leon looked back at her.
"Jessica, do you know why he dared to make the original Leon kneel to pick up files?"
Jessica didn't say anything.
"Because Leon would pick them up every time."
He tugged at his cuffs and stepped into the elevator.
The Legal and Compliance Department was on the 14th floor, its decor ten levels better than the second basement floor.
The corridor was carpeted in dark gray, and footsteps landed with a muffled thud.
Leon found the door marked Conference Room C, didn't knock, and pushed it open.
Two people were sitting inside.
The one on the left was in his early fifties, wearing a three-piece gray suit with a silver tie clip. His hair was meticulously combed, and his stiff, upright posture made the back of his chair look like a prop.
His name tag read Richard Webb, Senior Executive of the Legal and Compliance Department.
Mark was sitting on the right.
Mark's right arm was slung across his chest, secured by a simple triangular bandage.
The moment he saw Leon push the door open, Mark recoiled half an inch into his chair.
Richard looked up and stared at Leon through his reading glasses for three seconds.
"You are Leon Li?"
"Yes."
"Sit."
Leon didn't sit.
He walked to the table, hands in his pockets, and remained standing.
Richard raised an eyebrow.
"I'll say it again: sit down."
"It's faster to talk standing up, Mr. Webb. Your time is expensive, and so is mine."
Mark snorted from the side.
"Since when is your time worth anything? You're a $3,200-a-month archivist who misses two days of work and comes back to hit your superior. Who do you think you are?"
Leon shifted his gaze to Mark's face and paused for a second.
Mark shut his mouth.
Richard tapped the table with his knuckles.
"Mr. Li, I didn't bring you here today for idle chatter. Mark Johnson has filed a formal complaint with the Legal Department citing personal assault and violation of the Employee Code of Conduct. According to Chapter 7, Section 3 of the Vought International Employee Handbook, physical violence against a direct supervisor carries a minimum penalty of immediate termination and, at most, can be referred to the police."
He paused and picked up a printed document from the table.
"This is your termination notice; it's already been drafted. You can sign it, leave today, and we won't pursue criminal charges. Or, if you don't sign, we'll submit the surveillance footage and injury report to the NYPD, and you can talk it over with your lawyer."
Leon listened and nodded.
"Are you done?"
The eyes behind Richard's reading glasses shifted.
"Do you have anything to say in your defense?"
"No defense. I'd like to ask you a question."
"What question?"
Leon pulled the black USB drive from his pocket, placed it on the table, pressed down with his index finger, and slowly slid it in front of Richard.
"Mr. Webb, do you know what's on this?"
Richard looked down at the USB drive, then looked back up at Leon.
"What do you mean?"
"It means I've worked in the Archives for two years. In those two years, I've handled roughly sixty thousand internal documents. I made a backup of some of the more interesting ones."
Mark interjected.
"A backup? You secretly copied company confidential files? That's a Level 2 violation! Richard, add that to the list, call the police immediately!"
Leon ignored him.
His gaze remained fixed on Richard's face.
"For instance, in April 2019, The Deep sexually assaulted a female intern on a yacht during a Vought annual meeting. The victim reported it; I remember the case number, NYPD-2019-JK7752. The case was dropped within 72 hours of being filed, citing insufficient evidence."
Richard's fingers stopped on the table, motionless.
"But what's interesting is that I found an internal memo from the Vought Legal Department in the Archives, signed by Brian Coleman. The memo instructed the PR department to pay the victim a $750,000 hush-money settlement and simultaneously required the IT department to delete all cloud backups of the surveillance footage from the yacht."
Mark's face went from red to white within three seconds.
"What did you say?"
"I said your brother-in-law helped The Deep cover up a rape case."
Leon's tone was as casual as if he were discussing what to have for lunch.
"That's just one of them. I found eleven similar memos involving four members of The Seven, with the earliest dating back to 2016. Each one has a signatory, and each one has a Vought Legal Department approval tracking number."
Richard pulled his hand back from the table and rested it on his lap.
The conference room was silent for five seconds.
Mark turned to look at Richard, his voice dry.
"Richard, he's bluffing. It's impossible for him to have gotten those; those files have at least Level 4 clearance."
"The digital versions have Level 4 clearance."
Leon flicked the USB drive on the table with his fingernail.
