5
After talking to Lady Gora, Toshinori walked into the alley and canceled his transformation to take a smoke break and gather his thoughts. His confident look evaporated with a pop and a puff of smoke. There was no longer a muscular figure, just a horrible thinness along with a slouching posture. Sunken eyes and cheeks that revealed sharp cheekbones. His perfectly combed back hair had deteriorated, leaving his head with only a shaggy appearance. Perhaps he couldn't seduce any girls in this guise.
"I've wasted almost an hour and a half. Just that much more and I won't be able to turn into that pile of muscle again for the day. I've got seven more criminals to catch. Hell, I'm definitely not going to make it in time. The system definitely knows how to prioritize, wanting me to focus more on conquering some young heroine," Yagi pondered. A throbbing pain began to come from the left side of his chest. Toshinori burrowed even harder into the shadows of the alleyway, feeling the iron-tasting liquid coming down his throat. In the same instant, he vomited blood and a wild hunger awoke in the man.
- "Right. I haven't even had breakfast. It's worth going to the cafeteria. As long as I'm in my skinny shape, I don't stress too much about the limit. It's worth trying to go up against criminals closer to nightfall. That's their favorite time of day," Toshinori whispered aloud, raising his cold gaze to the cloudy sky. Being the Almighty, he tries to keep a smiling face and a kind-hearted look, but in his skinny form, wearing masks is pointless. This is who he is. Here and now. Frowning and focused. Planning and cautious.
The path to the café took a couple dozen minutes. Along the way he met a couple of some heroes on patrol. He didn't meet the Mountain Lady again, but he didn't need to. The girl herself had given him her number, so he didn't even need to worry about looking for her tomorrow. She would definitely call Yagi herself. The man had no doubt about that. After all, they had ended on a good note and their next meeting was just around the corner.
The cafe was very ordinary. A brown sign with a chocolate cake on it and the name of the place itself. There, Toshinori decided to order a strong coffee and a soup. As a breakfast, it was quite enough for him.
Just like a pattern, a cute waitress appeared on the horizon and took his order. All he had to do was wait and think of a plan to seduce Yuu. He only has 7 days, so he can't expect a great romance from him. If he had a month in his pocket, Toshinori would have fallen completely in love with her, but since he had one week, he could only count on the lust, the inexperience of the young girl, and his excellent reputation as Japan's greatest hero.
"I'll try to get close to her while patrolling together. Besides, she wants popularity, which means I can play on that. I don't want to go into wild manipulation, but if I have to, I can also take on the role of a bad guy for the sake of perfect completion of a task. With the current limit of three hours you can't do anything, but with nine hours a day.... With that kind of time, I won't need any successors," Toshinori continued to ponder.
Coffee was brought to him, followed by soup a few minutes later. Quickly satisfying his hunger, Yagi took out his wallet and paid for everything. The soup was okay, but the coffee was good. Toshinori appreciated the drink.
Realizing that there was nothing more to do before dark, the man found a bench near the cafe and started reading the news on the internet through his phone. Technology in this world was quite advanced, surpassing any technology from his previous life. Only it was all terribly expensive, and advanced technologies like the holograms could only be afforded by the richest companies along with various important institutions in the country. In general, ordinary people were content with ordinary things.
After sitting like this on the bench until lunchtime, Yagi watched the schoolchildren hurrying home. The middle school students were vigorously discussing their future, shouting that they would definitely become professional heroes when they grew up. "So naive, yet so.... Noble? Heroes are so often in danger, after all, and yet teenagers still dream of becoming them. Though... Not for nothing. I, for example, genuinely enjoyed beating criminals and helping people. Heh," Toshinori grinned. Except that because of his sullen appearance, the man's chuckle seemed quite intimidating to the passing schoolchildren. The crowd began to visibly avoid his shop.
Oh, if they had known that the Almighty was in front of them, albeit in very bad shape, they would have put up a real fight for his autograph instead of walking away from him contemptuously.
Suddenly some kind of swampy liquid spurted out of a nearby sewer manhole. Within seconds, the mass took the form of a slug in blue jeans with two yellow eyes and grinning teeth. It dragged two bags of money behind it and scurried away, scattering all the people with whips of dark green mud.
