Saitama's POV

The A-Class's eyes shot open, and he sat up. He tried to take in a breath of air, but felt nothing on his tongue.

He stood up, looking at his surroundings. Millions of stars and a jet black sky stared back at him, and the ground beneath him was yellowish white rock.

Orochi's POV

What was going on?

The Monster King looked up. Just now… the entire Monster Association Base had shaken, the shockwave so strong it cracked the foundations.

His instincts told him that the Hunter was here.

"Psykos." The psychic snapped to attention. "Fetch Water and Nyan, it is time we strike." She nodded, and her drones flew out to retrieve the cat while she went herself to get Evil Natural Water.

"Wait, Psykos." She paused. "Send someone to relieve Nyan if he has not finished investigating the disturbance."

"Don't worry, I know who he's fighting. I know just who to send."

Garou's POV

This nimble fucker.

The martial artist ducked and dodged, avoiding the cat monster's claws. Growling, he lashed out, but the cat simply turned thin as paper and weaved between his fists.

The other two monsters that had come with this cat to investigate had been easy to dispatch, but this fucker was tricky. Not only was its speed and power on par with his, but its ability to turn into any shape made it almost impossible to hit. It had also attempted to enter his mouth, which he only avoided by a frantic use of the Water Stream Rock Smashing Fist to force it away from him.

"Nyan!" An eyeball in wings flew into the room. "The Hunter is here! Disengage!"

The cat returned to his normal state and stood beside the eye. 'What about Garou?"

The Eye scrutinised him for a moment. "We can leave him to Phoenix Man." The cat nodded, and they sped away.

Wha- Were they just leaving?

"Don't look down on me!" He rushed forward, using the full power of the Water Stream Rock Smashing Fist. The monsters dodged and disappeared around a corner, and he destroyed the wall behind them instead.

Wait. He looked down at his hands. Those strikes, he felt them connect.

He peered around the wall he had demolished. Behind it was the corpse of a monster, almost completely reduced to mush by his strikes.

"Oops." He looked down at the Monster that he had accidentally struck. It looked like a bipedal phoenix, although on closer inspection there was a human hand underneath the feathers. This must be the Phoenix Man they were talking about. Tch. How could they have expected someone like this to handle him?

Whatever. Shaking the blood off his hands, he continued walking. This place was enormous, he remembered being brought through countless twisting tunnels, and he had no idea where he was.

Well, the best place to start was head up…

The walls exploded into an enormous fireball. The martial artist threw his hands and legs over his vital areas in a disciplined block, but the heat and impact were so intense that he got flung away regardless.

Out of the flames rose another Phoenix-like monster, but much, much larger, with glowing skin and a grinning face in his beak.

Tareo's POV

"Oi kid, stop crying! It's noisy!" The small child sniffled, trying his best to suppress his sobs as the monster shouted at him.

Ever since he had been kidnapped he had been kept in this cold cell, with only this goat monster for company.

Boom! He sat up, too surprised to feel scared as a bunch of loud noises started coming nearer to him.

"Oi oi, what's-" the next thing he knew the monster that was guarding him had turned to mush, and in the center of that was some white haired man with burnt clothing and red skin.

"You?" The white haired man looked at him with shock, before quickly recovering and grabbing on to him.

"Clench your teeth!" The uncle dragged him down the corridor, sprinting with such speed that if the boy hadn't followed his instructions his tongue likely would have been bitten off. They reached a room filled with humming machinery and large containers. The uncle stopped, and stuffed him into the narrow gap between two large computers.

"Stay here! Don't move if you know what's good for you!" And he vanished.

Zhiznucrast's POV

This was a problem.

The immortal spirit clenched his fist, breathing heavily. After feeling Saitama still alive he had been so agitated that he had lashed out and practically deleted part of the underground base, killing the two ninjas near him.

Calm down.

Taking another deep breath in an effort to soothe his frayed nerves, he stood up.

