"Smells of sulfur." Frank's voice squeezed out from the communicator.
Ron pressed the call button.
"How many?"
"Three. All wearing black hoodies. Wrong gait—knees aren't bending."
Knees not bending.
Ron mentally reviewed this detail.
"Don't alert them. Follow them, see where they go."
"Roger." The communication ended.
Ron sat back in the folding chair.
The system panel hovered on his right. Parker Robbins's territory map refreshed every six hours. The color blocks in Midtown Manhattan had changed from light red to dark red. The Bronx and Brighton Beach followed closely.
Hell's Kitchen was still white.
But the edges of the white area were being slowly eroded by a ring of light red.
The next day. Courtroom.
Ron opened the day's case files.
The first three were all land disputes within Hell's Kitchen's jurisdiction.
The first one. A dispute over the transfer of ownership of a six-story apartment building on West 48th Street. The plaintiffs were a consortium of long-term tenants who had lived there for thirty years. The defendant was a company called "New Dawn Realty."
Ron turned to the plaintiffs' statement.
Blank.
Only one line of handwritten text: "Plaintiffs withdraw their suit."
Signature. Date. Fingerprint.
Ron opened the second case file.
A commercial property on West 52nd Street. Again—the plaintiffs withdrew their suit.
The third. A warehouse title on 10th Avenue.
Withdrawn.
Three case files, three properties, three withdrawals. The time interval between submissions was no more than forty-eight hours.
Ron closed the case files and stacked them together.
He accessed the system panel and called up the query interface of the New York business registration database.
New Dawn Realty. Registered address: Delaware. Legal representative: A non-existent Social Security number. Registered capital: $10,000.
Shell company.
Ron continued investigating. New Dawn Realty's parent company was another shell company. And then, the third layer. Fourth floor. Fifth floor.
The controlling shareholder of the sixth floor is called "Robins Trust."
Parker Robbins.
Ron put away the system panel, stood up, and draped his black robe over his arm.
He walked to the window.
The streets of Hell's Kitchen looked eerily calm in the afternoon sun.
The plaintiffs who withdrew their lawsuits weren't "persuaded."
They were terrified.
Parker Robbins could appear invisibly in anyone's bedroom at midnight, leaving a charred handprint beside the pillow.
The communicator vibrated.
Frank.
"Followed up. Intersection of West 39th Street and 11th Avenue. An abandoned auto repair shop."
Frank's breathing was low.
"There's something inside. Lots of boxes. I peeked through the vent—M4 rifles, anti-tank rocket launchers." Ron's hand lifted from the window frame.
"And two portable anti-aircraft missile systems."
Frank added.
Anti-aircraft missiles.
Parker Robbins was stockpiling weapons. Weapons of this caliber could only come from two sources—from within the military or from a transnational arms network.
"Is anyone in the warehouse?"
"Four." Frank's pause was longer than usual. "But they don't seem human."
"What do you mean?"
"Very weak heartbeat. Breathing rate four times a minute. I scanned the area with my Observation Haki—the life force is somewhere between alive and dead." Ron picked up his suit jacket from the back of his chair.
"Don't go in. Wait for me."
"It's too late." Frank's voice was tense. "One of them turned to look at the ventilation duct. I'm upwind, my Observation Haki masked the scent."
"But it's looking this way." A metallic tearing sound came through the communicator.
Frank didn't speak again.
West 39th Street. Abandoned auto repair shop.
Frank rolled out of the ventilation duct.
The half-beast transformation was complete in the instant of the fall. Gray fur swelled from beneath his skin, tearing the side seams of his tactical vest. He landed on all fours, his paw pads digging into the oil-soaked concrete. The repair shop had been modified.
The original parking area was now filled with dark green ammunition crates. The wooden crates bore Russian markings.
A "person" stood in each of the four corners.
Wearing black hoodies. The hoods pulled down below their brow bones. Hands hanging at their sides.
Frank's vertical pupils swept over the nearest one.
It stood there, motionless. Its chest remained flat. The facial features beneath the hood were indistinct, indistinguishable.
But its head was facing Frank.
Frank moved three steps to the right.
Its head followed, turning three steps.
There was no change in the degree of neck movement. The entire head rotated smoothly within the hood.
Frank's hind legs sprang up.
A charge.
