The fluorescent lights of "Super Saver Saturday" at the Z-City Municipal Grocers hummed a dull, indifferent song, a stark contrast to the storm brewing in the heavens outside. Saitama, bald head gleaming under the artificial glow, meticulously compared two heads of cabbage. One was slightly larger, but the other had a tighter, more appealing leaf structure. His brow furrowed in concentration, the fate of his dinner hot pot hanging in the balance. A distant, muffled BOOM rumbled, causing the cheap shelving to vibrate slightly. A few price tags fluttered.
"Hmm," Saitama mused, tapping a gloved finger against his chin. "The bigger one might have more water weight. Less actual cabbage. Tricky." He was blissfully, almost aggressively, unaware of the panic slowly unfurling in the streets beyond the automatic doors.
Another, louder CRACK-BOOM echoed, this one punctuated by the distinct shatter of glass somewhere in the store. A tin of discounted tuna clattered from a high shelf, rolling to a stop near his worn red boots.
"Oi, Genos, you feel that?" Saitama called out, not looking up from the cabbages. "Think they're doing construction nearby? Kinda early for a Saturday."
There was no reply. Genos, his loyal cyborg disciple, had been tasked with scouting for a rumored sale on premium soy sauce across town – a mission of utmost importance. Saitama sighed, finally settling on the slightly smaller, denser cabbage. "Guess I'll just get both. Never know when you'll need extra cabbage."
As he reached for a plastic bag, the entire supermarket lurched violently. The lights flickered, died, then sparked back to life with a sickly green tinge. Screams, previously muffled, now pierced the air, sharp and terrified. The automatic doors buckled inwards with a screech of tortured metal, and a wave of superheated air, thick with the scent of ozone and something else… something ancient and malevolent, washed over him.
Saitama blinked. "Huh. Wind's picking up." He finally looked towards the entrance.
Where the doors once stood, a scene of utter pandemonium was unfolding. The sky outside was no longer the familiar grey of Z-City; it was a roiling canvas of bruised purples and blood-reds, torn asunder by a jagged, shimmering rift that pulsed with an unholy light. From this tear, creatures that defied terrestrial biology – all chitin, razor-sharp claws, and too many eyes – were pouring into the streets, their screeches tearing at the sanity of anyone who heard them. Buildings crumbled under blasts of crackling, dark energy.
In the epicenter of this chaos, hovering disdainfully above the carnage, was a figure. It was humanoid, yet clearly not human. Clad in obsidian armor that seemed to drink the light, with a horned helmet that obscured its face save for two pinpricks of crimson light, it radiated an aura of such profound power and cosmic indifference that reality itself seemed to warp around it. Its voice, when it spoke, was not heard with ears, but felt in the bones, a resonant hum that vibrated through every atom of existence.
"Mortal realm… insignificant. Your star, your world… a flickering candle before the cosmic storm. I am Vorlag, Scourge of the Shattered Veil, Herald of the Endless Void. Your pitiful existence is an affront. Prepare for oblivion."
One of its six, multi-jointed arms, ending in a hand wreathed in crackling shadow-flame, gestured languidly. A nearby skyscraper, one of Z-City's proudest, simply… imploded. Not with an explosion, but a silent, horrifying compression, as if an invisible god had clenched its fist around it. Dust and debris rained down.
Saitama watched, cabbage in one hand, a basket now containing said cabbage and its twin in the other. His expression was one of mild annoyance. "Hey, uh, Mr. Scourge? Kinda busy here. Big sale on king crab legs, and I don't want to miss out."
Vorlag, who had likely never been addressed with such casual disrespect in its millennia of existence, slowly swiveled its terrifying, helmeted head towards the source of the voice. The crimson pinpricks narrowed. It saw a bald man in a cheap-looking yellow jumpsuit and a white cape, holding groceries. The sheer, unadulterated mundanity of the sight, juxtaposed against the apocalyptic backdrop, was so jarring it almost caused a feedback loop in Vorlag's cosmic consciousness.
"You… address me?" The voice was laced with a cosmic incredulity that could curdle stars. "Insignificant speck. Do you not comprehend the finality you face?"
Saitama scratched his head with his free hand. "Finality? Is that like a new brand of detergent? Because I'm pretty set on 'Ocean Breeze Blast' right now. It really gets the stains out, you know?" He looked down at a small, imaginary stain on his pristine white glove.