It was fine. Even if Saitama was still alive there was no way he could survive where he had been sent to. His host was still human after all, he would suffocate or starve. And even if by some miracle the outrageous human survived that, it wasn't far fetched, he knew his host's insane resistance to all environmental hazards, he would be weakened enough to kill.

He tried to ignore the slight twinge of sorrow and melancholy at that thought.

Growling, he pushed those thoughts aside. This was the biggest, the only drawback he had to endure.

The one and only weakness of his powers was that, whoever he possessed, he gained traits from, permanently. It was not a slow thing either, he had spent less than a year absorbing Psyko's powers and yet her overinflated self confidence and shitty personality had rubbed off on him. He had gained tactical thought from Geryuyanshoop, his blood knight tendencies had been made worse by Boros, and many of the other smaller monsters he had possessed had given him some change in his personality or another, but they were all small changes.

Until he met Saitama, who was corrupting his very nature.

He had believed that it was not a concern at first. He only possessed the body after all, not being able to penetrate Saitama's mental blocks, so the hero's personality couldn't have changed him that much.

Growing fond of Genos was an unfortunate side effect, but it was fine, he had told himself. He was fully aware that it was his host's fondness for the cyborg tainting his views, but he found the cyborg calming. It was almost pleasant to simply sit there and watch the cyborg busying around the house, or engaging in enthusiastic conversation.

But then the other things happened.

It began with Mumen Rider. He liked him despite his weakness, to the point that he genuinely enjoyed it when Mumen visited. Then it was King. He still hated him, the false warrior pretending, stealing his host's achievements, but even now a small part of him felt guilty for how he treated the S-Class. It wasn't his fault he had no guts. He had accepted these new attachments with no questions, he was lonely, he told himself. He had spent years alone fighting off Blast and years by himself in Saitama's mind, it made sense that he would latch on to human connections.

But no, Saitama had changed him.

His host had altered his morals. He still remembered feeling guilt for the first time when he thought about killing Mumen, and the days he had spent in shock upon realizing it. He gave up in the end, he had carefully pushed Mumen so that he would only be severely injured but still look dead, as was necessary for the plan.

But this was not the biggest issue. The biggest issue was that it hadn't stopped.

He clenched and opened his fist. He had expected the changes to cease once he had permanently taken over Saitama's body. What he had used was his ultimate move, a once in a lifetime power grab in which he absorbed almost all his host's power while making it so that he lost the ability to possess anyone else. It had been tough. Saitama's immense mental resistance meant he had to use tricks to make him think that his closest companions were dead, and use the despair to weaken and punch through the mental blocks. Once he was free of Saitama, he could enjoy all the man's powers without any of the inhibitions.

But that was not to be. It may have been his imagination, but he still didn't feel as strong as Saitama was at his peak. Not to mention even now his personality was still being altered. He had told Child Emperor he wanted the S-Class heroes as his companions. Child Emperor! That brat! It was one thing to want intellectuals or strong warriors at his side, but the S-Class? That bunch of haughty weaklings? Why would he want them! He didn't, at least not a few days ago.

He was becoming more tolerant of humans and weaklings. Saitama may not have shown it, but he was an incredibly soft hearted individual, if impatient at times. He had originally simply wanted the satisfaction of killing Garou, but now he was seriously considering taking the man on as a disciple or enforcer. He had planned to kill Boros to test his new power, but now he was debating sending the man back into space as his conqueror.

Although, if Saitama was where he was...

It didn't matter, Saitama could not stop him now. He had beaten Blast, he sure as heck could bea-

Wait.

The Monster stopped, looking down at the latest group of monsters. For the last few minutes he had been clearing a consistent stream of small waves of weak monsters. This couldn't be a coincidence, he could not sense any monsters at all along the paths beside him, only directly in front of him, leading him to a room, none of which were above Tiger.

Well then.

Cracking his knuckles, he sprinted forward to the trap set for him.