F-boy had, technically, made a valid point.
There was no pay-to-win option. The gacha pool didn't accept cash. No amount of money could convert directly into a better drop rate.
What Jordan did have was stamina, a teleportation ability, and the fact that this world was not remotely running low on monsters.
He'd been coasting on Saitama's proximity for months—a passive Limiter Fragment farm that required minimal effort. Comfortable. Efficient. Also, if he was being honest with himself, a little lazy. Saitama was an extraordinary source, but Saitama wasn't the only source. And with both Saitama and Genos currently deployed somewhere in Z-City systematically clearing the local monster population, the competition for available draws was going to be steep in that particular neighborhood.
Jordan sat in front of the disaster channel with his chin in his hand and actually watched it for once.
The anchor was cycling through incident reports with practiced urgency. A-City: minor structural damage, Wolf-level confirmed, local heroes responding. B-City: suspicious activity near the waterfront, assessment pending. E-City: commercial district, Demon-level threat reported, Hero Association dispatching—
He memorized the location and stood up.
If the Association is dispatching someone, they're going to get there eventually. He grabbed his jacket from the hook by the door. I'll just get there first.
The apartment filled with blue light for exactly one second.
Then it was empty.
Seafood Market, E-City.
The market occupied three city blocks along the waterfront—stalls, tanks, ice beds, the particular smell of salt water and commerce that came with any place that had been selling fish since before the street signs went up. On a normal afternoon it ran at comfortable chaos: vendors calling prices, buyers negotiating, the constant background percussion of ice being scooped and crates being shifted.
This was not a normal afternoon.
The wall of the cold storage unit at the market's northeast corner had been developing a problem for the last thirty seconds—cracks spreading in a branching pattern, dust falling, the concrete surface bulging outward as something on the other side insisted on becoming a different shape. The vendors nearest to it had the good instinct to step back. The ones farther away hadn't noticed yet.
Two blades of pale blue light punched through the wall in crossing arcs.
The impact that followed wasn't a break so much as an elimination—the entire wall section ceasing to exist as a wall and becoming instead a cloud of debris that traveled outward at considerable speed, clearing the immediate area of anyone who hadn't already moved.
The figure that stepped through the settling dust was over two meters tall. Below a broad pair of human shoulders, strong arms, and a torso built for something that did physical work, sat a head that had never belonged to anything that called itself human: a massive fish skull, scaled and cold, intelligent eyes gleaming from deep sockets, the jaw lined with teeth designed for something other than polite conversation. The whole head radiated cold the way a freezer door does when you leave it open—a steady, palpable drop in the ambient temperature of everything nearby.
In each hand, a weapon that could charitably be called a sword—two mackerel, frozen so thoroughly they'd achieved the structural integrity of steel, their tails wrapped in what appeared to be fishing line for grip.
The Frozen Fish Monster stood in the ruins of the cold storage wall and took in the frozen tableau of the market—every vendor, every customer, every passerby who'd turned at the sound—with the expression of something that had been waiting a very long time for this exact moment.
"I," it announced, to the gathering silence, "am the vengeful spirit of every seafood product wantonly consumed and carelessly discarded by humanity. I have returned. And today—"
It swung both frozen swords in a wide, demonstrative arc, the blades whistling through air that dropped another two degrees just from their passage.
"—every human who has ever loved seafood must answer for it!"
Nobody moved.
It was the specific paralysis of a crowd that has encountered something so far outside the expected parameters of a Tuesday afternoon that the threat-response system has simply... buffered.
"Extreme Cold Salted Fish Slash!!"
The frozen blades came down.
The burst of cold air and cutting force hit the nearest row of stalls like a wall—ice crystals forming on every surface they touched, the structural supports of three adjacent shops giving way simultaneously, splinters and frozen goods scattering across the market floor. Somewhere in the aftermath, someone started screaming. That broke the paralysis. Within seconds the market was pure, undirected chaos—vendors abandoning stalls, customers abandoning dignity, everyone converting whatever direction they were facing into away.
The Frozen Fish Monster watched them go, then raised its swords again and roared with the specific satisfaction of something whose plans were proceeding exactly as imagined.
It did not notice the bright blue light that flickered in the air above the market, five stories up, and was gone again before it fully formed.
One kilometer down the coast, on a stretch of beach where the seafood was prepared rather than sold, a small open-air food stall was doing modest but genuine business.
