Nexus-5 pressed forward without pause. After Kael had regained enough strength to stand and move steadily, they advanced into R City. The city was already ablaze—buildings collapsing in waves, smoke clawing at the sky, and civilians trapped beneath concrete and fire.
They worked swiftly, pulling survivors from wreckage and guiding them toward safer ground. Just as the last group was escorted away, a patrol car rolled in and stopped beside them. The officer leaned out of the window, voice calm but alert.
Officer: Hey there. Looks rough out here. Need a ride?
Kael answered with a courteous nod.
Kael: Good to see you, officer. My team and I are clearing this area. Our destination's still some distance away—we don't want to cause you any trouble.
The officer waved it off immediately.
Officer: No trouble at all. It's the least I can do. We live to serve and protect. Hop in.
They accepted. Leona took the front seat, while Kael, Diego, and Michael settled into the back. As the vehicle moved through the burning streets, casual conversation filled the air. The officer asked what life was like as a superhero.
Kael answered honestly—it was exhausting, relentless—but as long as they stood together, they endured.
The officer chuckled softly.
Officer: You know… I had a child about your age once. Bright kid. Real bright.
A pause.
Officer: Almost a pity… that you all have to die.
The atmosphere shattered.
The officer's eyes darkened, swallowing the light. His left arm twisted unnaturally, metal screaming as flesh reshaped itself into a long, gleaming steel blade. He swung in a single, sweeping arc—fast enough to end them all.
Time froze.
Diego had stopped it—just before the blade reached Leona.
His thoughts raced in the stillness.
Diego: (thought)If I push him out, the vehicle keeps moving. None of us can drive. But if I place everyone on the ground while time is stopped… they'll survive the crash. They'll be injured as their velocity will be the same as the car's.
Diego calculated it instantly.
One second has passed.
There was no room for hesitation. Plan A was already dead—so he switched to Plan B.
Two seconds have passed.
He forced the rear door open and shoved Kael and Michael out of the moving car, their bodies flung toward the asphalt before inertia could tear them apart.
Three seconds have passed.
Now came the hardest part.
The front door.
Leona was seated beside the driver, and Diego was still trapped in the back. The distance felt immeasurable.
Four seconds have passed.
The door resisted him. His body screamed from the strain, his lungs burned, but he knew the truth—
—there was just enough time to save one more person.
Not himself.
Leona.
He was tired—tired of being weak, tired of being the deadweight that others had to carry.
Five seconds have passed.
He seized her arm.
That resolve—raw, absolute—answered him.
Time stretched.
His ability burned brighter, extending past its limit.
Six seconds have passed.
He tore her free and leapt after her, hurling himself out of the car without looking back.
Seven seconds have passed.
That was all he could do.
Time resumed.
Pain exploded through Diego's body as the blade found him—deep, brutal, and precise. The cop's strike carved into his thigh, the force sending them tumbling across the ground as the wrecked car thundered onward behind them.
Momentum dragged them mercilessly.
But Michael was already moving.
His body unraveled mid-motion, strings snapping outward like living threads. They wrapped around Diego and Leona, halting their roll just before the damage became fatal.
Diego screamed.
Blood poured freely from the gash in his leg.
Michael acted without a word—his strings weaving, stitching flesh and sealing the wound with practiced precision, slowing the bleeding just enough to keep Diego conscious.
The explosion from the crashing car roared behind them.
The enemy noticed.
The cop burst free from the wreckage and charged toward them, blade gleaming, intent unbroken.
Leona stepped forward and summoned a radiant barrier, its surface humming as energy condensed into a shield between them and death.
Michael needed seconds.
The cop struck.
The blade slammed into the shield, sending violent ripples across its surface. Instead of retreating, the cop adapted—his eyes sharp, predatory. He twisted his angle and drove the blade forward, piercing through the distortion in the energy field—
Exploiting the ripple itself.The ripple was the barrier's fatal flaw.
The cop exploited it without hesitation.
His blade slipped through the distortion and sliced across Leona's palm, the sudden agony forcing her concentration to shatter. The energy barrier collapsed instantly, dissolving into fractured light as she staggered back, clutching her wounded hand.
The cop followed up, driving another slash toward her—
—but Michael intercepted.
He caught the incoming blade with his forearm-wrapped cords and answered with a brutal straight jab that thundered into cop's guard.
The cop skidded backward, boots grinding against the ground. He raised his free hand, manifesting a compact shield just in time to absorb the blow. The impact still hurled him several meters away.
He laughed.
Officer: Without question, Strand Cord, you surpass me in raw power.
