Fierce Battle

"A monster! Run!"

The punks who had been watching the show screamed and fled the warehouse when they saw their boss's inhuman form.

"Vroom, vroom, vroom! I finally did it! This feels incredible!"

Onibi Maru, now a motorcycle monster, let out the roar of an engine starting and fixed his headlight "eyes" on Baicang.

"You're dead!!"

The wheels beneath him began spinning wildly, propelling his enormous body straight at Baicang.

"You call that a motorcycle? That's a dump truck!"

As the three-meter-tall Onibi Maru hurtled toward him, Baicang quickly dodged.

When his attack missed, Onibi Maru laughed and shouted, "It's no use! Onibi Maru and I have become one! You can't escape!"

With an exaggerated maneuver, Onibi Maru made a high-speed, 180-degree turn and charged at Baicang again.

Facing the frenzied Onibi Maru, Baicang avoided a head-on clash and jumped straight up, evading the attack in midair.

Boom!

Onibi Maru smashed a huge hole straight through the warehouse's solid wall.

"With that speed and strength, he should be at the level of a Tiger-level monster." Looking at the huge hole in the warehouse wall, Baicang formed a rough assessment of Onibi Maru's strength after his transformation.

"Stop running, coward! Face me head-on!"

"Sure." Baicang agreed, ready to find out how well he actually performed in combat.

Strictly speaking, this was his first real head-on battle. Saitama had instantly killed the pig-headed monster, and the frog monster's fight with Tank-Top Tiger didn't count. This time, Onibi Maru fit his requirements.

"Vroom, vroom, vroom! Taste the power of our love!" Onibi Maru shrieked as he charged again.

Baicang fought down the urge to make a snide remark. Watching Onibi Maru rush toward him, he dodged just before impact, then darted forward while Onibi Maru was turning and kicked one of his wheels.

Onibi Maru staggered and dropped to one knee, unable to get his wheels moving again. Seizing the opening, Baicang punched his windshield, which was positioned on his chest.

"Argh!" Crying out in pain, Onibi Maru raised a mechanical arm and smashed it toward Baicang. Baicang dodged left, turned, and swept Onibi Maru's other supporting leg out from under him.

Onibi Maru hurriedly braced himself with his hands to keep from falling. Seeing that Onibi Maru had his hands full, Baicang went straight back to his old tactic: attacking low.

He threw a punch at Onibi Maru's head. Sensing danger, Onibi Maru shouted, and a large horn suddenly popped out of his back.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

The piercing noise forced Baicang to abandon his attack and cover his ears in pain. Taking advantage of the opening, Onibi Maru scrambled up and threw a vicious punch at him.

Baicang could only hastily block with his left arm. The punch sent him flying into the racetrack's guardrail.

"Vroom, vroom, vroom! Bet you didn't see that coming!"

Onibi Maru let out a smug, bizarre laugh as he watched Baicang lie pinned beneath the railing.

Expressionlessly, Baicang moved the broken guardrail off his upper body, stood, brushed the dust from his clothes, and looked at the swaggering Onibi Maru.

Speed: his attacks are too slow. I can dodge them easily. Strength: he's not even as strong as me, so he barely does any damage. Aside from being a little faster than me when his wheels are running, having a big body that can take a beating, and that annoying horn just now, he's practically no threat.

Baicang quickly analyzed the information he had gathered from their exchange.

Also, why does my body feel stronger than when I fought Bald Brawny Man last time? Do transmigrator perks get paid out monthly?

Looking at his completely uninjured body despite having taken a solid hit from Onibi Maru, Baicang fell into thought.

"Damn you! How dare you ignore me!"

Seeing Baicang stand there without paying him any attention, Onibi Maru turned the horn on his back up to maximum volume, set his wheels spinning, and charged at him in fury.

"Blasting your horn in the middle of the night? Have you got no consideration for anyone else?!"

Annoyed at Onibi Maru for interrupting his thoughts, Baicang activated his psychic power directly at the rapidly approaching monster.

Ding...

"How is this possible?" A clattering of colliding parts came from Onibi Maru's belly. He immediately bent over, clutched his stomach, and stopped his wheels.

The horn on his back drooped as though it had wilted, its piercing noise growing quieter and quieter.

"Looks like the fuel you gave your precious bike yesterday was watered down." With a distinctly malicious look, Baicang walked toward Onibi Maru.

"It was you! What did you do?!" Clutching his stomach, Onibi Maru forced himself upright.

Baicang said nothing. Following the principle of finishing an enemy while he was down, he went straight for Onibi Maru.

Onibi Maru had just started his wheels to escape when, the moment he spread his legs, an inexplicable urge struck him.

"Oh~" He hurriedly clenched his iron buttocks, barely keeping his "life" from erupting.

Baicang kicked Onibi Maru, who had his rear stuck out, straight to the ground. Lying facedown with both hands clamped over his butt, Onibi Maru had no way to fight back.

Baicang showed him no mercy. As his idol Teacher Ace had said, super beasts couldn't feel pain! Baicang believed monsters couldn't feel pain either. Aiming at Onibi Maru's wheel-foot, he stomped down hard enough to buckle the entire wheel.

"Aaargh!" Onibi Maru let out an agonized scream. He stopped clutching his butt and struggled to roll over and get up.

"Too late." Baicang stomped on Onibi Maru's damaged wheel again, dodged his flailing arms, and buckled the other wheel with another kick.

A cruel yet familiar scene played out once more.

Unable to move, Onibi Maru was nothing more than an oversized punching bag to Baicang. Easily dodging his counterattacks, Baicang twisted his arms off like braided dough.

Baicang moved in front of Onibi Maru and crouched to look at his inhuman face. Shaking his head, he said, "You could've stayed human, but you chose to be a monster?"

He slowly stood and crushed Onibi Maru's neck beneath his foot. Onibi Maru's struggling body gradually lost its strength and stopped moving.

Seeing engine oil and gasoline pooling on the ground, Baicang lost interest in the monster's corpse and turned to leave.

Suddenly, he remembered something, and his mood instantly plummeted.

"Wasn't I here to seize the stolen money?"

Taking a deep breath, he returned to Onibi Maru. Looking at the thoroughly dead monster, Baicang cried out in anguish, "No!!"

A dejected Baicang returned to his room. He quietly opened Runo's door, checked that she was still sleeping, then went back to bed with his mind at ease.

Burying himself completely beneath the covers, Baicang secretly wiped away his tears.

"Killing him without getting the money was bad enough, but now I can't even report defeating a monster to the Hero Association. What a total loss..."

Meanwhile, a group of police officers and Hero Association personnel cordoned off the abandoned factory.

"Is this the scene?" a suited Hero Association staff member asked the officer beside him.

"Yes. Based on that concerned citizen's call, we're pretty sure this is the abandoned factory." The officer took out a tablet and checked the coordinates on its screen.

"All right, let's move!" A short-haired girl in an athletic tank top flexed her wrists and started forward.

"Wait! Tanktop Girl!" The officer hurried to stop her, but she moved faster than he did and kicked the factory doors open.

There was no monster attacking a biker gang, as the caller had reported. Only a mangled monster corpse lay silently on the floor.

The girl blankly uttered a single word.

"Huh?"