019 SUSPECTED
After Damen's mining app upgraded last time, he hadn't noticed much change—just a minor feature he dismissed as useless.
Or so he thought.
Now, staring at his phone in the café, he realized even the smallest tweaks could be deadly advantages. He should not overlook them.
"The Favorite List… hah," he chuckled, scrolling through the names.
Santiago's name sat at the top, followed by the other fighters scheduled for the upcoming matches. There were ten names in total. It was the app's limit.
But ten was more than enough.
With the Favorite Targets list, Damen no longer needed to see his victims directly to mine them. As long as they were within his mining range and his range was wide enough to cover the stadium from where he sat—he could mine them and strike them at will.
He scrolled idly through the list, sipping his iced coffee, while the next match unfolded on the TV overhead.
----
The next match began.
"Who do you think is going to lose this one?" Damen asked casually.
The waiter grinned, puffing out his chest. "Oh, you've come to the right guy. I'm an expert in MMA fights. Big Mac's a beast—he's definitely taking the win."
"Right…" Damen said with a faint smile, already locking his phone's target on Big Mac.
The fight raged on, brutal and fast.
Big Mac dominated, pushing his opponent to the edge. Victory was seconds away—until suddenly he dropped to the mat, clutching his side with a groan.
The crowd gasped. His opponent pounced, hammering strikes until the referee intervened.
"Who the hell just hit me with a mental attack?!" Big Mac roared, staggering to his feet, only to collapse again as another invisible blow struck him.
The referee began the count.
"5… 4… 3…"
Suddenly, the opponent who thought he was winning fell to the ground too. "Who the hell attacked me?" he asked again.
The stadium erupted in confusion.
Damen laughed under his breath, with a dark edge to it.
On the café TV, fighters clashed in the ring. Damen barely paid attention to who won or lost. He siphoned attributes indiscriminately, stripping them from everyone on screen who was in his favorite list.
Winning didn't matter…only the harvest did.
He's waited for a full month inside Heroes' gym steadily mining DemCoins and resisting the temptation to steal attributes in case he would be caught.
Now he had the perfect alibi to steal. Those victims he acquired from were fighting in the MMA Stadium while he was already gone. If anybody were to be blamed for launching mental attacks on the fighters… it won't be him.
And he was greedy. He drained and drained until suddenly the app froze.
"Damn it… why's this stuck?" he muttered, jabbing at his phone.
The Acquire: Strength button wouldn't register.
He leaned back, thinking. Then it clicked. He's reached the Strength limit again.
The number of attributes he could pull depended on the available meta stats from his targets. If he had more stats than the victim, he would get nothing. That's the reason he doesn't take from ordinary people anymore… there's nothing to take.
"If I'm not wrong… I've reached the Strength cap for H-class metas, I can't take more than my meta rank," he speculated.
He smirked, tucking the thought away. There would be time to test that theory later.
For now, he kept mining until each attribute hit its ceiling. By the end of the match, his stats were full across the board.
Even Charm was maxed.
----
[In a secret room under the basement somewhere]
"Why did you summon me so urgently?" Director Ambrone demanded as he strode into the windowless meeting room. A massive screen glowed at the front, illuminating the tense faces around the table.
The man leading the meeting didn't even flinch at Ambrone's intrusion. "Sit down, Director. Don't disrupt the briefing."
Ambrone clenched his jaw, but he bit back his protest and found a seat.
On the screen, images and videos began to cycle—middle schoolers writhing in pain, their faces twisted in agony.
"These," the speaker said, "are the first victims—students. I call them Victim 0."
The display shifted. It was a random miner sleeping in the hospital. Then an idol boy band and their bodyguards, caught on camera clutching their heads, screaming.
"Lander, what is this?" Ambrone barked. "Why is the Superheroes Intelligence Agency being shown ordinary civilians getting hurt? This is the local police's work not ours."
"This," Special Investigator Lander said calmly, "is only the beginning."
"The beginning of what?"
The screen changed again. MMA fighters being carried from the stadium on stretchers.
"The beginning of psychic mental attacks. Whoever's behind this started with civilians, then escalated to H-class metas."
Ambrone slammed a hand on the table. "Impossible. All registered psychic metas are documented and monitored. None of them could have done this."
"Unless," Dorin spoke up, raising her hand, "a new psychic has recently awakened and he's testing out his powers- first with civilians and now with low level metas."
"Correct, Investigator Dorin," Lander nodded.
Ambrone narrowed his eyes. "Do we have a suspect or not?"
"Yes… and no," Lander said.
Ambrone leaned forward. "What the hell does that mean?"
The next image appeared: a boy sipping iced coffee at a café playing his phone.
Dorin's eyes widened. "That's… Damen Dark. One of my gym's trainees…. erm regular."
"I cross-checked every victim," Lander explained. "From the middle school students to the miner and the MMA fighters. Damen Dark is the only common link. He was present nearby in some way before every incident. It anyone would be using psychic attacks that could be him."
"That's absurd," Dorin shot back. "He's just a recently awakened meta. I've seen him training. He's not psychic. Psychics don't sweat it out in gyms."
"I'm not accusing him outright," Lander replied. "But whether he's the attacker or not, he has a connection."
The room fell silent.
Ambrone finally spoke. "You said he had ties to the MMA attacks. How?"
The screen flickered again. It was footage of Damen collecting his winnings from the betting Station after Santiago's winning match.
"He bet on Santiago. Santiago won because his opponent collapsed mid-fight. He's the victim of a psychic strike during the match."
"If he's the psychic we are looking for, there is enough motive for him to do so. He's won so much money", Dorin added.