Securing the earpiece holding the communicator that included a small camera Cortana was going to use to see what they saw, Ruby stepped through the portal that led to the location where one of the bombs had gone off at, Crescent Rose in rifle form and ready to fire in case of attack. As she scanned around for hostiles Weiss stepped out behind her as the portal closed, Myrtenaster at the ready as well.

Around them the sounds of people screaming in fear and the sirens of emergency services rang out as people ran for cover. Some saw the girls leaving the portal and in their fear turned and ran, thinking that they were part of the attack. Seeing these people be afraid of her made an awful feeling curdle Ruby's gut, but she set it aside. She had a job to do.

It wasn't hard to find the blast site a block or so to the east of their position. The girls quickly made their way to it, hoping to find any survivors or clues as to the source, only to have to stop in horror at what they found.

The bomb had gone off in the middle of a crowded street, but unlike what they had expected this hadn't been a conventional explosive. Some sort of substance was covering a large amount of the area and was eating through anything it encountered like cartoon acid. Many of the tightly packed cars were missing portions of their bodies, the edges of the missing parts sizzling and growing as the acid ate into them. The street itself wasn't faring any better, large parts of it eaten away, pipes and power lines becoming exposed and in the process of being destroyed as well.

What was worse was the people. At least a dozen of the victims were already dead and in the process of being completely melted, while those still alive were the ones 'lucky' enough to only get the acid on a limb or two. Those poor souls were screaming in agony, the acid apparently incredibly painful. Some brave bystanders had moved those they could to safely and were trying to tend to them, but there wasn't really much they could do.

If Ruby hadn't lived through Millennium's attack on London then she likely would have frozen in horror and just stood there, but she'd unfortunately already seen things that were just as horrific, so after only a couple of instants to shake the feeling off she barked her instructions to Weiss. "Whiteout, start freezing the acid. Hopefully that'll stop it from being able to eat through anything. We can't let it get into the water pipes. I'll focus on the casualties." She didn't bother looking back to make sure her orders were being followed as she ran for the nearest victim that was still alive. Behind her she heard the sound of Weiss doing as told.

Reaching a man in his mid twenties who was screaming as more and more of his leg began to melt away she slid to a stop between the teenaged boy and older woman who were trying to tend to him, reaching into a first aid pouch at her hip and pulling out more medical supplies than it should have been able to hold. "Hold him still." She said, quickly going through the triage and field medicine lessons Chief and Cortana had put her and the rest of the team through.

The woman immediately did as she was told, holding the man's shoulder down, the teenager doing the same after a moment to stare at Ruby.

Ruby stared at the worsening wound and the way it was crawling up the man's leg, about to reach his knee, and knew she was going to have to do something unpleasant to save his life. It was a miracle he hadn't died of shock or something else already. "I'm sorry, but I think I'm going to have to amputate."

The victim's screams stopped for a moment as he grit his teeth at her words, hands reaching convulsively for his leg, before he finally shouted "Do it!" with tears of agony trailing down his cheeks.

Ruby stood up and drew Crescent Rose again, shifting it into scythe form. She aimed above the man's knee as her helpers held him down, and gritted her own teeth before swinging her weapon, severing his leg with ease, hating herself for having to do so every moment.

The man's screams subsided, becoming whimpers and sobs, the pain of the clean cut apparently much more bearable than feeling his flesh melting.

Ruby dropped back beside him and grabbed the antiseptic gauze she'd pulled out to bind the wound and keep him from bleeding out. The woman took the items from her, looking her in the eye. "I have first aid experience, so let me focus on him. You go help the others."

Ruby hesitated before nodding, quickly getting up and moving to the next victim, only to see them, a girl of about sixteen, suddenly go still and silent. The girl of about the same age kneeling beside her and holding her hand, sobbing, looked up at Ruby as she approached and shook her head as tears poured from her eyes, telling Ruby what she already knew.

The huntress closed her eyes for a moment in grief before shoving it aside and moving on to the next person in need of her help.

She needed to try to save as many people as possible. She could cry for the people she'd failed to help later.

Blake felt sick as she stared in horror at the bubble of contained space-time which was going through the same cycle of a group of people falling to the ground, several being pierced by metallic debris, before rewinding and started again. As she watched a thirteen year old fell onto a jagged spike of metal, being pierced through his throat, staring up at her as he choked on his own blood before suddenly lifting off as time rewound and going through it all over again.