"He reminds me of someone. But I can't remember who, somehow. Okay. I don't care. I'll deal with this sense of deja vu later," thought Yagi, shifting his gaze to the nearest alley where he could transform into his combat uniform. The monster, on the other hand, was rushing towards another sewer manhole, not forgetting to scatter ordinary civilians with sadistic pleasure.
- "HA HA HA HA HA HA! FEAR ME PEOPLE! FEAR ME! BE AFRAID, BECAUSE YOU..." - the swamp criminal never got a chance to finish his speech, getting hit with the Detroit Punch. It was a simple arm swing, but it was executed with such power. A force capable of destroying an entire building, or even a street. The powerful air currents simply blew the slug into small pieces, and the nearest trees tilted from the shockwave.
People were in shock, slowly coming to their senses from the confusion and loud popping. The arrival of the Peace Symbol was unexpected as usual. He often appeared so suddenly and dealt with the villain in seconds. All this he did so quickly that no one had time to get hurt. It was for such characteristics that he was considered the main hope for mankind.
- "Everything is fine now. Why? Because I'm here!" - The bass voice sobered the people and they exploded with joyful exclamations as they looked at the broad back of the greatest hero. The Almighty had saved them again and stopped the terrible villain. Well, the fact that in the end the criminal was torn to pieces, we can simply omit, because it was obvious to everyone that the villain was neutralized rather than killed. After all, the Symbol of Peace is not engaged in murder!
Or does it?
"Hmm... I wonder if that slug is still alive." - Toshinori thought. Well, he couldn't help himself at the end and hit it with all his might. It's no big deal.
"Wait... I think I remember where I know that swamp monster from. It attacked the main character in the first episode of the anime, and then the main character's best friend. Damn, that means it didn't die from the impact, but just split into a hundred pieces. What a mess!" - By the time Yagi remembered all this, it was too late. In confirmation of this information, the system window popped up, where the number 3 in the first condition was still displayed, with the capture of ten villains. This meant that the swamp criminal had not yet been left behind.
The villain had managed to gather into the likeness of a small puddle and seep through the sewer manhole. Cunning critter! After all, he is not stupid and understands the peculiarity of his mutation quirk, taking advantage of a semblance of invulnerability from physical attacks.
Yaga had to go in pursuit, so that the slug did not do bad things. But he will definitely do them! After all, you can not escape from fate. In the anime, the Almighty chased after him, and now Toshinori had to chase after the mud monster. But now the man realized exactly at what point in the anime timeline he had fallen. Right at the very beginning of canon. It's so cute! The mud villain and Lady Mountain's debut. All of which he vaguely remembered from the first episode, so there was no way Toshinori could be more wrong.
- "DAMN ALMIGHTY, STOP CHASING ME!" - shouted the criminal, quickly climbing out of the hatch in the tunnel under the bridge. The monster needed to find himself a victim he could sneak in and hide in. A very unique feature of his quirk that he sometimes uses to hide from his pursuers in the form of the police.
And luck smiled on the mud slug. One schoolboy in a black uniform with curly green hair walked under the bridge. He was short and skinny. Definitely weak willed, which meant it would be easy for the villain to penetrate him. Having gotten so close to the kid that he didn't immediately notice the horror behind his back, the monster already started to unleash his tentacles....
But it was too late. Too late for the stupid villain.
- "Tentacle hentai?! Not on my shift, asshole!" - came the brave voice of the Peace Symbol. Again the Detroit Punch hit the slug's carcass. But this time the power invested was not enough to split the monster into a hundred pieces. The damage was done with pinpoint control, which only caused the villain to be flattened and thrown back into the wall like some kind of flatbread.
[4/10 criminals were stopped]
The Almighty waved away the system notification and shifted his gaze to the dazed teenager, who had fallen to the ground and was looking at Yagi with frightening awe.
"Really? What a fateful encounter," Toshinori complained to himself, not knowing whether to be surprised or not. Kanon had decided to give him a gift, but why? He's not really looking for heirs. He should be fighting villains, not explaining himself to teenagers. Eh...