Midtown High School, Queens.
The morning sun bathed the concrete courtyard in a deceptively pleasant golden glow. Students milled about, savoring the last few minutes of freedom before the bell herded them into the classrooms.
Peter Parker sat on a weathered bench, his knees bouncing with a nervous energy that had nothing to do with the upcoming chemistry quiz.
In his hands, he held a thick, glossy magazine titled Weekly Shonen Jump.
"Harry, check this out," Peter said, nudging his friend. "I bought Light's new anthology magazine at the newsstand this morning. It looks... different."
Harry Osborn didn't look. He was currently leaning forward, his chin resting in his palm, staring wistfully across the yard.
Mary Jane Watson was laughing at something a cheerleader said, her red hair catching the sunlight.
"Harry?"
"Hmm? Oh, right. The comic." Harry finally tore his eyes away from MJ, glancing down at the magazine in Peter's hands with mild disinterest. His brow furrowed. "A bald guy? In a cape?"
"I know, right?" Peter adjusted his glasses, looking down at the cover. "It doesn't make sense. Every superhero comic out there is trying to be Captain America. You know, tactical gear, masks, jawlines you could cut glass with."
He tapped the image of Saitama. "This guy looks like... an egg. An egg in a yellow jumpsuit."
"Maybe it's a parody?" Harry shrugged, his attention drifting back to the red hair across the courtyard. "Read it and tell me if it's trash. If it's good, I'll have the butler pick up a copy."
Peter nodded, opening the magazine. The smell of fresh ink and paper wafted up—a scent Peter secretly loved.
He noticed the publisher's logo immediately: Marvel Entertainment.
'So Light really did it,' Peter thought, a mix of skepticism and curiosity bubbling in his chest.
He knew Light. Light was cool, sure, but an artist? The last time he checked, Light's sketches were mediocre at best.
'He must have hired a ghostwriter,' Peter concluded logically. 'There's no way he drew this himself.'
He flipped to the first page.
His breath hitched.
The art wasn't just good; it was phenomenal. The opening splash page depicted a city in ruins.
The level of detail was staggering—shattered concrete, twisted rebar, the smoke billowing with a texture so real Peter could almost smell the burning rubber.
Standing amidst the chaos was the bald protagonist. The shading on his white cape was exquisite, capturing the fabric's weight and movement.
But then, Peter looked at the hero's face.
He blinked. He took off his glasses, cleaned them on his flannel shirt, and put them back on.
"What is that?" Peter whispered.
The background was a masterpiece of high-contrast realism. The villain—a purple, alien-like, monster—was drawn with terrifying, gritty detail. And the hero?
Two dots for eyes. Two thin lines for eyebrows. A circle for a head.
It looked like a doodle a toddler would draw on a napkin.
"Is this... a printing error?" Peter muttered, flipping back and forth. "How can the art be this good and this bad at the same time?"
Despite the jarring stylistic clash, Peter kept reading.
The dialogue was sparse. The monster, Vaccine Man, began a monologue about the Earth's rage and environmental pollution.
It was the kind of heavy-handed villain motivation Peter was used to seeing in the X-Men titles. Usually, the hero would retort with a speech about hope or justice.
Saitama just stood there, his expression blank.
Saitama: "I'm just a guy who's a hero for fun."
Peter frowned.
'For fun? Not because of a tragic backstory? Not because of great power and responsibility?'
It felt wrong. It felt disrespectful to the genre.
And yet... Peter couldn't look away.
The fight began. The Vaccine Man transformed. The art shifted into overdrive. The monster grew massive, veins bulging, claws tearing through the asphalt.
The sheer scale of the threat was palpable. In any other comic, this would be the setup for a six-issue arc involving the National Guard and a team-up event.
Peter's heart raced.
'How is he going to beat this thing?' Peter analyzed, his scientific mind racing. 'Does he have telekinesis? Super speed? Energy projection?'
He turned the page, expecting a splash page of a beam struggle or a tactical dodge.
WHAM.
One panel. A single, nondescript punch.
