The arrival of the delegation from the Sanctuary of the Silent Blade sent a fresh wave of panic through the Royal Palace, a panic made all the more acute because it lacked the chaotic, almost comical, nature of Saitama's previous escapades. This was different. This was deliberate. This was a challenge issued by a legendary, reclusive power, and it was aimed squarely at the heart of Midgar's most volatile asset.
The delegation consisted of five individuals. They waited in the main palace courtyard, the same spot where Saitama had first been presented to the King. Four of them were clad in the same flowing white robes and featureless silver masks as Seraphina, their postures perfectly still, their presence radiating a disciplined, chilling silence. They stood like statues, swords at their sides, their very stillness a testament to their immense control.
At their center stood their leader, the "Matriarch of Stillness." She wore no mask. Her face was ancient, a beautiful, severe sculpture of weathered stone, framed by long, snow-white hair braided with silver cords. Her eyes, the same shade of deep amethyst as Seraphina's, held the unnerving calm of a frozen lake, hinting at unfathomable depths beneath. She leaned lightly on a simple, unadorned staff of pale, petrified wood, but it was clear this was a mark of station, not a sign of infirmity. Her power was not overt, not a crackling aura, but a palpable presence, a stillness so profound it seemed to warp the air around her, demanding silence and respect.
King Olric, flanked by his most trusted advisors, met them in the courtyard. The atmosphere was thick with tension. This was not a diplomatic visit; it was a confrontation cloaked in formal language.
"Matriarch," the King began, his voice carefully measured, regal, "your unannounced arrival is… unexpected. The Sanctuary has kept its own counsel for centuries. What purpose brings you to Midgar now?"
The Matriarch's amethyst eyes met the King's. Her voice, when she spoke, was quiet, yet it carried across the courtyard with absolute clarity, a sound like ancient stones shifting. "The world shifts, King Olric. A new weight has been placed upon the scales of power. A weight so great it threatens to break the mechanism entirely. We have come to measure this weight." Her gaze drifted past the King, towards the palace wing where Saitama resided. "Seraphina, one of our most promising pupils, faced your 'Tempest.' She found not an opponent, but a refutation of all she knew. She conceded, not from fear, but from a logical understanding of futility. This is… unacceptable."
Lord Valerius bristled. "Unacceptable? Your swordswoman was defeated. There is no dishonor in acknowledging a superior foe."
The Matriarch turned her chillingly calm gaze on Valerius. "You misunderstand, Commander. The dishonor is not in the defeat. The unacceptability lies in the unknown. We do not fear power. We seek to understand it, to define its edges, to find its center. Your Tempest has no discernible edges. We are here to help him find them." She looked back at the King. "We have issued a formal challenge. A trial by combat. Not for glory, not for a prize, but for… clarity. A true measure of his strength, against one who understands the nature of 'stillness' and 'the void'."
"And who would that be?" King Olric asked, though he already suspected the answer.
The Matriarch smiled, a faint, humorless expression. "I, of course."
A collective gasp went through the King's entourage. The Matriarch herself? The legendary head of the Sanctuary of the Silent Blade, a figure whose skill was said to be so profound she could sever the bond between a soul and its body with a single, silent touch? This was not just a challenge; it was a duel of mythological proportions.
"That is… unwise," Archmagus Theron cautioned, stepping forward slightly. "Matriarch, with all due respect, the power you seek to measure… it does not operate on a scale that can be safely contained. The risks…"
"The risks of not understanding are greater, Archmagus," the Matriarch countered coolly. "A force of nature left to wander unchecked, driven by whims and appetites, is a cataclysm waiting to happen. It must be confronted. It must be made to understand its own nature. We are here not to defeat him – a concept that may be meaningless – but to show him what he is. To hold up a mirror."
Before the King could formulate a response that would somehow refuse this terrifying proposition without causing a major diplomatic incident, a cheerful voice cut through the tension.
"Hey! Is this the fighty place? Am I late?"
Saitama ambled into the courtyard, trailed by a pale and sweating Sir Kaelan. He wore his hero suit, a look of genuine, almost childlike, eagerness on his face. He looked at the assembled dignitaries, then at the silent, masked swordsmen, then his eyes landed on the Matriarch.
"Oh, hi!" he said, waving. "You must be the head bad guy… uh… I mean, head challenger! You look… old. But in a cool, wise, maybe-knows-a-secret-pancake-recipe kind of way."
The Matriarch's ancient amethyst eyes fixed on Saitama. She studied him, her gaze piercing, analytical. She saw no aura, no ki, no discernible power source. Just… a man. A bafflingly ordinary-looking man who radiated an almost offensive level of nonchalance. And yet, she could feel it – the subtle warping of reality around him, the passive "wrongness" that had so thoroughly broken Seraphina's paradigm.
"Saitama the Tempest," the Matriarch said, her voice still calm, though perhaps a faint trace of curiosity had entered it. "I am the Matriarch of the Sanctuary of the Silent Blade. I have come to test the limits of your strength."
Saitama beamed. "Awesome! A test! Is it multiple choice? I'm not great at those. But if it's punching, I'm pretty good at punching." He cracked his knuckles. "So, do we do it here? Or back in that big sandy circle place? The acoustics were pretty good there."
"This place will suffice," the Matriarch stated. She gestured for her four masked attendants to retreat, which they did with silent, fluid precision, creating a wide circle. She then took a single step forward, her petrified wood staff held loosely in one hand. She did not draw a weapon.