He charged straight at the nearest "guard." His right claw, coated in Armament Haki, swept across the two rows of ammunition crates, the claw tip less than half a meter from the guard's chest.
The guard's mouth opened.
His jaw dislocated and slid down, revealing a dark, gaping cavity.
Dark green flames erupted from within.
Frank's fur stood on end.
He lunged sideways.
The fiery eeriness grazed his right shoulder, slamming into three metal shipping containers behind him.
There was no explosion.
The metal didn't glow red.
From the point of ignition, the three containers rapidly turned gray, then white, then brittle. The metal surfaces shattered into dust and collapsed.
Corrosion.
Frank sprang to his feet, staring at the pile of grayish-white metal debris.
Things burned by this flame turned to ash.
Not just physical heat. It was a force that disintegrated matter at the molecular level.
The second guard moved.
It didn't move. Its feet remained flat on the ground, its entire body gliding forward. The speed was slow, yet it was completely silent.
The third. The fourth.
The four guards closed in simultaneously.
Frank's Flowing Cherry Blossoms concentrated in his right claw. The corrosive properties of the evil fire were unknown, and he didn't intend to take it head-on.
Frank chose the closest one. He pressed down with his front paws, his hind legs springing forward.
The entire gray wolf's body spun as it rammed into the guard's chest.
The claws, infused with cherry blossom energy, pierced the hoodie's fabric and embedded themselves in the guard's torso.
No blood.
No feeling of bone breaking.
The claws sliced through a layer of dry, papyrus-like material. It was hollow inside.
Frank's claws had torn a large hole in the guard's torso.
It looked down at the hole in its chest.
The hole began to heal automatically. The papyrus-like tissue at the edges grew rapidly, spreading towards the center.
Three seconds. The hole closed.
Frank withdrew his claws, a few grayish-white fragments stuck between his fingers. The fragments quickly weathered upon contact with air, turning into fine ash.
Not flesh.
Frank's vertical pupils contracted.
It was a "container" powered by some kind of energy. If pierced, it would regenerate on its own.
No heart. No brain. No weakness in the conventional sense.
The other three guards had completed their encirclement.
Three mouths opened simultaneously.
Three streaks of dark green evil fire swept across the area.
Frank ran at full speed. His paws dug four white marks in the oily ground.
The first streak of evil fire grazed his back.
A piece was sheared off the lower left corner of his white cloak. The edge of the fabric didn't burn—it turned to ash.
The second streak chased after his tail.
Frank leaped onto a row of ammunition crates, using the height of the wooden crates to vault over them.
The evil fire struck the crates. Forty crates of M4 rifles were reduced to ash within two seconds. The metal gun barrels turned white, brittle, and shattered. The copper-cased bullets in the magazines didn't detonate—the gunpowder had been corroded into inert powder.
Frank landed beside the side door of the repair shop.
A third wave of evil fire rushed in from the front.
There was no room to dodge.
Frank crossed his right paws to block in front of his chest. He unleashed his full power with Ryuo.
The evil fire collided with Armament Haki.
The black luster flashed violently.
He withstood it.
A searing pain, as if gnawing at his bones, shot from his paw pads to his forearm.
Frank slammed his right paw outwards.
The evil fire was deflected, striking the ceiling and burning through two layers of corrugated iron roof.
The repair shop's side door was behind Frank.
He turned and slammed his right paw down.
The side door exploded.
Frank charged into the alley.
The four guards didn't chase after him. They slid to the side door, facing the alley, and stood still again.
They didn't chase. They only guarded.
Frank leaned against the wall at the end of the alley, his half-beast form slowly fading. His gray fur retreated beneath his skin.
He glanced down at his white cloak.
Three holes. Bottom left, right shoulder, back.
The edges of the holes were grayish-white, like burnt rice paper.
Frank pressed the communicator.
"Ron."
"I heard you."
"Those four things aren't human. They'll grow back if you shoot them through. Evil fire can corrode matter. Liu Ying can barely withstand it for a while, but not many times."
Frank glanced in the direction of the repair shop.
"Parker Robbins can mass-produce these things. He's building an army."
There was a three-second silence on the communicator.
Ron's reply was short.
"Come back." Shipyard safe house.
Frank showed everyone the three holes in his cloak.
