On his way home, Adam started checking on the treasures he had collected in today's heist.
"It seemed that lady luck is on my side today, just look at these abilities, though most of them are on the lower end of the spectrum, they can be used to nurture 'energy knife' to increase its grade…" Adam muttered with a satisfied expression before he was alarmed of an explosion nearby.
Before he decided to go and take a look, Adam dismantled all of the useless abilities and used it to increase energy knife's rank from F to B. He doesn't invest all of the resources on energy knife and quickly strengthens all the other useful abilities.
Soon, he reached the source of the explosion and stood at a safe distance as he doesn't want to get caught.
Through the use of an ability he acquired 'eagle's eyes', Adam managed to get a glimpse at the situation and from where he stood, a few metres upfront was where an intense combat took place.
'A fight?' He thought as his eyes locked into the scene, 'I wonder who might be the one fighting? What monster is it?' He added, thinking about a new ability he could acquire.
After the smokescreens dissipated, three humanoid figures were seen engaging in a combat against a gigantic octopus.
Ransacking through the memories, Adam finally recognised the three figures, they are the heroes under the name, "El Diablo", "Frost Bat" and "One Step Swordsman", the octopus they're fighting against are a B-ranked monster "Thousand Handed Octopus", it was fairly known by its thousands hands (?) or tentacles that sprouted from its body.
The sheer number of tentacles was not the only reason it was a threat, the octopus also had an insane physical power and an incredible elemental resistance sometimes the stronger version of them even had an outright immunity to some elements, that's why it was regarded as one of the most annoying and dangerous monsters to fight against and a contender for the title of the strongest B-ranked monster.
Diablo, a C-ranked hero that has only started his hero journey barely a year ago, he had disclosed a good amount of information of his ability that was named 'hellfire bone weapon' an S-ranked ability, the public feature was that the ability can create a permanent bone weapon coated in a unique fire named Hellfire, he doesn't have a higher hero rank despite his impressive ability rank was because of his incompetence and inexperience, he also never used the ability to its fullest potential.
Frost Bat, a C-ranked hero and also the wielder of a C-ranked ability 'frozen bat', from the internet, interviews and videos of her combat, the ability seemingly cater to its summoning nature more, it can summon up to 50 bat made out of ice that is essentially a suicide bomber that will froze something in exchange for its life, it also allows the user manipulate ice on much lesser scale than most other known ice ability, she is quite decent.
One step swordsman, a B-ranked hero and a wielder of a C-ranked ability 'line rush' which allow the user to move at an incredible speed in a straight line, a simple and straightforward ability used to its full potential and beyond accompanied by his own expertise in swordsmanship, he truly has achieved the pinnacle of his craft.
He stared at the fight with a faint smirk, 'Will they manage to defeat the monster?' He thought.
As he was watching from the sideline, a drone flew by to get a better view of the fight, Adam had noticed the drone arriving but he didn't expect it to be so close to him but alas he just continued his viewing of the fight while maintaining his hidden presence.
The heroes finally won as One Step Swordsman finally landed a killing blow by using his final move, Last Cut, using almost every ounce of his strength to cut something in front of him at an incredible speed. Soon, he fall on the ground kneeling as his sword broke into millions of pieces.
Diablo and Frost Bat also fell on their knees as they were struggling to breathe, they were completely exhausted as they might reach a life threatening condition if the fight goes on much longer.
They celebrated their victory before a figure engulfed in the shadow try to approach the corpse, One step sworsman sensed him and instinctively put his sword hilt right near the figure's neck.
"Who are you?" One step swordsman said appearing hostile towards him.
The figure calmly stood there with an air of confidence and nobility, the bright sunshine illuminated the figure and revealed their appearance, a manly figure, wearing a white suit underneath a long brown coat, the suit was complimented by the red necktie and a very dark gray pants that bordered on black, his feet was encased in a black leather shoes, on his head was a top hat of similar color to his coat, the figure's face was covered in a mask and on his left eye was a monocle, the figure's hand tightly wrapped around a walking stick that supported his weight as he leaned slightly to the side.
"Me?" The figure asked, "Well, I'm just a nobody, good sir." He added, his tone was calm and polite.
One step swordsman caution was unwavering even after he heard the figure's answer, it might even rise, "Do not tell a lie, what were you doing here dressed like that?" He muttered with an intense murderous aura that seeped deep into the figure's body.
The figure flinched in response but none of the people present noticed that, 'This guy… he's seriously considering chopping my head off at any moment, he doesn't seem to be interested in mercy…' The figure sighed, 'This will be annoying…' He added before he upgraded his former 'energy knife' ability to S-rank, though it might be overkill, he wouldn't take his chances.