She'd heard of a similar effect before when going through some of Cortana's reports on some of the elements of Earth Bet that they would need to look out for. A founding member of the parahuman serial killer group called the Slaughterhouse Nine, Gray Boy, had a similar power, able to create bubbles of looped time. He liked targeting innocent people and setting them up in horrible, painful situations before trapping them in a loop to experience it over and over again. Harry had actually been intending on investigating one of the time bubbles and seeing if he could end them after they'd dealt with Coil.

Thankfully Gray Boy had been killed some time ago in a rather definitive manner, so the likelihood that this was caused by that psychopath was miniscule. Not that the information helped much in this situation beyond ensuring that the Unbound were unlikely to be attacked in a similar manner.

That still left figuring out who or what recreated Gray Boy's power and if they could do it again, however.

Blake was shaken out of her stupor by Yang's hand on her shoulder, the blonde's face serious behind her mask, her usual good humor nowhere to be seen. "We can't do anything about that right now, we need to focus on the injured we can actually help."

Blake took a deep breath before nodding, turning away from the people going through hell to focus on doing what she could. Even so, part of her felt like an absolute failure with every step she took, despite knowing that Yang was right.

They'd find whoever did this, and once they did, they were going to pay...

Jaune grit his teeth as he pulled an unconscious woman from under the debris of a destroyed jewelry store that Pyrrha was holding up by using her semblance on the plumbing and wiring amongst it. Thankfully this victim was alive. Not all of them had been so lucky.

Once Jaune had carried the injured woman to where the other victims were laying Pyrrha set the debris down once she had double checked that there wasn't anybody else, living or dead, underneath it all. She then began making her way over to help Jaune and a couple of bystanders that had decided to volunteer to help with tending to the injured.

Before she got far, however, she saw a middle aged asian man approach the group, his eyes darting around and looking scared out of his mind. He didn't appear to be armed or otherwise dangerous, so Pyrrha assumed he was a bystander that needed help. "Can I help you?" She asked.

The man paused, licking his lips, eyes darting from her to Jaune and Back. "You're heroes?" He asked, voice heavily accented and shaking from his obvious fear.

"Yes sir. I'm Nike, this is Paladin." She said, motioning to Jaune, who was glancing over even as he bound a gash in a child's arm. "We're with the Unbound."

Suddenly the man surged forward, taking hold of Pyrrha's arm, startling her to the point she almost struck out at him. "She made me do it." He said, his voice almost a sob. "She made me set the bomb." He glanced over at where Jaune and Pyrrha had set the large amount of people who hadn't escaped the blast alive. "I'm sorry!" He wailed.

Pyyrha's eyes widened and she focused intently on the man. "Who? Who made you do this?" She asked as Jaune got to his feet, hand on Crocea Mors, just in case.

"That monster!" The man spat, eyes wide and not all there. "You have to stop her, please! You have to stop Ba-!" Suddenly, with no warning whatsoever, the man's eyes and mouth went wide before his head literally exploded only a couple of feet from Pyrrha's face, making her shriek in shock as her front was covered in blood, brain matter and bone fragments.

"P-Nike!" Jaune shouted, leaping forward to catch her as she fell back instinctively, almost tripping to the ground as the man's body dropped lifelessly to the ground. "Nike, are you alright!"

Pyrrha whimpered and shakily reached up with trembling fingers at her gore covered face, the Grecian style half mask she wore the only reason she hadn't gotten any in her eyes. "I… I…" She began to hyperventilate, numbly trying to clean her face, only succeeding to spreading the viscera around. "I…"

Jaune quickly picked her up in a bridal carry and moved her as far from the headless corpse as possible before reaching into his supply pouch and pulling a damp cloth out, beginning to gently wipe his partner's face as the civilians that had been helping them stared in shocked horror. "Shh… Shhh… It's alright, partner. I've got you."

Pyrrha let out a hiccuping sob before burying her face against his shoulder and beginning to cry. Jaune held her gently, rubbing her back. As he did so he murmured softly. "Cortana."

"I saw." The AI said somberly. "I'm looking into this further, but for now I think it's safe to say that we know how and why all these bombs were set by people we wouldn't expect."

"They could be anyone." Jaune said softly, both for Pyrrha's sake and to keep from being heard by the civilians.

