Location: Hosu City – North-West Warehouse
Vrrrmmm.
The engine hummed at a low, nearly imperceptible frequency.
Outside the reinforced glass, Hosu was a landscape of orange fire and oily black smoke.
High above, Ryukyu's massive silver-and-green dragon form cut through the smog.
Whoosh. Whoosh.
The rhythmic beat of her wings was so powerful it shook the car's chassis.
Kaito tapped the dashboard console. The tactical frequency hissed.
"Ryukyu, this is Command," Kaito said.
His voice was a flat, dry contrast to the screaming in the background. "Break your current hover-pattern over the sector four apartment block. You're holding a static position at sixty meters. The downdraft from your wings is forcing oxygen into the broken windows of the fourth floor. You're feeding the fire. Shift your altitude to eighty meters and rotate fifteen degrees East. Use the suction from your upward stroke to pull the smoke column away from the central stairwell. The residents need a ten-second pocket of clear air to reach the fire escape. Move now."
On his screen, the massive gold-and-green heat signature of the Dragon Hero shifted exactly fifteen degrees.
"Unit 2, status," Kaito commanded, his eyes tracking a cluster of red dots near the docks.
"We're pinned!" a sidekick shouted over the sound of explosions. "These thralls won't go down! Every time we hit them, they just get bigger!"
"Unit 2, cease physical engagement immediately," Kaito's voice remained level.
"I've analyzed their quirk signatures. They are kinetic-absorption types. Every punch you land is a battery charge for their next outburst. Fall back ten meters and maintain a loose perimeter.
There is pre-loaded chemical-suppressant grenades inside your tactical belts. Deploy canisters three and four. The gas will neutralize the Trigger-surge in their nervous systems without triggering a kinetic release. Do not engage in hand-to-hand. That is an order."
"Unit 5, provide cover fire for Unit 2's retreat," Kaito continued. "Angle your sonic-blasts at the pavement, not the targets. Use the vibration to disrupt their footing. Ryukyu, the stairwell is clear. Pivot back to the intersection and begin suppression of the primary heat source. Maintain the Vortex formation."
"All other units, contain all trigger enhanced individuals and animals"
On his primary dashboard display, the Hosu tactical grid was a shifting mosaic of blue and red.
Kaito saw the sidekicks moving in the precise patterns he had established.
The red clusters of villains stayed boxed in, their escape routes systematically cut off. The "Arisaka Standard" was holding the city of Hosu together making them more fast and efficient.
"Hmm?"
Suddenly, Kaito's fingers froze an inch above the glass.
The clinical silence of the car felt heavier. Kaito didn't look at the screen. He closed his eyes.
He let his awareness expand, pushing past the industrial ruins of Hosu and crossing the prefecture line into the different cities.
This was his home—the place where he had bought a sanctuary for Grandma Saki. He felt her slow, steady breathing. She was asleep.
He felt Kimiko in the neighborhood, her heart rate calm and rhythmic. He felt her husband cooking in the kitchen.
Then,
Whirrr-zip.
A violent spike of kinetic energy tore through the Naruhata border. It was Mach-speed displacement—jagged, erratic, and lethal. Number 6.
Behind the speedster, dozens of smaller, heavier pulses.
They were biological, distorted, and saturated with the sickly chemical heat of the Trigger drug. Villains in an organized full swing.
Kaito senses shifted to the entire Naruhata Ward.
There was Community Fair in full swing. He felt the heat of the cooking stalls and the joyful movement of the crowd.
Then, Kaito also sensed them.
Koichi and Kazuho were near the Ferris wheel, their movements alert but unaware of the tidal wave approaching.
He felt Knuckleduster in the shadows near the clock tower, his focus sharp and desperate, still scanning the faces in the crowd for a trace of his missing daughter.
They should be outmatched.
The Villain Factory was already deploying. He felt smaller groups of animal-trigger villains emerging from the drainage sewers, positioning themselves.
He tapped the phone on the dash.
Brrr-ring. Brrr-ring.
"Kaito?" Makoto Tsukauchi's voice came through the speakers.
"Makoto. Where are you?" Kaito said.
"I'm in my room doing my thesis research. Why? Are you coming home now? Can you please get me dinner?"