Four customers occupied the best table, positioned for the sea view.
The owner—small mustache, enthusiastic manner, the particular radar of a proprietor who recognized significant clientele—had just delivered an eel rice bowl set meal to the man at the head of the table with the focused care of someone who understood that certain customers required a certain kind of attention.
"Atomic Samurai" — that was what the Hero Association called him, and the name had crossed enough city limits and reputation thresholds that the stall owner had deployed it with the precise combination of respect and familiarity that gets repeat business — thanked him without looking up from his beer, drained the glass in one practiced motion, and set it down.
"Appreciated."
The owner bowed himself backward with practiced grace and left them to it.
Across the table, the three disciples of E-City's most technically accomplished swordsman occupied their seats with varying degrees of relaxation. Iaian — blonde hair, blue eyes, knight's armor worn with the unconscious ease of a man who'd been in it so long he stopped noticing the weight — had his katana propped against the table and was watching the horizon with the mildly alert expression of someone who was technically off-duty but never fully turned off. Beside him, Okamaitachi had settled into the kind of elegant repose that only works if you commit to it entirely: beige sweater, floor-length pleated skirt, shoulder-length hair framing those characteristic painted blushes, altogether presenting the image of a quiet, refined female swordsman right up until she opened her mouth and the voice came out. Okamaitachi is a Transwoman.
Bushidrill occupied the third chair with the posture of a man who had opinions about posture. His specially commissioned longsword — the blade shaped into a continuous helical spiral that earned it the name — leaned against his knee. His beard was doing what it always did, which was existing aggressively.
Atomic Samurai set down his toothpick. "The largest seafood market in E-City is just ahead," Iaian said, turning from the horizon. "If we're stopping in Z-City to see Mr. Bang on the way back — it would be impolite to arrive empty-handed. High-end seafood, two boxes. He'd appreciate it."
"Reasonable." Atomic Samurai picked the toothpick back up, considered it, put it down again. "The three of you can handle the errand."
The three disciples exchanged one of the rapid looks that develops between people who have trained together long enough to hold entire conversations in a glance. They stood, bowed in the synchronized way that confirmed the training had taken hold, and headed for the market road.
Atomic Samurai leaned back and signaled for another beer.
The road gave them enough distance from the master's table that Okamaitachi exhaled, rolled her shoulders, and immediately resumed the personality the training context required her to suppress.
"I'll say it again." She stretched her arms above his head, the pleated skirt swaying. "After training this long, I feel like I'm getting less improvement per session. Not more. Less."
"Because you've hit a ceiling." Bushidrill didn't break stride. "Don't blame Master for that. Blame yourself."
"I didn't blame Master."
"You implied it."
Okamaitachi gave him the kind of look that contained both profound aesthetic disdain and actual competitive assessment. "I implied that I've been training hard and not seeing returns. That's an observation, not an accusation. You're too sensitive."
The vein at Bushidrill's temple made a brief appearance. "You know what your problem is? Every hour you spend cataloguing handsome men is an hour you could spend on training. Basic division. Do the math."
"My hero ranking is still above yours." Okamaitachi said it pleasantly, which made it worse. "So whatever I'm doing with my time, it's working."
"You—"
Bushidrill's hand went to his sword hilt. Not a threat—more of a stress response. The same way other people reach for their phone.
Iaian had been lowering his helmet incrementally since they'd left the table. It was now positioned to block his peripheral vision on both sides. This was not accidental.
They spar three times a day, he reflected. And no matter how much they curse each other, they always know exactly where the line is. He'd stopped finding this exhausting approximately eighteen months ago and had started finding it, in a distant way, comforting. Some things you could rely on.
The distant sound arrived on the coastal wind — a muffled concussive boom, the kind that meant something structural had stopped being structural. A column of smoke climbed over the rooftops to the northeast, dark and rising fast.
Iaian's hand moved to steady his sword before he'd consciously decided to.
Okamaitachi and Bushidrill went quiet mid-sentence. Three sets of eyes turned northeast.
"Where is that?" Okamaitachi shaded her eyes with one hand, trying to read the distance.
Bushidrill was already moving — two quick strides to a low wall, one step up, one hand on the roof edge, and he was standing on the tiles with the easy balance of a man who had done exactly this kind of rapid vertical repositioning so many times it had stopped requiring thought.