"I know." Cortana said before going silent, obviously focusing on the wider situation.

Jaune simply held his partner as she wept.

"This is bringing back some bad memories, R-Lotus." Nora said softly as she carefully walked around the statue made out of ice of a woman holding a young child.

Of course, a quick look around showed that it wasn't actually a statue.

Everything within a fifteen foot radius of what had once been a bus stop had been flash frozen completely solid, as they'd discovered when one of the statues that had once been people fell over and shattered into a thousand pieces.

Ren was looking after some of the poor souls that had been at the edge of the area of effect, far enough to survive but not far enough to avoid injury. One man had a leg freeze as he ran, which then shattered when he fell from the sudden pain. Another woman had one of her arms freeze halfway up the forearm, and was now shivering and whimpering under a blanket Ren gave her.

Ren glanced up at where Nora was walking and looking for any other survivors. "I know, Lyn." He said over their private communication channel. "Thankfully this is more… limited… than that was.." He said as he finished bandaging the arm of an old man that had gotten cut up on the jagged ice.

Nora was about to say something in response when she caught the sound of someone calling for help in the building behind the bus stop. She quickly moved over to the window that had allowed her to hear the calls and peered through, finding several people huddled against one of the corners of the small room, the wall with the door completely frozen and the window too small for them to get out. "Is everyone alright?"

"We're freezing our asses off!" One of the occupants called.

"Please, get us out before we die of hypothermia or something!" Another said.

"If there's anyone next to the window, get away. I'm knocking the wall down." Nora said, doing her best to remember the civilian interaction training that the team had gone through, something that she'd taken a lot more seriously since London.

Once she was satisfied that they had backed away she shifted Magnhild into hammer form and set her feet against the frozen ground. Then she swung her weapon with a shout, breaking through the weakened wall with a burst of frozen plaster and brick.

Stepping back she allowed the people in the building to move past her, several of them thanking her as they hurried away from the freezing cold ice and the gruesome remainders of the victims.

Nora sighed but smiled slightly, satisfied that she was doing something to help, and continued her patrol while Ren worked.

Lara worked on stabilizing the survivors of the explosion she and Beast Boy had been sent to deal with as the office building behind her continued to blaze in a towering inferno. Many of these people had suffered severe wounds, so she had to work to ignore the cries of anguish in order to focus on the person in front of her, applying some special UNSC burn paste on the wounds to help save their lives. Thankfully she wasn't the only one doing so, as a couple of groups of EMTs had arrived and were working to stabilize the victims using the same burn paste, which Lara had provided. It had taken a moment to convince them to use it, but when they saw how well it was working on the ones she'd already tended to they stopped complaining and got to work.

The bomb at the site she had been assigned had apparently been an exceptionally powerful incendiary. According to some of the less injured victims, it had gone off on the third floor of a five storey building, immediately immolating anybody within a twenty foot radius, no matter what was in the way, including the ceiling and intense heat had severely burned anybody within another ten feet, most of those dying soon after, though at least there was more than ash left of them. And if that wasn't enough, then the building did the obvious and went up in flames, trapping the survivors and burning many of them.

Thankfully the building was somewhat isolated from the others around it. If this had been a denser area of the city then they'd likely have an entire block burning rather than a relatively small building. Lara wondered if that had been intentional on the bomber's part.

The sound of masonry breaking behind her made Lara whirl around, worried that the building was collapsing. Thankfully something much better happened, with a large green gorilla leaping out of a window that'd had quite a bit of the surrounding wall punched away to make more room. In the ape's arms were three more office workers, which he gently set down after landing with a thundering crash.

Lara studied Beast Boy to make sure he was uninjured. Thankfully his aura seemed to have mostly protected him from direct damage, but some of his fur was singed and he was panting heavily. After a couple of moments he had shifted back to human form and collapsed onto his ass, pulling a water bottle out of a pouch on his utility belt and wetting his face before gulping it down. "That's the last of them, as far as I can tell. I don't think there's anybody left alive in there.

As a fire engine finally arrived and the firefighters burst into action to control the blaze, Lara finished with the person she'd been tending to and moved to the next, who happened to be laying next to Beast Boy, allowing her to speak to him. "Are you alright? You didn't get burned or anything, did you?"

