Shane let out a long sigh.

  Eighty percent?

  He stared at the white text floating above his bed. In a raid with dozens of participants, including A-rankers, the System had decided a single F-rank hunter had shouldered four-fifths of the burden.

  It was also definitive proof that without him, Brooklyn would be a crater by now.

  Shane shook his head and swiped the text away. He went back to his phone screen, thumbing the live news feed.

  He watched the exact moment the notification hit the hunters on the site.

  On the small screen, the camera focused on the survivors milling around the ambulances. They looked like they were carved from dust and dried blood. At least, until a collective flinch rippled through them.

  One by one, they froze and stared into empty space as their System texts popped up.

  But their reaction was cut short. The tiny speakers of his phone whined as the wail of sirens drowned out the reporter.

  Blue and red lights flooded the ruined street as police cruisers swarmed the scene.

  The camera panned violently, trying to catch the action.

  Heavily armored officers poured out of the vehicles. They moved toward the paramedics who were trying to push a gurney.

  On that stretcher lay the unconscious form of Whitley Barlowe.

  Shane watched with interest.

  It was a sight seeing Whitley out cold, his face swollen and purple from the beating the boss had given him.

  But even unconscious, a C-rank swordsman’s body was dangerous. If he woke up confused and thrashed, he could snap a normal paramedic’s spine by accident.

  An officer stepped forward with a pair of thick silver shackles.

  Though it probably can’t stop high-rankers, they were still made from ingredients from the dungeon, so should be enough for Whitley.

  They locked the heavy metal around Whitley’s wrists and ankles, securing him to the reinforced gurney. The runes on the cuffs flared, sealing off his mana flow to ensure he couldn’t use skills even if he woke up.

  “Cuffs are on. He’s secured.”

  “Alright, load him up. Get him to the transport.”

  Whitley slept through the end of his career.

  The raw live stream snapped away from the chaotic street view to an animated graphic that filled the screen.

  [BREAKING: CAUSE OF BREACH IDENTIFIED.]

  The broadcast transitioned to the brightly lit news studio. The male anchor was already at the desk, looking grave with a stack of papers in his hand.

  “We are interrupting our live coverage with a significant development.”

  He looked directly into the camera.

  “We have just received confirmation regarding the cause of the anomaly in Brooklyn.”

  The screen behind him shifted to the digital grid of the city. The area where the Heaven’s Executioner had spawned was highlighted in red.

  “Authorities have confirmed that the breach occurred in a government-designated safe patrol zone. This sector was under the exclusive supervision of C-rank hunter Whitley Barlowe.”

  Shane’s eyes narrowed. So that was how this whole mess started.

  It explained why Whitley had seemed so nervous and jumpy before the raid. He was probably afraid of the monsters. But more afraid of being found out.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  He’d likely ignored the dungeon on purpose, letting them fester because his fragile ego was still bruised from the monster wave dungeon where he’d been criticized for sacrificing rookies.

  Shane had met enough stupid people in his life to know how their brains worked. Whitley probably thought he was “teaching everyone a lesson” by letting a problem brew, only to panic when it exploded into an A-rank catastrophe.

  Shane shook his head.

  Also, in a way, he really was the reason the future had changed. Because he had saved the hunters from the monster wave dungeon, including Whitley.

  If he’d let things flow the way it would have in the game’s original timeline, Whitley would have been remembered as a tragic victim, not a criminal.

  If he’d let Whitley die in there, none of this would’ve happened.

  He blew a strand of hair out of his eye. Well, if something like this happened again, all he had to do was kill all the monsters, wasn’t it? He slid that mental note in the back of his brain and tried to check how the public was reacting to this incident.

  But his phone slipped from his numb fingers, clattering onto the floor, but he didn’t bend to pick it up. He couldn’t.

  As his vision blurred, he realized that the fatigue from his [Insomnia] quirk, piled on top of everything else, was causing him to pass out.

  His knees buckled first.

  He went down, his palm slapping hard against the floor, streaking through a patch of his own drying blood.

  Well, he thought, his consciousness rapidly spiraling down the drain. At least I’ll get some decent sleep this time. That was his last thought.