A ripple of genuine, unadulterated fury pulsed from Vorlag. The ground cracked further. The air grew heavy, pressing down with the weight of a dying sun. Tendrils of pure despair, blacker than a starless night, lashed out from its form, vaporizing cars and chunks of road.
"SILENCE, INSECT!" Vorlag roared, its voice now a psychic shriek that made the lesser creatures writhe and gibber. "YOU WILL BE THE FIRST TO BE UNMADE, A TESTAMENT TO YOUR SPECIES' UTTER WORTHLESSNESS!"
A colossal orb of roiling, negative energy, shot through with veins of crimson lightning, began to coalesce above Vorlag's outstretched hand. It grew rapidly, dwarfing the crumbling buildings, promising annihilation on a city-wide scale. The very air screamed.
Saitama sighed, a long, put-upon sound. "Man, always something, isn't it? Just want to get my groceries. Okay, fine." He gently placed his basket on a miraculously intact checkout counter. "Let's get this over with."
He took one, almost lazy step forward.
Vorlag unleashed its attack. The "Sphere of Absolute Negation" descended, a miniature black hole of pure destructive will, aimed squarely at the bald man who dared to defy a Herald of the Endless Void.
Saitama looked up. "Oh, that looks kinda bad."
He cocked his right fist.
There was no dramatic power-up, no surge of visible energy, no battle cry. Just a man, a fist, and an incoming apocalypse.
Thwump.
The sound was… anticlimactic. A dull, almost comical thwump, like a wet towel hitting a concrete floor.
But the effect.
The Sphere of Absolute Negation, an attack that could have erased Z-City from the map, simply… vanished. Not exploded. Not deflected. It ceased to exist, as if it had encountered a concept so utterly superior to its own destructive nature that it had no choice but to unravel into nothingness.
In its place, a shockwave, born not of destructive energy but of pure, incomprehensible force, radiated outwards from Saitama's fist. It was a silent shockwave, at first. It didn't tear or burn. It simply pushed.
Vorlag, Herald of the Endless Void, Scourge of the Shattered Veil, felt something it hadn't experienced since before the birth of galaxies: surprise. Then, a micro-fraction of a second later, it felt an irresistible pressure. Its obsidian armor, harder than neutronium, buckled. Its multi-jointed limbs snapped like dry twigs. Its cosmic form, sustained by eons of power, began to unravel.
The crimson lights in its helmet flickered, then widened in dawning, impossible horror. "What… what are y—"
The rest of its pronouncement was lost as its body, from the tips of its horned helmet to the claws on its feet, disintegrated into fine, shimmering dust that was instantly dispersed by the still-expanding, yet strangely gentle, shockwave. The lesser creatures, caught in this same wave, popped like overfilled water balloons, their dark energies neutralized.
The rift in the sky, the source of the invasion, wavered as if struck by a celestial hammer. Cracks spiderwebbed across its surface. Then, with a sound like a dying star collapsing in on itself followed by a universe sighing in relief, it shattered into a million glittering shards of light that rained down like ethereal snow before fading away.
The bruised purple and blood-red sky bled back to its familiar, polluted Z-City grey. Silence descended, broken only by the distant sirens and the crackle of a few remaining fires.
Saitama lowered his fist, a wisp of steam, almost invisible, curling from his glove. He looked at his knuckles. "Huh. Still couldn't feel a thing. Oh well." He turned back to his grocery basket. "Now, where were those king crab legs?"
As he bent to pick up his basket, the ground beneath him, already fractured, gave way completely. Not from the fight, but from something else. A shimmering, violet light erupted from the newly formed chasm, devoid of Vorlag's malice, but filled with an equally potent, yet different, kind Pof otherworldly energy.
"Whoa!" Saitama yelped, losing his balance. The cabbages and his basket tumbled into the glowing abyss. "My dinner!"
He lunged for his groceries, but the violet light pulsed, and a strange, irresistible force, like a gentle but infinitely strong current, tugged at him. He flailed, his cape flapping comically.
"Hey! Not cool! My limited-edition spicy seaweed snacks are in there!"
Despite his immense strength, the pull was insidious, not a direct force he could punch, but a fundamental alteration of the space he occupied. With a final, indignant yelp, Saitama, Hero for Fun, the One-Punch Man, vanished into the violet glow, leaving behind a very confused and rapidly crumbling section of Z-City.
