Kamijou checked the text within his phone, its contents having had a rather unsettling discovery.
"No... this can't be... the Fish-Cutlet Bento Surpreme discount just ended? And I was just looking forward to buying it after all this time! Ahhhhhhh, such rotten luck!!!" Lamenting his bad luck up in the heavens Kamijou dropped to his knees before going off into an overdramatic rant over "the unfairness and lack of consideration these major brands possess towards the common man," before ending it with, "This is why I'll never forgive the Bento industry for this injustice!"
It had been a couple weeks since the brawl, and his chance encounter with a Judgement officer had made him very nervous towards future encounters. Now that the force had their sights on him thanks to her it's only a matter of time before they catch up.
What he did back then would probably be considered assault and battery, if nothing else extreme vigilantism. Was there truly nothing he could do to make sure they won't be able to stop him from helping and saving people?
Before he could deeply consider his next course of action his Instinct blared within his skull, signalling the vigilante of danger.
"Ok, maybe sometime I'll think about this later." Kamijou said to himself as he swung away.
-
"Seriously I would advise you all to super piss off and go back to whatever super dirty hole you crawled out of. You're gonna super poison the air with your putrid breaths."
"Basically, if you 5 know what's gonna happen to you do us a favor and leave. Otherwise we might do you all severe bodily harm. We're being very nice right now, so please do so and leave."
"If you 2 bitches gonna keep yapping and yapping your mouths off to us we ain't guaranteeing you girls' safety."
"Don't fuck with us, you bitches. It ain't fucking polite."
"Oh my, so vulgar. No wonder SkillOut's got a super reputation for being losers."
"It's rather unfortunate. Basically, you can never convince a moron that chocolate and shit don't match."
"Why you!"
"...Jeez, this is getting quite messy." Kamijou thought to himself seeing these two girls mouth off to their attackers (or are they attacking them, mentally and psychologically?).
Both of them look around the same age and height, although their appearance, getup and hair color couldn't be any different.
One girl, her brown haired cut to a short bowl, wore an orange hoodie, similar to his own, however it noticeably lacked long sleeves, exposing her bare arms. She wore a pair of shorts which were basically hotpants, showing off her legs without care in the world.
A part of him immediately knew the root cause of the situation.
The other girl looked to be a foreigner, with long blonde hair and bright, cerulean eyes, alongside a cute nose, her small pink lips curved in a small slight smirk. Her clothing was far more conservative than her companion, which completely constrasted her caustic mouth, a blue long-sleeved shirt with a white bow on her petite chest, and a skirt which went down to her thighs, her legs covered by black pantyhose.
He would admit, she had very nice legs, very natural. The other one seemed to be more deliberate with her 'appeal'.
He can never understand the vanity of women.
"You'll regret saying those shit when I'm through with you!" Kamijou looked up from his ponderings and caught the thug throwing a haymaker towards the brown haired girl.
Kamijou was about to jump in and save her, however he noticed the girl's apathy towards the attack. He didn't know exactly why it felt weird, but the expression she displayed was similar to a trio of sisters he had the misfortune of meeting under rather extraordinary circumstances.
The orange girl merely glanced at the fist coming her way, and ducked under it, before clenching her small fist and firing it towards the larger boy. Normally a hit like that wouldn't likely deal out any sort of damage towards the thug, especially with the girl's slender physique. Women fought differently compared to men; usually women of her size would be taught to fight more tactically and creatively than men, although it is possible for women to use brute force against men; at the cost of their arms and knuckles breaking.
Elbows, knees and palm strikes are usually employed in this kind of fight, mixed with distance management and spatial awareness.
Kamijou prepared himself in case things got ugly.
And they did. In the most unexpected way possible.
The girl's punch into the delinquent sent him flying off the air, and he launched up the building before he struck his back into the near-edge of the building's roof, causing a slight crater within the wall, before slowly limpin forward and falling to the ground, landing on the ground with a loud, sickening thud.
"Oh shit," Kamijou said. "Yeah, I'm getting involved in this; don't know who chick is, but I'm not about to let her commit murder in this alley."
Kamijou leaped off the building and landed in front of them. The thugs and the girls turned around to see this weirdly dressed man in a hood.