Kaito replied with a low and hard rasp voice. "There is a breach in the ward."
"Kaito? What's going on?"
"The people who targeted the old man weeks ago have breached the Naruhata North Gate. There are dozens of them, Makoto. It is an organized siege on the park."
"What? We're under attack? How did you know, you're in Hosu right?" Makoto replied while being worried and puzzled.
"You know I have private sensors and high-altitude feeds active in the ward. I don't leave my home unmonitored. Now is not the time for questions...Call for help... Call your brother immediately. Tell him there is a mass-casualty event in Naruhata. Trigger supply chain related. Please, Makoto. Hurry."
BOOM.
A distant, low-frequency explosion from the direction of the park rattled the car's windows, the sound traveling through the earth before it hit the air.
"I heard it!" Makoto's voice shifted from confused to terrified in an instant.
Thud.
The sound of her phone hitting the floorboards echoed through the cabin. "I'm calling him! I'm going!"
Click.
_-_-_-_-_
Location: Hosu Police Command Hub
Naomasa Tsukauchi stood in a room vibrating with the sound of shouting men and the constant crack-pop of radio static.
He was leaning over a tactical map of Hosu when his private phone buzzed in his pocket.
He pulled it out, frowning.
"Makoto? I'm in the middle of a—"
"Naomasa! Naruhata!" Makoto was screaming.
He could hear the sound of her running, her footsteps heavy and echoing in a concrete stairwell.
"There's an attack! I see the smoke! People are screaming near the Ferris wheel! It's the people with the drug, Naomasa! You have to send help!"
Naomasa froze.
He looked up at the long-range seismic monitor on the far wall.
A jagged spike was blooming over the Naruhata district. It matched the kinetic impact of a high-speed projectile.
"Get to safety, Makoto," Naomasa commanded.
He dropped the phone and slammed his fist onto the master override console.
"Clear the Naruhata local frequency! I want a prefecture-wide redirect on every available Pro-Hero!"
"Sir? The Hosu perimeter—" an officer started.
"The Hosu perimeter is being held by the Arisaka Standard!" Naomasa roared.
The dispatch monitors showed the Ryukyu sidekicks moving in perfect geometric formations, as if a single mind were guiding their every step
"Naruhata is a ghost town! If we don't move now, they'll burn it to the ground! Flag it as an AFO-Linked Siege!"
Clack-clack-clack.
The dispatchers hit their keys.
"All available Pro-Heroes in the Musutafu and Naruhata sectors," Naomasa shouted into his headset, his voice booming over the hub's speakers. "This is Detective Tsukauchi. Code Red. Major villain assault at Naruhata Park.
This is a Trigger supply chain event. All pros redirect to Naruhata immediately. Local units, focus purely on evacuation and perimeter containment. Let the specialists handle the fairground center!"
_-_-_-_-_-_
Location: Naruhata Park – The Community Fair
The fair was supposed to be the one night of peace for the district.
The smell of frying dough and grilled corn hung in the cool evening air. Children were queued for the Ferris wheel.
Bzzzzzzzz.
The sound started as a low, irritating thrum. Within seconds, it became a deafening roar.
The sky above the old clock tower shimmered and darkened.
Thousands of bio-engineered bees descended in a swirling, oily curtain, blotting out the stars.
Kuin Hachisuka stood atop the tower. Her skin was a translucent, sickly pale.
Her eyes were vacant, reflecting the hive-mind of the Villain Factory. She didn't speak. She just pointed.
Ssssh-pikt.
In the crowd, Soga, Moyuro, and Rapt were standing by a dart-game stall.
Soga was laughing, a cigarette dangling from his lip.
Zzip.
A bee struck the back of Soga's neck. Then Moyuro's. Then Rapt's.
They didn't scream. Their spines arched. Their eyes rolled back until only the whites showed.
Under the influence of the Queen Bee's toxin, their quirks flared with a violent, unnatural intensity.
"Aghhh!"
"Roaar!"
Soga's skin erupted in three-inch bone spikes that tore through his clothing.
Moyuro's form dissolved into a blurring, erratic shadow. Rapt's muscles swelled with a toxic green light.
"Clear the stage," Kuin whispered.
CRAAASH.
