The Super AI he carried boasted computational speeds ten thousand times faster than the strongest computers of this era. The intelligence born from that naturally would not engage in the thankless task of comparing physical strength with an idealistic construct like the Doomsday Monster. It barely needed to calculate to conclude that a missile barrage was clearly superior in both cost-effectiveness and damage output. At this range, even the most incompetent AI could hit the enemy with precision.
Beyond seven steps, missiles might not be accurate, but they were fast. Within seven steps, missiles were both accurate and fast.
Since the opponent had already fallen, the next step was to kick it while it was down.
Hardened alloy fangs collided with the Doomsday Monster's tough body, molecular vibrations relentlessly ravaging its tissues. As the Doomsday Monster's screams grew louder, V-rex's tearing force and bite strength continued to increase. With one final bloodcurdling cry of "Doomsday Monster!" V-rex temporarily ended the enemy's suffering. Dark energy erupted as he bit off and tore away the Doomsday Monster's entire right leg, then flung it into the distance with a toss of his head.
Having lost the ability to stand, the Doomsday Monster struggled to turn itself over and crawled with both hands and its remaining left leg. Born to instill fear in others, it now felt from V-rex a terror hundreds of times deeper than anything it had ever inflicted upon humanity. No matter what, its meager intelligence now wanted only one thing: to escape this terrifying enemy as quickly as possible.
But V-rex noticed its intention to flee. He pinned the Doomsday Monster down with one foot, and another round of agonized screams marked the beginning of a new "dismemberment."
"Roar—!"
The tyrannosaurus's overwhelmingly domineering roar was V-REX's declaration of victory.
"Guh..."
Covering their writhing throats and mouths, Saya and the others looked as though they were about to throw up. They had never seen such a horrifying scene of giant beasts devouring one another.
While V-rex busied himself with "Shang Yang's art," the view shifted to Time Fire's side.
Side Story Case File 18: Courage That Wouldn't Rise
The people who had narrowly escaped death gulped down the fresh air of survival.
"Just as I thought... in the end, I held everyone back..."
A strained, bitter smile appeared on Homare's face. Her fingers, gripping both armrests, let out a harsh creak.
"I'm sorry, Rumi E. If you hadn't brought along deadweight like me, you definitely could have escaped."
After the Doomsday Monster fell, its enormous shadow engulfed the two small, fragile figures. Even that short golden hair lost its brilliant color in the darkness.
She wanted to move her legs. If she could move, she would surely be able to grab Rumi E's hand and flee with her. Instead, whenever she tried to command her legs to move, her body began trembling uncontrollably. In the end, they did not respond at all.
Just like before. That day, after falling on the track, getting back up should have been easy for a body that still retained an athlete's conditioning. Yet her trembling heart desperately cried, Do you want another tragedy to happen? and stopped her.
It was the same this time. Even though feeling had returned to her legs, even though rehabilitation had restored her body to normal, to the point where she could stand just like anyone else.
Modern medicine could restore her body to how it had been before the accident, but the heart that had been hurt once more was not something modern medicine could heal.
Thinking that, Kagayaki Homare closed her eyes as if resigning herself to fate.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, as though everything had already been decided.
In the end, I was too afraid to even lose once...
"No... what are you saying?!"
The response to Homare's complicated, despondent feelings came from Aisaki Emiru, a current female college student, without a trace of hesitation.
"Abandoning my friend and running away is something I could never do!"
Watching the two interact, Hana withdrew her gaze from the corner of her eye. Her suppressed mood finally lifted a little.
Maybe none of them in this world were perfect yet, but this friendship would never fade!
"Hey, you still alive?"
Ah, crap, I forgot there was another guy here—
Without anyone noticing, he had already walked over to the women. Seeing that even panic could not conceal the look of a patient from his own hospital, Ash let out an amused snort. The Vulcan Gun danced between his fingers, twirling from his right hand to his left before landing on his left index finger, then spinning smoothly into its holster.
Hmm, what was up with Cure Yell this time? Why hadn't she shown up? Did she get stuck in traffic?
Ash made that maliciously random guess, while Nono Hana suddenly felt an inexplicable chill.
"Hey, you people over there. You're her friends, right? Get me a bottle of water."
Without acting like an outsider in the slightest, Ash demanded it without hesitation when the others turned their eyes toward his flame-shaped visor.
"Will mineral water do?"
"Oh, thanks. Let's see... Evian..."
Looking at the apparently high-end brand of mineral water in his hand, Ash hesitated for a moment.
Mineral water... I've only had Nongfu Three Fists and O Haha or something. What kind of brand is this? It looks like something ordinary people can't afford.
