I Will Not Coexist with Evil

"Can you tell me who my dad is now?"

Eager to learn his father's identity, Quicksilver looked at Ron expectantly after revealing the limits of his ability.

"Take it.

It has not only your father's name, but also his photo."

Ron pulled out a folded sheet of paper from his pocket and handed it over with a smile, keeping his promise. His tone carried a deeper meaning.

"Once you see it, you'll have no trouble figuring out who your father is."

"Great, thanks."

Quicksilver's body flashed, and he impatiently used his ability to snatch the paper away, failing to notice the hidden meaning in Ron's words.

"He really is fast."

Emma, standing nearby, murmured in surprise.

"I'm starting to believe he can reach twenty times the speed of sound."

From over ten meters away, she had not seen Quicksilver's movement—or even an afterimage. His body had merely flickered faintly where he sat, and the paper was already in his hand.

"Don't underestimate him. He may only be ten, but if he wanted to do something to someone, perhaps only two or three people on Earth could stop him."

In the X-Men universe, most mutants had ordinary bodies aside from their powers. Quicksilver was the only one with super-speed, and almost no one could keep up with him. He was practically invincible.

"My boss is one of them, right?"

She smiled softly.

Ron smiled but said nothing.

Ability Points: 36,000

Nearly a hundred thousand had been deducted. After a brief wave of heat passed through his body, he gained Quicksilver's ability.

His nearly limitless genetic capacity meant that what would have been agonizing genetic modification for others, even if they survived it, felt like nothing more than a faint warmth to him.

He tried activating it.

Bzz!

The next instant, it was as if everything had stopped.

Ron entered a strange new perspective.

The flashing icon awaiting selection on the game console froze.

Outside the window near the ground, a robin that had been darting past remained suspended in midair, its wings frozen mid-flap, every feather clearly visible.

Inside the room, the steam rising from a cup of hot water seemed to stop drifting, retaining the shape it had held a second ago.

Time, which flowed without pause, seemed to have had its pause button pressed and suddenly became still.

The world was like a massive piece of amber, every object frozen in place except for him.

"His speed is so fast that it creates an effect similar to stopping time."

Ron withdrew his gaze from Emma, whose smile had turned into a motionless wax statue, and understood.

He did not leap up in uncontrollable excitement to test his speed just because he had acquired Quicksilver's ability. He merely maintained that state and looked around.

He could confirm his speed later.

"I suddenly understand why speedsters like Superman and The Flash sometimes get ambushed by people far slower than themselves, or even ordinary people."

After a while, realization dawned on him.

A nearly frozen world was too boring.

If a speedster kept their ability activated all the time, then even casually exchanging a few words with someone would feel like it took months of relative time.

When he and his girlfriend woke up in the morning, even a simple "good morning" would take what felt like half a month to finish hearing.

If this perspective remained active forever and could not be turned off, a speedster would probably go mad from loneliness before long.

"It seems I can partially shut down the ability and retain only super-fast reactions."

Ron began familiarizing himself with his newly acquired power.

He turned off super speed, heightened time perception, and everything else, retaining only super-fast reactions. Then, if anything unexpected happened, he could activate the ability again without affecting his normal life.

He partially shut down the ability and looked at Quicksilver, who had opened the paper.

Time seemed to resume flowing. The bird outside darted away, and the steam above the cup seemed to break free of its restraints and continue drifting.

"Dad..."

Uneasy, Quicksilver did not immediately unfold the folded paper at super speed. Instead, he slowly opened it bit by bit, moving even more slowly than an ordinary person.

What would his dad look like? Would he be tall and thin like Quicksilver imagined, or a little more muscular?

The man who had fathered him surely could not be some slow-moving fat guy, right?

When the paper was finally unfolded and he saw what was on it, he looked it over twice in disbelief.

"Huh?"

Quicksilver's eyes widened. He looked at Ron in stunned anger, held up the paper, and pointed at the face on it.

"This is my dad?"

"Yes."

Ron nodded.

Quicksilver strongly felt that he had been tricked. "That's not my dad!"

"No, I said he is your father."

Ron nodded slowly and firmly, his tone emphatic.

"Don't lie to me. I've seen this thing you gave me more than a thousand times already."

Quicksilver angrily pointed outside.

"They're all over town. There's an identical one pasted on the utility pole at the end of the street, less than fifty meters away."

He had unfolded the paper in his hands with great apprehension, only to find a wanted poster with a familiar face on it.

It was a wanted poster for Magneto, the world's greatest terrorist.

Because of that hateful man, the existence of mutants had been exposed, forcing him, his mother, and his sister to move away from the neighborhood they knew.

"Uh, actually, it isn't identical. That's the very one from the utility pole at the end of the street."

Watching the furious child, Emma carefully raised a hand to point at it and said with a smile.

She had personally seen Ron stop the car when they arrived and have someone tear it down and bring it over.

"??"

Quicksilver's face filled with question marks. He angrily threw down the wanted poster, becoming even more convinced of his suspicions.

"You'd even lie to a child? I've never seen an adult like you!"

"If this were a lie, wouldn't it be easy to expose?"

Facing the accusation, Ron calmly spread his hands and spoke slowly.

Young Quicksilver froze, then quickly realized something.

That did seem to be true. His mother was still alive, and one question would reveal whether it was true or false.

No one would tell a lie that could be exposed so easily.

"But..."

"Could it be... I..."

"That's right. You're Magneto's son."

Ron nodded and helped him say the words he had been unable to get out.

He had to admit, he had always thought Magneto had been alone in darkness and pain, pursuing his enemies. Only after remembering Quicksilver did he realize he might have misunderstood.

Magneto's life had actually been quite comfortable. While pursuing his enemies, he had not forgotten to leave romantic affairs everywhere. His stern, cold aura had given people the wrong impression.

"M-My dad is a terrorist?"

Quicksilver could not believe it.

Now that he knew who his father was, all his joy had vanished.

"How could my dad be a terrorist?"

His voice grew louder, as though he could not accept it.

"Correction: he's the greatest terrorist in human history," Emma said.

Was that title supposed to sound impressive?

Ten-year-old Quicksilver broke down, the corner of his mouth twitching.

"Uh, actually, you know..."

Remembering that Ron had said he and Magneto had once been friends—which implied they were no longer friends, perhaps even enemies—Quicksilver swallowed and hurriedly forced out a smile.

"I've never seen my dad since I was little, and I don't have any feelings for him. He abandoned my mom and me when I was young.

I only wanted to know who my dad was so I could get revenge on him.

That's right, revenge on him."

Quicksilver grew smoother as he spoke. In the end, he shouted emotionally in his childish voice.

"I will not coexist with evil!"

He declared righteously that he was not on the same side as the terrorist Magneto and had absolutely nothing to do with terrorists.

"Boss, isn't this child a little too mature?"

Emma was somewhat dumbfounded. She turned to Ron, feeling that Quicksilver was overly mature.

"Speedsters can't be measured by ordinary people's sense of time."

Ron smiled.

If Quicksilver wanted to, he could easily learn in one year what others needed decades or even centuries to learn. It was perfectly normal for him to be far more mature than children his age.