Author's note:
To skylorbaker14: Thanks for the optimism! I hope this lives up to your expectations.
--
Chapter 3: Soldier Vs. Sorcerer
(Director Piggot POV)
"I don't see the point in this meeting," Armsmaster states as he sits down. "I doubt whatever happened is urgent enough to warrant an additional meeting this week. I was about to finish another modification for my halberd."
"I don't want to hear it," she replies as she tries to tamp down the headache that is already throbbing in her skull. "I couldn't wait for the normal weekly meeting because I don't trust any of you to not act like the loose cannons you pretend not to be."
"Ah, don't act like you don't love us!" Assault jokes before her withering glare and Battery's elbow in his ribs makes him control himself. "Sorry, please continue."
"I believe you have all been briefed on the newest cape to arrive in the Bay?" she asks as her eyes rove across the assembled Protectorate heores.
"Curse, the vigilante," Battery says. "He was mentioned in the last couple of briefings. He has been making the rounds of Brockton recently. If I am remembering right, he makes a point of hitting the Merchants, Empire, and ABB in some capacity every night. Given the fact that his attacks seem to weaken everyone equally to maintain the power dynamic, analysts guess he either has a Thinker rating or is working with a Thinker as well."
"It is more likely the latter," Armsmaster comments. "His power set seems to revolve around weaponry and combat. His use of guns and hand to hand combat suggests supports this. If he has a Thinker rating, it likely isn't capable of gauging gang dynamics and the cascading effects of his strikes on criminal infrastructure. He is a scalpel, not the surgeon."
"You responded to one of his scenes, right?" Assault asks curiously. "It was that ABB convoy that Curse hit. What is your vibe of the guy?"
"If nothing else, he appears to be strong," Armsmaster acknowledges. "Site analysis showed he took out the trucks with a rifle before picking off most of the security. He eliminated the last driver more personally before killing several men in tinkertech suits. The tech was inferior to my own, but it should be noted that whatever attack he used on them seemed to overpower their durability without much difficulty."
"Damn, did he leave anyone alive?" Assault wonders.
"The women being transported were recovered with no injuries," Armsmaster recalls. "Several ABB members were also recovered with only concussions and other minor injuries. From their interrogations, they had only recently joined the gang and this was their first job."
"It follows the trend," she says. "Curse manages to leave the gang members whose hands are still unstained with the filth that the larger gang engages in. Our best guess is either a powerful Thinker helping him or some kind of personal Thinker ability that lets him judge the people he encounters."
"That would make him a strong asset," Battery remarks. "Why haven't we heard about him before? It doesn't sound like the PRT would pass on the chance to either recruit him or whoever he is working with."
"That is because I had never heard about him either until he showed up in our area," she grudgingly admits. "The only information I had was a memo from the Chief Director Costa-Brown to not pick a fight with a cape who has white hair, glowing blue eyes, and dresses in black leather with a gold swirl button. He appears to be a third party asset that the PRT has a blanket hands off policy concerning. I was only informed when he stuck around for longer than a week."
"Why on Earth would a vigilante, who from all descriptions I have heard is a teenager, be allowed to roam freely by the PRT?" Assault asks. "They usually have a hard on for vigilantes. I would know."
They all pretended not to hear the muttering at the end as they continued.
"I don't believe I need to tell you about the problem that has been increasing over the past two years, do I?" she asks.
"It is about the Spectres, isn't it?" Armsmaster says with an annoyed tone.
"Trust Spectres to be the only thing that makes Armsy look like something crawled up his ass more than usual," Assault chuckles.
Spectres were the PRT's number two priority behind the actual Endbringers. The creatures had first appeared around two years earlier when they started to be seen by parahumans patrolling particularly abandoned and decrepit areas. They had only increased in number and range over time.
As far as anyone could tell, the only things that could perceive Spectres were parahumans and tinkertech. The only reason that normal PRT personnel had ever seen one was through photos from a tinkertech camera. Without the unique nature of parahuman brains or tinkertech, Spectres were invisible to the senses of standard humans.