Miles away, or perhaps worlds, in the Royal Capital of Midgar, the night was cool and pierced by the twin moons. Within the opulent, yet shadowed halls of the royal palace, Princess Iris Midgar paced, her silver hair shimmering like moonlight, her expression a mask of frustration and thinly veiled fear. Her younger sister, Princess Alexia, sat more calmly, observing a meticulously detailed map of the surrounding territories, though her crimson eyes held a similar disquiet.
"It makes no sense, Alexia," Iris stated, her voice tight. "Three noble houses, all with significant land holdings and private militias, vanishing from contact within a week. No ransom demands, no signs of struggle reported by their border patrols before they went silent. Just… gone."
Alexia traced a finger along a route leading to the Olba Barony. "Their last communiques spoke of unusual magical energy signatures. Fluctuations. Nothing concrete, but enough to warrant concern. Lord Olba himself dismissed them as 'atmospheric disturbances.'"
"Atmospheric disturbances don't swallow entire baronies whole," Iris snapped, then sighed, running a hand through her hair. "Forgive me. This uncertainty… it gnaws. The Order of Diablos has been quiet for too long. Could this be their doing? A new weapon? A new ritual?"
"Perhaps," Alexia conceded, her gaze sharp. "Or perhaps it is something else entirely. Something… new. The magical scholars at the academy report anomalies in the ley lines, a subtle thrumming that resonates with an energy they cannot identify. It's faint, but pervasive."
Suddenly, the ornate candelabras lining the grand chamber flickered. A gust of wind, impossibly cold and smelling faintly of ozone and something else… something akin to freshly turned earth after a lightning strike, snuffed out half the flames, plunging the room into deeper shadow.
Both princesses tensed, hands instinctively moving towards the hilts of their swords.
From the deepest, now unlit corner of the room, a voice spoke, smooth as polished obsidian, calm as a winter's night, yet carrying an undercurrent of power that made the very air vibrate.
"The stage is ever shifting, Princesses. New actors arrive, new scripts are written, often without the courtesy of an invitation."
Iris and Alexia whirled, swords now drawn, pointing towards the source of the voice. There, materializing from the shadows as if he were sculpted from them, stood a figure. He was cloaked and hooded in a material so dark it seemed to absorb the faint moonlight filtering through the high windows. Only the sharp line of a jaw and the faintest glint of intelligent, assessing eyes were visible beneath the hood. His presence was overwhelming, a silent declaration of absolute mastery over his surroundings.
"Shadow!" Iris hissed, her stance unwavering despite the sudden dryness in her throat. "What is the meaning of this intrusion? How did you bypass the royal guard?"
The figure chuckled, a low, almost inaudible sound that nonetheless sent shivers down their spines. "Guards are for predictable threats, Princess Iris. The truly interesting dangers… they seldom knock." He took a step forward, the shadows clinging to him like a second skin. "You speak of vanishing nobles, of strange energies. These are but ripples on the surface."
Alexia, ever the more analytical, lowered her sword slightly, though her grip remained firm. "You know something of this, Shadow?"
"I know that the world is a tapestry woven with threads of power, deception, and ambition," Shadow replied, his voice a mesmerizing cadence. "Sometimes, threads from… elsewhere… become entangled in our weave. And sometimes," he paused, his unseen gaze seeming to pierce the very fabric of the night sky beyond the castle walls, "those threads are… exceptionally potent."
He tilted his head, as if listening to a sound only he could perceive. A faint smile, barely visible, touched his lips.
"Indeed. One such thread appears to have just arrived. And it has landed with… considerable impact."
Deep within a lightless forest several leagues from Midgar, a new crater, still smoking with a faint, violet luminescence, had just been violently carved into the ancient earth. At its center, covered in dirt and pine needles, a bald man in a tattered yellow jumpsuit slowly sat up, spitting out a mouthful of soil.
Saitama blinked, looking around at the towering, unfamiliar trees and the two alien moons hanging in the inky sky.
"Huh," he said, dusting off a piece of his ruined cape. "Well, this isn't the Z-City Municipal Grocers. My cabbages…" A look of genuine despair crossed his face. "And the king crab sale…!"
His stomach rumbled, a sound that seemed to echo unnaturally loud in the sudden, profound silence of the alien forest.
This was going to be a long day.