The thugs, however for a split second, immediately hauled ass, grabbed their unconscious buddy and took off from the alley.
"Didn't even need to say anything. Heh, you outdid yourself Kamijou-san." He muttered to himself.
"So, basically, who are you again? You just made them take off." The blonde girl said to Kamijou, a slight annoyed tone within her voice.
"Yeah you're a super killjoy, I was about to super smoke these pricks."
"...You guys OK?" Kamijou ignored the latter's subtle threats and merely asked them this. They only shrugged in response.
"Super peachy."
"Though you'd ask the guys who took off over there that question, basically."
"Well, don't let me see you cause any trouble, it would be very bad for girls your age to be hanging around in here."
"...What are you, our super dad? Go super buzz off and something, we're super fine."
"Jeez, you got a damn attitude problem. Is it that time of year for you right now?" Kamijou carelessly let out to them. Then all of a sudden the air surrounding the alley went cold.
Chills went down his spine, and a voice in Kamijou's mind berated his "big fat mouth".
"What. Did. You. Super. Say?" The brown haired girl inched closer to the red boy. Blondie on the side only sighed, and stepped aside, not wanting to be caught in the danger zone.
"...rotten luck." Kamijou let out. The girl darkly chuckled.
"Yeah you said it, it is rotten luck you got to deal with me."
"..." Kamijou let out a long sigh, before his aura changed as well.
Bobcut noticed this change as well, which made her feet shuffle subconsciously.
Saiai Kinuhata had fought numerous people throughout her red-checkered past, and very few of them gave off the type of aura this man gave off.
She knew her Offense Armor, which allowed her to punt that bastard up into the sky, made her virtually unstoppable. As long as it isn't something made to counter her powers, or any Level 5 nothing can truly pierce her Offense Armor.
But this man seemed to not care about the dangerous situation he found himself in.
She had many people underestimate her power. Very few have lived to call it.
But this man, she felt something... very off about him.
Then the man stirred without warning, looking over his shoulder. This confused her, what could possibly be important enough to ignore this entire situation altogethe-
She didn't have anything to think about afterwards, as the red man leaped up and swung away from the alley.
"Basically, he was bright enough to know how much of a threat you are to leave. Never thought Of see the day something like that happen. Well anyway... come on Saiai we gotta take off before Mugino kills us"
"...Yeah. It'd be a super bad time."
'Any much longer and I'll end up losing too much energy to deal with all of them. Dammit,' Kuroko thought to herself as she found herself surrounded by 30 or more thugs, clenching their fists, some of them glowing with power, sneering towards the officer.
"You're gonna pay for this Judgement, we're not gonna let you get away with this!"
"You ain't getting the Level Upper from us!"
"Oh great, why did it have to get to this point? This was supposed to be a simple stakeout," Kuroko muttered to herself. She had not the best time of her life obviously, even more so since these jerks got a few good hits in.
All in all, Kuroko was in a pickle. Feeling the needles in her thigh belts, she counted. '9, 10, 18, 18 needles? Hmmm, can't get into my bag since I left it over there,' she glanced over where her bag was, trampled by the large group, making her grimace. 'Guess I have to make them count.'
"So what now little missy? Still think you can take us on?" Who she thought to be the leader of the group had stepped forward, raising his hands in front of him. As he did so the ground trembled beneath Kuroko, so much so that she nearly fell, causing the crowd to jeer and snicker at her pitiful act of clumsiness. "This is what happens to all High-levels the moment they realize how outnumbered they are: afraid, pathetic, and best of all... BITELESS!"
The crowd around Kuroko cheered at the leaders' words.
The volume of their cheers stung Kuroko's ears, who due to her injuries had balance issues. She also had to deal with a superficial cut in the left upper temple.
"Now then, watch as I tear her ego apart, and show this wretched city, that their injustices towards us Level 0s will never go unpunished! This is our moment! Our triumph! Our victory!" Each shout boosted their morale even more. "And we will start with this-"
His speech was interrupted by a needle to his forehead.
Or more specifically the backend of the needles squarely hit him in the forehead, knocking him out immediately.
"Really, you should quiet down with the speeches and whatnot." Kuroko remarked.
"I only have a couple more of those for you all, so think carefully of your next courses of action before I run out, then you'll know which items I could use around you all as weapons against you. And I sincerely mean that in the most polite way imaginable."