The only weapon that had proven useful were Irregulars. They were capes who appeared to unlock their powers due to the unique structures of their brains instead of possessing a Corona Pollentia or Gemma. These special few had also arisen in the same time frame, further showing their seeming connection to the Spectres that they combatted.
Tinkertech weapons had been shown to possess a capacity to destroy Spectres, but it was largely inferior compared to an adept Irregular. Even Dragon was bound by this trend as well, even if her tech had the highest success rate among Tinkers. However, Armsmaster took the failings of his creations personally and would have devoted himself obsessively to the pursuit of anti-Spectre tinkertech weapons if she hadn't threatened to revoke his budget.
As it had stood before Curse's arrival, the only Irregular cape in Brockton Bay was a man by the name of Aoi Todo, a New Wave cape who went by the name Ovation. Apparently, he tried to use the name Boogie Woogie before the masses on PHO stomped that idea out. Despite the man's eccentric personality that made him an annoyance to work with at the best of times, he was one of the top Irregulars in the world and regularly kept Spectres from appearing in any meaningful amount in the Bay.
"So, Curse is another Irregular?" Battery guesses. "Or is he more important?"
"For lack of a better word, he is The Irregular," she says as her headache seems to get worse. "He seems to draw the Spectres out of their hiding like nothing else can. Hell, he seems to be hunting them whenever he isn't obliterating gangs and neutralizing any particularly depraved capes he comes across. Don't even get me started on the Endbringer fights."
"Endbringer?" Assault wonders for a moment before it dawns on him if the shit eating grin is anything to go by. "Oh, don't tell me he is the guy? The same one who singlehandedly brought down Endbringer fight casualties into the single digit percentages? The source of betting pools around the world for whatever ungodly surprise will happen at the next fight?"
Armsmaster's scowl becomes even more pronounced with each word from Assault, much to the other man's amusement. She really should have stopped Assault, but she couldn't help the part of her that wanted the Tinker's ego to be taken down a few notches.
"I can't even tell which is my favorite," Assault continues. "That one time he apparently stole a Soviet-era nuclear submarine, retrofitted it to function with a one man crew, and used a series of tinkertech missiles and torpedos to blast Leviathan up? The time that he managed to somehow get an orbital weapons platform into space, hide it from the Simurgh temporarily, and used it to fire a massive fuck-off laser down on Behemoth? Maybe it was the time where he apparently used a sniper rifle to fire a miniature black hole at the Simurgh from miles away, said black hole gathered up a hundred thousand tons of debris before compressing it into the size of a pickup truck, and then blasted into the Simurgh while it was magically locked in place somehow?"
"Oh, so Curse is the guy that everyone says is Dragon's new rival for World's Best Tinker," Assault says before grinning at Armsmaster. "It must be tough when a weapon Tinker is going after your girl."
Armsmaster can't help the annoyed twitch of his eye at the statement, but he manages to contain any further reaction. "So, due to being an Irregular, a known weapon Tinker, and a potential analytic Thinker, he is off limits."
"Exactly," she confirms. "The last thing I need is one of you going off the reservation and starting a feud with him. Out of all of you, the only one who ever shows enough forethought is Militia..."
She trails off when she finally notices the missing military themed cape. Her headache had been so distracting she hadn't even realized the woman was missing until she was brought up. Out of the capes currently missing, Dauntless was out of the city on a mission currently, but Ms. Militia should have been here. She couldn't tell why, but this did not bode well.
A message rings on her phone from Monitoring which she glances at. The moment she reads it is the moment when her headache turned into a full fledged migraine.
Ms. Militia has engaged Curse in combat.
As it turns out, she couldn't trust any of her capes to be anything more than trigger happy children.
--
(Yuji Itadori/Curse POV)
Today had been going so well. I had woken up to Sherrel making dinner pancakes, Lisa had found me about a couple dozen new targets, and my newest bike had thankfully been completed by my favorite pancake cooking Tinker. I would like to say the bike made me the happiest, but it was really the pancakes. You wouldn't believe how rarely you get to eat breakfast food when the Special Grade sorcerer you share a body with gets to have the day shift.
