Criminal

Beep, beep, beep! Beep, beep, beep!

The phone on his bedside table kept ringing. With a resigned sigh, Baicang crawled out from under the covers and picked it up.

He had wanted to ignore it, but the idiot on the other end kept calling whenever he failed to answer. They had already called twenty times!

Seeing Mizuki's name on the screen, Baicang wanted to crush the phone.

Unfortunately, Runo had bought it, so he didn't dare.

"Hello? Mizuki, what is it?"

"Senpai, it's time to start training!!" Mizuki sounded as though she was warming up on the other end, grunting with exertion as she spoke.

Baicang: "..."

Yesterday had been far too much stimulation for Baicang, first from Runo and then from Mizuki. He feared that if he kept facing Mizuki's deep cleavage, he might lose control and do something he shouldn't. So he had exchanged contact details with her, agreed to continue tomorrow, and fled.

Baicang could only swallow the bitter pill. "Fine, fine. Then let's meet at Central Park... around nine..."

"Yes! Senpai, I'm heading over right now!" Before Baicang could finish, Mizuki had already hung up.

"...o'clock... meet... beep, beep, beep."

Hearing the disconnected tone, Baicang felt a huge vein of anger throbbing on his forehead.

But remembering that Mizuki was simply that kind of airheaded girl, he could only resign himself.

He casually glanced at the time on his phone.

"Five o'clock!!"

That idiot Mizuki had actually dared to drag him out of bed at five to exercise. Baicang was getting hard-his fists were, anyway!

Central Park.

Yawning the whole way, Baicang arrived at the fountain in the center of the park. He had promised her, after all. However reluctant he was, he still had to come.

"Senpai! Over here! I'm over here!" Mizuki, who had arrived long before him, jumped excitedly to catch his attention. Once she saw that he had spotted her, she happily ran toward him.

Looking at the energetic Mizuki and her familiar tight sportswear, Baicang could only conclude that this was far too criminal.

It was far too much stimulation first thing in the morning.

Noticing the three medals still hanging around her neck and the bandage on her face, he couldn't help asking curiously, "Mizuki, what are those?"

Seeing him point at her medals and bandage, Mizuki smiled. "These are some tools I asked the Association to make for me."

"Tools?"

"Yep, let me show you." As she spoke, she took the medals off her neck. Under Baicang's astonished gaze, they transformed into a large disc.

"This way, I can use it as a discus to attack enemies that can fly." Mizuki then assumed a discus thrower's competition stance, ready to demonstrate for Baicang.

Looking at the expensive statue in the fountain, Baicang hurried forward and reached out to stop her. "I get it. Don't damage public property."

After stopping the eager Mizuki, Baicang felt that he should also get a weapon for dealing with flying monsters.

Asking the Association to make me a Barrett should be fine, right?

"Senpai, how are we going to train today?" Mizuki raised her right hand high and looked at Baicang excitedly.

"Hmm... let's start with a ten-kilometer run to warm up." Baicang decided to follow Saitama's training method.

"Yes! Senpai, please blow this." Mizuki took out a track-and-field whistle and handed it to Baicang.

"Hearing a whistle always gets me more motivated before training or fighting monsters," Mizuki explained.

A whistle? More motivated? A beautiful, muscular girl?

Feeling some wicked idea surface in his mind, Baicang patted his head and quickly stopped himself.

Seeing that Mizuki had already assumed a runner's starting stance, he could only take the whistle.

"All right."

Tweet!!!

The instant the whistle sounded, Mizuki shot forward.

"Sprinting flat out right from the start? Still too young." Watching Mizuki race away, Baicang shook his head with a sigh.

Wait, where is she running? We haven't even decided where the finish line is.

Baicang: "..."

He could only chase after Mizuki, shouting all the way for her to stop.

Mizuki seemed not to hear him. Instead, when she glanced back and saw Baicang chasing her, she grew even more excited and ran faster and faster.

This infuriated Baicang so much that he decided to teach Mizuki a thorough lesson once he caught her!

