Ron's body disappeared at the edge of the rooftop.
"Shave." A slit was torn in the air, his figure stretching as a blur across three blocks, his toes barely touching the rooftops of two apartment buildings before landing at the intersection of Ninth Avenue and 46th Street.
Frank was four seconds slower. The gray wolf's four legs shattered the concrete railing of the rooftop, leaping from the seventh floor. His front paws gripped the fire escape ladder of the opposite building; the metal frame bent thirty degrees under the force of gravity, and he used the rebound to flip onto the roof, sprinting eastward along the drainpipe.
Ron arrived first.
The blonde woman lay on the sidewalk, three gashes cut on the sole of her left foot by shards of glass, blood mingling with rainwater and spreading across the paving stones.
Six people surrounded her.
The middle-aged man in pajamas at the front held a red brick, his arm raised high, his movements stiff, the angle of his joints wrong—it wasn't a person exerting force, but rather something pulling him along.
His pupils were purple.
All six men had purple pupils.
Ron pushed off with his right foot, shifting two meters to the side. His left hand gripped the middle-aged man's wrist, pulling the brick from his grasp.
The middle-aged man showed no pain. His other hand reached directly for Ron's throat, fingers spread wide, nails embedded with dirt.
Ron dodged, his right index and middle fingers pressed against the back of the middle-aged man's neck, beside the third cervical vertebra.
Armament Haki concentrated at his fingertips, the vibrations precise enough to penetrate skin and muscle layers, directly affecting the medulla oblongata.
The middle-aged man's body went limp.
The second. A young woman in sportswear clutched a utility knife, the blade stained with blood from her own palm—she had gripped it too tightly, cutting herself.
Ron flashed to her side, similarly pressing two fingers against the back of her neck.
Down.
The third. The fourth. The fifth.
Six seconds, five.
The sixth was a man in a suit, the largest, over 1.9 meters tall. He was unarmed, but the force of his punches far exceeded that of a normal person—the controlled individuals felt no pain, their muscles were completely unrestrained, and each punch pushed their tendons and bones to their limits.
Ron didn't dodge.
Armament Haki covered his chest, and he took the punch head-on.
The man in the suit's right wrist shattered. He didn't react; a left fist followed immediately.
Ron's right hand gripped the back of his head, pressing down, while his left knee rose, a layer of Armma Haki cushioning the impact between his knee and forehead—the force was just enough to knock him unconscious without causing skull damage.
The man in the suit collapsed.
All six lay on the ground. Their breathing was steady, their heartbeats normal. The purple was fading from their pupils, their irises slowly returning to brown, blue, and green.
Frank rushed out of the alleyway, his half-beastly body casting a long shadow under the streetlight. He glanced at the six men on the ground, his vertical pupils locking onto the blonde woman.
The woman was curled up beside a fire hydrant on the sidewalk, her arms wrapped around her head, her whole body huddled together.
Frank knelt down and lifted her from the ground.
The woman struggled violently, her fist pounding into Frank's chest.
Frank didn't move.
She threw another punch. A third. A fourth.
The force gradually diminished.
"Let go...let me go..."
"You're safe." Frank's voice was low, the rough texture deliberately softened by half a tone. "No one's holding you anymore."
The woman's fist stopped.
She looked up. Her face was covered in tears and grime, a bruise on her left cheekbone, her lips cracked and bleeding.
But her eyes were clear. Not purple.
"What's your name?" Ron walked over and knelt in front of her.
"Jessica." Her voice was trembling, each syllable shaking. "Jessica Jones."
"How long has he been controlling you?" Jessica's fingers dug into her upper arm, her nails sinking into her flesh.
"Three days." She swallowed, her Adam's apple bobbing twice.
"He made me do a lot of things."
She didn't finish the sentence.
Ron didn't press further.
"Where is he?" Jessica's fingers loosened her grip on her upper arm, revealing four red dots seeping from the marks.
"The Crown Hotel. Top floor. Everyone in the building is under his control—waiters, guests, security guards, all of them. More than forty."
She gasped, her chest heaving.
"He didn't just come to New York for fun. He's doing something for someone." Ron's back straightened slightly.
"For whom?"
"I don't know everything. But he made a phone call, and I was standing right next to him. He said—'Mr. Fisk is in a hurry; he wants me to speed things up.'" Ron stood up.
Kingpin.
The Purple Man was hired by Kingpin.
Mind control.
Judge Mickelson was bribed; Ron had checked the bank statements and confirmed it. But how many people were left in the New York legal system? Prosecutors, witnesses, jury members—if Kingpin had a weapon that could control anyone with his voice, he wouldn't need to spend money on bribes.
He only needed to make the Purple Man say one word.
A thin layer of sweat broke out on Ron's back.
"Let's go. Back to the safe house."
Frank hoisted Jessica onto his shoulder. She didn't struggle anymore.
Twenty minutes later. Safe house.
Frank placed Jessica on the cot and turned to the gas stove. After rummaging through the cupboards, he found a packet of instant noodles, tore open the seasoning packet, and poured it into the pot.
Jessica sat on the edge of the bed, her hands resting on her knees, her ten fingers interlaced, knuckles white. She glanced at the guns and ammunition boxes hanging on the wall, then at the white cape on Frank's back that read "Justice."
