Chapter 72
The conditions for ability users to use their powers were often surprisingly complicated. In cases like Anschel or Ender, who could use their abilities without spatial limitations, they were ranked as SSS-class among ability tiers.
Mental control or sound-based ability users couldn’t affect enemies who covered their ears or the deaf, and surprisingly, even natural-type ability users faced many spatial constraints. Just like how Harriet was no different from an ordinary person if he wasn’t in a place with water.
“Mr. Harriet, I’ll cover you.”
Anschel realized within three minutes how foolish that statement sounded. Harriet was strong enough not to need any cover. Rather, clumsily trying to help might only interfere with his movements.
The beatdown began when a man with a body ignition ability, charging at Harriet with flames engulfing his entire body, was sent flying against the wall with a single roundhouse kick.
Of course, the opponents weren’t incompetent either. They were trained soldiers, and their momentarily disrupted formation quickly recovered. Seeing one of their own pathetically collapse, the rest didn’t move carelessly and surrounded Harriet.
At that moment, fire spewed from Harriet’s gun barrel. He shot at the forehead of the man in front using a very small pistol he had brought.
Of course, it didn’t work. Typically, someone pointing a gun at a trained ability user would be considered a fool. However, as the man hesitated at the gunshot, Harriet moved.
Having instantly slipped into the center of their formation, Harriet’s first action was to strike the jaw of the opponent before him with his palm. Then, grabbing the collapsing body, he frowned as if troubled. He grasped the man’s heavy body with one hand and lifted it dangling in the air.
The burly man with a dragon head mask lost consciousness with one blow and hung limply in Harriet’s grasp. Veins bulged prominently on Harriet’s snow-white forearm.
While everyone hesitated at the sight of their comrade being used as a shield, Harriet pulled out a dagger hidden at his waist. It was a small dagger, no larger than a fruit knife used for peeling fruits.
Anschel noticed it was the dagger that Rieon had used to peel melons. Harriet lightly stabbed the dagger into the forearm of a man attempting to use his ability nearby, then immediately lowered his upper body. It was a remarkably swift movement for someone holding a heavy man with one hand.
After kicking the knee of another hesitating man trying to use his ability, causing him to collapse, Harriet grabbed his nape and raised his knee. The man’s mask shattered with a cracking sound.
While these men collapsed without even regaining their senses, Harriet dodged others who rushed at him. Suddenly, he lifted his leg to avoid something. Sharp blades had emerged from the floor where Harriet had been standing, attempting to attack his uncomfortable left leg. However, Harriet spun around to dodge and broke the incoming blades in half with his knee.
“Ah, what kind of bastard is this!”
Harriet slightly turned his head, confirming that the face barely visible through the mask belonged to a rather old man. He threw the broken blade at the man with a rat mask who was using his ability with his hand on the floor.
“Aagh!”
The man’s shoulder was slashed by the knife. It was complete chaos.
It wasn’t that their skills were lacking. They simply weren’t a match for Harriet. Even when they tried to neutralize him using abilities and guns, Harriet was a step ahead. His movements showed no hesitation as he accurately identified those using abilities and exploited their weaknesses.
He was amazing during the previous research facility infiltration, but to think he was this good.
Anschel was so surprised that his mouth fell open. The last man remaining, wearing a pig mask, floundered as he used his ability. He was a rather rare interdimensional ability user. Similar to Anschel but an entirely different SSS-class ability user.
Harriet fired his gun at the back of the man who was trying to tear space and escape. The flying bullet suddenly burst into flames and oxidized, and the body of the man with the pig mask completely disappeared.
Anschel nervously gulped, and Harriet picked up the blood-stained dagger from the floor. Among the ten people sprawled across the warehouse, groaning “Ugh… aah…” Harriet stood quietly.
This entire beatdown was completed in just 3 minutes.
A man wearing a rabbit mask, who had been sitting quietly in a chair, rose slowly. Despite his well-built physique, he made an old man’s groan.
“When the body ages, even moving becomes difficult. I’ve developed presbyopia these days too.”
Harriet wiped the blood on his cheek with his finger and smiled slightly. The man with the rabbit mask clicked his tongue and looked at those sprawled on the floor.
“You’re all struggling this much with just one person? The name ‘special forces’ is wasted on you.”
“Ugh… why don’t you try fighting him yourself…”
The man trembling at the rabbit-masked man’s feet was the one with a sheep mask who had been knocked unconscious after taking a hit to his temple from Harriet’s knee before he could properly use his ability.