"But the original paper copies are sitting in the iron cabinet in the second basement, third row, seventh column, and I have the key. Mr. Webb, you should know better than I do just how rotten Vought's file management system is."
Richard sat in his chair and slowly removed his reading glasses with one hand.
Without the obstruction of the glasses, his eyes looked a size smaller, and his eyelids twitched twice.
"What do you want?"
"First, tear up that termination notice on the table."
Richard looked at him, motionless.
Leon took the USB drive back, held it in his palm, and twirled it.
"Mr. Webb, let me do the math for you again. If these memos were to appear in the inbox of a New York Times reporter, how much would Vought's stock price drop? How much would The Seven's image collapse? As the signatory and approver, how many years of federal litigation would you and Brian Coleman face?"
Richard placed his reading glasses on the table; the temple clicked against the surface.
He reached out, picked up the termination notice, and tore it in half.
Mark jumped up.
"Richard! What are you doing? This bastard hit me! He skipped work! He violated policy!"
"Mark." Richard's voice was flat.
"Shut up."
Mark's mouth hung half-open, his face turning the color of liver.
Leon put the USB drive back in his pocket and smoothed his suit jacket.
"Thank you for your cooperation, Mr. Webb."
"What exactly do you want?"
"We'll talk after work."
Leon turned and walked toward the door.
"Your parking spot is in the B1 level, West Zone, third row, gray Mercedes S-Class. My memory is quite good. Eight o'clock tonight, don't be late."
The door closed behind him.
In the conference room, Mark gripped the edge of the table, his entire right arm shaking.
"Richard, you can't just let him walk away! He's threatening you!"
Richard sat in his chair, staring at the torn-in-half notice on the table.
His palms were covered in sweat.
8:03 PM, B1 parking lot.
The fluorescent lights illuminated the gray concrete floor with a sickly pallor; only a few scattered cars remained on the level.
Richard Webb sat in the driver's seat of his gray Mercedes, hands gripping the steering wheel, engine off.
The driver's side door was pulled open from the outside.
Richard turned his head.
Leon stood outside the car door, the white light of the parking lot reflecting off his gold-rimmed glasses.
"Right on time."
Richard's Adam's apple bobbed.
"What do you want? Don't beat around the bush with me."
Leon bent over and reached into the car, one hand grabbing Richard's tie.
His fingers tightened, cinching the tie.
Richard was dragged from the driver's seat, his back slamming into the concrete pillar nearby, his feet dangling three inches off the ground.
He tried to scream, but the tie choked his throat, producing only a string of garbled gasps.
Leon held him against the wall with one hand, as easily as hanging up a coat.
"From now on, you work for me."
Richard clawed at the tie knot with both hands, his face turning beet red.
"I need the progress of all ongoing cases in the Vought Legal Department, the schedules and security deployments for every member of The Seven, and the meeting minutes of Vought's upper management. One report every week, sent to my designated encrypted email address."
"You're crazy... I can't do that..."
Leon's fingers tightened another notch.
"Mr. Webb, I'll give you two options. First, you cooperate with me; your job is safe, your family is safe, and you can continue to be a Senior Executive at Vought."
Richard's eyes rolled back; oxygen deprivation made his struggles increasingly feeble.
Leon loosened his grip slightly, letting him take half a breath.
"Second, those documents appear in the headlines of every media outlet tomorrow, and you and Coleman go to federal prison. As for whether your head ends up on the flagpole in front of Vought Tower, that depends on whether you keep me in a good mood."
Richard hung on the wall, his toes touching the ground, the color draining from his face in waves.
"Which one do you choose?"
The fluorescent lights in the parking lot hummed, and Richard's lips trembled for five seconds.
"The first one."
Leon let go.
Richard slid down the pillar, sat on the ground, braced his hands on his knees, and gasped for air.
Leon crouched down and straightened his crooked tie for him.
"Pleasure doing business with you."
He stood up, dusted off his palms, and turned to walk toward the parking lot exit.
The sound of his leather shoes on the concrete was steady and unhurried, the echoes rolling back and forth in the empty parking lot.
Richard sat on the ground, staring at the back retreating around the corner, his whole body shaking as if he had just been fished out of ice water.
He touched his own neck.
Below the knot of his tie, five fingerprints were clearly imprinted on his skin.
Chapter 8: Night Patrol
New York
1:17 AM.