His internal struggles was invisible from the outside perspective, to an outsider he was merely staring down at the three heroes especially One step swordsman with little to no reaction even after a threat, that stunt cause the viewer of the broadcast to get excited.
Inside the broadcast chat was thousands of people that were wondering and speculating on the identity of the figure.
| Broadcast Chat • 5.82k views |
[A new face? Who the hell is this bozo?]
[Idk, but he does possess quite the drip!]
[3v1? My money on the new guy, he got that aura!]
[Stereotypical British lookin ass.]
[Gentleman rizz.]
[Lookin like a certified gentleman frfr.]
[He doesn't seem to have any information on the internet.]
[What a mysterious aura~!]
[He must be strong!]
The broadcast chat was flooded by the constant messages from the viewer interested in the identity and status of the uninvited guest.
'How can I effectively de-escalate this situation?' The figure thought, under the mask his calm face showed the edge of his mouth curled into a smile, 'If he forced me to go all out then I wouldn't hesitate.' The figure added
One step swordsman sharpened sense picked up on the figure's change of atmosphere, he felt like he could see the invisible light that was surrounding the figure's body, instinctively he tried to terminate the figure by slashing his neck.
The slash caused the surrounding dust to rise and create another smokescreen, this smoke was fairly thick and blocked the viewer and the heroes sight, One step swordsman's was stunned as he was worried that he might've accidentally killed the figure.
Fortunately, a silhouette was seen standing within the thinning smoke, a fairly deep voice can be heard, "Worry not, my friend, for I do not seek any meaningless bloodshed and I only have a minor goal in my appearance today." The figure's voice alerted the heroes as they instinctively stepped back and get ready to engage in combat.
Seeing their stance, the figure couldn't help but sigh, "Sir and madam, can we please not resort to violence? I'll just quickly finish my task while the three of you just calmly watch," He said, "We can handle this matter in a more professional manner than to kill each other, I also would prefer to not have to wash blood from my favorite clothing." He added, the atmosphere around him began to change as the three heroes began to feel the weight of his words.
"How can we trust you? What were you planning to do with the corpse? You might have a necromancy adjacent ability and is a villain." Diablo said, his voice was doubtful and full of fear.
The figure stood there in silence, behind the mask the figure's face calmly stared at the three heroes in front of him as a faint smile decorated his face.
"Villain? Well, that's a valid assumption, if I were in any of your shoes I'd have the same reaction but fear not," the figure said, "I am not a villain, at least I don't consider myself as one or similar to them, I am just merely a passerby." His speech was cut off by the doubtful stares of the heroes.
He coughed, "Well it's true that I'm not truly just a passerby but I am really not a villain, the name's Mister Gentle, I am not fond of violence and bloodshed so I hope that the situation will never call for that reaction among us as none of us want to waste anymore stamina, right?" the figure said.
The heroes did not dare to challenge the figure's statement and morality hence giving him the benefit of the doubt and allow him to do whatever he wished.
The figure's hand come in contact with the thousands handed octopus's corpse.
[Ability successfully stolen.]
[ A-ranked Ability Card
Name: Anti-Elemental Body
Description: The body possesses the natural defense and resistance against elements, not only that the user have a high physical toughness. Immune to all elemental debuff of A-rank or lower.
Evaluation: A godly defensive ability, you can make all element user a run for their money if they ever met you. If this is only A-rank, how strong would its S-rank version would be? ]
'Amazing! Truly an ability befitting of one of the strongest B-ranked monster!' the figure thought, 'Wait, this ability is A-rank, does that mean the monster they defeated was a mutant? Though difficulty of the fight before was fairly normal albeit the monster was pushing the heroes quite a bit but that was believable if the monster was an adult and a genetically stronger thousand handed octopus, it seemed that the monster was probably a newborn.' He added.
The figure turned his head towards the heroes, "Thank you for giving your cooperation, sir and madam, hence I will take my leave," He suddenly stopped before he turned again to give a card to One step swordsman, "I almost forgot, here's my name card, contact me if any of you folks need any help in the future." the figure calmly exclaimed as he walked into the darkness.
The three heroes fall on their knees once again as the adrenaline dispersed, One step swordsman quickly took a glance at the card.
"High-ranking member of the Light of Day club? What's that?" He muttered under his breath.
Seeing the card, the drone zoomed in to show the card toward the viewer and many of them suddenly turned into a theorist and began theory crafting filled with insanity.
Adam smiled at the sight of his phone, the chat's reaction, it's quite funny, now that he has already started the preparation of the first step of his plan, Light of Day club, a place that will be Adam's wealth maker, this is a preparation before he took the first step, before he revealed the true existence behind the Light of Day club, himself and his organization, Arch-Divine.