"Who are you people?"
Frank didn't turn around.
"Eat noodles." He brought over the cooked instant noodles and placed them on the ammunition box next to the cot. The chopsticks were disposable, still in their packaging.
Jessica stared at the bowl of noodles for five seconds.
Steam rose from the bowl, and the salty aroma of the seasoning wafted into her nose.
She untied the chopsticks, lowered her head, and took a bite.
Frank moved a folding chair to the doorway, turned his back to her, and began cleaning his gun.
Jessica ate half a bowl, then stopped.
"That guy… your boss. Can he catch the Purple Man?"
Frank pulled back the bolt, checking the rifling.
"If he says he can, then he can." Jessica didn't say anything more. She finished the rest of the noodles.
Ron didn't return to the safe house.
He stood on the rooftop of the office building opposite the Crown Hotel, his eyes closed.
Observation Haki penetrated four hundred meters of air and twelve stories of building structure, seeping into the top floor of the hotel.
Forty-two life forms. Heartbeats highly synchronized, breathing rhythms perfectly synchronized—characteristics of being controlled. They were scattered throughout the various rooms of the penthouse suite, some standing, some sitting, some lying on the floor. None of them were sleeping.
In the very center of the suite, the aura of one being was completely different from the other forty-two.
His heartbeat was fifty-five beats per minute, neither fast nor slow. His body temperature was normal. But a layer of extremely faint chemical signals permeated his body—Observation Haki couldn't analyze the specific components, only sensed that the signal was continuously spreading outwards, covering a radius of about thirty meters.
Pheromone.
Ron opened his eyes and brought up the system analysis.
[Purple Man - Kilgrave. Ability Mechanism: Pheromone + Sonic Command Dual Control.]
[Pheromone travels through the air, acting on the amygdala and prefrontal cortex of the brain, reducing the target's willpower resistance.]
[Sonic command triggers a forced obedience response after the pheromones take effect. Both are indispensable.]
[Countermeasure Recommendation: Full Armament Haki coverage (including eardrums and nasal mucosa), physical isolation of both channels. Current synchronization rate 30%, execution accuracy: barely feasible.] Duration limit: Approximately four minutes.
Four minutes.
The straight-line distance from the entrance to the penthouse suite to the location of the Purple Man is fifteen meters. Forty-two human shields stand in between.
They cannot be harmed.
The Purple Man cannot be made to speak.
Within four minutes, get past the forty-two people and handcuff the Purple Man.
Ron retrieved the Seastone handcuffs from his system space and gripped them in his right hand. The black metal was cold, the swirling patterns digging into his palm.
He dialed the encrypted channel.
"Frank."
"Here."
"Across from the Crown Hotel, on the rooftop of the Seventh Avenue office building. Bring a sniper rifle."
"Plan B?"
"Yes. If I get controlled—you know what to do." The channel was silent for two seconds.
"Roger." Ron turned off the channel and turned to go downstairs.
The iron door to the safe house was pushed open from the inside.
Jessica Jones stood in the doorway, her left foot bare, cut by glass; the blood had congealed into a dark brown scab.
"I'm going with you." Ron stopped.
"You're just an ordinary person. You'll only be a hindrance." Jessica's jaw tightened.
"He controlled me for three days. Made me do—"
She didn't finish.
"I want to see him handcuffed."
Ron looked at her.
"No. But I promise you, he'll pay for everything he did in Impel Down." Jessica slammed her right fist on the folding table.
A fist-sized dent appeared in the tabletop.
The metal legs creaked as the table tilted fifteen degrees.
Jessica froze.
She looked down at her fist. Her knuckles were intact, no redness, no broken skin.
Frank, who was stuffing magazines into his tactical vest, stopped. His vertical pupils locked onto Jessica's right fist, then moved to the dent in the tabletop.
A notification popped up on the left side of Ron's vision.
[Detected dormant IGH chemical enhancer in Jessica Jones's body.] [Probably activated under extreme emotional stimulation. Willpower strength assessment: Grade A. Suitability potential: Navy candidate.] Ron withdrew his gaze, looking at the fist mark on Jessica's hand.
This was no ordinary person.
Top floor of the Crown Hotel.
Kilgrave stood before the floor-to-ceiling window, the top two buttons of his purple shirt undone, a glass of red wine in his right hand, his left index finger tracing circles on the glass.
His own face was reflected in the window.
He smiled at his reflection.
"Where has my little Jessica gone?"
He turned around.
Forty-two people stood in various corners of the suite, each with a different posture, their pupils uniformly purple.
Kilgrave placed his wine glass on the coffee table, walked to the central broadcast panel, and pressed the intercom button.
"Everyone." His voice carried through the hotel's internal broadcast system to every floor, every room, and every corridor.
"Go find a blonde woman. Bring her back to me when you find her."
The forty-two people turned simultaneously and headed for their doors.
Footsteps echoed from the top floor to the eleventh, tenth, and ninth floors.
The elevator doors opened, and a group of expressionless people poured out of the lobby, pushed open the revolving doors, and walked onto the street.
They dispersed, heading in all directions towards Hell's Kitchen.
Kilgrave picked up his wine glass again and leaned back into the sofa.
Outside the window, forty-two figures with purple pupils disappeared into the New York night.