The trio turned on the civilians.
Soga's spikes shredded the game stalls. People screamed as the three friends, now puppets of the Hive, began to tear through the crowd.
BOOM.
At the North Gate, the concrete barriers vaporized.
Octoid and Chuma Yakumaru marched into the fairgrounds, leading a line of twenty grey-hooded figures.
These were the "Failed Projects"—Trigger-saturated humans whose skin was translucent, showing the black, pulsing veins beneath.
"Seal the exits!" Octoid roared, his eight mechanical limbs flailing like scythes.
KABOOM.
The Suicide Bombers—low-output Nomu experiments—ran into the fairground exits and detonated.
Pillars of orange fire and black, chemical smoke rose, turning the park into a sealed slaughterhouse.
_-_-_-_-_-_
Location: Naruhata Park Fairgrounds
"AAAGHHH"
The joyful music of the fairground speakers was cut short by a jagged burst of static.
Then the screaming began. The sky above the Ferris wheel was a mass of black, vibrating insects.
Kuin Hachisuka's bees descended like a curtain of soot.
Bzzzzzzzz.
"Run! Get to the station!"
"My daughter! Where is my daughter?!"
Panic turned the crowd into a stampede. Parents scooped up toddlers.
A pregnant woman tripped near the popcorn stall, her eyes wide with terror as a swarm of bees circled her head.
Whish. Whish. Whish.
Koichi—The Crawler—blurred through the legs of the crowd.
He wasn't the clumsy amateur anymore. He was a low-profile interceptor.
He slid on his palms and knees, his All Might hoodie fluttering in the wind. He saw the pregnant woman fall.
SKID.
He zipped under the swarm, grabbed her by the waist, and used his momentum to slide her twenty meters across the asphalt into the safety of the concrete public restroom.
"Stay inside! Keep the door shut!" Koichi yelled.
His voice was steady. It was the voice of a professional. He turned back to the crowd, his hands up.
"Everyone! Look at me! Don't run toward the North Gate! Move in a line toward the fountain! Stay low! Follow the blue line!"
Koichi activated his quirk again, his hands glowing with a faint blue light.
He was creating a frictionless path for the elderly and the mothers to slide toward the bunkers.
BOING.
Kazuho, Pop-Step jumped from the top of a ticket booth to the iron frame of the Ferris wheel.
She saw the bees clogging the gears. The ride groaned.
Creeeeak.
A dozen children were trapped in the high cabins.
"I've got the sky, Koichi!" Kazuho shouted. She reached into her belt and pulled out two canisters.
Thump-thump.
The acoustic canisters exploded in mid-air.
VWOMP. VWOMP.
The high-frequency pulse shattered the bees' coordination.
Thousands of insects hit the ground like pebbles.
Kazuho landed on the side of the clock tower, her face smudged with black soot and sweat. She wasn't dancing for a camera.
She was focused on the cabins.
"The gears are clear! Jump to the nets!"
_-_-_-_-_
Location: The Park's East Perimeter
"You disturbed me, trash" Stendhal turned his head to the another villain. He was preparing to kill the trio who was injected with trigger drug but he was disturbed.
SHINK.
A Villain Factory animal-trigger hybrid—a man with the head of a boar and arms like tree trunks—charged through a fence.
RAGHHH
He roared, his tusks dripping with chemical foam.
Click-clack.
Click-clack.
Stendhal appeared in his path. He didn't crouch. He stood tall, his shoulders loose, his hands open.
He was a mirror of the countless practice he had watched a thousand times. He was looking for the "Logic" of the kill.
Swissh
The boar-villain swung a massive fist.
Tilt.
Stendhal didn't dodge.
He moved his head three inches. The fist whistled past his ear.
Baam.
Stendhal's palm struck the villain's elbow.
CRACK.
The joint reversed.
SHINK.
In one motion, his blade was out. It didn't swing in a wide arc. It was a straight, six-inch thrust into the villain's jugular.
Spurt.
The villain hit the ground. Dead before his heart beat again.
Stendhal didn't look at the body. He looked at his hand. "No wind-up. No friction," he rasped.
He turned his gaze again toward the center of the park.
Stendhal looked at three figures lying on the grass near a target stall where he had incapacitated them.
