Sophia dropped her fork.
Clatter!
It hit the plate hard. Adrian flinched—his new reflexes were so fast his sluggish, unaccustomed body couldn't quite catch up.
"Okay," Sophia stood up, her chair scraping violently against the linoleum. "Who the hell are you, and what did you do with Hayes?"
"It's me." Adrian raised his hands, palms out.
In the cracked mirror over the sink, a stranger stared back: six-foot frame, pitch-black hair bleeding into stark white roots, and glowing cerulean eyes. The Six Eyes.
"You said you were joking about being a sorcerer!She gestured wildly at his transformed body. "You look like a Zara model for evil twins. Adrian, your eyes were brown!"
"They were." He didn't blink. His upgraded brain was already processing a million variables at once. "Everything changed yesterday. I can't explain it without sounding insane."
"Try me. I saw the Hulk slam a flying whale into a building yesterday. My bar for insane is pretty high."
Adrian kept it short. "Things came through during the invasion. Not aliens—worse. Cursed spirits. I can see them, and now I can fight them."
Sophia stared at him, her jaw tight as she processed the truth. "So the alley yesterday... that wasn't a concussion?"
"No."
"If you get yourself killed doing this, I'll never forgive you," she whispered. "You're all the family I've got left in this city."
"I'm not planning on dying."
An hour later, Adrian stepped onto the streets wearing a heavy hood and dark sunglasses to hide his glowing eyes.
The city was in ruins. National Guard checkpoints blocked off Midtown, and dust hung heavy in the air. But where the destruction was worst, cursed energy pooled thick—grief and panic manifesting into hungry monsters.
Time to test this body.
Behind a ruined laundromat three blocks from the checkpoint, he found his first target. A low-grade cursed spirit resembling a deformed, six-legged dog was gnawing on a fallen streetlamp.
Adrian didn't need a weapon. He channeled a thread of cursed energy into his right fist, feeling the crackling warmth, and closed the distance in four rapid strides.
Boom!
A single punch pulverized its skull with a sickening crunch. The impact launched the creature into a steel dumpster, caving it in before the body dissolved into black mist.
[ +15 EXP ]
A translucent blue system window flickered in his vision.
Peak Human Physique is no joke, Adrian thought, flexing his knuckles.
He kept moving.
Two more low-level spirits appeared. A floating jellyfish made of barbed wire—gutted with one reinforced kick. A quick, scuttling crawler—pinned to the concrete with a cursed-energy-infused piece of rebar.
[ +10 EXP ]
[ +12 EXP ]
He crouched behind an overturned car three blocks deeper into the hazard zone. Activating the passive vision of his Six Eyes, the world shifted into threads of shimmering violet energy.
Then, he felt it.
Not a faint energy signature. Heat.
Blistering, furnace-like heat radiating from a manhole cover fifty feet away. The asphalt around it was literally melting, bubbling into black tar.
Through his Six Eyes, the violet threads formed a massive, pulsating vortex of raw, suffocating power. Something immense was sleeping beneath the street.
[ WARNING: CURSED ENERGY SIGNATURE EXCEEDS CURRENT SCAN THRESHOLD ]
[ SOURCE UNCLASSIFIED. EXTREME DANGER. RETREAT RECOMMENDED ]
Adrian's blood ran cold. Heat like a blast furnace? Cursed energy dense enough to melt asphalt?
Jogo? Or something worse?
He didn't hesitate. Step by step, using Todo's battle instincts, he backed away without making a sound. He didn't run. Running invites a chase.
The sleeping monster didn't move
I'm barely Grade 3, Adrian realized, sweat trickling down his neck once he reached safety. And whatever is down there didn't even care that I was close.
By dusk, he slipped back into his apartment.
Sophia was waiting on the couch, TV muted. Her eyes locked onto him instantly.
"You're bleeding," she said.
Adrian checked his arm. A thin trail of red ran down his forearm from a stray barb. He hadn't even felt it.
"It's fine. Barely a scratch."
"That's what scares me," Sophia said quietly. "You didn't even notice."
Adrian didn't answer. He locked the door behind him and stared out the window toward Midtown.
The Avengers had saved New York from the aliens. But the real nightmare was just waking up underneath it.