However, it was a sad necessity. Since Gojo let me do all of the hero stuff and only pitched in a little every now and then, I had to work when villains and Cursed Spirits were the most active.
If only Brockton's only Waffle House hadn't been turned to ashes by one of Lung's tantrums. If PHO was to be believed, the staff had put up a valiant resistance which put the dragon cape on the backfoot for most of the confrontation. However, Lung's power only gets stronger over time and it eventually won out. Sadly, no new franchise had moved in since, so the city was deprived of the perfect breakfast destination.
Lisa kept insisting IHOP was superior, but you can't truly enjoy meal unless you know that the staff could eaily handle a cape fight breaking out in the restaurant at 3 am. It isn't a Waffle House, it is a Waffle Home. But I digress.
I had struck an ABB safehouse and promptly proceeded to murder the occupants. You know, just a normal Tuesday night.
They resisted more than usual, but it wasn't enough to really make a difference given the lack of tinkertech or cape powers. The only standout was a guy who actually tried to attack me with a ninja sword. I promptly disarmed him and cut his head off with it, so I guess it didn't help him all that much.
After feeling the great balance and cutting edge of the blade, I decide to take it with me. I give the sword a quick toss back into its sheath before slipping the rope loop tied to the scabbard over my head. I finish settling the weight on my back when I dodge to the left.
A high powered round blasts into the ground where my right leg used to be and punches through the concrete floor beneath the carpet. The only sign of where it came from is the new hole in the window.
I immediately use a round to activate Shot Step and blast my way through the exterior wall I was standing next to. Another round is spent when I use Shot Step again and crash directly onto the back of my bike. I start it up with a roar from the engine before I twist the throttle and go shooting out of the alley.
I weave through the streets serpentine in an effort to avoid any additional sniper fire. The key was to be inconsistent with the swerves so a sniper can't predict your path too easily. It seemed to be working from the missed shots the peppered the road around me until my luck ran out.
A shot lands on the front wheel and blows it clean off of the bike. If it had just been a flat tire, then the backup tire would have inflated to fix the problem. However, that wasn't much use when the entire wheel is suddenly missing.
I just hope Sherrel doesn't blame me for this one too. It's not like I broke this one on purpose! Despite that, U could already hear Lisa's taunts about how I couldn't protect a bike to save my life. I would like to see her deal with this shit and not lose a vehicle or two in the process!
Well, it was more like five or six. Maybe seven. Well, there was the boat in Morocco, so maybe eleven? Then the ATV in the Ukraine. And the moped in Venezuela. Also that helicopter in Ghana. Better not mention the sub I had to abandon after that Leviathan fight.
Yeah, she probably had a reason to get so annoyed with me. I wouldn't be surprised if she forced me to use rocket propelled rollerskates for a month as punishment. Sure, they were still faster than running, but at what cost?
Oh yeah, I am still crashing. I kick off of my bike as it begins to tumble and break apart across the street. I land on my feet and skid to a stop as I bleed off my residual speed with the friction of my shoes against the road.
I sense another bullet coming, so I draw my katana and slice it in half before it reaches me. The two pieces impact the ground behind me harmlessly as I finally spot the shooter. She was wearing military fatigues with an American flg bandana and sash. The rifle in question was a dark green one that rapidly changes into a grapple gun which she uses to rappel down to street level before shifting to an assault rifle form.
"You aren't going to just let me go, are you?" I ask as blue and black flames ignite along the katana's blade. "I would rather not waste either of our time."
"We can't leave a homicidal vigilante on the streets," the hero says. "If you submit to PRT questioning, we won't hurt you in the process. If you resist, I can't make any promises."
"Shame," I say. "I would have liked to talk shop with a decent shooter, but it seems like we don't have the time."