The Vaccine Man didn't just fall; he disintegrated. The force of the impact was rendered with ink lines so dynamic they seemed to vibrate off the paper. Guts and smoke exploded out the back of the monster.
"No way!" Peter yelped, his voice cracking loudly in the quiet courtyard.
Harry jumped, startled out of his daydream. "Jesus, Pete! What?"
A few nearby students turned to look, eyeing the usually quiet Parker with confusion.
Peter ignored them. He ignored Harry. His eyes were glued to the page.
It was anticlimactic.
It was absurd.
It defied every narrative law of the comic book medium.
And it was the coolest thing he had ever seen.
"He... he one-shotted the boss," Peter whispered, stunned.
He quickly read through the rest of the issue. The anthology included the first four chapters.
He watched Saitama accidentally kill a giant experimentation monster (Marugori) and then face the Subterraneans in a dream sequence that had Peter sweating with its intensity.
By the time he reached the end of the fourth chapter, where Saitama wakes up and realizes the epic fight was just a dream, Peter was hooked.
His mind was racing with theories.
'What is his power source?' Peter thought, biting his thumbnail. 'Is he a mutant? A mutate? Did he fall into a vat of experimental chemicals? You can't just be that strong physically without some kind of biological enhancement. His muscle density would have to be titanium.'
He needed to know.
The mystery of Saitama's strength was infinitely more compelling than the brooding of standard heroes.
"Peter."
A shadow fell over him. Peter looked up, blinking. Harry was standing over him, looking annoyed but curious.
A circle of classmates had gathered, drawn by Peter's outburst.
"You've been staring at that book like it holds the secrets of the universe for ten minutes," Harry said, holding out his hand. "Let me see it."
"It's... it's incredible, Harry," Peter said, handing it over reluctantly. "It makes no sense, but it's incredible."
"Requisitioned," Harry declared, snatching the magazine.
"Hey! I wasn't finished!"
"You can read it in chem lab," Harry grinned, flipping open the cover. "Let's see what Light has been up to."
As the bell rang, signaling the start of the school day, the copy of Weekly Shonen Jump passed from hand to hand.
...
In the ecosystem of the comic book industry, there are creators, there are readers, and then there are the predators: the critics. Edward Vance was one of the apex predators. A veteran columnist for a major pop-culture blog, he consumed comics with a ravenous, cynical appetite. His reviews were legendary for their brutality.
Just last week, he had eviscerated a new "dark and gritty" superhero series, tearing apart its derivative plot and excessive use of shadows to hide poor anatomy. To Edward, the current market was a wasteland.
He walked through the aisles of Heroes Haven, a prominent comic shop in Greenwich Village, his eyes scanning the racks with bored detachment. It was all the same. Every cover screamed for attention with the same recycled tropes: muscular patriots wrapped in flags, brooding billionaires in high-tech armor, or mutants fighting for a world that hated them.
"Boring. Derivative. Trash," Edward muttered, sliding a glossy issue back onto the shelf.
He was looking for a spark. A deviation. Something that didn't feel like it had been committee-designed to sell lunchboxes. He had already visited two other shops that morning and found nothing. He was about to give up and just reread his archived run of Captain America—the gold standard of the Golden Age—when a voice called out from the counter.
"Edward! I didn't see you come in."
It was Miller, the shop owner. A man with thick glasses and an encyclopedic knowledge of the Silver Age.
"Miller," Edward nodded, adjusting his scarf. "Please tell me you have something that isn't a tie-in to a toy line. I'm desperate."
Miller grinned, a knowing glint in his eyes. He reached under the counter. "I knew you'd be in today. And I saved a copy of this just for you. Trust me, you haven't seen anything like it."
He slid a thick, anthology-style magazine onto the glass counter.
"Weekly… Shonen Jump?" Edward read the title, his nose wrinkling slightly. "Never heard of it. Is this some indie zine?"
"It's a rebrand," Miller explained. "You know Inksworth Publishing? The old family-run place?"
"The one that was hemorrhaging money? I thought they folded after the crash."
