The moment Richard rose from the throne of broken Sentinel steel and pulled his blade from the ground, the fourteen mutant agents entering the square shifted into combat stance.
They had arrived only minutes ago, but briefings were already circulating through encrypted channels. He had destroyed three Sentinels. He had incapacitated Benjamin, Director of Operations, with a long-range attack no one had fully identified.
Surveillance had captured him carrying Benjamin away while the director was gravely injured. It had not captured the moment of death. To avoid damaging morale, command had chosen not to state the obvious conclusion.
But these agents were not fools.
They knew Benjamin's strength.
They knew the capabilities of the Sentinel units better than anyone outside development command.
And they knew what it meant that Richard had shattered both.
At first, some of them had quietly assumed that the Class A warrant had been excessive. Now, standing in the smoke-filled square beneath news helicopters and police floodlights, not one of them believed that anymore.
If anything, Benjamin had underestimated him.
Destroying three Sentinels alone was already a benchmark few mutants had ever reached. Magneto himself had destroyed five at the height of his early campaigns. Richard's record tonight placed him dangerously close to that tier.
Even if he had not yet shaken the entire nation as Magneto once had, tonight's performance alone justified consideration for an S-level designation.
Across the square, Richard observed them calmly.
They did not advance.
They did not speak.
They waited.
He did not.
Flash.
To cameras and human eyes alike, he vanished.
He reappeared in front of two agents like a phantom breaking through space itself.
"Eight Swords Flash."
He did not use Earth-Shaking Slash. He did not use Iai Strike.
He used Sephiroth's signature technique.
Eight slashes.
Smooth.
Precise.
Lightning-fast.
Steel sang through the air.
The two agents had already tensed the moment he disappeared. Their bodies were coiled for impact, powers primed to trigger.
They were still too slow.
The blade passed through them before muscle or mind could react. For a fleeting instant, they remained upright.
Then their bodies separated.
Fragments fell to the ground in uneven pieces, scattering across the stone of the square.
In their final heartbeat, the same question burned through both of them.
Had he really only awakened recently?
Then they were gone.
Shock rippled outward.
The remaining agents stared.
The reporters inside circling helicopters stared.
Millions watching through live broadcast stared.
The two agents had not resisted.
They had not evaded.
They had not even visibly moved.
To the average viewer, it looked impossible.
Some insisted he must have used an invisible ability. Others refused to accept what they were seeing. Those who had always believed in the absolute superiority of the Department felt something fracture inside their certainty.
Inside the square, the reaction was worse.
The remaining agents did not merely feel surprise.
They felt fear.
It was subtle at first. A tightening in the chest. A dryness in the throat. An instinct that whispered retreat.
Even those with disciplined minds felt it. Those with weaker wills felt something closer to panic. Several had a single thought flash across their minds.
Resign.
The Department paid well. The benefits were excellent. But compensation meant nothing if you were dead.
Richard could not read minds.
He didn't need to.
Their faces told him enough.
Instead of attacking immediately again, he spoke.
"I've been thinking about what kind of gift I should give you," he said, voice steady but amplified clearly across the square and into every microphone. "Something appropriate. Something to thank the Department for issuing a Class A warrant against me."
He paused deliberately.
"Now I know."
He lifted the blade slightly.
"I'll give you despair."
The word hung heavy in the air.
No one answered him.
If they had possessed the strength, they would have attacked immediately, if only to reject the insult. But none of them moved.
He did.
Flash.
He vanished again.
He appeared behind a female agent with long golden waves and sharp features, her posture still tense from the previous kill.
The blade swept once.
Clean.
Her head lifted into the air before her body understood what had happened. It fell moments later, life extinguished before fear could even fully register.
Three down.
This time, Richard did not vanish again.
Instead, he raised his hand.
"Big Flame."
Heat surged outward.
"Flame High Wall."
A roaring wall of fire erupted around the perimeter of the square. Flames climbed more than ten meters high, forming a blazing barrier that sealed the entire battleground.
Police vehicles beyond the line recoiled from the heat. Snipers lost their line of sight. Officers outside could do nothing but watch through thermal haze.
Inside, the agents understood immediately.
No escape.
No external interference.
The door had been closed.
Under the glare of cameras and the suffocating heat of the fire wall, Richard moved.
This was no longer a confrontation.
It was execution.
Flash.
Earth-Shaking Slash.
A shockwave cracked stone and threw two agents backward into the flames.
Iai Strike.
A body split before it finished turning.
Thunder.
Lightning tore through the air, branching violently and dropping another to his knees before burning straight through his chest.
Blizzard.
Ice burst outward in crystalline arcs, freezing one agent mid-charge before shattering him into fragments under a follow-up strike.
Flame.
Fire wrapped around another, swallowing screams in roaring heat.
Dimensional Slash.
Space itself seemed to distort for a heartbeat before carving through armor and flesh alike.
He did not repeat a single rhythm.
Flash repositioned him constantly. Bounce and ion shockwaves blasted opponents off balance. Telekinetic bursts slammed bodies against broken Sentinel debris.
The square became a storm of elements.
Lightning tangled with fire.
Frost clashed against shockwaves.
Blood sprayed across stone already blackened by soot.
Severed limbs fell.
Explosions echoed.
Screams cut through the roar of flame.
From above, news cameras captured everything.
Richard moved like a figure pulled from nightmare. Blade in hand, silver hair illuminated by firelight, he carved through the remaining agents with relentless efficiency.
One attempted to retreat toward the fire wall and burned.
Another launched a desperate ranged attack and was cut down mid-cast.
Another tried to coordinate a combined strike and lost an arm before finishing the command.
In less time than most viewers could process, the square had transformed into a battlefield drenched in blood and elemental aftermath.
Richard stood amid it, blade stained, breath steady.
Under the gaze of countless spectators across the nation, he completed the killing feast without hesitation.
.....
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