His eyes gleamed.
Officer: But shall we see who's faster?
He straightened and gave a mock bow.
Timber: Allow me to introduce myself. Timber. Codename—Careless Whisper.
Michael: Less talking, more fighting.
Timber grinned.
That single line ignited the battlefield.
They vanished—colliding an instant later with a shockwave that split the ground beneath them. Michael dominated the exchange in strength alone, every blow heavy enough to shatter bone, but Timber moved on a different plane entirely.
Speed.
Michael swung—missed.
Struck again—air.
Timber slipped through every attack with infuriating ease, weaving between punches as if the blows were arriving seconds too late. Michael increased the tempo, unleashing a relentless barrage fueled by sheer force and precision—
—but Timber countered cleanly.
Steel flashed.
Michael felt the sting before he saw the blood.
Cuts opened across his cheek, arms, biceps, then his chest—shallow but numerous, bleeding lines mapping Timber's superiority in speed.
Then Timber saw it.
An opening.
He drove his blade forward and pierced straight through Michael's abdomen.
Michael staggered, coughing blood onto the shattered pavement.
Kael moved instinctively, stepping forward to intervene—
Michael: Don't!
Michael growled, forcing himself upright.
Michael: You'll get killed.
Timber tilted his head, almost impressed.
Timber: Brave. Foolish—but brave. Fighting someone far beyond your league.
He raised his blade again, drawing it high.
A downward slash followed—clean, decisive—
—but Michael caught the descending blade with his bare hand.
Michael: If I'm dying today, I'm not doing it without taking you down with me. Take this!
He drove a devastating punch straight toward Timber's face.
Timber reacted instantly, attempting to pull back and raise his guard—but his arms refused to move.
In that split second, realization struck.
Michael's strings had already wrapped around Timber's wrists, coiling tight, locking his limbs in place like iron restraints.
Michael: You're not escaping this!
His fist crashed into Timber's face.
Blood sprayed. A tooth skidded across the ground.
But pain screamed through Michael's own body a heartbeat later.
He looked down just in time to see Timber's leg liquefy—metal flowing like molten steel—before hardening into a blade that pierced straight through Michael's thigh.
Both men staggered back, having traded grievous wounds.
The agony shattered Michael's concentration. His grip loosened.
Timber tore free.
Michael collapsed to one knee, unable to stand, blood pooling beneath him. Timber didn't waste the opening.
He raised both blades high.
Timber: This ends now. Meet your end, Strand Cord!
The twin slashes descended—
—but never landed.
A dagger, bound to a chain, snapped through the air and intercepted both strikes with a violent clash of metal.
The weapon shimmered—gold fused with steel, compact yet unyielding.
Before Timber could react, a woman spun in behind him and drove a brutal back kick into his spine, sending him skidding across the ground.
Lady: Good thing the car exploded. Otherwise, I wouldn't have found you idiots in time.
Timber pushed himself up and looked at her properly.
Recognition dawned.
Timber: (muttering)So it's you. The quickest human alive. Lynn—S-Class Hero, Rank 13.
Also known as Iron Maiden as her codename.
Lynn: Wow. I must be getting famous if even my enemies know my name.
Timber laughed darkly.
Timber: Don't get cocky, bitch. Once I'm done with you, no one will remember who you were.
Lynn's expression didn't change.
Lynn flicked one of her daggers toward Timber.
He caught it effortlessly.
What's this? Trying to show off? Timber scoffed inwardly.
Then Lynn vanished.
Not retreated—erased—as if swallowed by the air itself.
Before Timber could even register the absence, she was already there again—beside the very dagger she had thrown. Steel flashed. Her blade kissed his cheek, drawing a thin line of blood.
Timber reacted on instinct, sweeping low to take her legs.
She was gone again.
Lynn reappeared mid-motion, seized Timber by the collar, and vaulted upward, dragging him into the air before driving a brutal double dropkick into his chest. The impact hurled him backward, skidding across the ground.
Timber twisted mid-fall, landing hard but upright, mind racing.
Timber: (thought)How did she get that close when I was fully prepared? Is she simply that fast—so fast I can't even perceive it?
No.
That explanation didn't sit right.
It's something else, he realized grimly. And if I don't figure it out, I'll lose.
Across from him, Lynn settled into her stance, blades ready. Timber mirrored her, muscles coiled.
Timber: I don't know what kind of attack you're planning, but throw whatever you want. I'll be ready, Iron Maiden.
Lynn answered by drawing more daggers—many more. Nearly ten gleamed between her fingers.
