What Are You Doing?
Nathan stared blankly ahead. He looked at the message.
'Evolution? What the fuck is that?'
[Proceed with evolution now?]
[Yes] [No]
Without hesitation, Nathan reached up and pressed 'No.' There was no way he was going to accept something he had no idea what it would do, especially if it meant changing the skill that he had used for decades to grow stronger and torment the rest of the world.
'But no rivals?'
Nathan thought back to the first message as it was the only clue he had about the evolution of his skill. He frowned.
'Is it because I regressed?'
Regressing had to be something very few had done. If he was the only one who had done it, it made sense he didn't have any rivals.
But he still couldn't make sense of it.
Ever since he awakened his skill, he had always had multiple rivals and rival candidates. Even when he was at the top of the world, and the Shrouded Hero was his only rival, he still had several other rival candidates he could gain information about and from.
'Ah, fuck it.'
Nathan didn't understand it. And since he wouldn't figure it out just by thinking about it, he decided to stop thinking about it. Besides, he had more important things to do.
Nathan entered the barbershop, which now only had the barber guy and the two Vijang thugs. He closed the door behind him and set down the bag of food before flipping the sign, telling everyone they were closed, not that there were many who would have entered upon seeing the Vijang thugs anyway. After all, the door and the storefront were both made of see-through glass.
"What are you up to, punk?"
The thugs looked at Nathan, irritated by the interruption of their business.
"Get out of here, brat! This isn't the time to act up."
The barber also spoke up since he could see Nathan was about to do something reckless. Even if Nathan was crazy, seemed dangerous, and rude, the barber didn't want him to die or get seriously injured.
Nathan calmly turned around and looked at the thug who had gotten close.
"Are you deaf, punk?!"
The thug poked Nathan in the chest while shouting in his face and being as intimidating as he could.
Nathan grabbed the thug's finger and broke it.
"Don't fucking touch me, you lowlife."
Nathan glared at the thug with cold eyes as he held onto the broken finger and forced the thug to his knees.
The thug was already squealing in pain while the other thug and the barber were shocked.
"Hey! What the fuck do you think you're doing?!"
The other thug stomped over to Nathan and was about to slug him in the face.
Nathan let go of the finger, stepped to the side, and grabbed the arm flying by his face by the wrist and the border between the upper arm and the shoulder. He used the thug's momentum from the missed swing against him and tugged on his arm, bringing it down to a more accessible height.
He kneed the arm on the elbow joining like a stick and broke it, folding it in the wrong direction.
"Teaching a couple of mangy strays some manners."
Nathan politely answered the thug's question, not that the thug could hear him since he was busy screaming in pain on the floor like a baby.
Nathan clicked his tongue in frustration and crashed down on the thug's face with his meteor-like fist. He knocked the thug out cold. He probably broke his jaw too.
The first thug realized his broken finger wasn't that bad and tried to get up and run past Nathan. But Nathan grabbed him by the neck of his collar and yanked him back, slamming him into the floor, taking his breath away.
Nathan stepped on the thug's neck. No air in his lungs and no way to refill those empty lungs.
The thug was dying, and Nathan watched him come to that realization. He watched the flourishing panic in the thug's eyes before they started to lose their light as the thug stopped struggling.
His arms fell limp to his sides and his eyes lost focus.
But Nathan didn't let up. He wasn't done yet.
The Vijang Syndicate hadn't been merciful. He wouldn't either.
He didn't care that it hadn't happened yet. He still remembered the death of his parents and the burial of a peaceful life.
That was the only thing Nathan cared about. He had already been hurt by the Vijang Syndicate. He was justified to exact preemptive revenge.
"What are you doing?! Stop that!"
However, the barber shoved Nathan away before the thug suffocated to death.
Nathan righted himself and looked up at the barber with a steely glare.
"What am I doing? ME?!"
Nathan took a step forward and returned the shove by pushing on the barber's chest. The barber, frightened when faced with Nathan's bloodlust, let him.
"How dare you stand in my way?"
Nathan pushed the barber backward again, stepping on the thugs like the bugs they were.
He grabbed one of the scissors from a nearby barberstand and was about to attack the barber with it when he collapsed like a puppet with its strings cut.
'...Shit.'
He had overtaxed his body.
Nathan had temporarily forgotten how weak his body was now. He had drawn upon a power his body was not yet used to handling. It had still been far from his pre-regression strength. But it was enough to knock him out when the backlash caught up to him.
Nathan glared at the barber with his remaining strength. And as his eyes involuntarily closed, he saw the flicker of a holographic message asking if he wanted to proceed with the evolution.
Unfortunately, he couldn't even answer since he lost consciousness.
His last thought was regret about not finishing the two thugs.
Nathan sank into darkness.
When he next opened his eyes, bright white light washed away that darkness. Nathan squinted from the discomfort. But he forced himself to take in his surroundings.
"A fucking hospital?"
Anita tapped him on the head with her hand.
"Ouch."
"There's no need to curse. And stop whining."
"What happened to those fuckers?"
"Those fuckers?"
"Thos bug-like, rat bastards."
"Are you talking about the two innocent men you beat up?"
"Innocent?"
Anita glared at her confused son.
"Yeah, that's what you call people who weren't doing anything to deserve the terrible beating they got unless you consider getting a haircut a crime deserving of corporal punishment?"