In the instant the yellow-green monster froze up in shock, a blazing bolt of lightning, like a shooting star ripping through the night sky, crashed straight down onto its body.
The powerful current wrapped the creature in an instant, crackling loudly as blinding light burst out.
The monster didn't even have time to react before it was flung away like a kite with its string cut, skidding tens of meters across the ground before it finally came to a halt, kicking up clouds of dust in its wake.
Everyone present stared, utterly stupefied, mouths hanging open, eyes wide with shock and disbelief.
The yellow-green monster that had seemed as invincible as some fiend from the abyss… had actually been blasted away by an unknown attack.
Time seemed to freeze for a heartbeat. The whole world fell into a brief, dead silence. Only the acrid scent of smoke in the air proved that what had just happened wasn't a hallucination.
And then the bystanders suddenly noticed a figure in a bright yellow robe standing quietly in front of the little girl.
A light breeze blew past, stirring the hem of his robe so that it whispered softly. He leaned down a little and reached out, gently ruffling the girl's hair, his touch as careful as if he were soothing a frightened fawn.
The corners of his mouth lifted into a warm smile as he spoke softly:
"It's all right now. Don't be scared. I'm here."
After casting Shield Charms on the others nearby as well, he asked a nearby detective to lead them away, while he stayed behind to deal with the yellow-green monster.
Once the civilians had been evacuated, Harry looked toward the ruined heap farther ahead.
The yellow-green monster had been hurled into a pile of scrapped cars several dozen meters away.
Despite how impressive his attack had looked, sending the monster flying and smashing it into the junk pile, in reality he'd only managed to give it a few superficial wounds.
The worse part was that around those wounds, new flesh was already sprouting at a shocking speed. Severed blood vessels reconnected themselves, shattered bones clicked back into place. It wouldn't be long before it was completely good as new.
The thing's physical attributes were terrifying, and it possessed an extremely powerful regeneration. Taken together, its overall strength already surpassed that of a high-level demon and had stepped into the realm of demon lords.
Facing a monster like this, even Harry had to take it seriously.
After all, he was right in the center of New York City. He absolutely couldn't afford to use power that might spiral out of control. If anything went wrong, the source of this disaster wouldn't be the yellow-green monster anymore—it would be him.
And if that happened, his rampaging magic might very well wipe New York off the map.
Just then there was a thunderous bang and the pile of cars exploded apart, metal fragments spraying in every direction.
The yellow-green monster heaved itself up out of the wreckage and glared at Harry with savage hatred.
Like a berserk prehistoric beast, it drove its feet into the ground, leaving two deep craters in the asphalt. Then, wrapped in a howling wind, it charged at Harry with unstoppable momentum.
Its huge body tore forward at such speed that it dragged the air itself into a roar, like a runaway tank barreling down the street. The air around it twisted and warped from the pressure.
Harry's eyes sharpened. He was just about to cast a spell to meet the charge when he suddenly sensed another massive presence rushing toward him from behind.
He raised an eyebrow, didn't hesitate for even a second, and Apparated. Light flared faintly around him, and in the blink of an eye he vanished from where he'd been standing and reappeared at the corner of the street several dozen meters away.
Almost at the same moment, a blur tore through the spot where he'd just been.
An uninvited guest, green from head to toe, shot past like a fired shell and slammed straight into the yellow-green monster in midair, smashing it away.
Both monsters crashed down onto the street, sending up clouds of dust. The cars nearby rocked and toppled, and the lampposts along the pavement snapped like twigs.
Within the swirling dust, the two creatures immediately grappled with each other, their roars and bellows deafening.
Thick limbs clawed and hammered, and every clash set the ground trembling. Cracks split the street like spiderwebs, racing outward in all directions.
Their fight only grew fiercer. The surroundings were reduced to utter ruin, but the pair seemed to forget the world around them. Their eyes held only each other, their hearts fixed on a single goal—beat the opponent.
The sight stirred a strange, hard-to-describe feeling in Harry's chest.
Hulk and the yellow-green monster—Abomination, as he'd soon learn—were going at each other with total disregard for the destruction around them, and yet there was this weird… rhythm to their back-and-forth.
Standing off to the side, Harry suddenly felt oddly out of place, like a complete outsider in the middle of the chaos, extra and unnecessary.
Watching their relentless trading of blows, he had the absurd feeling of having "been force-fed dog food"—like he'd been dragged into watching some intense, intimate drama he hadn't signed up for.
He couldn't help muttering inwardly, "Do these two have some kind of secret history? Is this supposed to be some kind of tangled love-hate feud playing out in front of me?"
As the two monsters grappled bare-chested, their close-quarters struggle growing increasingly heated, Harry even learned their names from the scraps of snarled words between their near "cheek-to-cheek" brawling.
The gross, filthy yellow-brown monster that looked like it had never met soap in its life was called Abomination—a name Harry had never heard before.
But the solidly green one, who at least looked like life treated him a bit better, was called Hulk. That was a name he had heard on the news.
Not long ago, there had been a vicious monster attack at Caltech, and the main figure involved had been Hulk.
His combat strength was staggering; even when the military deployed heavy force, they couldn't do a thing to him. Harry hadn't expected to run into him again—especially right in the city center.
What surprised Harry even more was that, despite Hulk's furious temper and the terrifying rage rolling off him, when Harry probed deeper he found that Hulk's inner world was nothing like his fearsome exterior.
Inside, he was like a child who'd never really seen the world—a simple, honest heart, with a hazy, innocent understanding of what was around him, even a hint of shyness and introversion.
Aside from his overwhelming strength and his lack of clear ideas about good and evil, he was no different from a kid.
That sparked a thought in Harry's mind. Wasn't this the perfect borrower?
If he taught Hulk the right values and then signed a loan contract with him, it wouldn't be long before he became Harry's most outstanding "tool"… a righteous mage in his service!
But just as that thought formed, Harry's magic surged violently through his body, rampaging inside him and hammering out a warning.
The intensity of it far exceeded anything he'd ever felt before.
Even when he'd once tried to pry into the Vishanti's domain of power and "poach" them, the backlash hadn't been anywhere near this strong.
His eyes hardened as he thought it through, and a realization flashed through his mind like lightning—Hulk was connected to some Dimensional Demon God whose power was beyond comprehension.
After weighing it up, though, a flame of excitement slowly rose in his gaze.
This was perfect.
If he could get Hulk to behave and listen to him, it would be a massive win.
He wouldn't just gain a monstrously strong ally without spending his own magic; he'd also get the chance to study the mysterious dimensional power inside Hulk. If he managed to unravel it, he might even be able to deduce a whole new class of unparalleled magic from it.
Harry couldn't help the grin tugging at his lips. He really was too clever sometimes.
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