Soga, Moyuru, and Rapt.
Their bodies twitching from a mix of toxin and low-grade Trigger and the quirk activated by him.
They were paralyzed, their eyes wide and rolling in their heads.
Click-clack
Click-clack
Stendhal walked toward them.
His boots made a rhythmic clack-clack on the pavement.
To Soga, the world was a blur of fire and pain.
He saw the black mask of Stendhal looming over him.
He saw the silver reflection of the blade. He couldn't move his arms. He couldn't scream.
'Is this it?' Soga thought. 'Beaten by bees and killed by a dangerous vigilante?'
Moyuru and Rapt were sobbing silently, their bodies locked in place.
They saw the "Executioner" raise his sword. Stendhal's shadow covered all three of them.
"You are glitches," Stendhal whispered. "Noise that pollutes the Standard."
He swung the blade down.
WIISH.
A blue-and-grey blur slammed into the trio.
THUD.
Koichi Haimawari tackled Soga, Moyuru, and Rapt all at once, his low-friction quirk allowing him to slide their combined weight fifteen meters away.
Stendhal's blade buried itself into the dirt where Soga's neck had been.
Clang.
Koichi stood up, his breathing heavy.
He looked at the three thugs—the people who had bullied him, the people who had harassed Kazuho in the past.
They were shivering on the grass, looking at Koichi with a mix of absolute terror and disbelief.
"You...?" Soga wheezed, his voice breaking.
"Don't move," Koichi said, his eyes fixed on Stendhal. "I've got you."
Stendhal straightened his back. He looked at Koichi. He recognized the boy from the alley. The nuisance. The one with the "useless sympathy."
"The boy with the drag," Stendhal said. His voice was cold. "You are protecting filth. Why do you insist on preserving the infection?"
"They're not villains!" Koichi yelled. "They're just idiots! They don't deserve to die for being controlled! They haven't killed anyone."
Stendhal's hand tightened on the hilt. He dropped into a stance. "They haven't killed anyone yet. Then you will be deleted with them."
Clack. Clack. Clack.
The sound of heavy boots echoed from the smoke behind Koichi.
The air pressure in the park shifted. It felt like a heavy weight was pressing down on everyone's chest.
Knuckleduster stepped out of the haze. He had just finished clearing a group of Trigger-enhanced dogs and some small fry villains near the North gate.
He was drenched in sweat, but his posture was perfect. He looked younger. He looked powerful.
"You again," Iwao growled. He didn't look at Koichi. He looked at Stendhal. "You're late for your execution. And you're targeting the wrong trash."
Stendhal froze.
He looked at Knuckleduster. The old man was different from before.
The "Friction" he had sensed before was gone. Knuckleduster was moving with a new, refined density.
"Knuckleduster," Stendhal noted.
"The trio stays," Iwao said, pointing a thumb at the terrified Soga and his friends. "I know these punks. They're bottom-feeders, not Factory assets. Look at the masterpiece watching us from the back."
Iwao pointed a scarred finger toward the ruins of the Ferris wheel.
Standing in the shadows of the burning ride was Number 6.
He was watching the commotion with a manic, toothy grin, his eyes fixed on Knuckleduster.
"That's the one who's causing the noise," Iwao said.
Soga, Rapt, and Moyuru looked from Koichi to Knuckleduster.
Tears were streaming down Rapt's face. They were alive.
The Naruhata Vigilantes was standing between them and a serial killer.
Stendhal sheathed his blade. The click of the guard hitting the scabbard was sharp.
"Do not let me see them again," Stendhal rasped to Koichi. He turned his back on them, his focus now locked on the silhouette of Number 6.
"I will remove the mastermind. The irredeemable must be eliminated."
Iwao cracked his knuckles.
CRACK-POP.
"Crawler, get those idiots to the medic. Pop Step, cover them!"
"On it!" Kazuho yelled from the clock tower.
The trio lay on the ground, gasping for air, watching the three monsters of Naruhata prepare for the real war.
_-_-_-_-_
Location: Naruhata Park – Aerial Entry
VROOOOOM.
The sky over the park screamed as four blue-flamed engines ignited in the dark.
