"Damn it! It's got self-cleaning and self-repair abilities!" Clint cursed.
On the battlefield, Saitama was once again forced back by a frenzied swipe of the monster's claw. His landing spot ended up right behind a steel billboard panel that had been blasted loose and was now stuck into the ground at an angle.
He glanced at his slightly heated fist, then at the monster that looked like a moving fortress radiating a stench of death. For the first time, a hint of "this thing is actually a bit troublesome" appeared in his dead-fish eyes.
"Do I need to use a little more strength?" Saitama muttered, almost to himself.
He had just raised his fist, ready to try putting in a bit more power, when the monster's attack came again!
Its massive body swung its long tail with an awkward yet terrifyingly fast motion!
That enormous tail, like a siege ram covered in bone spurs and dark-red flowing light, swept toward the billboard where Saitama had just landed—along with the half-collapsed wall still standing behind him!
Dust billowed as the steel billboard twisted and tore like paper, and the half wall was smashed down in a single sweep!
"Saitama!" Natasha shouted anxiously.
Amid the rumbling, a figure shot out of the collapsing wall's smoke like a fired shell—it was Saitama!
In that split second he had chosen to retreat, but he still got caught by the shockwave of the tail strike. His body crashed through an empty phone booth on the street corner and slid more than ten meters through shattered glass and metal fragments before finally stopping. The phone booth's remains were smashed to pieces by the impact.
"..." Saitama stood up from the pile of phone booth debris without a change in expression and brushed off the bits of glass clinging to him.
He wasn't hurt, but he did look a little… bedraggled.
His cheap red superhero costume was covered in dust and oil-like smears, and there were a few new scuff marks on his yellow gloves. The feeling of getting "knocked flying" like this was something he hadn't experienced in a long time.
The monster's deep-crimson eyes caught sight of this and it let out a low, gloating growl.
Standing high atop the ruins, it roared at Saitama again in open provocation. Its body, bathed in flowing dark-red energy, was like an tireless fortress from hell.
"This bastard… is getting smarter…" Natasha gritted her teeth, reporting to headquarters while thinking furiously.
She watched Saitama get knocked back, watched Steve barely managing to circle the edges of the fight, watched Clint's shots proving useless. They needed a breakthrough.
Just then, at the suffocating edge of the battlefield, a voice with a metallic calm and deep steadiness came through their radio channel.
"Captain Steve, Agent Natasha. Analysis of the target's surface energy flow is complete. Its energy resembles a combination of lava-state plasma and an unknown bio-field, with extremely high fluidity and self-adaptive defense. But we've found a key point: the energy is highly concentrated around the spinal central node region. The energy flow there is slower than at the outer surface. It's the critical node for both information transmission and energy allocation. If its output is overloaded or forcefully disrupted, it could trigger a breakdown or overload of the entire energy field!"
It was the voice of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s chief scientist, Dr. Bruce!
He had been in the underground lab the whole time, running real-time analysis using satellite and frontline energy maps. Right now, this discovery was like a lighthouse in the fog.
"The spinal center? That's the area on the back of its neck near its shoulders! The energy reaction there is the strongest—and the most concentrated!"
Natasha reacted instantly, her gaze locking onto the spot where the back of the monster's neck met its shoulders, a region protected by thick bone armor yet still exposed in brief flashes with every movement. The dark-red light there throbbed like a beating heart.
(End of Chapter)
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