I close the distance with another Shot Step before I unleash a slash at her chest. She blocks it with her weapon which transformed into a tonfa for defense.
"Detonation Manifestation: Flashbang."
The Cursed Energy in my hand coalesces until a flashbang grenade falls into my grip. I flick the pin off before I toss it towards her. Her tonfa shifts into a revolver which blasts said flashbang right between us and sets it off. We both barely cover our eyes in time but are still forced to put some distance between us while our senses recover.
She recovers a touch faster given that the flashbang was closer to me and she must have a fair amount of experience shrugging off their blasts over her career. Her weapon shifts into a gun and was about to fire before I pulled out a new trick.
By channeling one of my Six Shooter rounds through my sword, I discovered a new attack I can manage. With a slash, a wave of Cursed Energy shoots forward to continue the strike. It cuts through the air towards the hero, but I wasn't particularly worried. Everything about her reaction times gave the confidence that she could handle it.
Like I expected, she dodges in time before it flies past and slices through a lamppost and carves a deep furrow into the building behind her. It was meant to distract her for a moment and give me another second to recover. The attack did its job since I was more than ready to parry the barrage of bullets she fires at me.
I think back to an Aleph video game I once saw a video of. There was this white haired guy with a cool black jacket and katana who could do a bunch of crazy slash attacks and stuff. What was it called again? Demon Mart Cares? Devil Mon Crazy? Devil May Cry! That's it!
Anyway, the sword guy, who I think was called Vergil, could do this cool defense move where he would block bullets by moving his sword around so fast he left afterimages as he uses the blade to deflect incoming bullets.
I do my best impression as I knock as many rounds out of the air with my sword and dodge the rest. I dash to the side and charge forward with the opening I make as she is forced to lock onto me again.
With the urgent danger I pose, she reflexively counters my slash with a longsword of her own. We are in a clash before she uses her superior weapon skills to disarm me and fling my weapon into the air. However, I was more than up to the task of forcing her to lose her own weapon by pivoting my katana against her sword's crossguard at the last second and causing it to slip from her hands.
The two swords flip through the air as she resorts to hand to hand combat. Her technique allows her to counter my superior strength, but my speed kept her on the backfoot enough that she couldn't press her advantage. She ducks under a kick before we catch our swords and meet in another clash.
Wait a second, since when was my word so glowy and nonmetal? I remember it being steel before, not this odd blue material. When I glance at the hero's katana burning with green fire, I realize my mistake.
We switched swords.
Through some odd interaction between our Cursed Techniques, I was able to use her weird changing weapon since it still counted as a weapon that my technique recognized. On the other hand, I must have channeled enough Cursed Energy into the katana for it to become a Cursed Tool. Even if she wasn't a genuine sorcerer with the thing in her brain giving her a flawed access to her technique, the lingering energy in the blade must have kickstarted her ability to use her own Cursed Energy consciously.
Don't act like you just thought of that. I literally just told you and you repeated it like it was your own idea.
Not now, Gojo! I am in the middle of a cool fight! We can talk about this later.
Here's hoping you didn't imbue your Cursed Technique into the sword too.
Wait, what? Gojo! Hey, Gojo! Tell me what you meant!
Sadly, the Special Grade sorcerer just went back to his nap as I focus on dueling the cape with her newly unlocked Cursed Energy.
She was faster and stronger now by a fair margin. Sure, I was still more than a ways above her in both respects, but that was a combination of my ridiculous normal strength in addition to my Cursed Energy reinforcement. From how Gojo described the sorcerer grades, I would say she was a solid Semi-First Grade even if she was just starting out.
That was weaker than my baseline strength which Gojo rated as fitting a First Grade sorcerer, but her experience helped to bridge the divide. I had only been fighting villains and Cursed Spirits in life and death struggles for two years. By my guess, she had been a hero for at least ten years, probably more. This meant she also had way more experience with human opponents since my time was also spent trying to eliminate monstrous Cursed Spirits.