Ingenium, Tensei Iida descended in a high-speed V-formation, leading a wedge of his Iidaten sidekicks.
The air pressure from their descent rattled the windows of the nearby clock tower.
"Rescue Team Alpha, deploy the high-tension nets!" Tensei roared into his comms.
He hit the asphalt at eighty miles per hour.
CRAAASH.
He didn't stop to engage.
He used his arm-boosters to create a cyclonic wind-tunnel, blowing the bee swarm and the chemical Trigger-smoke away from the trapped families near the fountain.
_-_-_-_
Sssssss-hiss.
Chuma Yakumaru stood near the North exit, his body gathering a thick, purple energy emitted from the pores in his skin.
He raised and charged his hand into and fist and delivered a strong kinetic punch to the building.
BANG
"Die! Everyone should die. Hahaha!"
Yakumaru used his right leg this time, using his quirk, Bruiser to charge another devastating kick attack to the running civilians.
"Hahaha! TAKE THIS!"
But.
"Not today!" Tensei shouted.
CLANK-VROOOM.
Tensei engaged his Recipro Burst.
He became a silver blur, kicking the ground to create a shockwave of air that dissipated Chuma's attack before it could touch the crowd.
His sidekicks, moving with mechanical precision, fired magnetized capture-cables.
The wires wrapped around Chuma's limbs, pinning him to a concrete pillar.
THUD.
"Secure the perimeter!" Tensei commanded.
_-_-_-_-_-_
Near the park's East stage, Akira Iwako lunged from the shadows.
His arms were transformed into jagged, bone-like blades, and his eyes were bloodshot from a Trigger enhanced.
He moved with a twitchy, unnatural speed, aiming a decapitating strike at a police officer.
But.
CRACK-WHIP.
Midnight's whip lashed out, wrapping around Akira's wrist.
She flipped through the air, her long purple hair trailing like a banner.
"You're a bit too loud for this fair, darling,"
Midnight said.
She landed gracefully and tore the fabric of her sleeve, exposing the skin of her arm.
Puff.
A concentrated cloud of pink Somnambulist gas exploded.
"No! What is this?"
Akira tried to hold his breath and swing his other blade, but Midnight's sidekicks moved in with long-range stun-batons.
BZZZZZT.
The electrical shock forced Akira to inhale. His eyes rolled back.
Thump.
He hit the ground, unconscious.
_-_-_-_-_
In the center of the fairgrounds, five Suicide Bombers—the failed experiments—began to glow.
Their skin turned a translucent, pulsing orange. They were seconds away from detonation.
Aizawa landed in the center of the group. His long black hair defied gravity as his eyes flared a lethal, bloodshot red.
Flash.
The glowing skin of the bombers instantly dimmed. The "Self-Destruct" quirks were erased.
SHWISH-SNAP.
Aizawa's capture cloth whipped through the air like a living serpent.
He spun, binding the arms and legs of three bombers in a single motion.
He slammed them together.
BAM.
"Move in! Now!" Aizawa yelled.
Detective Naomasa Tsukauchi arrived with a tactical police squad.
They moved in with high-pressure fire hoses filled with quirk-dampening foam.
SHHHHHHH.
The foam coated the bombers, neutralizing their body temperature.
Naomasa stood with his pistol drawn, coordinating the handcuffs.
"Secure them! Check for secondary triggers!"
Cracck-boom
Aizawa turned to help the civilians, but the ground beneath him exploded.
Octoid erupted from the earth, his eight mechanical limbs tipped with serrated blades and ink-cannons.
SPLURT.
The moment the ink hit Aizawa's goggles, the 'Erasure' broke. Octoid's eight mechanical limbs suddenly roared back to life, moving with a jagged, manic speed that Aizawa couldn't track in the dark.
He swung four limbs at once. Aizawa dodged the first two, but a blade caught his shoulder.
Sliiict.
"I'll pull the eyes out of your head, Hero!" Octoid roared.
Aizawa wiped his goggles, but Octoid was fast.
A mechanical claw gripped Aizawa's throat and slammed him against the brick wall of the clock tower.
CRUNCH.
The brick shattered.
"Aghh!"
Aizawa's vision blurred.
Octoid raised a sharpened limb for a killing blow to Aizawa's chest.