The crowd, initially furious by her sneak attack towards their leader, were taken aback by her threats.
Neither one on her sides were willing to make the first move. They didn't want to risk rushing in and be taken out in the first attack.
Her threat seemed to work, except that Kuroko was bluffing. 30 to 40 of them. 18 of 45 needles in her person. Only a couple minutes to stall before she could run out of juice.
And rather unfortunately, "She's only one girl, and there's more of us! Her threats but nothin' but empty! She's lying, get her!" That one cry made all of them about to dogpile the lone officer.
Preparing her last calculations and picking up some needles within her belts she braced herself for the thousand fists, kicks and powers heading her way.
Kuroko took a deep breath, and with a sharp exhale teleported the needles towards some nearby thugs about to grab her. The needles pinned their shoes to the ground, causing them to trip, and the sudden stop caused their buddies behind them to follow suit, forming a convenient barricade for the other thugs.
Kuroko knew it wouldn't last long, so she made sure to make every attack count. Turning around she saw a large esper raising his hand above, a large spear of light formed within his palm. With great speed he slammed the light spear unto where Kuroko was and it exploded in a great flash of light. His eyes widened in shock.
The light was intended to blind the officer and serve as a distraction for the esper to deliver the finishing blow.
As a result of the light ability his sight was immune to sudden light flashes, which is the reason why when his fellow thugs covered their eyes with their arms, he was the only one who didn't.
And it explained his shock, because at the moment before the spear struck her Kuroko had immediately teleported away from the spot, but not before she left behind a certain trap for said light esper.
A simple nail hovered in the air for a few seconds before the tip, through the quantum forces of the 11th dimension caused by Kuroko's leap, dug into the esper's palm.
Time appeared to speed up, as the esper realized the needle had pierced his palm, and a loud cry of pain and agony was released from their throat. Their cry of pain was cut short when Kuroko suddenly appeared on top of his head and dropkicked him into the pavement.
Leaping once again onto solid ground Kuroko scanned around her, seeing the looks of disbelief and fear on their faces. She reckoned that the guy she had just dealt with was their main weapon against her, which she thought was rather stupid to say the least.
If you relied only with what you have and not improvise then you get hurt; it eas one of the few things the young officer learned back in boot camp.
She prepared to leap once more, however the sounds of battle a few meters away from her took her attention.
As she turned around she saw grown men and boys thrown around like ragdolls, as if pushed aside by a powerful wind. Kuroko leaped toward a tree nearby, to take a closer look.
She couldn't believe it. She thought it would've been impossible to find this guy.
The same guy that's been elusive ever since that day.
The man in red.
He was currently engaged in combat against dozens of powered thugs, dodged under and over laser beams, fireballs, telekinetically thrown objects and the like, and sending them all flying with one single punch.
This was a powerful fighter, Kuroko was sure of it. She didn't know how and when he got there, but she really appreciated it.
Looking behind the man in red a large thug, larger than the one earlier, raised his hands, and she could see the concrete in front of him rising, and chunks of chair-sized rocks hovered in midair, all pointing towards the scarlet fighter.
Kuroko reached into her belt.
Kamijou hauled everything into this fight. Seriously, how many of them are there?
And he couldn't see where the victim was. He had hoped it wasn't too late.
His gut tensed as he ducked under a fireball sent towards his head, and he fired a glob of web towards the esper's face in response.
Feeling his gut tense once more he looked behind him to see a chair-sized chunk of concrete levitating in the air, no doubt controlled by the big dude behind it. Kamijoi saw the large boy smirk as he about and launch-
Before he rocked his head to the side and knocked unconscious.
Kamijou -he leaned back to evade a punch and threw a backhand towards them- was rather surprised by this. Was there a telekinetic around somewhere to help him?
His answers were questioned when he saw some of the thugs in the group -jumping back he managed to avoid getting speared by 2 icicle spikes before firing a line towards the espers and slamming their heads to each other, leaned back to evade a haymaker before he threw a right cross towards his opponent's face causing their nose to bleed- flicker momentarily before they were in the air, upside down and crashing on the ground.