"Is that no good, Mr. Time Fire? Then I also have Yajia Spring and lluliaq."
"That's enough, that's enough."
Then, amid the others' gazes shifting from confusion to shock, Ash unscrewed the cap and dumped the entire bottle over the head of the dazed Homare.
Clear, icy coldness helped Homare clear her head through sheer physics.
"Ugh—" The ice-cold spring water falling from above jolted Kagayaki Homare awake. She opened her eyes, then quickly squeezed them shut again as mineral water flowed into them, instinctively pulling out the hand trapped beneath her and rubbing her eyes.
"Awake?"
The voice of the person before her made her hands freeze.
The Crimson Warrior stood before Kagayaki Homare. The Doomsday Monster's massive shadow had vanished somewhere, and the afternoon sun still hanging high cast its light upon the land freed from shadow, including Kagayaki Homare, who sat in her wheelchair amid the ruins.
The red warrior stood with his back to the sun and looked down into Kagayaki Homare's eyes. The sunlight streaming from behind blurred Time Fire's figure in her vision. Only his metallic lips gave off cold, merciless movements, while her stunned expression was reflected faintly in the fiery visor. It was like one of those clichéd scenes from tokusatsu shows or hot-blooded anime, used to portray powerful reinforcements descending from the sky.
"Who are you?" The overly dazzling light made Kagayaki Homare narrow her eyes instinctively.
"Who I am isn't important. What matters is that you need to stand up and go to the shelter with your companions. Staying here makes it hard to guarantee your safety."
"But didn't the enemy already—"
Before Hana could finish, Ash mercilessly covered her mouth. She could only wave her arms around in protest and make muffled, angry noises.
Saying something Kagayaki Homare could not quite understand, the red warrior bent down and extended a hand toward the girl in the wheelchair.
"No, I can't stand..."
"You won't know unless you try, right?" The red warrior shrugged, speaking in a light tone.
"I touched your legs just now. They have normal sensation and basic healthy neural reflexes. There aren't any injuries on them, and your muscles are fine too. Walking normally should be easy."
Ash did not think there was anything wrong with saying something that left everyone around him petrified, calmly laying out his conclusion bit by bit.
"Eh... you touched my legs?"
Without a doubt, that was O harassment.
But faced with Time Fire's excessively matter-of-fact attitude, even Homare herself did not know whether she should scream at him for being a pervert or blush helplessly.
"Yeah. Come to think of it, they felt pretty nice. The shape of your legs is pretty good too. Looks like you used to be an athlete or trained before."
Naturally, Ash effortlessly ignored the looks from everyone around him that said, Do you even know what the hell you're saying?
"But... I tried before." Homare's complexion looked rather poor. "For me right now, it isn't something I can do just by wanting to."
"That's why I said you should try."
"No... I can't do it!" Her fingers clenched the armrests even harder. "I want to, but no matter what I do, I... I don't have the courage!"
"What I mean is... if you can't do it, then all you have left is willpower."
Ash suddenly grabbed the handles behind the wheelchair, turned it around, and pushed it straight out.
"So get the hell up already, you pathetic girl!"
Side Story Case File 19: A Self-Righteous Man
In the past, when Ash had still been young and had not yet had the chance to actually become a "villain," he had encountered the Transforming Hero series by chance. He had become utterly engrossed in the "heroic charm" that did not exist in reality, but he was not merely a tokusatsu nerd who had watched nothing but special-effects shows... well, at least not yet.
Occasionally, probably when he wanted a change of pace, even Ash would watch other anime. Aside from the giant robot shows he especially loved, the ones that left the deepest impression on him were actually those bland moe harem anime.
Unlike ordinary people, it was not the beautiful women with their varying personalities that stirred his perverted desires. In fact, he generally had no particular interest in women while watching a show. What truly left an impression on him were the male protagonists—yes, those useless male leads who were standard in such moe harem series, pathetic and spineless compared to all kinds of heroes.
The protagonists in those shows merely lived dull, ordinary lives. At most, they were occasionally kind to others—though it would be more accurate to say they acted weak and submissive around everyone. They were only a little better than Ash himself, who was normally completely gloomy around other people.
Yet those utterly useless protagonists would somehow have a whole crowd of women gravitating toward them, getting jealous over their relationships with them and acting out all kinds of romantic comedies. Whenever the heroines explained why they liked them, their answer was always some stock line like, "You're so kind." Honestly, it was infuriatingly effortless.
In fact, even now, Ash disliked those pointless plots about messing around with the opposite sex. Reality was the same. Wouldn't it be better to spend that spare time watching two more episodes of anime?