This meant her adaptability was on another level than mine. As our swords spark against each other, she swings the blade and releases the same flying slash I had managed earlier. Huh, Gojo was right. It really does have Six Shooter imbued in it. Shit.
With my honed reflexes, I flip above the slash only to see her stab the katana towards me and release another round of energy. Unlike the slash, this thrust was substantially faster and definitely more concentrated. I only dodge it at the last second by releasing a Six Shooter round of my own to the side to knock me out of the way. I didn't want to chance the attack carrying the piercing nature of the sword as well.
It is so unfair that I can't use her sword's power!
Wait, why couldn't I? I mean, I know it hasn't changed shapes, but does that really mean it can't?
Almost as if to prove how dumb I am, the sword turns into a blue pistol. I don't think this Cursed Technique likes how little I appreciate it.
The fight does seem to balance out after I realize I had a lot more options than I thought. My borrowed weapon shifts rapidly between different forms as I make use of its endless variety to match the hero's annoying proficiency with a sword. I bet she has some kind of Thinker power that lets her reflexively use weapons easily. That was such a cheat.
I mean, my Cursed Technique helps me with adapting to new weapons too. But her experience with weapons makes it totally broken! She already has actual practice with swords while I am using natural intuition with each of the weapon forms I produce with the Cursed Tool generated by her Cursed Technique.
As Gojo always says, talent can only shine with practice. He didn't become the world bendingly powerful sorcerer he is without training. Well, he was always super powerful, but he needed to train to become super duper powerful.
While he says I might be the most promising student he has ever had, I am still not on his level. I can't bust out new weapons and powers with immediate mastery like Gojo can with ease. I am good with new weapons, even great, but that is not enough in a world where there are people who train their singular skills to the point where they excel.
It was dumb to go against another weapon user when I have never practiced with a sword. I have gotten used to my worst being stronger than everyone else's best. Gojo calls it the curse of the strong. We become deluded with our own strength and believe that no one could ever beat us.
Apparently, there was once a man with no Cursed Energy who almost killed a teenage Gojo. If it wasn't for him learning Reverse Cursed Technique at the brink of death, he never would have gone on to become the Strongest. Still, it cost the person he was protecting her life.
I am lucky. In the grand scheme of things, this was a blessing. I was able to get snapped out of my complacency and realize I have a long way to go before I can ever hope of matching Gojo as the strongest in this world. It might not be much, but I might as well thank the hero for her help.
As I wrap the blue whip around her sword, she yanks it out of my hands. I let it go without a fight which causes the hero's eyes to widen in surprise before she focuses on finding out what kind of trick I am planning. I just grin behind my mask as I flip backwards with a handspring to land next to my bike.
"Take care of my sword!" I call out as I grab the wrecked motorcycle and throw it at her. "Detonation Manifestation: Impact."
I grab the small impact grenade that forms from my Cursed Energy and throw it at the tumbling bike. It crashes into the side before exploding in a massive fireball that completely fills the street.
--
(Hannah/Ms. Militia POV)
She covers her eyes to protect them from any shrapnel produced by the exploding bike. When the blast dissipates, the vigilante is gone with the only trace of his presence left is the sword she was holding and the burning wreckage of his destroyed motorcycle.
As she glances down at the sword she had taken from him, she watches the green flames that covered it go out. The only time that she had ever heard anything like that happening was with Irregulars. Seeing how she was a standard parahuman for years, this was both incredible and troubling.
On one hand, Irregulars had a more varied power set than normal parahumans. A shared characteristic was the power to enhance their physical abilities with their internal energy and imbue this energy into weapons. It was what made them so useful against Spectres. It was a gamechanger for her now that she could do the same.
However, there was no telling what this could mean for the PRT and capes as a whole. Capes didn't just become Irregulars. You were either an Irregular or a normal parahuman. You weren't supposed to switch or be both.
Despite this internal conflict, she can't help but admire her new toy. The katana was something special, completely different from tinkertech. The vigilante had changed it somehow. Even now, she could feel the latent power in the sword recharging, one of the six charges in the sword refilling as another remained hollow. He had left behind a present for her to figure out.