Another thug rushed towards Kamijou but he never got to attack as a sharp pain within his groin -Kamijou leaned back from a overhead kick, and under another kick, getting up he saw the thug leaping into the air before somersaulting and throwing a kick in his face to which he responded by ducking under said kick and firing a hook towards their torso which sent him flying- paralyzed him, making him clutch his groin with his hands before he got knocked out with a kick from the back of his shiny head.
Kamijou sensed a ripple within space as the person he was supposed to save, the officer, faced her back to his.
"For the record, this doesn't mean I will let you go after this."
"Ok then. But can we focus on them first."
"...I'll take the left, and you the right. Watch my back, I'll do the same. Understand?"
"I got the gist of it, yeah."
"Okay then," Kuroko said as she pulled out a couple of needles into her hands. "I only got a couple handcuffs, so you all will need to share."
Battlecries from both heroes, and the gang of espers filled the air as bodies, needles, powers and blood flew around in the air on that particular afternoon.
"Thanks for the help there. I would've been in a lot of trouble if you hadn't showed up."
"Don't mention it, I did what anyone would do in that situation. Nothing special about it."
"I'm rather disinclined to agree with that sort of self-defeating-" she started to say before her phone rang. "Excuse me a second. Uiharu? Yeah? ...I'm doing good. Well, apart from having to fight off a gang of Level Upper users," she said the last part in a hushed tone, to prevent the scarlet vigilante from overhearing.
"Oh my gosh, are you okay? And why did you say the last thing quietly?"
"A.) Yeah, I'm feeling peachy. And B.) It's a long story. I'll tell you about it back in the office. Prepare the first aid kit when I get there, OK?" Kuroko said to her partner before hanging up.
"That your partner in the other side?"
"Uh... yeah. Have been for a while now. You uh, got someone to help out with your... activities?"
"Uh no, no I don't maam. I work alone."
"Hmm. Reminds me of someone who works alone."
"..."
"...Nothing."
Kuroko felt a rather awkward silence envelop the air as they continued restraining the gang ul for AntiSkill to take in.
Kuroko, having managed to pick up her bag, cursed to herself as she found a couple of her needles broken; she seemed to have a dozen left. Looking over her shoulder she saw the red vigilante fire a white substance from his hands. What looked like some sort of silk had immediately wrapped around some of the unrestrained thugs, keeping them in place.
"What kind of power is that?"
"Hmmm? Oh... uh, um, it's... basically what you see."
"...Webbing? What sort of chemical formulas and compounds do you use to make that?"
"Uhhhhh... um, I uh, I-I don't think I could tell you as much as I could."
"What do you mean by that?" Kuroko asked, crossing her arms.
Kamijou nervously scratched his head. "Well, it's not like I know the... formulas in my head, it's just that... I, do it. Like I don't think about it. Like, I breath, right, I just breath without thinking and I keep doing it."
"So it's instinctual?"
"...Uh yep."
"...So, a Gemstone?"
"You could, say that."
"Because if it weren't up to my boss I would've thought you had been the Seventh Level 5, then again I've seen the guy, and you keep wearing a mask."
Kamijou touched his mask instinctually. "I-It's to protect my identity. I don't want other people hurt because of me."
Kuroko listened to his reasoning to why he wears a mask, and there were quite some strong feelings inside of her.
She swallowed said feelings, however, and said, "As much as I don't agree with your methods, you saved my life. So for that, I might ignore your activities for a week."
"...Okay?"
"Only for a week. Past that, and I'm looking for you. Understand?"
"Yeah, sure, I understand." Kamijou assured the girl. Then he glanced around, seemed to sense something. "I, uh... I gotta go."
"Go ahead. But remember, only a week."
"Okay," and from there the red man leaped and swung away.
"What an odd man." Kuroko commented, and decided to stretch for a bit before a sharp sting on her side made her wince. And unfortunately, the adrenaline has worn off from the battle, and her legs were the first to lose their strength. Before she fell though she managed to plop herself onto a nearby bench.
"Oh great, I'll be feeling this right in the morning. *groan*... If only Onee-sama was here to nurse me..."
It took 2 minutes until AntiSkill arrived and she was sent to the hospital for a checkup.
'So far,' Kuroko thought, 'not too bad. Although I might have to watch my back next time.'
-
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And I'll see you guys on the next chapter.
Sincerely,
Komigakuo.