Jack leaned over and touched the edge of the hole with his finger. Two grayish-white fragments fell off. He withdrew his hand.
"If this hit a person…"
"Nobody." Frank draped the cloak back over his shoulder. "Get to the point."
Ron stood in front of the wall with the naval flag hanging. He held three dismissal case files in his hand.
"Parker Robbins. He swallowed up five gangs in two weeks. Now he's stockpiling weapons and has the ability to create fiendish puppets as guards. He's also contacted people in Washington." Ron tossed the case file onto the table.
"Three land cases dropped simultaneously. The buyers all point to the same shell company. He's infiltrating Hell's Kitchen."
Frank leaned against an iron pillar.
"When do we make our move?"
"Bucky wakes up tomorrow morning." Ron glanced towards the basement. "After he wakes up, we'll deal with Parker first."
Jessica peeked out from the medical area.
"Those puppets—can the Soul-Soul Fruit penetrate them?"
Ron turned to look at her.
"The containers created by the Abyss Cloak are immune to physical attacks, but they're kept running by spiritual energy."
"Your Soul-Soul Fruit cuts through that layer."
Jessica nodded and retreated.
Ron walked to the window.
His Observation Haki extended southward. Parker Robbins's soul fluctuations were still flickering. The frequency of the interference pulses was even faster than yesterday.
The fusion between the cloak and its host was deepening.
The window of opportunity left for them was dwindling.
At the same moment.
Midtown Manhattan. Fifth Avenue.
Parker Robbins sat with his legs crossed behind what used to be Kingpin's desk.
On the desk lay a flip phone and a stack of photographs.
The photographs were taken by Vito. Blurry, telephoto lenses, taken from a pedestrian bridge three hundred meters away.
First photo. The main entrance to the New York Supreme Court. A man in a dark suit walks down the steps. A judge's badge is pinned to his chest.
Second photo. The exit of an underground parking garage. The same man drives out in a black sedan.
Third photo. A street near the Brooklyn Shipyard. The same black sedan is parked on the side of the road.
Parker picked up the third photo, held it up to the lamplight for three seconds, and put it down.
The flip phone rang.
Parker answered.
"Mr. Donovan."
"Received the photos?" Donovan's voice held a hint of caution.
"Received. Ron Stern. Judge of Hell's Kitchen." Parker pulled a match from one corner of his mouth and held it to the other. "Are you sure he's the one who took Kingpin?"
"The night of the Fisk Tower incident, the court duty log shows he left two hours early. He arrived on time the next morning and issued the arrest warrant for Kingpin." Donovan paused.
"And—his hand didn't even shake when he signed the warrant." Parker neatly folded the photo and stuffed it into a drawer.
"A judge. Judges by day, burns people by night." Parker chuckled, biting the match.
"Interesting." He stood up and walked to the floor-to-ceiling window.
A deep red cloak silently unfurled behind him. Outside, the construction barriers of the Fisk Tower were faintly visible in the night.
A dark green flame ignited on Parker's right index finger.
He raised his finger, pointing it at his reflection in the windowpane.
The flame flickered twice at his fingertip.
"Your Honor, we have to meet."
He extinguished the flame, turned, and sat back in his chair.
He dialed again on his flip phone.
This time it wasn't Donovan.
It rang twice.
The other end answered.
Parker spoke.
"Congressman Malik. This is Parker Robbins. Kingpin's successor."
There was a four-second silence on the other end.
A hoarse male voice with an Eastern European accent came through.
"Young man, how did you get this number?" Parker put his feet up on the table, twirling a match between his teeth.
"Found it in Kingpin's contacts. His collaboration with you—I want to renew it." Gideon Malik didn't hang up.
Parker stared at the spots of light reflected from the crystal chandelier on the ceiling.
In the direction of the shipyard, Ron stood by the window.
As his Observation Haki swept across the southern night sky, a very subtle psychic pulse carrying the smell of burning sulfur suddenly spread in his direction.
It wasn't an attack.
It was a test.
Someone was looking for him.
Ron's right hand hung at his side.
A drop of lava seeped from the tip of his index finger, landing on the windowsill and burning through the paint.
In the basement, Bucky's electrocardiogram suddenly jerked violently.
A system notification popped up.
[Winter Soldier Purification Progress: 99%]