Dust and smoke billowed, as thick as fog.
Poof.
Saitama stood steadily at the edge of the bottomless chasm that had opened up when the ground collapsed, loose stones and clumps of earth trickling down into the abyss. He glanced down at his feet in confusion.
"Huh? The road here… is missing?"
That last step, he hadn't even used any strength. He'd just accidentally tapped a shoddy, hollow stretch of concrete. He still had no idea that he was the true culprit behind the earth-shaking cave-in and the scepter plummeting into the underground river.
On the other side, Natasha clung to the steel beam with all her strength, gasping for breath. A moment ago, she'd been barely half a meter from that suddenly splitting chasm. Heart still pounding, she lifted her head. Her gaze passed over the drifting haze of dust and landed on the bald figure standing at the edge of the pit.
Him again?!
Natasha's heart hammered wildly, her eyes a tangle of conflicting emotions. That last upheaval… did that count as him saving her? Or almost shaking her straight into the crack along with everything else? And that assassin who'd been sneak-attacking Corvus Glaive and got "brushed" into the rubble… was that also his doing?
It was all too chaotic.
The smoke and dust slowly thinned.
The Avengers team regrouped, still rattled. Clint jumped down from the partially collapsed high platform. Steve retrieved his shield. Bucky checked on the unconscious soldiers whose bodies had been warped by the scepter's energy. Natasha straightened up, watching Saitama's direction with wary eyes, then looking toward the completely collapsed, ice-cold, mist-wreathed pile of wreckage in the distance—that was where Corvus Glaive was buried… and where the secret of the scepter's disappearance lay hidden.
The center of the tunnel was a complete mess. Even the mutants spawned by the scepter's influence seemed to have been frightened by the sudden chaos and cave-in; for the moment, they'd gone quiet.
Saitama stood at the edge of the fissure, but his gaze wasn't on the wreckage or the deep pit beside him, nor did he pay any attention to the complicated looks coming from the group on the other side.
His eyes pierced the lingering dust and fixed on a spot deeper in the tunnel, closer to Steve's team—
There, beneath a stretch of rock whose structure still looked relatively stable, he could make out a triangular space propped up by massive construction steel beams, like a little bridge underpass. Inside, a few torn burlap sacks and flattened cardboard boxes were scattered about.
Saitama's expression instantly lit up with pure, delighted surprise.
"Found it! That bridge hole!"
He completely ignored the bottomless crack at his feet, the rubble burying Corvus Glaive, the vanished scepter, and Natasha's conflicted stare. He pointed excitedly in that direction, like a kid who'd just stumbled across a treasure.
"Hey! That spot looks pretty good! Looks like nobody's living there! I've got a place to stay tonight!"
With that, he paid zero attention to the widened chasm created by the collapse in front of him. He simply took a light step and "walked" across—though in reality, it was a casual jump—and happily strode toward that ideal, free, temporary shelter.
In the swirling dust, Steve and the others stared at one another. Clint looked at the bald head marching enthusiastically toward the little "bridge hole," then back at the devastated battlefield and the terrifying enemy buried under the ruins. He opened his mouth, then finally squeezed out a single word:
"…Damn."
The damp, decaying air of the underground tunnel, thick with dust, blood, the lingering bite of cold from the fading blue light, and a suffocating haze of shock and bewilderment, seemed to congeal above the collapsed zone.
Saitama slipped into the corner of the "bridge hole," formed by huge I-beams bracing the concrete. The space wasn't big, but it was just enough to squeeze into. A few sheets of cardboard and torn burlap lay scattered on the ground, all of it buried under a thick layer of dust.
Completely unconcerned, he brushed the dust off the cardboard with one hand—still wearing those cheap white gloves—and nodded in satisfaction.
(End of Chapter)
[Check Out My P@treon For 20+ Extra Chapters On All My Fanfics!!] [[email protected]/Draumel]
[Thank You For Your Support!]