Zero Point · Awakening

Midnight Awakening

Chapter 1: Midnight Awakening

The nighttime Queens. Lucian stood behind the convenience store cash register, looking down as he wiped down the old coffee machine. He wore the T-shirt Vought International uniformly issued to partner businesses. The logo on the chest had been washed until it was pale and the collar was frayed, but it was very clean.

"Hey, kid."

A middle-aged man wearing a leather jacket shoved his way to the counter, reeking of alcohol. He did not even wait in line, cutting straight past the boy wearing headphones ahead of him and slamming two cans of beer heavily onto the cash register.

Lucian scanned the beer through the barcode, first glancing at the flashing red light of the surveillance camera, then looking into the drunk's bloodshot eyes. He did not argue, simply extending his index finger and pointing at the black hemisphere in the corner of the ceiling.

The drunk followed his finger to look up, cursed a foul word, and finally pulled out a handful of loose change to slap onto the countertop. Afterward, he grabbed the beer, stumbled into the glass door, and disappeared into the night.

Lucian pulled out a tissue, nudging several coins stained with stains into a small dish. From beginning to end, his expression remained unchanged. He had experienced this kind of thing too many times. At the very beginning he would still panic, but now he was too lazy to even waste any emotion.

Off-work time was eleven-thirty at night.

Lucian passed through the convenience store alley, stepped over the wild grass growing out of the cracks in the sidewalk, and turned into an old apartment building. Two-thirds of the voice-activated lights in the stairwell were broken. He lived on the fourth floor, with no elevator. When the key slid into the keyhole, the sound of a television and a strong smell of curry leaked out through the gap in the door of apartment 402. The person living inside was an elderly Indian American landlord who always loved staying up late to binge-watch midnight dramas.

Lucian opened the door and went inside, habitually double-locking the door and hooking the security chain. The entire room was only fifteen square meters. A single bed, a peeling desk, and a plastic chair picked up from the roadside. A second-hand suitcase stood in the corner; its zipper was broken, so it could only be tied shut with rope.

Lucian placed his backpack on the chair and took out a paper bag from it.

Inside the paper bag was near-expiration bread brought back from the convenience store, originally priced at three-fifty, one-twenty after the employee discount. Besides that, there was also a box of flattened cupcakes. Today happened to be the expiration date, and the store manager had originally prepared to throw them away, but Lucian said, "I'll take them," without asking for money.

He placed the cupcakes on the desk, fished a candle out of the drawer, and stuck it in the center of the cupcake's collapsed cream. Then he felt around in his pocket for his phone and glanced at the time.

23:58.

There were two minutes left.

Lucian sat on the edge of the bed with his spine straight and his hands resting on his knees. He did not turn on the lights; only the neon sign from the building opposite cast red light in.

23:59.

Lucian lit the candle. Eighteen years ago, a smuggled Chinese American woman gave birth to him in an abandoned garage somewhere in Queens, then shoved him into a cardboard box beside the trash can and vanished.

00:00.

Lucian was just about to blow out the candle and put a full stop to this shabby coming-of-age ceremony when a sharp pain suddenly came from his mind. Countless images poured into his brain-those were the memories of another world, the plot of The Boys, the truth of Compound V, and... his past-life self.

He remembered who he was.

He remembered how he had come here.

He seemed to have broken through the puzzle of in-utero delusion and awakened the retained wisdom of a past life.

Lucian's hands gripped the edge of the bed tightly, sweat quickly soaking his T-shirt and dripping down his chin onto the floor. The memories of his past and present lives surged in his mind, finally merging together and slowly returning to tranquility.

Lucian slowly raised his head. Right in the center of his vision, a red interface floated into view.

There was no sound and no animation, only a minimalist interface and text projected directly onto his retina:

[Multiverse Travel System]

[Energy Reserve: 0.1% (absorbs internal energy to charge; can travel through worlds when fully charged)]

[Current World: The Boys]

[Host Ability: Copy (System Upgraded Version)]

[Rule Description: Direct contact with a target allows copying of one of the other party's superpowers. Copy progress is displayed in real time, and targets cannot be changed before progress is full. Limited to one copy per person, irreversible once selected. The stronger the ability, the longer the required contact time; when the copy completion degree reaches 100%, the ability is completely solidified.]