Beast Boy waved the question off. "Nothing my aura won't heal with a bit of rest and some food." He reassured her, his light tone not matching the grim visage of his face. "I'd been through worse during my time as a Titan." He took another gulp of water before beginning to tend to the victims. "We figure anything out about who is doing this or why? I wasn't really paying attention, what with running around in a burning building and all."

"Apparently the people the ABB has been fielding during this debacle are forced conscripts. "Lara said grimly. "They have bombs stuck in their heads that will go off if they disobey orders."

Beast Boy blanched, which was an interesting effect with his skin tone. "Holy shit. Are we sure about that?"

"One of them exploded all overy Nike." Lara said darkly. "Paladin is keeping an eye on her. She… didn't take it well."

"I know supervillains who wouldn't take something like that well, Relic. A sweet girl like Nike? She's going to need to see Doctor Wonder regularly for that." Beast Boy said with a sigh as he finished applying the burn paste to the victim he was tending to.

Lara nodded sadly. "Agreed. I think we're all going to be spending quite a bit of time with her after this is all over."

Beast Boy looked around at the painfully small group of surviving bombing victims. "You've got that right." He said sadly.

Taylor was doing her best to focus on her current task rather than the amount of death she'd found herself surrounded by. God, she hadn't even been a hero for a month and she was already dealing with a massive disaster. The only way this could be worse was if the Slaughterhouse Nine had rolled into town or an Endbringer had decided to stop by.

The bomb site she'd been assigned was a massive mess. According to what she'd gathered, whatever had gone off had caused intense, localized shockwaves in a wide radius, which had caused three buildings to completely collapse.

Taylor had to admit that the situation suited her particular skill set well, and had to wonder if Cortana had assigned her here because of it. Her bugs allowed her to map out the rubble and locate survivors much more quickly than would normally be feasible, allowing her current partner, Penny, or rather, Spago (she'd need to look up what that meant, it sounded familiar), to dig them out with her impressive strength and array for floating swords. It was allowing them to save people that likely would have been trapped for days within minutes, but even so, the amount of dead victims her bugs were coming across was extremely demoralizing, though not surprising.

All the still living victims were being carried over to the area around couple of nearby ambulances who's crews were busy triaging them. Taylor wished she could help, but she didn't know enough first aid to be much more than a hindrance. That and she had to be available to inform Penny of the locations of the victims. Still, Taylor decided she'd be requesting some training in first aid in case any similar situations happened in the future. Though she dearly hoped they wouldn't.

Taylor sighed as her bugs came across another buried body, a child, as far as she could tell. She didn't notice a pulse or anything similar sadly, but she still informed Penny so they could be recovered.

Something told her she'd be taking Alice up on her offer sooner than expected.

Her attention was drawn when her flyers warned her of something coming through the air, and she turned her gaze to find two members of the Empire Eighty Eight, Krieg and Rune, approaching on a large piece of debris that the latter was likely telekinetically using to move around.

Taylore tensed, forming a cloud of the insects she wasn't using for the rescue efforts, ready to attack if needed.

Krieg and Rune eyed the cloud warily as the older neo-nazi hopped off the floating debris. "So, you're one of the ones that took down Lung." He said gruffly as he looked at Taylor before turning his gaze on the collapsed buildings. "Relax, we're here to help with the rescue, since this is in our turf. Can't exactly let the damn chinks' attack go without a response."

Taylor ignored the slur for the moment, her eyes narrowing as she focused on the more immediate issue. "How do you know this was caused by the ABB?" She asked.

"The fact that they're attacking the damn PRT to get Lung out is a bit of a clue." He said dryly. "Now are we going to keep chatting, or are you going to let us get to work?"

Taylor ran through her options quickly, but admitted that what she knew of their abilities meant that they could be useful in the current situation. "Fine, but no ignoring people in need of rescue because of their race." She said sternly, making sure to put as much authority into her voice as she could. Normally she would be worried about facing such notorious capes, but after facing down an enraged Lung the threat these two presented didn't seem as great.

Maybe her perspective had become skewed.

"Or what?" The teenage villainess asked, a sneer on what was visible of her face. It promptly disappeared when a floating blade attached to a glowing string suddenly appeared in front of her and Krieg's throats, making them both stiffen up.