WHIP-CRACK.
Midnight's whip caught Octoid's killing arm an inch from Aizawa's heart.
"Hands off the colleague!" Midnight yelled, straining against Octoid's massive strength.
"Haha. Make me!"
Octoid laughed, his eight limbs thrashing.
He was about to overpower her when a massive shadow covered the area.
STOMP.
The ground shook as Enigma, Ingenium's sidekick, activated her Gigantification quirk.
She grew twenty feet tall in a second, her massive boot slamming down next to Octoid to disrupt his footing.
"Got you!" Enigma roared.
She reached down with a hand the size of a car and pinned Octoid's main torso to the ground.
CRUNCH.
"Ugh!" Octoid gasped, the air leaving his lungs.
Aizawa fell to his knees, gasping for breath, his hand clutching his bleeding shoulder.
HUFF-PUFF
HUFF-PUFF
Midnight immediately flooded the area with a massive dose of sleep gas.
Puff-VWOMP.
Octoid's thrashing slowed. His mechanical limbs sputtered and went limp.
"Thank you. Clear the center!" Aizawa rasped, pushing himself up. He looked toward the ruins of the Ferris wheel. "This was just the beginning. Look at the smoke."
The Pros stood together, wounded and breathing hard, as the fight between the famous vigilantes and the speedster villain came to end.
_-_-_-_-_
Location: Naruhata Park – Near the Shattered Ferris Wheel
BOOM.
A kinetic shockwave leveled the remaining fairground stalls.
Number 6 skidded across the grass, his boots smoking as he stopped in the center of a fresh crater.
He adjusted his visor, his eyes locking onto the masked figure standing ten meters away.
"The Purge-Vigilante. Stendhal," Number 6 said. His voice was a jagged, mocking rasp. "I know your face from the files. You're the one trying to play 'God' in the alleys. You've been killing my lower-tier runners. I should be annoyed, but looking at you... you're just moving in slow motion."
Stendhal didn't answer.
He stood with his shoulders loose and his hands open.
He was a mirror of the Hero X he had obsessed over. He wasn't looking at Number 6; he was looking at the "Logic" of the friction in the air.
"Nothing to say? Fine. Let's see if your 'justice' can keep up with a real clock."
WHIRRR-ZIP.
Number 6 vanished. He didn't just run; he accelerated into the Overclock state.
To everyone else, he was a blur. To Stendhal, the air became a solid wall of pressure.
SHINK.
Stendhal didn't wait for the impact.
He tilted his head two inches to the left.
A jagged bone-spike, manifested from Number 6's knuckle, hissed past his ear.
'He read me?' Number 6's eyes widened behind his visor.
He didn't stop.
Number 6 unleashed a flurry of twelve strikes in two seconds—kicks, palm-thrusts, and bone-bullet feints.
Clack. Tap. Slide. Pivot.
Stendhal moved like ink on paper.
He didn't block; he slipped.
He flowed around the punches, his movements so minimal they seemed lazy, yet he was always a fraction of a millimeter away from a lethal hit.
He was applying the "Minimalist Logic" to every frame of the fight.
"How are you reading my line?!" Number 6 roared, his irritation spiking.
He was in Overclock, but the masked vigilante was moving as if he knew exactly where the kinetic friction would build before the punch even landed.
He pulled back his right hand, tensing his middle finger against his thumb to fire a Bone Bullet point-blank at Stendhal's chest.
Fwish.
Before he could release the trigger, a massive, dense shadow blotted out the fairground lights.
BOOM.
A fist the size of a cinder block slammed directly into the side of Number 6's jaw.
Number 6 didn't see it coming. He was sent tumbling twenty meters, smashing through a popcorn stand and two concrete planters.
CRASH. SMASH. THUD.
Knuckleduster stood in the clearing, smoke curling from his heavy knuckles.
He was breathing in deep, jagged gasps. He looked at his hand, his eyes wide with a mix of fury and confusion.
In the moment he had lunged, he felt a sudden, violent surge of speed—a mobility he hadn't possessed in years.
'The recovery is better than I thought,' Iwao thought, his heart thundering. 'Kaito's surgery... I feel like a freight train.'