"They didn't fold. The son took over. Light Inksworth. He renamed the whole company Marvel Entertainment and pivoted the entire editorial line."
"Marvel?" Edward raised an eyebrow. "Bold name. Sounds arrogant. If he fails with a name like that, he'll be the laughingstock of the industry."
"Maybe," Miller shrugged. "But look at the art."
Edward looked down. The cover art for One Punch Man stared back at him. The technical skill was undeniable. The composition, the coloring, the dynamic lighting—it was top-tier, easily rivaling the best cover artists at the major publishers.
But the subject…
"A bald guy in a yellow suit?" Edward asked. "Is this a comedy?"
"Just read it," Miller urged.
Edward picked up the magazine. He intended to just skim the first few pages.
Ten minutes later, he was still standing at the counter, completely absorbed.
He turned the page, his eyes widening. The dream sequence with the Subterraneans was playing out. The art shifted from the simplistic, gag-style face of the protagonist to a gritty, high-octane battle manga style that screamed with intensity. The sheer kinetic energy of the fight scenes made his pulse quicken.
"This…" Edward whispered, flipping another page. "This is anarchy."
It deconstructed everything. The hero wasn't angst-ridden. He wasn't noble. He was bored. And yet, the action was better than anything the "serious" comics were putting out.
"Well?" Miller asked, leaning on the counter with a smug smile.
Edward looked up, dazed. He felt like he had just woken up from a fever dream.
"It's brilliant," Edward said, his voice serious. "It's completely insane, and it's brilliant."
He slapped a twenty-dollar bill on the counter. "I'm taking it. Keep the change."
Edward rushed out of the store, the magazine clutched under his arm like a holy text.
He needed to get home.
He needed to write.
The author's name—Light Inksworth—burned in his mind.
'Who is this kid?' Edward wondered. 'To write this, you have to hate superheroes. Or you have to love them so much you want to break them.'
Back in his apartment, Edward sat before his computer, the glow of the monitor illuminating his focused face. He logged into his blog and crossposted to his Twitter account. His fingers flew across the keyboard.
@EdwardV_Reviews:
[Stop what you are doing. Go to your local comic shop. Buy "Weekly Shonen Jump" Issue #1—specifically for "One Punch Man."]
[I know I said the genre was dead. I was wrong. This book just resurrected it, killed it again, and danced on its grave. It is the most original piece of visual storytelling I have seen in a decade.]
[Rating: Essential. If you don't like it, unsubscribe. I'll eat my hat. #Marvel #OnePunchMan]
He hit enter.
The reaction was immediate.
Edward's followers were used to him tearing things apart. A recommendation this glowing was unprecedented. The comment section exploded.
User1: Wait, Edward actually likes something? Is the world ending?
User2: I saw that at the store! The cover looked weird so I skipped it. Going back now.
User3: Is this a paid promo? How much did Marvel pay you, Ed?
Edward scoffed at the "paid promo" comment. He typed a reply:
[Read it and tell me I'm wrong. The art alone is worth the cover price.]
The internet did what the internet does best: it generated hype.
"One Punch Man" began to trend. People who had never bought a comic in their lives were intrigued by the buzz. Hardcore collectors, trusting Edward's notoriously difficult taste, scrambled to get first printings.
By early afternoon, the situation in New York City had shifted from curiosity to a frenzy.
At Heroes Haven, Miller stared at the line of people snaking out the door and down the block.
"Do you have the Jump thing?" a teenager at the front of the line asked breathlessly.
"Sold out," Miller said, wiping sweat from his brow. "We sold out an hour ago."
Groans of frustration rippled down the line.
"I called three other places!" someone shouted from the back. "Nobody has it!"
Miller looked at the empty shelf where the stack of Shonen Jump had sat this morning. He had ordered fifty copies, thinking it was a risk.
He could have sold five hundred.
"Damn it," Miller muttered, grabbing the phone to call the distributor. "Hello... Yes, I wanna order a hundred copies more... Yes, yes... Thank you."
Across the city, and soon across the country, the same scene played out.
The One Punch Man phenomenon had begun.