"We're your publishers. We just track your stats and the ratings people give you," she explained. "Let's go with us. We'll drop you off, and there's a chance another hero might show up too. If that happens, you'll have to cooperate with him or her to defeat them. The villain this time is 'Cranker' again."
"Don't worry. I'm... I'm... Hero HK," I said.
"Uh? But you're 'Z'. Why 'Hand K'?" she asked.
"The 'H' is for Harem and Hero both, and the 'K' is for King," I explained.
"Harem?! Everyone will laugh, even though 'Hero King' sounds good. Okay, you're the Z-Class hero, but you have another name—Hero King!"
Then we departed for the prefecture. The name on the entrance board read: 'Samehada Prefecture'. It was nearly 700 meters away from Z.H.T.
When we reached the big mall, the villain suddenly attacked. A giant piano came crashing down, thrown right through the shattered glass window of the mall's third floor, heading straight toward our car!
The car started spinning as the driver tried to avoid an accident. In that split second, I flung the door open, exiting the spinning vehicle with a heroic flair. It all happened in a flash, but if you saw it in slow motion, your eyes would glaze over from awe.
The running crowds stopped in their tracks when they looked at me. Most of them whispered, "Who is he? A hero? Then he must be a new hero! Can he beat this villain?"
Others murmured, "He looks familiar... maybe I've seen him somewhere."
These were all normal questions. They had likely seen me in the newspaper, so they recognized me as someone familiar, but couldn't quite place me because I had changed my hair to two different colors, wore different colored eyes, and radiated a pure hero aura.
As Temari steered the car safely away from the danger zone and toward the other civilians, I shouted up at the building. "Hey, villain! Come down here! I'm going to teach you a lesson!"
Instantly, the villain leapt down through the broken glass wall.
With a massive whamp, he landed on the ground right in front of me. He was a man made entirely of rock! His massive, rugged body coupled with his terrifying face made him look incredibly menacing.
He sneered, "So... what did ya say?"
"Nothing, except I said you're a ruin of an abandoned building who just ran into a good place, so you felt jealous and started throwing a tantrum. Heh heh! I just roasted you a little."
I saw his face turn even darker with rage. The edge of his rocky lips curled, and he gritted his teeth. "You... newbie hero... talking big! I'll kick your ass!"
He punched the ground beneath me with his massive hand. I dodged it, but the impact completely shattered the pavement, opening a crater right where I had been standing.
On the sidelines, Temari was tense. 'What the hell is he doing? Calling down his own death?!' she thought anxiously.
Back on the battlefield, I announced boldly, "I'm gonna beat you!! Heh."
"Wait up there, you action lover!" my enemy roared, rushing toward me and lifting his massive stone hands above his head to smash me into the dirt.
I kicked off the ground using my mechanical shoes—one black, one white—and shot nearly 19 feet up into the air. I activated my anti-gravity shoes, freezing my position right there in mid-air.
But my enemy's attack still smashed into the ground, hitting close to where I had just been. I simply walked a little further through the air, and my enemy crashed heavily onto the pavement below. As I walked along the empty air, a glitching purple and blue light sparked beneath my soles, looking as if I were stepping on twin plates of lightning.
The villain rose from the crater his body had made when he crashed. He glared up at me and shouted, "I'm Rocky Rock! It'll be an insult if I lose to a newbie... so I'm gonna use my full strength!"
Then he started smashing the ground constantly, wrecking a massive area of the mall. I didn't stop him because I wanted to see what he was planning to do. Suddenly, Rocky Rock stopped his rampage, fell silent, and then wailed, "Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!"
The sound was so incredibly loud that the crowds had to cover their ears.
Then, the wrecked concrete fragments started floating, drawing toward him and merging directly with his body. I didn't interrupt because I was busy looking at the hot girls in the crowd, some of whom were taking pictures of me while I struck a few cool poses.
Temari muttered to herself, "Maybe we've made a massive historic mistake by appointing this Aqua guy as a Z-Class hero..."
My gaze finally drifted back to my enemy when everyone else focused their terror on him. "Whoah! What the hell is this?!"
I found that Rocky Rock had grown nearly 20 feet tall, a giant towering over me. The leftover rocks had completely merged with him, making him two feet wider, and his eyes had turned into pupilless crimson orbs.
He boomed, "It's my Alpha Rock Form! I usually only use this against B-rank heroes, but today I'm forced to use it against a newbie whose rank is unknown to the public. Be ready!"
With a sweep of his arm, he tore away a section of the mall beside him and hurled it straight at me. This time, I thought I might actually die; dodging a piece of concrete ruin that massive wasn't going to be easy.
"Oh no! Aqua—" Temari's scream cut off as the flying rock wall suddenly shattered into tiny pieces right before everyone's eyes.
I wondered who had saved me. Looking up, I found a hologram projecting over a girl who was hovering in the air, flames erupting from her hands. The screen displayed her stats:
Girlpanion number 9:
Real Name: Minamoto Kirie (From Ahiro's World)
Profession: Cosplay
Status: Cosplayer
"You!!" I shouted.
The girl turned her head halfway toward me and replied, "I'm Cranker Hero—Amber!"
She had long, red hair that flowed like fire, sharp eyes with brilliant fair skin, and wore a striking red, orange, and yellow-and-white hero costume that was incredibly short and tight. She was undeniably one of my girlpanions.
I noticed that the crowd was now applauding with renewed hope, cheering, "Amber-sama!! Kick out this rock brat!!" and "Amber-sama!! You're our hero!!"
Then my enemy scoffed. "Heh, my old enemy Amber. It's good that today I'm gonna kill both my old enemy and a new hero who needlessly insulted me so much!"
After saying that, he smashed the mall section beside him. Before we could react, the surrounding ruins merged onto his frame, and his size swelled to nearly 40 feet tall!
He bellowed, "Now you're gonna die, bitch and brat!"
Next, he threw a massive, swinging punch toward us. Amber jumped into the air, dodging the fist, and wailed—
"Ankle Crush!!"
Fire burst violently from her hands. Pointing herself toward the sky, she accelerated downward with immense speed. Her ankle drove a powerful, flame-enhanced impact straight onto the giant rocky fist, crashing it down into the ground and blasting a crater through the enemy's hand.
Amber landed gracefully, standing up and lifting herself into the air once more using her fire jets. "How was that?"
But we watched in shock as the broken rock pieces instantly magnetized back together, merging with his hand once more.
The villain laughed, "Heh! I've increased my rock-merging ability! Now I can merge with pieces as small as a 10-nanometer radius. You can find tons of pieces scattered here and there; just think about what will happen to you once I merge all of them into my armor!"
Without giving Amber a single chance to dodge, he swung his other massive hand and punched her squarely.
Her body took the full force of the impact, sending her flying into a nearby building. There were many people inside. Though she crashed heavily through the glass walls, her durable body protected her from serious injury, leaving her bruised but standing.
My enemy laughed mockingly, "Heh, heh. Now it's your turn, newbie!"
He dug his massive, fat, rocky fingers deep into the ground and plucked out a giant slab of pavement. He roared, "Take it!" as he hurled it directly at me.
Temari screamed in terror, "NOOOOOOOOOO!!"
But before the flying slab could hit me, the thrown piece was instantly sliced into thousands of tiny fragments, raining harmlessly down onto the street.
"Ha? What just happened? Did another hero show up?!" my enemy's companion muttered in confusion.
The glowing blue lights that had sliced up the massive boulder flew straight back toward my hands. I caught them smoothly between my fingers. Resting snugly in my grip were six of my signature King Cards.
- To Be Continued...