BOOOOM!! A pillar of smoke erupted several blocks to the north.
The shockwave rolled across the rooftops.
Majestic immediately looked over. Before he could say anything, his intern's voice came through the Comms between static bursts.
"Hey Sensei! Is it possible to get backup over here?"
"What's going on?"
On the other end across town, hidden behind a rusted watchtower overlooking the abandoned industrial district, the upper half of Setsuna Tokage's body peered over the edge of a rooftop at the scene below.
"I tailed it from a distance just like you ordered until it reached a collapsed industrial building ..." Her body was split into dozens of body parts, face frowning at the scene before her.
The deeper she looked... The less it resembled the aftermath of a random attack. Support columns had been folded in half and the street looked wrecked beyond recognition. "...It doesn't look like the Nomu did this."
Another explosion echoed through the factory.
BOOM!! Dust rolled through the shattered complex.
Then...
Her floating head caught movement.
"...There!"
At the center of the destruction, Hood stood amidst the rubble. Jet-black tendrils extended from its back, writhing slowly through the air. Several of them had pierced into collapsed debris. Littered around were corpses of battered men and women. Only two were left alive.
One of them coughed violently, blood dripping from the corner of his mouth as he struggled against the crushing grip.
"Ugh... let... go..."
Hood's glowing yellow eye settled upon him.
"...Light..."
The slight wound on his chest from the man's attack quickly healed
"...Where... did..." His grip tightened.
The man's face immediately turned purple.
"...the light..."
"...come..."
"...from?"
"... Ugh .. He's gone .."
Hood remained perfectly still, eyes narrowing
"...Lies..."
CRACK! Another tendril coiled tighter around one prisoner's ribs.
The sickening sound of bones giving way echoed across the empty factory.
The man howled in agony. "I swear! That white bastard just disappeared. I don't know crap!"
Hood's eyes narrowed. "Then .. " SQUELCH! The man's face stiffened. Following which, he slumped to the ground, devoid of life.
Nakime, still restrained this whole time, felt her blood run cold "...That bastard..." Her eye twitched.
Dropping the corpse, Hood's glowing eyes settled upon the final survivor.
"Die .."
He raised a cluster of thick, writhing black tendrils, aiming for her chest. But before they could pierce her through, the ground beneath Hood's legs burst apart.
RUMBLE!!
Massive slabs of earth burst upward from every direction, folding inward like gigantic jaws. Layers upon layers of compressed stone slammed together, completely enclosing the High-End inside a colossal dome of solid rock.
Dust exploded into the sky.
Setsuna's floating jaw nearly detached from the rest of her face.
"...What's going ..."
FWOOOSH!!
A black blur shot past her so fast that the resulting wind nearly scattered every detached piece of her body.
"W-Whoa!"
The figure didn't slow down. Orange chakra erupted around him, cloaking his body from head to toe.
CRACK... CRACK... CRACK...
A gigantic translucent ribcage materialized around him, followed by an enormous skeletal arm extending from the side.
Orange energy rapidly condensed into its grasp to form an energy blade of ridiculous proportions.
The skeletal Susanoo swung without hesitation.
SHRRRRKKK!!
The glowing sword cleaved through the stone prison as though it were paper. The resistance that followed only lasted for a split second.
SQUELCH!!
The blade carved through flesh.
BOOOOOOM!!
The large stone prison split cleanly in two as a violent shockwave ripped across the industrial district sending dust and debris in all directions. Chunks of rock rained from the sky.
Down below, the enormous sword slowly came to a halt.
Nakime's eyes widened. "What just ..."
Meanwhile, '...It dodged that.'
Behind his mask, Yuta's expression darkened.
Just then. A sonic wave shot out of the debris cloud. Inside his Susanoo, Yuta stiffened for a moment. Almost immediately, several black tendrils erupted from the collapsing stone. They shot toward him from multiple blind spots.
CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! Each slammed against the glowing ribs of Susanoo. Still midair, the energy construct was knocked away, and Yuta along with it for over several feet before smashing a crater into the earth.
On the areas of collision, not a single dent appeared.
"...Tch." Yuta clicked his tongue as he regained control. 'Temporary paralysis.'
His gaze settled upon the bisected lower half of a body lying across shattered stone.
"I really thought I had it with that one." He scratched the side of his mask as he stood to his feet.
The moment he raised his head, both of them locked eyes. High above the ruined complex, Hood hovered motionlessly in the morning sky.
The High-End's lower abdomen and legs were completely gone .... cleaved cleanly in two by the initial strike. But a horrific, writhing network of black muscle fibers and fresh bone was already crawling outward from his waistline, regenerating his lower body from the stomach downward at an impossible, nauseating speed.
At the very last moment, the High-End had burst upward through the collapsing prison, causing the slash intended for its head to miss by a lot of inches.
Unfortunately, an opening like that wasn't likely to happen twice. Opposite him, Hood's yellow eyes observed him with great scrutiny as it continued to regenerate.
"... You ..." The dual-toned rasp descended. "... You're still standing."
Yuta tilted his head, returning said scrutiny. "So the report wasn't farfetched. You really can talk."
The orange blade held by Susanoo dissolved into motes of chakra.
On the way here, Hawks had relayed nearly everything he had heard from his communicator.
An intelligent Nomu with rapid regeneration, multiple quirks and extreme adaptability. All in all, yet another thing that apparently happened after Season Four. Yuta's brows furrowed. The sheer speed of this creature's hyper-regeneration was significantly more outrageous than anything he remembered from the early USJ incident in the original timeline.