“Well, how many minutes do you think it would take me?”
The rabbit-masked man addressed Harriet. Harriet smiled awkwardly and briefly turned his head away. Then his expressionless white eyes, devoid of emotion, settled on the man wearing the rabbit mask. Several fireballs ignited around the rabbit-masked man.
It seemed he was the fire ability user who had oxidized the bullet when things got dangerous. Fire pillars also began to rise around him. It was quite a threatening ability. Anschel was terrified by the fierce pillars of fire burning around him.
“About 15 seconds.”
But Harriet, without erasing his smile, answered lightly. The rabbit-masked man seemed to stare at Harriet for a while before raising both hands. Simultaneously, all the fire pillars and flames filling the warehouse extinguished. As the suffocating heat abruptly decreased, Anschel exhaled a long breath.
“Where did you bring such a monster from?”
The rabbit-masked man shook his head at Anschel. With the fire gone, the warehouse darkened again. There was also rustling sounds, seemingly from the men who had been beaten by Harriet starting to move.
“Ughh…”
Watching them writhe and groan, Anschel felt both cautious and sympathetic.
With a click, the warehouse lights turned on. A bright light different from before shone. Men with broken masks were standing, wiping blood and groaning.
Harriet examined them with an apologetic smile. Surprisingly, most of them were quite elderly men. Then the rabbit-masked man slowly removed his mask.
Seeing his face, Anschel was so shocked that he opened his mouth as if about to faint.
“Jayden… Olden…”
He was Jayden Olden, known as the Peace Committee Chairman and Dante Maxim’s right-hand man. Having suddenly gone into seclusion before making a splendid comeback this time, he let out his characteristic sly smile. Harriet’s eyes widened as well.
He was the person who always stood behind Alcita Maxim. Or was it that he had come to find Alcita who had visited the orphanage alone? He always worried about Alcita.
“Stop going around alone, Alcita. It’s dangerous.”
Jayden always scolded Alcita like that.
“Well, I’ve confirmed your abilities, and now it’s time for real negotiations. You’ve proven your worth to me, so I should prove mine as well.”
Men gathered around Jayden. They glared fiercely like hunting dogs protecting their master. Of course, their faces, bruised and battered by Harriet, weren’t intimidating at all.
Jayden threw two photographs onto the table, as if he had prepared them in advance. Anschel nervously swallowed and examined the photos. Both men in the photos were individuals Anschel knew.
He didn’t know them personally but recognized them because they were famous. They were both presidential candidates who had opposed Dante in the previous and the election before that.
He remembered them as having a mature, dignified presence with their own political influence. Both were popular with the public because of their military backgrounds. If both hadn’t suffered sudden, unexpected deaths, they might have been able to oppose Dante Maxim.
“…Why these?”
“They were the guys I was sponsoring.”
Jayden took out a cigarette. Using his ability to light it, he grinned. In his mid-50s, he was an attractive man with a dignified charm. Wrinkles elegantly spread around the corners of his mouth as he smiled handsomely.
Anschel swallowed a groan while having the frivolous thought that if he were to age, he’d want to age gracefully like that. It was believed that Jayden had chosen to stand by Dante Maxim’s side because he believed his friend had been killed by merpeople.
But why…
“Why?”
Why did he speak like someone who had been preparing to strike at Dante Maxim’s back for the past 10 years?
As Anschel muttered with a confused expression, Jayden raised one eyebrow. Brushing back his brown hair with his hand, he said:
“…Why?? Did you think I would let that old man who killed Alcita get away with it??”
“……”
Anschel held his breath.
Almost everyone on land now believed that the Ellikiss ship, which Alcita had boarded for crossing, had sunk due to merpeople. Dante’s brainwashing had been a brilliant success, and 20 years had passed since that day. It was enough time for lies to become truth.
“Wasn’t it something you knew too? That’s why you got all worked up about becoming president.”
Jayden’s face disappeared and reappeared through the hazy cigarette smoke. He wore a very tired expression. He had been fighting for 20 years. It was an incredibly long time. The time he had spent fighting for the dead Alcita had become longer than the time he had spent with him.
“Do you know how the presidential election proceeds?”
“…50% public vote, 50% congressman vote, isn’t it?”
“That’s right.”
Jayden sat leisurely in his chair. Anschel nervously looked around, while Harriet, seemingly uninterested in joining this complicated conversation, calmly surveyed the surroundings.
However, those who made eye contact with Harriet flinched and looked away. They were touching their faces, which were swollen and bruised as if throbbing.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