"A test of limits," she continued, her gaze locked on Saitama, "requires a clear understanding of what is being tested. Your physical power is, by all accounts, absolute. A direct confrontation is… inefficient."
"Inefficient?" Saitama looked disappointed. "You mean you're not gonna fight me? Aw, man! I was really looking forward to it!"
"Oh, we will 'fight'," the Matriarch assured him, a faint, cryptic smile touching her lips. "But not in the way you anticipate. The body is a vessel. True strength lies not in the vessel, but in the will that commands it. Let us test… your will."
Before anyone could react, she tapped the butt of her staff on the stone ground. One simple, quiet tap.
Tap.
There was no explosion. No shockwave. No flash of light. But the entire courtyard… changed.
For Saitama, the world suddenly dissolved. The stone courtyard, the worried faces of the King and his council, the blue sky above – all of it vanished, replaced by an endless, silent, featureless expanse of pure, unbroken white. There was no up, no down, no sound, no sensation. It was a perfect, absolute void of sensory input.
He stood in the center of this infinite nothingness, looking around, blinking. "Huh," he said, his voice sounding strangely flat, without echo. "Did someone turn on a fog machine? Or is this, like, the inside of a giant ping pong ball?"
In the real world, in the courtyard, Saitama had not moved. He stood perfectly still, his eyes slightly unfocused, a blank expression on his face. The Matriarch stood opposite him, her eyes closed, her hand resting on her staff, a faint, almost invisible silver light shimmering around her head.
"What is this?!" King Olric demanded, his guards instinctively raising their shields. "What has she done?!"
"A psychic duel, Your Majesty," Archmagus Theron breathed, his eyes wide with awe. "A Mindscape. She has not moved him physically, but has drawn his consciousness, his very spirit, into a personalized reality of her own creation. A place where physical strength is meaningless. This is the ultimate technique of her Sanctuary – the 'Chamber of Stillness.' She intends to break his will, his spirit, without ever laying a hand on his body. A brilliant, terrifying gambit."
Inside the white void, a voice echoed in Saitama's mind, the calm, melodic voice of the Matriarch. **
Saitama looked around the endless white. "Eternity, huh? Sounds… really, really boring." He sat down on the non-existent floor, crossing his legs. "So… no snacks in here, I guess? No TV?"
**
Saitama sighed. He looked at his hands. He looked at his feet. He looked at the endless, featureless white. An eternity of this? It was worse than a lecture on royal etiquette from Kaelan. It was worse than running out of noodles. This was… the ultimate boredom.
He sat there for what felt like a few seconds. He thought about what he wanted for dinner. He wondered if he'd left a sock on the laundry line. He tried to remember the theme song to that one cartoon with the talking dog.
Then, he got bored of being bored.
"Okay, I'm done with this," he announced to the void.
**
"Nah," Saitama said. "I think I can be done." He stood up. He looked around the infinite, white, metaphysical prison designed to shatter the psyches of gods and demons. He then did something the Matriarch, in her millennia of existence, could never have anticipated.
He punched it.
He punched the concept of the white void. He punched the metaphysical construct of the Mindscape. He punched the very idea of the 'Chamber of Stillness.' It was a single, straightforward, "Normal Punch," aimed at the featureless nothingness in front of him.
In the real world, the Matriarch of Stillness suddenly gasped. Her eyes flew open, wide with shock and pain. The faint silver light around her head shattered like glass. Her ancient, serene face contorted in a silent scream. Blood trickled from her nose and ears. Her petrified wood staff cracked from top to bottom.
In Saitama's perception, the infinite white void in front of his fist developed a small, dark hairline crack. Then another. And another. A network of cracks spread outwards at impossible speed, and then, with a sound that was both a deafening shatter and a profound silence, the entire metaphysical reality of the Mindscape… broke. It crumbled away like ancient plaster, revealing the familiar, solid reality of the palace courtyard behind it.
Saitama lowered his fist, blinking as his senses readjusted to the real world. "There," he said, looking around. "Much better. That white room was really starting to hurt my eyes."
He looked at the Matriarch. She was swaying on her feet, her face ashen, her amethyst eyes wide with a horror that went beyond fear, a look of someone who had just witnessed the fundamental laws of their universe be casually, brutally, defied. Her four masked attendants rushed to her side, supporting her.
"My… my Mindscape…" the Matriarch whispered, her voice a broken, trembling thing. "My Chamber of Stillness… he… he punched it… he punched a concept… and it broke…" She stared at Saitama, at the fist he had used to shatter a reality built of pure thought, and she finally, truly, understood.
Saitama wasn't just a physical anomaly. His power, his very existence, transcended the boundaries between the physical and the metaphysical. He could punch concepts. He could shatter realities. He was not just a piece on the board; he was a being who could, with a bored sigh, punch the board itself into splinters.
The Matriarch looked at Saitama, at the King, at the stunned court. Then, supported by her attendants, she turned, and with a dignity that was somehow more profound in her defeat, she began to walk away, her steps unsteady.
Her challenge was over. Her question had been answered. The abyss had been measured. And it had no bottom.
Saitama watched them go. "Huh. She left too. And I didn't even get to do my 'Consecutive Normal Punches' this time." He sighed, a sound of profound disappointment. "Another boring fight." He then looked hopefully towards King Olric. "So… since I won again, does that mean I get, like, a bonus pancake? For the trouble?"
The King of Midgar just stared at the retreating form of the defeated Matriarch, then at the man who had just punched a hole in philosophy, and slowly, deliberately, put his head in his hands.