Leon stood on the edge of the apartment rooftop, folded his suit jacket and placed it on the ventilation duct, then loosened his shoulders.
The night sky over Manhattan was stained a murky orange by the lights from the ground; no stars were visible.
With a push from his toes, he ascended silently.
Fifty meters, one hundred meters, three hundred meters.
The wind grew stronger, and the temperature dropped lower.
His skin showed no reaction.
Leon stopped at an altitude of eight hundred meters, hovering in the air.
"Speed test."
He set a route for himself, from directly above the rooftop to Battery Park at the southern tip of Manhattan Island, a straight-line distance of 9.7 kilometers.
Three.
Two.
One.
New York stretched into a streak of light before his eyes.
9.7 kilometers, 2.8 seconds.
Leon came to a sudden stop above Battery Park, the Statue of Liberty below him glowing green, the tip of its torch only sixty meters from his feet.
"Too slow."
He adjusted his breathing rhythm, turned around, and flew north.
Second run, 1.9 seconds.
Third run, 1.2 seconds.
With each run, his body's adaptation to Super Speeddeepened.
Leon made seven round trips over Manhattan, with his final time settling at 0.7 seconds.
9.7 kilometers, 0.7 seconds.
People on the ground couldn't even hear the sound of the air being torn apart above them, because he was twelve times faster than the speed of sound.
Speed test complete.
"Heat Vision."
He hovered over the East River, locking onto an abandoned barge on the water.
Distance: four hundred meters.
The moment his eyes focused, two crimson beams of light shot out from his pupils, slicing straight into the barge's hull.
The steel plate softened instantly under the high heat, the edges of the cut burning into bright orange slag.
Leon controlled his vision to move slowly, and the barge was cleanly cut in half from the middle, the cross-section smooth enough to be used as a mirror.
He blinked, and the Heat Vision extinguished.
The half-barge slowly tilted and sank into the East River.
"Precision is good. Let's try distance."
He locked onto an abandoned water tower in the Bronx, ten kilometers away.
Ten kilometers.
Heat Vision triggered again, this time with him suppressing the output to minimum power.
Two hair-thin red lines streaked across the night sky, and a corner of the water tower ten kilometers away was sliced off, the broken iron fragments falling silently.
"Ten kilometers, minimum power precision cutting, acceptable."
Leon withdrew his gaze and stretched in the air.
Super Hearing was the final test.
He closed his eyes and pushed the sensitivity of his hearing up layer by layer.
The sounds of Manhattan flooded in like a tide.
The low-frequency vibration of car engines, the sound of broken glass hitting the floor in a bar, the crying of a baby in an apartment in Queens, fourteen hundred streets away.
There were too many sounds, too chaotic, but his brain could process all information streams simultaneously, automatically filtering out background noise and locking onto abnormal signals.
Everything was under control.
In this world, no superhuman could hide their tracks from him.
Just as Leon was preparing to withdraw his hearing and return to the apartment, a sound jumped out from all the noise.
Southwest, Brooklyn.
A woman's scream.
"No! Please, don't!"
The sound of breaking glass.
The dull thud of a counter being overturned and smashed to the ground.
A coarse voice was laughing.
"Cut the damn crap, take all the money out of the register, or I'll shove your head into the deep fryer."
Another voice, lower, with the texture of metal grinding against the ground.
"Wait, someone outside is on the phone, they might be calling the police."
"Calling the police? Let him call. By the time those cops get here, my rock fists will need a warm-up."
Rock fists.
Superhuman.
Leon opened his eyes, direction locked.
Brooklyn, the intersection of Bedford Avenue and Lenox Road, a 24-hour convenience store.
His figure disappeared from where he stood.
0.4 seconds later, Brooklyn.
The convenience store's glass door was mostly shattered, with potato chip bags and spilled drinks scattered on the floor.
Four people.
Three ordinary humans, their faces covered with cloth, holding baseball bats and folding knives.
The fourth, standing at the very front, was two meters tall, his entire body's skin a dark brown, rock-like texture, shirtless, every muscle covered in a layer of coarse, mineralized tissue.
He was holding the convenience store owner by the collar, suspending the thin, sixty-something-year-old man in mid-air, his other rock fist swung wide to strike the old man's face.
Leon walked into the convenience store.
His leather shoes crunched on the broken glass.
The Rock Man turned his head.