She just hopes the director didn't try and take the sword for testing. Or worse, Collin trying to reverse engineer the power.
--
(Yuji Itadori POV)
I collapse on my bed as I was mentally and physically tired. Using someone else's external Cursed Technique like that had drained me more than I expected. That thing did not like me and it had fought me the whole way.
Sherrel was justifiably angry that her newest baby was destroyed hours into its first drive, but she gave me a pass when Lisa proved it wasn't my fault. I wish she didn't insist on telling the Tinker I blew up what was left. Sherrel kept trying to give me punishment noogies, which was the only thing she could really do since she would just hurt herself if she hit me. Crazy durability for the win!
Sherrel knew not to tickle me since it would initiate a tickle war. The last time the Tickle Truce had been broken, I almost made her pee before she finally surrendered.
Now, I just wanted to take a nap. I usually slept while Gojo was in control, but there was something really nice about sleeping in your own body for once. It was less like you were underwater and more like you were floating on the surface.
Before I close my eyes, I glance down at the object resting in my hand. It was just a sliver, but a fragment nonetheless of the hero's Cursed Tool formed by her Cursed Technique. It had come off when she yanked the whip out of my hands and it had miraculously decided to stick around. I didn't know why besides the possibility that it had taken a liking to me (unlike the rest of the shifting weapon).
Also, the hero was apparently called Ms. Militia. I was informed by Lisa who found it particularly bewildering how I didn't know the name of one of the most prominent capes in Brockton Bay, a city I had lived in for the first sixteen years of my life.
Hey, it's not my fault that I never bothered to pay attention to the cape scene! It was too much of a hassle most of the time when a bunch die every three months in an Endbringer attack. In my book, I only need to recognize the ones I need to kill and I can just avoid the rest.
Still, a sliver of Ms. Militia's Cursed Tool was a pretty good trade for mine. It might have contained a copy of Six Shooter, but that was only one of my tricks. It evens out since I got a new trick of my own.
I will the little fragment to wind around my finger until it resembles a blue ring before I close my eyes and let myself drift off to sleep. Today wasn't so bad after all.
--
(??? POV)
"I don't know why the boss wanted me to come to this dump of a city, but whatever," they grumble. "It's not even like it has any Cursed Spirits worth harvesting. Still, if the boss gives an order, you listen. You don't ask how high to jump, you just jump as high as you can manage and hope it is good enough. Do you get what I mean?"
The bound man whimpers beneath his duct tape gag in response. He was bound to the wall by a centipede Cursed Spirit whose legs stabbed into his weak flesh and caused small trickles of blood to pour down his body.
They just sigh at the lackluster answer. "I don't know what I was expecting when I asked monkey filth, but I digress," they says before the man's head was bitten off by a pair of skeletal jaws from above before the remaining body was torn to shreds by a mob of frenzied Cursed Spirits.
They wander away in boredom as they look down on the unsuspecting city. The little monkeys had no idea that their illusion of safety was about to end very soon. After all, what would they do when the shining hope of the Endbringer fights was snuffed out?
Their despair would fuel the birth of so many new and interesting Cursed Spirits. It almost made them fidget in anticipation. After all, how much longer would the world hold on after they manage to kill the greatest healer in history, Panacea?
--
Author's note:
Yes! Another chapter down! It took me a little to find my rhythm when writing this, but I think it turned out nicely in the end.
Our boy Yuji might have lost his Cursed Tool imbued with Six Shooter to Ms. Militia, but he did gain a fragment of her Cursed Tool instead. It will be a bit before he is able to actually use it though. After all, he needs to build it up from the sliver it currenty is.
Also, who knows what will happen with the mysterious threat revealed at the end! Yuji will have to save Pan-Pan without spilling the beans that he is still alive. Who knows what the villain will throw at them in the attempt to kill her! Well, I know, but I'm not telling just yet.
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A pleasure as always,
Titan900
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