Taylor didn't let her surprise at Penny's actions show. The normally bubbly orangette was giving the two villains a dark look, and Taylor wondered what had brought it on. She may have only known the girl for a couple of days, but she could tell that this was extremely out of character for her. Still, she needed to play her part, and shifted her stance to look unconcerned, her arms crossed across her chest. "Or Spago there will make sure to leave you out of commission so you can't cause more unnecessary issues." She said seriously. "I'm sure she's got enough control to keep the wounds non-lethal…" She said, trailing off suggestively.

"We'll play ball." Krieg said before he turned his head to look at Rune. "Won't we, Rune?" When the girl in the red and black robes nodded slowly the blades were removed from their throats. Rune brought a hand up to hers before making her way to the rubble piles, beginning to telekinetically move the larger pieces with ease, speeding the work up greatly.

Krieg approached Taylor, trying to stare her down, which Taylor made a show of not noticing, still acting unconcerned. The mass of bugs ready to swarm the nazi made it clear why she wasn't worried. "I'd be careful if I was you, girl." The man said darkly. "We're setting it aside because we've got bigger fish to fry, but the Empire doesn't take threats lightly."

Taylor returned his stare, her stance continuing to radiate unconcern. Then she motioned to the rubble pile with her head. "Get to work, Krieg." She ordered coldly.

Krieg sneered at her before turning and beginning to punt debris away, making sure to aim away from any people, and Taylor let out a shaky breath once he was out of earshot before focusing back on the job at hand.

Armsmaster gritted his teeth as he fought alongside Miss Militia and agents of the PRT in order to defend the PRT holding cells and prevent Lung's escape.

Normally the entire Protectorate would have been called upon to fight off the assault of a large amount of gang members led by Oni Lee, but they had been sent off to deal with the numerous explosions throughout the city.

Intel had said that the ABB had obtained the services of a Tinker specializing in explosives, though she hadn't been spotted much yet, so this appeared to be her handiwork. The Protectorate Tinker grudgingly allowed that it had been a good plan. He and Miss Militia were having trouble dealing with the large amount of assailants non-lethaly, especially when trying to deal with Oni Lee's surprise attacks.

The veteran ABB villain had an extremely dangerous and useful power, that being that he could teleport anywhere within line of sight, leaving behind a temporary clone that he often used for suicide runs using grenades when his knives didn't work.

His danger level had gone up substantially due to the fact that he was apparently no longer carrying conventional explosives, as evident by the wide array of anomalous effects littering the battlefield which quite a few ABB members and PRT troopers had found themselves caught in.

Suddenly a yawning portal of pitch darkness appeared a bit off to the side of the PRT building, prompting Armsmaster to whirl around and prepare himself for some new assault. He was caught by suprise by what appeared out of the portal.

A towering figure in clearly Tinkertech armor stepepd into view, a large assault rifle of unknown but similarly Tinkertech make in his hands. The golden visor in the green helmet swept around, taking the situation in within moments before they stepped forward and began to fire on the crowd of attackers. Each time they pulled the trigger a burst of automatic fire left their weapon, making multiple people fall to the floor, out of the fight.

As another figure left the portal, this time appearing to be a man of indistinct features (a Stranger, perhaps) in a black suit and holding an assault rifle as well, Armsmaster approached them, his trademark halberd at the ready. "Cease at once before I'm forced to take action." He ordered.

The armored figure turned their head to face him as their companion began to open fire as well, with similar results. "We are not a threat to you or the PRT, Armsmaster. I am Master Chief, and this is Thanatos. We are members of the Unbound that were sent to help reinforce you." The armored man said in a deep, gruff voice.

"If you continue using lethal force with impunity then I will be forced to stop you." Armsmaster said seriously.

"We are not using lethal ammo." Master Chief before he fired again at a rushing assailant, making them drop. "The bullets have a Striker effect that will immediately knock out anybody hit with them for four to eight hours without further injuries."

Armsmaster paused before using his helmet's sensors to check on the latest person hit with the Unbound's ammunition, finding them to be completely find beyond some bruising incurred upon falling to the floor. He relaxed when he realized he was being told the truth and nodded. "In that case, your help is welcome. Please focus on dealing with the crowd with Miss Militia while I focus on Oni Lee."

"Understood." Master Chief said before doing just that, stepping forward in a calm and assured manner as he continued firing in disciplined bursts. His companion, Thanatos (and what did it mean that the Unbound had a member named after the Greek representation of Death?) moved to reinforce Miss Militia, easing the strain she was under.

