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Chapter Begins:
A few minutes ago, back at the place where the appearance of the stony mountain had heralded chaos.
The Mr. Compress here, wearing the Quirk Amplification Device on his head, was the first-generation clone of Atsuhiro Sako, a member of the Claws of Conformity.
The Quirk—Compress—allowed Atsuhiro to shrink down anything inside a spherical area into a small marble without actually damaging it.
To activate his Quirk, he first needed to touch the target with his hand.
Additionally, the weight of the compressed objects was significantly reduced, allowing them to be hidden or carried around more easily.
Atsuhiro was able to cancel his Quirk's effects on a single marble, or all his marbles at the same time, by snapping his fingers, which caused the compressed object or lifeform to return to its normal size alongside everything that was captured with it.
In itself, Mr. Compress's Quirk was already broken, with its potential uses limitless.
However, the Quirk Amplification Device took it to a new level.
Despite not being concrete, Compress had a weight and number factor involved in it.
Even if Atsuhiro could have compressed large rocks, he could never have compressed mountains.
The Quirk Amplification Device not only let him surpass this weight limit, but now he could… do so repeatedly, if he wanted to.
That's why he was chosen to be the first generation, making him much more stable than all the clones who were later given the Quirk Amplification Device.
"What a sad affair…" Atsuhiro commented, elegantly standing atop the hill. "I displayed the greatest magic on the grandest stage and yet no one's here to applaud for my act… Tch-Tch…"
Loud explosions were booming all across the forest.
Black smoke had already blanketed the sky.
And purple smoke was everywhere…
"Huh?" Atsuhiro's Clone grunted, confused. Wasn't he supposed to be far away from Mustard?!
Before he could think more on it, though, a loud rustle entered his ears.
It was like hundreds of beasts were charging at him from all directions, stomping on the ground with their iron hooves.
A blast of air hit the mask on Mr. Compress's face as he saw dozens of pillars of sand shooting into the sky before changing direction midair and coming for him.
"… You can't be serious…" Atsuhiro said. "Are you really trying to destroy my well-chosen stage… Mr. Hero?"
The Clone with amplified Quirk lifted his hand as tons of sand replaced his vision.
If it were his actual body without the device, then this could have posed a problem for him.
Now…
A suppressed glow flashed out of the palm of Atsuhiro's raised hand.
In the next moment, all the sand in a 50-meter radius around him disappeared, getting compressed into a small glass marble.
Mr. Compress turned around and faced the Hero, who had attacked him.
Half of the Hero's body was almost crushed, blood seeping out from random places. His left eye was swollen shut. The worst was his left arm, though, twisted at an odd angle, with several fingers bent in random directions.
Yet, in the remaining right eye, Sand carried a light.
"… The next time you hit me with a mountain…" he said, lifting his right hand, "… I am gonna get mad…"
Booooooooom!
It was a tsunami of sand… so big that it dwarfed the mountain on which they were standing.
Even the Clone with his amplified Quirk stumbled back in shock, knowing that he might not be able to compress this much sand… not as fast as he needed to, at least.
Then, suddenly, his panicked behavior disappeared.
"Haha!" Atsuhiro laughed, several more marbles appearing in his hands. "A Magician never comes unprepared…"
Sand's eyes widened.
Mr. Compress flicked one of the marbles forward and snapped his finger.
And out came a small lake's worth of water, drowning everything with large GURGLES!
The water washed away the sand, the Hero, and almost everything that came in its path before streaming down the mountain and flooding the forest.
Atsuhiro, drunk on the majestic display of his own actions, lifted both his hands, looking up at the sky.
"Ah…" He rejoiced, staring at the dark sky that was darkening even more. "What a…"
Something clicked in his mind… like a delayed observation…
How did the Hero climb the mountain in his bloodied state?
Why did the water wash away the Hero… in the same way as it did all the sand?
And… why was the sky getting blacker in his vision, as if… he was losing his sight…
"… Oh, no…" Atsuhiro gasped.
That was the last noise he made.
A thin, almost invisible, string of sand, which was crawling up his suit from behind, suddenly pulled its tip back like a snake and lunged… going through and through the Villain's head.
Mr. Compress's clone exploded into mud.
Simultaneously, all the marbles he carried in his hand were undone, releasing the compressed object they held within them.
BOOMS-BANGS-HISS echoed as an enormous quantity of sand, rocks, needles, and even more glass marbles rained, engulfing everything.
When things settled, two figures squirmed out of the earth.
One was Sand, who was alright other than a few injuries on his left hand. He also a thin layer of sand acting as a mask on over his mouth and nose.
The other was Midnight, with no cloth on her left side, a purple-colored fragrance lingering on her arm.
Sand looked around the destruction, as Midnight stopped using her Quirk.
"Good thing he didn't throw all this at us in the beginning," she commented, smirking. "And good thing we just happened to be over a tunnel you created underground in the last week… Did you know a Villain would be throwing a mountain at us?"
The sand-mask on the Dust Hero's face crumbled.
"Preparation is the key, Midnight," Sand said, remembering the words he said to Luke only recently, which brought a rare smile on his face. "I just learned that some holes can help you kill, if they are dug at the right time…"
When the assassin didn't get a response, he looked to his side and found… a cherry-red color on Midnight's face.
Sand's eyes widened to the extreme as he repeated his last sentence in his mind.
"You…" Midnight ground her teeth, raising her fist. "… idiot! Die!"
"No… No… Midnight, wait!" Sand pleaded. "I didn't mean that…"
The fist landed on Sand's face with a bang, Sand's entire face cracking as he was sent flying.
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