The scream that had been tearing through the underground lab cut off abruptly.
The psychic amplifier sputtered, sparked, and died with a sound like a wet cough. Smoke curled from the machine's vents, smelling of burnt plastic and ozone.
Saitama lowered his fist. "Uh. Did I break him?"
Zombieman lay on the table, perfectly still. His eyes were open, staring at the ceiling, but they were completely white. No pupils. No iris. His chest wasn't moving. His skin was a charred, smoking ruin where the sheer intensity of the psychic projection had overloaded his nervous system.
"Fascinating," Dr. Genus's hologram whispered, leaning in close. "His vitals have ceased. Brain activity is zero. Cellular regeneration has… paused."
Genos scanned the body. "Confirming fatality. Sensei, it appears your 'Serious Psychic Poke' was too effective. You have successfully simulated death to the point of actual death."
Saitama's jaw dropped. "Seriously? I killed a guy? An S-Class guy?" He grabbed his head. "Oh man, this is bad. This is really bad. I can't pay for a funeral! Do you know how much plots cost in City Z? Even the craters are expensive!"
"Sensei, I believe legal fees will be the primary concern," Genos corrected helpfully.
Suddenly, the air in the room grew cold. The smell of ozone spiked.
On the table, Zombieman's finger twitched.
Then, a sound—wet and squelching. The charred skin on his chest didn't just heal; it knit itself together with violent speed. Muscles reattached with a snap. Bones ground against each other as they realigned. It wasn't the slow, creeping regeneration Zombieman was known for. This was explosive.
He sat up.
It was a movement so fast it blurred. One second he was a corpse; the next, he was upright, sitting on the edge of the table. The wires connecting him to the machines ripped out, sparking.
He looked at his hands. Then he looked at Saitama.
His eyes were back, but they were different. The crimson irises burned with a new, terrifying intensity. There was a hunger in them. A depth that hadn't been there before.
"I saw it," Zombieman rasped. His voice sounded like gravel grinding in a blender. "The abyss. The end of all things." He clenched his fist, and the metal frame of the medical table crumpled like aluminum foil under his grip.
"I didn't break it," he whispered, looking at Dr. Genus. "The limiter. It's still there."
Genus's face fell. "It… held?"
"It held," Zombieman confirmed. "But I cracked it."
He hopped off the table. He felt lighter. Heavier. Both at once. The fear of death, which he thought he had lost years ago, had returned in that simulation, only to be conquered again. He wasn't invincible like Saitama. He wasn't a god. But he was no longer just a man who couldn't die. He was a man who refused to stop.
"Thanks," Zombieman said to Saitama. It wasn't a warm thank you. It was the thanks a survivor gives to the disaster that spared them.
Saitama breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh, good. You're alive. Don't scare me like that, man. I almost had a heart attack." He turned to Genos. "Let's get out of here. This place gives me the creeps, and I'm starving."
"Understood, Sensei. Navigating to the nearest exit."
As they walked away, Dr. Genus watched Zombieman. "We failed to create another Saitama," the doctor mused. "But I believe we may have created the ultimate monster hunter."
Zombieman picked up his trench coat from a chair. He put it on, hiding the steam still rising from his body. "Not a hunter, Doctor," he said, walking into the shadows. "A predator."
Miles away, beneath the city streets, the predator became the prey.
Garou slammed into the sewer wall, coughing up blood. The cybernetic reptile—Machine Type: Monitor Lizard—hissed, its chrome scales rippling.
"Analysis complete," the monster droned. "Martial Art: Water Stream Rock Smashing Fist. Defensive capability: High. Offensive output: Moderate. Weakness: predictable reliance on counter-attacks."
Garou wiped his mouth, grinning through the pain. "Predictable? Me?"
He launched himself forward. He flowed like water, deflecting the monster's razor-sharp claws, aiming a crushing strike at its robotic eye.
The monster didn't dodge. It simply shifted. Its torso rotated 180 degrees, faster than biology should allow, and a hidden piston-fist shot out from its back, catching Garou mid-air.
Wham.
Garou flew backward, skipping across the filthy water like a stone.
"Your technique is logged in our database," the monster said, advancing. "We have studied Silver Fang. We have studied you. Every move you make has a 98% probability of being countered."
Garou pulled himself up. His ribs were screaming. This wasn't a monster acting on instinct. It was a machine running an algorithm. It was fighting him with math.
"Math," Garou spat. "I hate math."
He closed his eyes. He remembered his fights. The feeling of being cornered. The feeling of breaking through. If the machine knew his style, he had to stop using a style. He had to stop being Garou the Martial Artist and start being Garou the Monster.
He abandoned his stance. He dropped his hands.