Lucian stared at those lines of text, watching for a full ten seconds. As the memories of the two lives completed their merger, some infant-period memories that had originally been hazy also resurfaced. He had once been injected with Compound V, and not just once; after being abandoned, he was taken away by a nearby hospital and stayed with many infants, those doctors dripping Compound V into his body via infusion bags. With the memories of his past life, he finally remembered:

That hospital accepted funding from Samaritan's Embrace. This organization, which superficially engaged in charity, was actually controlled by Vought behind the scenes, specifically tasked with injecting newborns with Compound V for them to maintain the lie that supes were the chosen ones. But after he was injected, he did not awaken any superpowers-let alone basic Body Enhancement, there were not even any side effects. Vought discovered this anomaly in him and injected him with different versions of Compound V, but it sank like a stone without any reaction.

In the end he was thrown into an orphanage under Vought's name. A few years earlier, people would still frequently come to check his body; later on, the checks became fewer and fewer. Until one day, it was as if he had been completely forgotten in the files.

He successfully grew to sixteen years old in that orphanage, and after getting a scholarship based on pretty good grades, he moved into his present apartment. For the past two years, he worked odd jobs while saving money for college.

Now it seemed the answer was already very obvious.

"System, did you eat all those Compound V doses? And my ability, what does the upgraded copy mean?"

[Because energy dropped to zero after traveling through worlds, internal energy was needed to sustain basic operations. The ability the host should have originally awakened was "Copy": it could only temporarily copy a portion of a target's abilities, and only took effect on abilities generated by Compound V.]

[After system upgrading, the copy ability can be permanently retained; same-type abilities can be fused and upgraded; the copy target is no longer restricted by Compound V.]

"It really was you." Lucian was silent for two seconds, glancing at the collapsed cupcake on the desk. "What the hell am I going to college for anymore. Homelander is about to take over the world and make concentration camps; a degree certificate definitely can't block heat vision. Better figure out a way to survive first."

Lucian sat back down at the desk, rummaging a stack of sticky notes and a pen out of the drawer. If everyone could only choose one ability, he needed to plan things out well.

First was Homelander-tentatively flight, since it was after all the fastest flight speed in the entire show. Then Soldier Boy's Super Physique, Immortality, Chest Beam-Chest Beam and physique were a choice of one.

A-Train's speed, Kimiko's healing factor. Heat Vision did not necessarily have to occupy Homelander's slot; he could try making contact with Butcher, as well as that infant in the plot who could emit lasers. After fusing the two kinds of heat vision, the might would not necessarily be any worse than Homelander's.

Storm's immortality or lightning, Gen V Cate's mind control, Translucent's skin, and he would also need Super Senses...

Lucian put down the pen and stuck these sticky notes onto the wall in order of priority, like a hit list.

"Still, the most important thing right now is to find a few low-level ones to test with first. The system said the stronger the ability, the longer the contact time needed. As for these people, I'm just a civilian commoner, and a Chinese American to boot-I don't have a chance right now."

"So step one, make contact with some low-level supes and brush up my own physique first. I don't want to get run over by A-Train while walking down the street one day."

Lucian walked back to the bed, lay down, and closed his eyes. He was recalling the plot and information from this lifetime, trying to figure out every Vought hero's public schedule and character weaknesses, when right at that moment-

Boom!!!

The wall shook violently.

Immediately following that, a short scream came from neighboring apartment 402, followed by the muffled thud of a heavy object collapsing. Lucian sat straight up from the bed instantly, looking toward the wall that was separated from 402 by only a single partition.

From the other side of the wall came heavy panting. There was also the scraping sound of a heavy object being dragged. Besides that, there seemed to be some kind of liquid constantly dripping. Drip. Drip. Drip.

Lucian pressed against the wall, listening quietly for five seconds.

He walked to the bed, dragging a rusted toolbox out from underneath it. There were no weapons in the box, only a few ordinary tools, but sometimes tools could also become instruments of murder. He picked up a claw hammer.

Another slamming impact came from next door, causing the entire wall to shake along with it. Lucian slowly walked toward the room door, having already prepared himself.