The three masked thugs also turned their heads.
The convenience store's fluorescent lights shone on Leon's white shirt and gold-rimmed glasses; he stood with his hands in his trouser pockets, surrounded by the mess of snacks and broken glass.
"Yo."
The Rock Man dropped the old man to the ground, turned to face Leon, and grinned.
His teeth were also rock-textured, grinding together with a harsh clatter.
"Another one with a death wish? Are you just passing by? Or do you want to be a hero?"
"Just passing by."
"Then get lost."
"Don't really want to."
The Rock Man took a step forward, and the floor cracked beneath his feet.
"Brother, I advise you to think clearly. My skin is bulletproof and hammer-proof. With your scrawny frame, one punch from me would be like swatting a fly."
Leon tilted his head.
"Really?"
"You're fucking looking for death!"
The Rock Man swung that mineral-covered fist, bringing it down with a whistling sound.
The target was Leon's face.
Bang.
The fist stopped.
To be precise, the fist hit Leon's face, and then shattered.
The rock-textured knuckles exploded from the middle, gravel splattering everywhere, the fractured surface revealing pink flesh underneath.
Leon stood where he was, his head not even tilted by a degree.
The Rock Man looked down at his right hand, which had shattered into pieces, his mouth agape, sound stuck in his throat.
Leon extended his right index finger.
"Try this."
His index finger flicked out, the tip tapping the center of the Rock Man's forehead.
A dull thud.
The two-meter-tall Rock Man flew backward, crashing through the back wall of the convenience store, then through the front wall of the dry cleaner next door, finally getting stuck between a dryer and the wall in the dry cleaner, motionless.
From the convenience store to the dry cleaner, three walls, a straight-line distance of fifteen meters.
One finger.
The remaining three masked robbers in the convenience store stood where they were, baseball bats and folding knives still raised in their hands.
Leon retracted his hand into his pocket and turned to look at them.
"You can run."
The three men's legs were trembling.
Leon pushed up his gold-rimmed glasses and the corners of his mouth curled up slightly.
"But I was just testing the precision of my Heat Vision, and I haven't tested enough yet."
His eyes glowed with a faint red light.
"So I suggest you stand still."
Three weapons dropped to the ground at the same time.
The three robbers knelt down.
The convenience store owner crawled out from behind the counter, shaking all over, and looked up at Leon.
"You, which superhero are you?"
Leon bent down to pick up a can of Coke that had rolled onto the floor, twisted off the cap, and took a sip.
"Not a hero."
He placed the Coke can on the counter and set a five-dollar bill next to it.
"Just passing by."
The sound of distant sirens came from the store entrance, getting closer.
Leon walked out of the convenience store, stepped over the broken glass on the floor, and looked up at the sky.
His body rose silently, and two seconds later, he disappeared into the night sky of New York.
The convenience store owner held onto the counter and looked up at the sky through the shattered glass door.
Nothing was there.
The three robbers kneeling on the ground looked at each other, and one of them squeezed out a sentence from his throat.
"What was that thing?"
In the dry cleaner next door, the Rock Man, stuck in the gap between the dryer and the wall, finally woke up, looked down at his right hand that had shattered into slag, and then at the dryer fragments embedded in his rock skin.
He repeated only one word over and over again.
"Impossible, impossible, impossible."
One thousand meters above Brooklyn, Leon hovered in the cold wind, reviewing the combat data from just now in his mind.
One finger flicked away a rock-transformed superhuman, with less than one percent of his power output.
The superhumans of this world weren't even qualified to warm him up.
The system panel popped up in his consciousness.
[Defeated superhuman "Rock Man" (unregistered, no Vought ID). Ability Level: C-.]
[Obtained Divine Might Points: 10.]
[Current Divine Might Points balance: 10/——]
Ten points.
Leon scanned the exchange list; even the cheapest enhancement item cost five hundred.
Still a long way to go.
He put away the panel and turned to fly toward his apartment.
He had to go to work tomorrow.
But before returning, he took one last look toward Vought Tower with his celestial vision.
On the 45th floor, The Deep's energy signal was still lit, moving slowly.
Still awake at 2:00 AM.
Leon withdrew his gaze, the wind blowing the hem of his shirt up.
The Deep, B-rank, land combat power is sixty percent of his total.
Richard should have a detailed itinerary for this fish.