However that might be because the USJ Nomu never needed to regenerate everything from the head downwards. His clone had hit this thing with a maximum-output, lightning-infused chakra Railgun, and it still hadn't died.
From the memories his brain had processed after the clone dissipated, the conclusion was clear: the only way to permanently put this thing down was to completely obliterate the head before it could automatically regenerate.
'However, my regular attacks aren't going to do anything here.' Lightning Release: Railgun was easily among his strongest offensive techniques. An evolved version of the attack he'd once used against All For One.
Even with barely a third of his chakra, a shadow clone could still replicate its destructive force.
Unfortunately, both versions required a completely unrealistic buildup charge, was entirely unsuited for a fast-paced aerial dogfight, and consumed an astronomical amount of chakra. More importantly, he preferred not to utilize heavy lightning-based applications outside of his public "White Fang" persona when possible to keep his capabilities hidden.
Aizawa's discussion was still fresh in his mind. However, the Nomu before him had a very fast reaction speed. Without it, he simply didn't possess a standard physical attack capable of erasing it in a single blow. Come to think of it, this was probably the third time his preferred combat style had encountered an opponent it simply wasn't designed to defeat.
"Since a standard back-and-forth punch-out is just going to waste my time... I'll have to resort to something else to kill you."
By now Hood's regeneration was complete. Hearing Yuta's words, his arms bulged to exaggerated proportions.
"...Kill..."
Its yellow eye narrowed.
"...Me?"
WHOOOSH!!
The instant the last word left its mouth, Hood disappeared and appeared right before Yuta's Susanoo.
BOOOOM!!
The force of the collision created a shockwave, sending debris in all directions.
'It's faster than I thought.' On the Susanoo, there still wasn't a single dent. He had initially wanted to dodge, only to realize the criminal was still behind him. Not to mention, his agility while shielded wasn't all that great.
However, he didn't need to move out of the way.
A black wing swept around. The impact struck Susanoo's ribs.
CLAAAAANG!! The translucent skeleton skidded sideways across the factory floor, carving two trenches through reinforced concrete before finally stopping.
Without pause—
FWIP! FWIP! FWIP! Dozens of black tendrils erupted from Hood's back.
They descended from every angle.
CLANG!
CLANG!
CLANG!
Each collision rang like enormous bells throughout the industrial district. Chunks of concrete flew into the air. Yuta's visible eye remained fixed on Hood.
Reaction speed...
Excellent.
Strength... Pretty outrageous. Honestly, in the current state of the country, 'Is there anyone that could realistically beat this thing besides me?'
Seeing his attacks weren't having any effect, Hood condensed his tendrils and hammered ..
Only to go completely still the next moment.
'Mugen Koya.'
VUUUUUUM—!!
The world instantly changed. Color instantly drained from the universe. With tunneling vision, everything shifted before resetting into something else. The crimson sky stretched in every direction without horizon. By the time Hood regained his senses, the city was long gone, replaced with cracked earth and a blood-red moon.
".... Where ... Is this?"
The monster stumbled, turning his head around, seeing nothing but a barren wasteland. Twenty meters away, Yuta stood atop a jagged spire of dried earth. "... It feels like it's been forever." Looking at the barren space, his mind returned to the night where he fought Overhaul and had been reduced to a miserable state.
If he had even ten percent control of his abilities back then, he wouldn't have needed to pull this lifeline which he had only managed through sheer luck.
WHOOSH!
Hood appeared before him right then and there.
BANG!
The shockwave caused the barren earth to shatter. Yuta, still clad in his Susanoo ribcage remained unharmed. The earth shot up, enclosing the High end and dragging him underground. Unfortunately, that still wouldn't be enough to kill it.
In the days since regaining his Mangekyo Sharingan, Yuta had finally gotten full knowledge of what his MS abilities could do. The left eye, Mugen Koya, was a Genjutsu similar to Tsukuyomi, enabling him to drag an opponent into an illusory world.
Time had a similar dilation, enabling him to stretch a single second in the outside world for as long as his chakra could last. The distinction however laid in the fact that the targets could not be subjected to torture at will.
In this world, opponents had just as much agency as they did in reality and he was unable to manipulate their perception or invoke illusory pain. However, what it lacked in those areas were made up for in other advantages.
The terrain was entirely his to manipulate at will with nothing but a single thought. Furthermore, any injuries sustained in this illusory world would remain illusions. Besides the strain from the Mangekyo Sharingan, injuries sustained prior to usage could similarly be erased at will.
What made it truly terrifying was applying the inverse to the opponent. Whatever injuries they faced in the illusory world would be perfectly transplanted into their real body like a reverse Izanagi. This function however, was countered by people possessing freakish regeneration.
Hence, requiring him to go a step further.
Yuta closed his eyes tightly, focusing the majority of his chakra reserves into his pupil. The pattern within the eye spun backward, activating his second, hidden pupil technique—Keiyaku (The Covenant)
'By a binding oath upon my own flesh, I surrender my own regeneration.'
'For the next twenty-four hours, let no wound upon my flesh close by itself.'
'I surrender the use of Mugen Kōya. Until seven sunrises have passed, let this eye remain forever shut.'
'In return... Grant me the power to ignore the limits of my eyes, so I may invoke ..'
BANG!
The High end erupted from the earth, roaring as it rushed towards me. Unfortunately, it was too late.
'... A Perfect Susanoo.'
VUUUUUUM—!!