The training room was known to the cadets as "The Meat Grinder." It was a place of pain, sweat, and screaming muscles. For Soshiro Hoshina, it had become a laboratory.
He stood in the center of the room, stripped to his waist, his lean, wiry body a tapestry of scars and perfectly defined muscle. He was not training. He was systematically deconstructing himself.
His usual regimen—practicing katas, speed drills, sparring—was gone. In its place was a brutalist, almost insane pursuit of a single, impossible goal: reaction time.
He faced a wall of emitters that fired condensed light-pellets at him from random angles. The program was set to "Kikoru Shinomiya - Max Speed," a level no one else in the Defense Force could even survive, let alone dodge.
Hoshina didn't try to dodge. His eyes were closed.
Fwip-fwip-thump-fwip!
Pellets streaked past him, a hair's breadth from his skin, his body twisting and contorting in a subconscious, fluid dance. He wasn't reacting to what he saw. He was reacting to what he felt—the subtle shift of air pressure, the faint hum of the emitters, the almost imperceptible tingle of static electricity just before a pellet was fired. He was trying to push his senses beyond the physical and into the realm of the predictive.
He was training not to be faster than a bullet, but to move before the bullet was even fired. It was the only way he could conceive of surviving an opponent who could punch the air and kill you.
Kafka stood by the entrance, holding a datapad and a towel. His new "adjutant" duties mostly consisted of monitoring Hoshina's vitals, a task that was becoming increasingly alarming.
"Sir," Kafka said, his voice hesitant. "Your heart rate has exceeded 220 beats per minute. Your body temperature is reaching critical levels. The medical protocols recommend—"
"Silence, Hibino," Hoshina gasped, not opening his eyes. A single pellet grazed his shoulder, leaving an angry red welt. He didn't even flinch. "Data. What is the delay between my predictive muscle twitch and the pellet's impact?"
Kafka checked the sensor readings. "It's... 0.03 seconds, sir. But that's a negative value. Your muscles are tensing to dodge 0.03 seconds before the machine even registers firing. That's... not possible."
A grim smile touched Hoshina's lips. "Not yet. It needs to be faster."
This was his new obsession. It consumed him. He pushed his body past every known human limit. He worked with R&D, experimenting with experimental nerve-enhancing stimulants derived from Kaiju adrenal glands—drugs that would kill a normal man. He spent hours in deep meditation, trying to expand his senses, to feel the world not as a series of events, but as a flowing river of cause and effect.
He was no longer just a swordsman. He was trying to become a living prophet of violence.
His quest led him back to the only other being on the base who could possibly understand what he was chasing: Genos.
He found the cyborg in a specially assigned workshop, meticulously calibrating one of his forearm cannons. The room was a stark, sterile white, a perfect reflection of its occupant.
"Genos," Hoshina said, walking in without preamble.
"Vice-Captain Hoshina," Genos replied, his optical sensors glowing as he turned. He had an arm detached, wires and circuits exposed as he worked. "To what do I owe the visit? My analysis of the base's protein-slurry rations is not yet complete."
"I am not here about the rations," Hoshina said, cutting to the chase. "I want to talk about your Master."
Genos's movements stilled. A quiet, almost possessive aura emanated from him. "My Master's affairs are his own."
"I am not interested in his affairs," Hoshina said, his voice intense. "I am interested in his principles. The principles of his power. Your report mentioned a 'Normal Punch.' You capitalized it. It is a classification. That implies other classifications."
Genos was silent for a long moment, his processors analyzing Hoshina's request, his motives, his potential threat level. He saw no malice. Only a desperate, almost fanatical, academic curiosity that mirrored his own.
"You are observant," Genos stated finally. "There are other classifications. Consecutive Normal Punches. And..." he paused, as if speaking a holy name, "Serious Series."
Hoshina's breath caught in his throat. Serious Series. The name itself implied a level of power he could not even begin to imagine. The 'normal' version could already kill from a kilometer away.
"I need to understand," Hoshina pressed, taking a step forward. "Not his secrets. The physics. The mechanics of his force projection. Your drones, your tactics... they are a hundred years beyond us. But your fighting style, your core philosophy, is based on observing him. You are the world's foremost expert on a subject no one else can even begin to study."
A flicker of something akin to pride crossed Genos's metallic face. "That is a correct assessment."
"Then I am asking you, as one scholar to another," Hoshina said, the words costing him a piece of his warrior's pride, but he didn't care. "Help me understand. In return, I will give you access to all our data on Kaiju biology. Their adaptive armor, their regenerative abilities... information that could be invaluable for your own upgrades."
It was a tempting offer. An alliance.
"The core principle of Master Saitama's power is that it is absolute," Genos explained, deciding to humor him. "It does not adhere to the conventional laws of physics as you know them. Trying to quantify it is a futile endeavor. It is like trying to measure the concept of 'infinity' with a ruler."
"But it must have a source!" Hoshina insisted. "An application point!"
"One hundred push-ups. One hundred sit-ups. One hundred squats. And a ten-kilometer run. Every single day," Genos recited, his voice completely deadpan.
Hoshina just stared at him. "...What?"
"That is the source of my Master's power," Genos said. "It is the sacred training regimen he has passed down to me."
For a moment, Hoshina thought the cyborg was mocking him. He looked into Genos's glowing, impassive eyes and realized with a jolt that he was being completely, utterly sincere. This cyborg, this hyper-advanced, genius-level weapon, truly believed his god-like master had achieved omnipotence through basic calisthenics.
The absurdity of it was a physical blow.
Hoshina was chasing an impossible, esoteric, metaphysical truth. He was pushing his body, his mind, and his very soul to the breaking point. And the subject of his obsession apparently got there by doing a workout routine that wouldn't even challenge one of his cadets.
He didn't know whether to laugh or scream.
He did neither. He just stood there, his mind reeling from the sheer, comical, soul-crushing gap between his own desperate struggle and Saitama's casual, mundane reality.
"I see," Hoshina said finally, his voice hoarse. "Thank you for the... insight."
He turned and left the workshop, leaving Genos to his calibrations. The cyborg had told him the truth, but Hoshina couldn't accept it. His obsession was too deep now. He believed Genos was protecting his master's true secret, a secret so profound it had to be hidden behind a ridiculous lie.
His quest was no longer just about survival. It was now a hunt for a truth he believed was being deliberately concealed.
The rivalry between the Chrome Demon and the Blade Master had officially begun. It wasn't a rivalry of strength, but of obsession. A race to see who could be the first to truly comprehend the incomprehensible. And it had all started with the universe's most ridiculous workout plan.