So when he first encountered them, Ash truly could not understand what "kindness" even was. It was a principle that even a genius like him could not decipher—how could it so easily make someone fall for an incompatible member of the opposite sex?
Later, Ash gradually understood. The protagonists in the moe harem anime he watched were written as useless losers. The so-called "you're so kind" merely meant that they had no traits beyond being nice to people, so "kind" was the only word anyone could use to praise them.
So from then on, Ash, who considered himself a genius and secretly looked down on everyone around him, swore that he would never become a "kind" person!
Ash was not useless. Ash was a genius!
Ash was not kind. Ash did not have even a penny's worth of connection to kindness!
Thus, faced with Homare's situation—her legs clearly being intact, yet unable to move simply because of psychological issues—the red warrior's heart filled with contempt.
So, since he had come and felt like helping her, Ash would not choose some "kind" method of slowly building her confidence and helping her stand again. That was far too inefficient.
Ash's choice was extremely simple and straightforward: pick up a helmet, put it on her head, then give her a push.
Yes, literally—give her a push.
Ash stood at the top of the downhill road as though he could not see the terror and pleading on the blonde woman's face. He aimed at the wheelchair behind her and lightly pressed his index finger forward against its back.
It was only a light push.
"Ahhhhh—stop! I can't stop!"
The blonde woman's terrified expression instantly made her look as though her soul had flown away. She tried to grab the wheelchair as it began speeding downhill, but the two wheels, already accelerating in the direction of the slope, were not something she could stop so easily. After unsuccessfully trying to force them to stop and scraping her hands a few times, Homare could only watch helplessly as she accelerated faster and faster down the slope. The chaotic wind blew past her face, yet she could neither escape nor do anything about it.
Stop! Someone, make all of this stop!
The girl was bound by her legs... no, by her own heart, to the wheelchair Ash had deliberately turned into an instrument of torture. The only thing she could do was—
"Homare—!"
"What are you doing—?!"
"Stop!" Emiru was not the only one whose jaw dropped at Ash's sudden stunt. Reacting a little faster, she hurriedly tried to grab the wheelchair, but her fingertips merely brushed past the handle on its back as it started rolling downhill. She could only watch helplessly as it descended.
Those who wanted to rush over and catch Homare first were blocked by Ash's outstretched hand. No passage allowed.
"Y-you, what did you do?!"
Weren't you—weren't you the hero who just defeated the Doomsday Monster? Why were you doing something like this now? Were you trying to kill her?!
"Her legs actually healed a long time ago. The reason she still can't stand is simply because she can't face her own weakness."
Probably some old psychological trauma or something? Well, ordinary people who could neither overcome nor cast aside their own hearts were just this weak!
Before the others' utterly shocked eyes, Ash revealed in a few sentences the truth Homare had always wanted to hide.
"Since she's too weak to find the courage to stand, I'll lend her some courage. As the saying goes, only before great terror does one see the truth."
"You—just because of something like that? This is your method?!" Saya stared wide-eyed at Ash's ridiculous reasoning for selling out her friend. "How dare you decide that when you don't know anything!"
"Nonsense." Faced with Saya's furious words, her spit practically flying onto his visor, Ash not only rejected her argument but also lightly wagged his index finger. "I do know, because—"
"I'm a genius."
So he could see through her at a glance, with a single touch.
"You—!" Equally stunned by Ash's shamelessness, the flustered Emiru looked toward Homare, who was getting faster and faster, and nearly burst into tears from worry. "There are better ways! If we, her friends, thought of something together, Homare would definitely stand up again with everyone's encouragement—"
"Too naive."
Listening to the piercing screams by his ears, Ash frowned slightly. "What could your soft approach possibly accomplish? Serious illness requires strong medicine. If you ask me, this should have been done long ago!"
"That's an incredibly arrogant thing to say!"
"It's not arrogance. I really am that impressive." Ash felt no shame, only pride. As the women gritted their teeth in fury, he patted the flame pattern on the chest of his battle suit, making it ring out like a boast.
"People who are capable have to be a little greater than ordinary people. Sorry, that's just what I'm like."
Side Story Case File 20: Unwilling Courage
"What kind of attitude is that? You're putting on way too many airs!"
"Sorry, that's my privilege."
Unlike the three women, who angrily denounced Time Fire over the excessive treatment their friend had received and his arrogant attitude, Nono Hana, whom they instinctively considered someone who needed protection, had been shielded behind them. Yet beyond everyone's notice, the Light Heart had somehow appeared in her palm, creaking under the force of her grip.
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