Just as he was about to catch up, Mizuki suddenly ran toward a noisy street.

Monsters? Out working and padding their numbers this early? Model employees of the Monster Association, Baicang wondered.

When he reached the street as well, he saw Mizuki fighting several monsters beside an overturned food cart.

Mizuki had one monster firmly trapped in a joint lock. Another tried to ambush her, only for her to clamp her powerful thighs around its neck.

But Mizuki lost her balance too, falling to the ground with both monsters. The other three seized the chance to surround her and stomp on her.

Rather than immediately rescuing Mizuki, Baicang found his attention drawn to the monsters.

Meatballs? Tofu? Cabbage? Crab sticks? Shiitake mushrooms? What was going on?

These five bizarre monsters instantly lowered the bottom line of Baicang's understanding of monsters as a species.

"It hurts~" Mizuki was beaten to tears, but she refused to let go, only crying out softly.

Hearing Mizuki cry, Baicang stopped pondering the diversity of monster species and joined the fight, kicking the Tofu Monster, one of the monsters ganging up on her.

"Ah!" The Tofu Monster screamed and kept stumbling backward, clutching its crumbled tofu.

Baicang: "..."

Seeing its good buddy gravely injured, the Shiitake Mushroom Monster nearby shouted in grief and rage, "Shiitake Machine Gun!" It turned and spat a stream of dried shiitake mushrooms at Baicang, who quickly darted to the right.

Bang, bang, bang! The dried mushrooms struck the ground, punching small craters into the hard concrete.

"Crab Stick Wrap!" Not to be outdone, the remaining Crab Stick Monster split its two crab-stick hands into dozens of strips several meters long and sent them lunging at him.

While dodging the Shiitake Mushroom Monster's shots and facing the Crab Stick Monster's attacks, Baicang slipped up, and one of the split crab sticks wrapped around his arm.

"Haha, you're finished!" The Crab Stick Monster laughed loudly and tugged hard on the crab stick wrapped around Baicang, preventing him from escaping.

"Nice one, buddy!" Taking advantage of the opening the Crab Stick Monster had created, the Shiitake Mushroom Monster immediately unleashed its ultimate move.

"Shiitake Cannon!!" White light shone inside the Shiitake Mushroom Monster's mouth, and an enormous black shiitake mushroom shot out toward Baicang.

The huge black mushroom flying toward him made Baicang feel rather sick. Not wanting it to touch him, he gave a forceful wrench and yanked the Crab Stick Monster toward him, grabbed its neck, and held it in front of himself.

Boom! After a deafening blast, the smoke cleared to reveal Baicang standing unharmed in the same spot.

That smells good.

Looking at the unconscious, still-smoking Crab Stick Monster in his hand, Baicang realized he hadn't eaten breakfast. He remembered Saitama had apparently eaten a Seaweed Monster once. He wondered whether these monsters...

Then he remembered that strange thing the Shiitake Mushroom Monster had fired with its Shiitake Cannon, and his appetite vanished.

Let's finish this quickly. After testing them out, Baicang felt these monsters were somewhere between Wolf-level and Tiger-level. There was no need to be too cautious.

He directly restrained the Shiitake Mushroom Monster with his psychic powers, then stomped the Tofu Monster, which was still picking up its crumbled tofu from the ground, into dust.

He then kicked away the Shiitake Mushroom Monster, which was squatting on the ground and pooping out enoki mushrooms, before disgustedly wiping his shoe on the Crab Stick Monster's corpse.

He looked toward Mizuki.

Without the other three monsters interfering, Mizuki had easily finished off the Meatball Monster and Cabbage Monster.

However, she was covered in broth and grease left behind when she had squeezed the Meatball Monster until it burst. Her already form-fitting sportswear was soaked through, faintly revealing the full contours of a certain part of her body.

Mizuki stared at the stains on herself with a adorably blank expression, her innocent, cute face paired with that wicked sight.

As Baicang approached, the sight gave him twice the headache... This really was criminal!