He didn't realize the O'Clock quirk had actually returned; he simply attributed the newfound speed to his "renovated" physical condition.
Number 6 pushed himself out of the debris, spitting a glob of blood. His manic grin returned, but it was twitching with pure malice.
"Old relic, that's a good punch. You're actually moving. I thought I actually killed you that day."
"I'm the man who's going to tear that smile off your face, brat," Iwao growled.
_-_-_-_-_
Bang.
Clang.
Shink
Swish-swoosh
Thud.
Shink.
Thump.
Swish-swoosh
For three minutes they moved as one. Stendhal and Knuckleduster knew each other that they can't touch Number 6 one on one.
They needed to attack together.
Knuckleduster was the raw, crushing power. Stendhal was the tactical, surgical blade.
Number 6 was the target caught between two masters.
STOMP.
Iwao charged. He didn't lead with a punch; he led with a shoulder tackle that cracked the pavement.
SHINK.
Stendhal trailed him, his katana flicking out in short, "Logic" strikes that targeted Number 6's tendons.
Number 6 flared his quirk.
Jagged ivory bone-plating erupted along his forearms and shins.
WHAM.
Iwao threw a massive right cross.
Number 6 blocked it with an armored forearm.
CLANG.
The sound was metallic. Iwao didn't stop. He pivoted, grabbed Number 6's arm, and used his weight to slam a knee into Number 6's ribs.
WIISH.
Number 6 used the momentum to spin, attempting to kick Iwao's head, but Stendhal was already there.
Stendhal's blade hummed as it struck the bone-plating on Number 6's shin.
SPARK.
It was blow-for-blow.
Number 6 was a blur, blocking Iwao's heavy hooks with his bone-shields while simultaneously parrying Stendhal's minimalist slashes.
CLANG. THUD. SHINK.
The coordination between the two vigilantes was flawless.
Knuckleduster would force a gap with a power-strike, and Stendhal would instantly fill it with a lethal thrust.
Number 6 was gurgling with rage.
He had the superior quirk, but he couldn't find a rhythm.
Every time he tried to accelerate, Stendhal's "Logic" predicted his exit point, and Iwao's "Standard" power met him there with a fist.
_-_-_-_-_
Number 6 blasted a kinetic explosion from his chest to force them back five meters.
KABOOM.
He stood in the smoke, breathing in jagged gasps. He looked toward the surroundings.
He saw Octoid pinned under Enigma's foot. He saw Chuma Yakumaru bound in magnetized cables.
He saw the blue-flamed engines of Ingenium circling the fairgrounds like vultures. The police were already moving in with Naomasa.
The "Field Test" for his lower-level agents was a total failure.
He looked back at Iwao and Stendhal. His bone-armor was cracked in a dozen places.
"I would really like to kill the two of you right now," Number 6 said. His voice had lost its manic edge. It was cold.
"I really would. But the Doctor doesn't like it when I waste the main course on the appetizers."
Number 6 backed away toward a massive, rectangular container covered in a heavy black tarp.
He had been dragging it through the park since the breach.
"You think you're back, Old Man?" Number 6 smiled. It wasn't a toothy grin; it was a thin, predatory line.
"You're just a relic. This... this is the future."
Rriiiip-snap.
He tore the tarp away.
The Pros—Aizawa, Midnight, and Ingenium—landed on the surrounding rooftops. The police force lead by Naomasa. They all froze. Even Stendhal lowered his blade, his cold eyes widening.
Inside the container stood a mountain of grey, hairless muscle.
Eight feet tall.
A black, hooded shroud covered its face, but the top of its skull was open.
A massive, purple-pink brain pulsed with a rhythmic, wet thump-thump.
It had four arms, each ending in four-inch obsidian claws that scraped against the metal.
Hssssssss.
It didn't roar. It didn't speak. It just breathed like a steam pipe venting.
The first batch Nomu Prototype created by the Doctor and AFO himself.
Number 6 pointed a finger to all of them.
"Kill them all," Number 6 commanded. "Collect the data."
SWISHH.
The Nomu lunged. Its first step shattered the asphalt. It moved with a speed that rivaled Number 6's own, a blur of grey muscle and obsidian claws.
~~~~~~
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(9 Advanced Chapters)