Saitama still didn't try to brute-force it. With a light tap of his foot, his body slid away like a phantom, slipping around to the demon's side as his eyes quickly swept over its entire frame.
The demon attacked nonstop. Saitama kept dodging, watching, analyzing. Before long, he realized the runes on the demon's front and sides were dense and bright—the energy force field there was extremely strong. But when he circled behind it, he noticed the runes across its back were noticeably sparser, and the glow was much dimmer.
"So the back's weaker?" Saitama thought.
Just then, after failing to land a hit for so long, the demon grew irritable and spun around, trying to sweep him away with its thick tail. That motion fully exposed the rune-sparse region of its back to Saitama.
The opening was here.
Saitama didn't dodge again. He pushed off the ground and closed the distance in an instant, appearing behind the demon. His right fist shot out like a cannon round—silent, yet carrying a precise, annihilating force—as it slammed straight into the center of the demon's back, the exact point where the runes were thinnest!
The stone statue demon sensed the danger behind it, but it was too late to turn. The runes across its body flickered wildly, trying to condense an energy field for defense, but its back was its weakness to begin with!
Saitama's fist landed solidly.
There was no earth-shaking explosion—only a crisp "ka—crack!" like glass shattering.
From the impact point of Saitama's punch, the sparse runes on the demon's back went out instantly, like lights losing power. Then fractures spread rapidly across its entire body!
"No————! Impossible!" the demon screamed in despair, feeling the core rune that sustained its existence being destroyed.
RATTLE RATTLE———!
The next second, the demon's massive body completely collapsed—not in an explosion, but crumbling into a pile of ordinary black stones with no trace of life, scattering across the floor. Only a few larger chunks still carried faint rune marks, fading away by the moment.
Silence returned to the gallery. Only the sound of the night wind blowing in through the hole in the dome remained.
Saitama shook his hand out, looked at the scattered stones, then bent down and picked up a piece, weighing it in his palm. "Oh. It's just regular rock."
Off to the side, Thor struggled up into a seated position. He stared at how the once-overbearing demon had instantly become nothing more than rubble—then looked at the bald man who was now studying rock composition. Without thinking, he flexed his still-numb hand. He summoned Mjolnir back; the hammer flew into his grasp, and that familiar heavy weight returned.
But at that moment… Thor suddenly felt that this hammer somehow didn't feel as heavy as it used to.
Was it an illusion? Or was it because he'd just witnessed another level of power—pure, absolute strength taken to its extreme?
Thor shook his head, clearing away the cluttered thoughts, then stood and walked over to Saitama.
"Saitama… once again… thank you."
Saitama set the rock down and dusted off his hands. "No problem. But Thor, next time you play with lightning, be careful. You almost struck yourself."
Thor's face turned red with embarrassment. He really had been careless.
"…With the museum wrecked like this, do we have to pay for it?" Saitama asked, looking around at the devastated gallery.
Thor let out a sigh. "…S.H.I.E.L.D. will handle it. Let's go."
The two of them walked out of the ruined museum side by side. The night wind brushed past them, and Thor watched the seemingly ordinary bald man at his side, feeling his definition of "strength" get rewritten yet again.
Runes, magic, reflected energy…
In front of absolute power and precise insight none of it seemed to matter.
Maybe that was Saitama's way: simple, direct, and unbelievably effective.
(End of Chapter)
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