  ***

  Luke Hinton was not happy.

  He sat in a ridiculously expensive imported leather armchair in the center of his penthouse apartment, swirling a glass of vintage wine that cost more than most people’s annual rent.

  Ignoring the stunning city lights of Manhattan’s view, he was glaring at the white texts in front of him.

  A few days ago, right after the breach, he’d bothered to exchange System IDs with the others who’d fought with him.

  Everyone except Shane, of course, who had vanished into thin air.

  [Group Chat: Ashwell Baits]

  [Henry Stone: Did you find which hospital Captain is in?]

  [Josh Miller: Hope nothing’s wrong…]

  [Kit McKay: @LukeHinton Any updates from your side?]

  Luke clicked his tongue as he read the messages.

  That little A-rank punk with the attitude, Kit McKay, had started the group chat. And it had been buzzing nonstop.

  Where did he dart off to, that sly bastard?

  Luke took a sip of wine, savoring the bitterness.

  He’d already run a check on the confidential patient lists of every hospital within a fifty-mile radius, using all the power the head of the information guild could muster to bypass privacy laws.

  Nothing.

  It hadn’t occured to Luke yet that he should check houses and apartments under Shane’s name. In his mind, Shane was a mysterious and powerful figure backed up by a strong institution.

  Why the hell would an S-rank register with the Hunter’s Association as an F-rank?

  If he’d been an unregistered hunter, Luke would’ve understood that he just wanted to avoid getting drafted into emergency situations.

  But what was the point of registering as an F-rank? He’d lose all the support and perks an S-rank hunter could enjoy.

  Message alerts flooded his view, but there was no new information.

  Tsk, this is a dead end, too.

  Luke swiped the chat away.

  Henry had been by Shane’s side for most of the fight. Luke had been playing nice with the naive tank for two days straight, responding to the group chat and acting the part of the concerned comrade, all to pry some information out of the kid.

  Luke had been hoping Shane had let something, anything, slip during the battle.

  But no luck. Henry knew absolutely nothing. He just submissively listened to Shane’s orders, and that was it.

  It wasn’t like Luke was out of options. Far from it.

  He’d just wanted to find Shane quietly, without going through the Hunter’s Association if possible, but the man was making it difficult.

  Shane heard Luke calling for him and still chose to teleport away, and that rubbed Luke the wrong way.

  He drags me into his suicide mission, and this is how he acts?

  Luke set his empty wine glass down on the marble coaster.

  And after naming the party the “Luke Hinton Party,” no less.

  Luke massaged his temples. For years, he had been meticulously curating his image.

  He intentionally sent his shadow clones to clear dungeons to keep his own name out of the rookie rankings.

  Whether Shane knew that or not he wasn’t sure.

  But thanks to that little stunt, Luke was currently the number one topic on every news channel in the country. At least, that was what a hundred of his shadow clones were showing him.

  Since searching for a name in a hospital was a simple task, he could spread the clones this much, but he’d soon need the real Luke to look for confidential information hidden in the Hunter’s Association.

  He walked toward the window to look out at the city, but stopped abruptly before he got too close to the glass.

  It wasn’t just the swarm of media vans clogging the street forty floors down. He could feel the irritating hum of mana pressing against his privacy wards.

  “Persistent,” Luke muttered, yanking the heavy blackout curtains shut.

  He knew for a fact there was at least one reporter with a [Levitation] skill hovering outside his balcony right now, turned invisible with a [Stealth] skill. He’d been under siege by super-powered reporters—or, stalkers, in his eyes—since the dungeon breach.

  Having no idea that Shane had used the party name for this exact result, Luke stomped back to the couch.

  Luke glared at his System window.

  What sort of institution was backing Shane Ashwell that his information could be this well hidden?

  And what was a B-rank Awakened with A-rank [Life Detection] and A-rank [Human Appraisal] doing working as a reporter? Luke was basically locked inside his own home.

  Out of sheer spite, he would dig through every record on Shane Ashwell, down to the last scrap.

  ...That is, if he could somehow shake off the flying cameramen surrounding his house first.