Black-Haired American Hero (2)
“…Hah!” Great America let out an arrogant laugh upon seeing me effortlessly dodge her attack. “Luck might be on your side this time, monkey.”
She clenched her fist again with that signature haughty grin I remembered.
—BOOOOOOM—!!!
She thrust her fist forward to strike me, but I slipped past it by a hair’s breadth—without making it obvious—and kept provoking her.
“Sorry, but you’re still not good enough for me.”
Now, some might wonder why I would deliberately provoke a sociopathic lunatic like her. The reason is simple.
First of all—
“You crazy bastard…!”
She’s extremely arrogant. If you treat her gently, she’ll just see you as trash. ‘This one can be handled with a little intimidation,’ ‘This one won’t say anything no matter what I do.’ That’s how Great America thinks. She’s like a pit bull that skipped every lesson in discipline and education. Eventually, once her overwhelming physical abilities get enhanced even further, she’ll become an untouchable tyrant.
That’s why I decided she needed proper “discipline” to understand that her world and her power aren’t everything.
“This damn fly…!”
—Whoosh—BOOOOOOM—!!!
“It’s useless.”
In that sense, this was necessary. I had to make her feel powerless. I had to make her realize that her abilities don’t define everything.
Of course…
‘My body’s starting to take a toll.’
This process was painful for me too, but—
…this was necessary for me as well.
I kept reminding her of her current position.
“Alright, let’s see if you can dodge this one too—”
And just as she was about to lose it completely, her eyes glowing as she prepared to blast apart the building—
“—Seriously, you’re a beast. You caused all this chaos and still act like this?”
I stopped and pointed at the wrecked conference room around us.
“…What?”
“Look at this mess. Company executives and other heroes are about to walk in here. You destroyed everything.”
Political pressure. Deep inside her, fear still existed. Fresh out of the lab and newly debuted, she knew nothing of the world. Raised under researchers, she was easily swayed by their every word. If they saw the scene she’d created, what would they do?
“Ah, no… No…!”
Exactly. Cracks would form in her mind.
Now, this was the important part. The reason she became a tyrant was because no one had ever disciplined her, and no one had ever been her psychological shield. So I wanted to become her standard. To teach her why her wrong actions were wrong and why she shouldn’t do them. A kind of… nanny role. Unfortunately, that was the only way to control this crazy woman.
“This is all your doing.”
So now it was time for real education. Customized training for a brat who never received basic education or proper upbringing.
“But if you apologize right now, I’ll clean it up for you.”
It was time to proceed.
“Just one word. ‘I’m sorry.’ ‘I was wrong.’ That’s all it takes.”
She didn’t know how to apologize. Even in the lab, she never apologized. If she failed, she had to succeed somehow—apologies were irrelevant. She simply repeated the “experiment” until she succeeded. That’s what warped her personality.
So now I had to teach her to acknowledge her mistakes.
“I’m not like those old men in the lab. I don’t lie. I keep my word.”
I began to tighten the emotional noose around her.
—Grind…!
Her teeth ground together. She bit her lip hard enough to draw blood. An unidentifiable emotion—fear or humiliation—frosted over her eyes.
—Stare…
When I silently met her gaze—
“….”
She lowered her eyes and chose silence. Avoidance, because she didn’t know how to apologize. But that wasn’t the flow I wanted.
I glanced at the watch on my wrist and spoke.
“One hour left until the meeting. You’re quite relaxed.”
Could she possibly restore this conference room within an hour? Impossible. She was created to fight, not to fix things. This alone was enough psychological pressure.
“….”
Yet she still kept her head down, saying nothing.
“Fine. If that’s how you want it, do whatever you want.”
I turned and slowly walked toward the exit.
—Step, step.
Just as I was about to leave at a deliberately slow pace—
“…ry.”
A mosquito-like voice. She was trying to say something.
“…What?”
“…ry.”
“I can’t hear you.”
“…I’m sorry.”
“Again.”
“I-I’m sorry.”
“Is that how you apologize? With that attitude?”
“…I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For turning this conference room into a mess—”
“—No, no. That’s the result. You still don’t understand what you actually did wrong.”
“….”
I turned back and looked down at her lowered head.
“The cause that led to this mess. The insults you threw at me. Monkey. Clown. Homo. Apologize for those words.”
“….”
Hatred flickered in her eyes. Yet she didn’t swing her fist. Fear of the lab researchers. And my unpredictable behavior. All those factors combined. This was a rather good sign. It meant she was coming under my control.
More importantly—
‘Great America’s eyes are looking behind me.’
She was glancing nervously past me. That meant someone was coming. Most likely an employee checking on the noise.
“Alright, I’ll give you one more chance. What do you need to say?”
So I pressed her like driving in a wedge.
“…I’ll apologize for the insulting words I said to you. I’m sorry.”
“That’s it. That’s how it’s done.”
The moment she finally spoke the apology—
—Thud, thud—!
“W-What’s going on—?! What is this…!!”
The executives arrived right on cue. Their furious voices reached Great America’s ears as she stood there flustered.
“Great America, and Jun! What the hell happened here?!”
Just as she was about to stammer—
“Ah, I provoked her a bit too hard while testing our abilities before the debut.”
I stepped in front of her and spoke calmly.
“…What?”
“We’re heroes. Heroes who’ll be moving as a team. So it’s only natural we need to understand each other’s strength, right?”
“….”
The executives looked incredulous yet intrigued. After all, I’d sparred with Great America to the point of destroying the room and still looked fine. That alone was enough to shift their attention toward me.
I continued.
“More than anything, this is my first time meeting Pax Corporation’s executives. Since there seem to be things we haven’t discussed yet, could you spare a moment?”
“…We don’t have time for—”
“—Hm? That can’t be right. Did you think I wouldn’t know about the surveillance cameras installed in my quarters?”
“…!”
A subtle pressure, letting them know I was aware of the monitoring.
“You—how did you—!”
“This doesn’t seem like the place for that conversation, does it?”
“…Right. There does seem to be something we need to discuss.”
“Yes, let’s go then. And Great America? You did very well.”
“….”
“But remember what I said earlier. Sometimes, just one word… can solve everything.”
With that, I left the conference room with the executives, hoping she would come to her senses even a little in the meantime.
‘…Now it’s time to handle these damn Pax executives.’
I never stopped thinking.
*
Left alone in the conference room, Great America stared blankly at the spot where they had disappeared.
The result of the fight? Ah, yes. It was shocking. Not a single one of her attacks had landed. Yet if they had continued fighting, victory would have been hers. She didn’t know what his ability was, but it seemed close to super speed. His breathing had grown ragged, and his body temperature had risen noticeably.
But what surprised her even more was—
‘…The executives. They listened to him.’
To her, the executives were creators—gods. They had always treated her as an inferior, as nothing more than an experimental subject. The same would apply to her relationships with other heroes. Being affiliated with Pax Corporation meant they came for the money Pax offered. Yet he didn’t care about that. Instead, he took the lead and guided them.
“…Crazy bastard.”
He wasn’t normal. Great America thought so. However, somewhere deep in her chest… she felt “something.”
—Great America, you did very well.
She was the symbol of Pax Corporation and America. Yet he praised her. And lectured her in front of the executives? There, for the first time in her life, she felt an emotion she couldn’t identify.
“….”
So she simply stared at the place he had left, unable to understand the feeling she had just experienced.
“…Just what are you?”
She murmured in a trembling voice.