"Probability of surrender: 99%," the monster stated.
Garou lunged. Not with a flowing strike. With a savage, uncoordinated, animalistic tear. He didn't aim for a weak point. He aimed for the monster's leg, sinking his fingers into the chrome plating and ripping it like wet paper.
"Error," the monster buzzed. "Movement does not align with known parameters. Technique unrecognized. Refine analysis—"
"Analyze this," Garou roared.
He didn't use the Water Stream. He used pure, chaotic violence. He headbutted the monster, cracking its optical lens. He kneed it in the processor core. He fought dirty. He fought wild. He fought like a cornered wolf that didn't know how to die.
The monster stumbled back, sparks flying from its damaged leg. "System overload. Unpredictable variable detected. Initiating retreat protocol."
"You're not going anywhere!" Garou leaped onto its back, wrapping his arms around its neck. He squeezed, not with technique, but with sheer, hate-fueled strength. "Tell me! Who sent you? Who's collecting the data?"
The monster's head twisted around. "The... Organization... is... the future..."
Crunch.
Garou ripped the head clean off. Wires sparked and flailed. The body collapsed into the sludge.
He stood over the wreckage, panting heavy. He tossed the metal head aside. Amid the debris of the monster's neck, something caught his eye. A small, pristine microchip, glowing with a faint blue light. It was stamped with a symbol: a stylized, geometric eye.
He pocketed it. "The future, huh?" He looked at his trembling hands. He was getting stronger. But so were they.
"You left me," Fubuki said. Her voice was dangerously calm.
She was waiting for them outside the secret entrance to the lab, leaning against a black sedan. Eyelashes and Mountain Ape stood behind her, looking nervous.
Saitama blinked. "We didn't leave you. We just... went faster than you."
"That is the definition of leaving someone, Sensei," Genos pointed out.
"Whose side are you on?" Saitama whispered.
Fubuki pinched the bridge of her nose. "Never mind. Get in the car. We have a situation."
"I'm not getting in the car," Saitama said. "I can walk home."
"It's not about home," Fubuki snapped. She held up her phone. "Look at this."
On the screen was a live broadcast. It was Forte, the A-Class hero. He was standing on a podium in front of a crowd of reporters. But he didn't look like the Forte they knew. He was wearing a new suit—sleek, black, with glowing red lines running through it. It looked like a high-tech version of a muscle system. And he looked… big. Confident.
"Citizens!" Forte bellowed into the microphone. "For too long, the Hero Association has relied on unverified, destructive anomalies! They promote recklessness! They promote 'Caped Baldy,' a man who destroys our cities to save them!"
The crowd murmured.
"But there is a new way!" Forte tapped his chest. The suit hummed with power. "Precision. Control. Calculated justice. The Neo Heroes have given me the tools to surpass the old S-Class dinosaurs."
He pointed directly at the camera.
"Saitama! The Final Fortress! I challenge you! Tomorrow, at noon, in the City Z Stadium. A public exhibition match. Let's see if your brute force can stand against the future of heroism!"
Saitama stared at the screen. "Who is that guy again?"
"That's Forte," Fubuki said grimly. "He was Rank 1 of A-Class until recently. And that suit… my intel says it's not just armor. It's a bio-enhancer. It forces the body to break its natural limits chemically and mechanically."
"Sounds dangerous," Genos said. "For him."
"It's a trap," Fubuki said. "If you fight him and win easily, you look like a bully beating up a weaker hero. If you refuse, you look like a coward. They're trying to corner you in the court of public opinion."
Saitama scratched his head. "So, if I go… do I get paid?"
Fubuki sighed. "It's an exhibition match. There's usually a purse. Probably a few million yen."
Saitama's eyes widened. "A few million?" He opened the car door and slid into the backseat. "Shotgun! Let's go. I need to buy new gloves."
High above the city, in a sleek, hovering fortress, Tatsumaki watched the same broadcast. She floated in her private quarters, a glass of wine hovering in the air beside her.
"Idiots," she muttered. "Trying to fight him with a suit."
But her gaze drifted to a second screen. It showed surveillance photos of Fubuki and Saitama walking together. Talking. Fubuki looking… happy. Confident. Not the terrified little sister she used to be.
Tatsumaki's glass shattered, the red wine suspending in a perfect sphere in mid-air.
"She thinks she can control him," Tatsumaki whispered. "She thinks she's found her shield. Her shortcut to the top."
She clenched her hand, and the wine evaporated into mist.
"I won't let her ruin herself," she decided. "If that bald fraud is going to be her shield, I'll just have to shatter him. And I'll make sure the whole world watches."
She pulled out her communicator. "Get me the Neo Heroes representative. Tell them I want a front-row seat to this 'exhibition.'"