Starlight's Difficult Position

Starlight's face fell. She did not know exactly what Homelander had learned, but his tone made one thing clear: she was the one on trial at this meeting.

"Let's start with that joint operation you and The Deep went on," Homelander said slowly. "You ran into a pretty tough opponent, didn't you, Deep?"

"Uh... yeah. He was an absolutely terrifying monster..." The Deep had not expected Homelander to turn the question on him. Caught off guard and already feeling guilty, he could not keep the panic out of his voice.

Homelander seemed not to notice. "But you still defeated him."

The Deep fought to hide his nerves and put on a calm face. "Actually, Starlight defeated him. I escaped on an ocean current as soon as the fight started, so I don't know what happened after that. You know I'm no fighter, Homelander. I didn't want to be an unnecessary burden on Starlight, so I had to..."

The more The Deep spoke, the guiltier he felt. He was terrified Starlight would expose him and tell everyone that he had brought in Deep Sea King to get revenge on her.

The Deep was sure Starlight had no solid evidence, but raising it at the meeting would still make the others suspicious.

Yet when he stole a glance at her, Starlight seemed unmoved. She apparently could not be bothered to expose him in front of everyone.

The Deep's answer sounded plausible enough. Homelander nodded, then turned to Starlight. "So, Starlight, can you tell me how you defeated that monster?"

Starlight said nothing.

If Homelander meant to condemn her in front of everyone, he had already reached his verdict. Nothing she said would change it.

The large electronic screen in the conference room suddenly lit up.

A photograph taken at the fishing docks that night appeared on the screen.

The dock was a wreck. Half of a massive corpse lay on the ground. The seawater seemed to have washed away the blood, and there were no severed limbs or fragments anywhere around it.

Compared with the shipping container beside it, that half of the corpse alone had to be five or six meters long. If it had been intact, the monster would have stood nearly ten meters tall.

A monster that enormous must have possessed unimaginable strength.

Yet its upper body had vanished without a trace. A huge, curved cross section ran through its waist. Everything below it was intact; everything above it was gone.

There was no doubt the monster had been killed in a single blow by some terrifying means.

The Deep went pale. He had known Deep Sea King was dead, but not that he had met such a gruesome end.

A-Train let out a gasp. "Whoa. Did you really do that?"

Homelander shot him a look. If A-Train had been any smarter, he would not have been manipulated at every turn by the higher-ups and nearly lost his place in The Seven.

"If she'd done that, I'd have trouble holding on to my position as leader," Homelander said with a sneer.

"So tell me, Starlight. Who helped you take care of that monster? I had no idea you had such a powerful partner. I'd love for you to introduce me to him."

Starlight could not possibly introduce Luke to Homelander. But when she looked back at the screen, her expression froze.

The display switched to three images.

One was Luke's application file for the superhero selection contest.

Another was a photograph of her and Luke talking closely on a park bench.

The last was a security-camera still of her leaving an apartment complex.

It was the complex where Luke lived.

"If I'm not mistaken, this is that secret partner of yours you don't want anyone to know about, isn't it?"

"The company is full of people asleep at the wheel. Tell them to score a competition, and all they do is hand in the results. If I hadn't investigated it myself, I'd never have known such a terrifying monster appeared in that contest."

Homelander smiled at A-Train. "Even after winning the Showdown of the Century, you're still not the fastest man in the world."

"What?" A-Train exclaimed.

Homelander gestured toward the screen. A-Train looked at Baldy on the screen.

"You're saying he runs faster than me?" A-Train could hardly believe it.

"He doesn't just run faster than you. Speed, strength, agility—he's practically perfect in every category," Homelander said.

He meant it. Even Homelander had been impressed by the power Luke displayed in the arena.

Luke was strong—stronger than almost anyone else in the room.

Only someone like him could have dealt such an overwhelmingly destructive blow to a monster that size.

"You seem awfully close to this man, Starlight." Homelander turned his attention back to her.

"Isn't it a good thing for us that Starlight knows someone so powerful?" Queen Maeve said.

"Exactly. That's the point." Homelander nodded. "But what happens if someone that powerful ends up on the other side?"