Well, he had said he would be focusing on Oni Lee, but the villain had actually left the fight only half a minute or so before the Unbound showed up. Armsmaster got a sinking feeling in his gut and began to rush for the holding cells only to grimace when the sound of a massive explosion rang out, part of the building collapsing. It seemed Oni Lee had taken advantage of the distraction with the crowd to get to Lung. Surprising, as the teleporter had been noted to not be the most creative thinker.

He reached the area of the holding cells only to find a mass of rubble, several dead or injured PRT troopers, and Oni Lee standing next to Lung, who was stepping out of his cell, already growing.

Armsmaster took up a fighting stance and prepared hismelf as Lung's eyes locked on him. This was going to be… complicated.

John fired on another of the attacking conscripts that had been approaching Miss Militia, a scowl on his face. The report on the bombs likely in the attackers' heads had just come in, and it definitely made him glad they'd gone with the non-lethal ammo. Whatever failings he'd had in his previous life as an assassin, he made it a point of pride that he'd never hurt an innocent while on a job, so this was seriously pissing him off.

He'd just turned to scan the street for any more nearby assailants when he was met with the sight of a man in a black bodysuit, a belt and bandoleer of grenades and knives, and a Japanese oni mask which grinned at him sinisterly. Before John could react the figure, Oni Lee, removed the pins on all of his grenades, none of which looked normal.

John instantly acted, launching himself at Miss Militia with an aura enhanced leap, tackling her away from the busted car she'd been using for cover. She'd been about to let out a cry of shock when there was a thunderous explosion mixed with a bunch of different, conflicting sounds from where John had been standing. Getting to his feet John found the entire area turned to slag, which had then frozen and shattered into pieces, among other effects.

"Thanks." Miss Militia said as she got to her feet.

John nodded as he let his eyes roam to search for Oni Lee before he pulled the stunt again. Handing the assault rifle he was carrying to Miss Militia so she could continue supporting Chief and drawing his handgun he began stepping away from the heroine to keep the both of them being hit when he next appeared.

He glanced over at Chief, finding him focused on the much diminished group of conscripts. Deciding to leave that in his more than capable hands John began hunting the teleporter.

Apparently John was right to separate from the others, as Oni Lee was the type to go for the less dangerous seeming target first. John was forced to quickly leap over a car as the familar sounds of dropping grenades rang out behind him, leading to another explosion. He'd scarcely landed when Oni Lee's demonic visage appeared in front of him, but this time John was ready, raising his weapon and firing before he could draw the pins, making the villain's body turn to ash, indicating a clone.

Their game of cat and mouse continued for the next five minutes or so, with John sometimes shooting Oni Lee in time, and others having to get away from the blast radius. He was barely aware of the roars of a ramping up Lung somewhere in the distance, or Chief's call over the group's communication earpieces for Nevermore's assistance subduing Lung as the Stunner bullets weren't having any appreciable effect. His entire focus was on stopping the teleporting suicide bomber.

Each time Oni Lee teleported to attack, John felt something. It was difficult to describe, like an itch at the back of his mind, a buzz. Over time, with each dodge, each shot fired, it grew louder, like it was trying to get through some sort of barrier. Until finally, that barrier broke.

John didn't know how he knew, but something compelled him to turn and fire in a seemingly random direction, empty of any targets. Except, just as the Stunning bullet had left the barrel, flying at a nearby wall, Oni Lee appeared in its path, just in time to be hit by it.

John watched as Lung's pet assassin dropped to the floor, not turning to ash this time. He approached warily and nudged the body with his foot, but there was no reaction. Then he shot the villain in the head again, just to be sure, before bringing his hand to his earpiece to report in. "This is Thanatos. I've subdued Oni Lee. Let the PRT know to come get him ASAP before he wakes up."

"Roger that, Thanatos." Cortana said. "Good work."

John allowed himself to relaxe as he saw Harry fly overhead from where he'd been working to repair buildings that hadn't collapsed yet, heading for Lung, who John could now see was significantly ramped up, at least ten feet tall and covered in flames and metallic scales.

Harry stopped to hover in front of Lung, who roared at the flying leader of the Unbound as Chief and Miss Militia moved to get a battered Armsmaster away from the burning rage dragon.

In response to Lung's roar Harry pointed his palm at the leader of the ABB, and within a moment launched a blast of red light the size of a basketball at the villain.