She hurled them skyward with all her strength, scattering them across the battlefield like falling stars—and charged straight at Timber.
Lynn: Thy time will come,and thy will be put down.
They collided once more.
Steel rang against steel. Blow after blow followed, each exchange faster than the last. The fight tightened into brutal close quarters, neither yielding, neither slowing.
Then—
As the daggers descended toward their original height, Lynn vanished again.
She struck from nowhere.
From everywhere.
Timber parried, dodged, countered—his mind working even as his body strained to keep up. And then, finally, the pattern revealed itself.
His eyes widened.
That's it…
Timber: (thought)It's teleportation! She's moving to wherever her daggers are being thrown by her.
Understanding snapped into place. That was how she struck him earlier—why catching her blade hadn't stopped her at all.
But even with the mystery solved, it didn't make her any easier to fight.
Lynn continued to attack from every angle imaginable—corners even Timber, with all his speed and perception, could barely track—Timber could do nothing but guard himself, forced into a defensive shell under Lynn's relentless assault.
Then—at last—he caught it. The faintest pattern. A fractional hesitation.
He read her final movement and met her strike head-on.
Steel clashed as Timber brought his blade down in a crushing arc. Lynn raised her guard in time, blocking the blow—but raw force overruled finesse. The blade tore through, carving into her shoulder. Blood followed immediately.
Timber didn't hesitate.
Just a little more, he thought. That's all it will take.
He lifted his free hand, gathering momentum, voice ringing with cruel certainty.
Timber: I win. You may have overwhelmed me with speed, but fate has chosen me as the victor. Now—die!
The strike never landed.
Michael appeared in a blur of motion, his arm snapping forward.
Cord Breaker.
The impact detonated against Timber's face, forcing him to abort the killing blow mid-swing. His body staggered sideways under the sudden, violent interruption.
Michael: Not quite. What Iron Maiden did wasn't for you to lose—it was for me to find the right moment. The right angle.
He seized Timber by the collar and yanked him forward, unleashing a barrage of blows.
Timber snarled and swung his blade toward the string tethering Michael's arm—
—but his hands never reached it.
Chains snapped into place around his wrists.
Lynn stood firm, bloodied but unyielding.
These bastards don't know when to quit.
Timber scoffed inwardly. She lacks the strength. I can tear free of this.
He pulled.
Nothing.
His eyes widened.
Timber: Impossible! She's not this strong—so how the fu—
Then he saw it.
Kael stood behind him, gripping the chains alongside Lynn, his expression carved from iron.
Kael: You're not going anywhere. Except the Ice Box.
The combined force was overwhelming. Lynn's resolve, Kael's raw strength—
—together, they anchored Timber in place.
For the first time, Timber felt it.
Loss.
But surrender wasn't in his nature.
With a growl, he liquefied his leg once more, the metal flowing like mercury, reshaping into a blade as he lashed out—aimed straight for Michael's strings.But the moment Timber attempted to swing his leg, something felt… wrong.
Nothing moved.
His body refused him.
As his gaze dropped, the reason became brutally clear. Michael had already unraveled his limbs into hardened strands, binding both of Timber's legs to the surrounding debris—an improvised prison of steel, stone, and precision.
Timber: (thought)No… no—this is impossible! Careless Whisper—an Elite Dark Knight—brought to his knees by a pack of brats?
His chest tightened. This can't be real. This has to be a nightmare.
Michael stepped forward, fists tightening.
Michael: The brain is always sharper than any blade. Burn that into your mind. And don't even think about moving—because if you do, it's going to hurt far more than it already will.
For the first time since the battle began, fear eclipsed Timber's arrogance.
Before the beating even started, a single thought surfaced—raw and unguarded.
Please… stop.
It was already too late.
Michael exploded into motion, unleashing a merciless barrage of punches, each blow landing with brutal accuracy.
The sound of impact drowned everything else.
When Timber finally went limp—his resistance shattered—they secured the suppression band around him and prepared for extraction.
But when they attempted to activate CTP once more, the system failed to respond.
Confusion spread quickly.
Lynn broke the silence.
Lynn: J City was attacked earlier—specifically the Ice Box. It went down before today.
That explained everything.
With CTP offline, the World Hero Association had no choice but to deploy air units, manually extracting inmates and injured heroes across the sector.
Diego's wound proved more severe than initially assessed. There was no debate—he was airlifted immediately. Leona and Michael, though injured, were stabilized and transferred to a nearby hospital.
As the extraction concluded, they turned to Lynn.
Their gratitude was brief but sincere.
Goodbyes were exchanged.
And just like that, the battlefield fell silent.