Only then did Starlight's face truly betray her unease.

Did Homelander know everything?

The screen changed again.

It showed a dim corridor with two figures in it.

The image was blurry in the poor light. All they could make out was Baldy from the photograph and a young woman with a striking figure.

A-Train's face changed. He knew that corridor all too well.

"You've all heard about The Female, I'm sure. A few days ago, the news reported her sudden death. According to the report, she died from an overdose of some hallucinogenic drug."

Vought International had tampered with that story too. It concealed the fact that The Female had killed her landlord before she died and replaced Compound V in the report with an unspecified psychoactive drug.

That news report could fool ordinary people, and little else.

Of course, A-Train believed it. With a brain as sharp as Malphite's, he had no idea what Vought International was working so hard to cover up for him. He was even quietly relieved that the autopsy report had found no Compound V.

"But before The Female died, this man named Luke and the woman beside him went into her apartment," Homelander said.

"What did you say?!" A-Train cried. Only then did he realize The Female's death might not have been an accident.

Everyone except Homelander and Starlight turned to stare at him in surprise.

They had no idea why he had reacted so strongly.

A-Train finally remembered that no one outside knew about his secret relationship with The Female.

"I just thought... this Baldy... especially the woman with him... they don't look like bad people..." A-Train's defense sounded feeble even to him.

"Whatever the truth is, The Female was once a Vought International employee," Homelander said. "Whether it was suicide or murder, we owe her justice. Don't you agree, Starlight?"

Starlight shook her head in shock. "No. They couldn't have killed The Female. They wouldn't..."

She stood and looked at Homelander. "Listen to me..."

A red glow rose in Homelander's eyes. His voice hardened. "Sit down, traitor."

Starlight's breathing quickened. "I haven't done anything to betray any of you..."

The glow in Homelander's eyes intensified, on the verge of bursting out.

"You haven't? Nothing good has happened since you joined us! Know why there are only six people here today? Translucent is dead! And there's a good chance that bald partner of yours killed him..."

Everyone in the room was stunned.

Translucent was dead?

It was almost impossible to believe. Translucent's body was extraordinarily tough. Even among all Espers, few were capable of killing him.

"No, that's impossible..." Starlight murmured as she backed away.

"Shut up." Homelander advanced on her. "If you were in my position, what would you do with yourself?"

"That's enough, Homelander." Queen Maeve stepped between them.

"She doesn't know anything," Queen Maeve said. "Maybe she trusted the wrong person and misjudged him. I was even more naive than she is at her age."

"Her adrenaline is surging, and her heart is racing like a frightened rabbit's."

Homelander's X-ray vision could see through almost anything. He had caught every abnormal reaction inside Starlight's body.

"She's scared because of you, Homelander." Queen Maeve shielded Starlight behind her. "She's young and inexperienced. You don't have to corner her like this."

The red glow faded from Homelander's eyes. He looked at Queen Maeve with a complicated expression.

"So you're protecting her?"

Queen Maeve shook her head. "We can decide what to do once we know the truth. I just believe Starlight is innocent."

Homelander looked at Starlight in surprise. "Wow. There must be something special about you. I can't even remember the last time Queen Maeve cared about someone else."

Then he turned to Queen Maeve with a meaningful look. "Think carefully. If you step in to protect her now, you may have to live with the consequences later."

"I hope you're right about her. For both your sakes."

Seeing the resolve in Queen Maeve's eyes, Homelander shook his head helplessly.

He returned to the floor-to-ceiling window and waved a hand at the others without turning around.

"All right, folks. Meeting adjourned. You can go."

The superheroes filed out of the conference room. Black Noir's face was hidden by his black uniform, but the others all left with troubled expressions.

Homelander gazed out the window.

His expression was unreadable.

The meeting had not gone as he had hoped, but it had achieved something.

Now it was time to erase those destabilizing elements from the world for good.

This chapter ran over three thousand Chinese characters, so it went up a little late.

Without a backlog of chapters, it's somewhat difficult to keep to a fixed update schedule.

But I promise I won't miss an update or let your support go to waste.

You can count on that.