Lung paused, as though surprised, before he dropped to the ground with a thundering crash, his flames immediately going out as he began to shrink back to normal size.

John couldn't help but snort. The (formerly) most dangerous cape in the bay, taken out as though he was an afterthought. That would surely enhance the Unbound's reputation.

Seeing as the immediate fight was over he took a seat on the hood of a mostly intact car to rest, watching over Oni Lee with his gun at the ready till the PRT troopers arrived to cart him away.

The initial assault was over, but John knew better than to think things had been resolved. The Unbound would be putting in some overtime for the foreseeable future, he was sure. Hopefully they'd be able to deal with the situation before they got too much further out of hand.

Something told him it wouldn't be that easy, though.

...He needed a drink.

Goddamit, I wanted to have this out literal months ago. It just fought me at some points like you wouldn't believe.

Still, it's done now. Rejoice!

So yeah, this is just the immediate aftermath of the bombing. Now comes the Unbound hunting down the culprit.

Of course, they'll also have to deal with the new nightmares they're going to be having thanks to this event, and Alice is going to have her hands quite full. Poor Pyrrha. I was very mean to her in this chap.

Also, I had some people looking forward to an epic showdown between Lung and Harry, but seriously, why wouldn't he use an overpowered stunner in this situation?

And yes, John unlocked his semblance. What do you give a hyperlethal assassin to make him much more terrifyingly dangerous? Combat precognition. Hehehehe.

I'll admit that the reason this is taking so much effort from me is because this isn't the part of the Worm universe that most interests me, at least in the immediate. I really want to get to Leviathan, what I have already called the Benevolent Show of Force, and the clusterfuck that occurs immediately after thanks to [REDACTED] fucking things up due to an event immediately before Leviathan. I think stuff there is going to be really interesting, though I can already hear the people calling my reasoning for certain events contrived. .;;

In any case, I believe I have said everything I needed to say, so onto my customary reminders:

The first is that you can have a say in what I write when you donate to my Pat A Ron. Every dollar donated equals a vote in my monthly poll, and now I've made it so that the votes for the things that don't win in a given month roll over into the next, which is why some fics that haven't gotten much love for a while have been updated recently. So if you want to donate and see your favorite stories of mine updated more often, go to Pat A Ron dotcom /athanmortis. The current poll closes on September 4th. Hope to see you all vote!

The next two reminders are more important to me, however. First is that my best friend has a Pat A Ron for their original fiction. Donate any amount you want and get access to some objectively excellent writing (far better than mine, if I'm being completely honest). Their first story, which is a supernatural steampunk detective thriller that I very much enjoy called 'The Curious Investigations of Mister Jonathan Scott', is currently at 18 chapters, the first of which is free, so you can see what his style is like. So if you like, say, The Dresden Files, but want it more steampunk, this is for you. And they've now started another story that will be updated while they build up more Jonathan Scott chapters, this one being a cyberpunk (the genre, not the game) story called 'Tales of Luminous City', the first chapter of which is now also free. And they're working on a third story, this one a space opera (at least from the prologue I've read. Might be wrong). You can find their stuff by searching for Grimm Tales in Pat A Ron. Unfortunately their updates might be a bit delayed seeing as their computer suddenly went kaput, making them lose all their stuff.

I would appreciate it a lot if you could help them out, as unlike me they've had employment trouble due to some disabilities, which this pandemic hasn't helped. Even a dollar to read what they've currently done would be a huge help at this point, cause they're in real need. Hell, if you were thinking of donating to me, give it to them instead. I would honestly appreciate it a lot more.

Second, my sister has also begun a Pat A Ron. She recently got her Bachelor's in Digital Animation. She's trying to make her own series to post on Youtube, but needs money, so she's making art and plans on accepting commissions. She primarily does tokusatsu themed fanart (Super Sentai, Kamen Rider, Power Rangers, etc.), and she plans to let people have a say in what she makes, much like I do. That's at Pat A Ron dotcom /linduarte. (Oh no, now you know my last name! The horror!)

Please keep in mind though that we've been made aware of a bug with the site that

makes it seem like you can't donate less than $5. If you don't want to donate that much, to any of us, just put a zero before the number you want to donate, such as 03. That should get you going.

As always, thank you for the support despite the delays and issues I've been having. I promise I'm doing my best to improve. Hopefully we'll see each other again soon.