Chapter 367: Hollowstreet.
"... what?"
"This is mere speculation, but I have a feeling it’s true. You know what the kid is capable of, and there is no way he hasn’t improved in the last couple of years."
Considering everything that happened in the past week or so, the Daggers were quick to put all the blame on the mysterious third party that has attempted to fan the flames between them and Black Skull. The only thing the two cases shared was the involvement of a skilled Diver, but that alone was more than enough.
"So it was him..."
Though the lower half of his face was covered in rigid metal, somehow, Jaguar appeared to be smiling at that moment. His gaze went down as he appeared to recollect something, and with each passing second, his mood seemed to change for the better, enough for him to start laughing.
"Hahahahahahaha"
Henry watched him in silence, his smile hidden behind his beard and mustache. He let him be for some time, but time was of the essence, and he couldn’t waste too much of it.
"Glad you liked the news, but let’s leave the celebration for another time." He said. "We should decide what we’re going to do from now on."
"What else are we gonna do?" Jaguar cackled. "We’re gonna find my kid, that’s what we’re gonna do!"
The alcohol must have landed another kick, seeing how he changed from an angry drunk to a merry one. Still, that wasn’t the answer the hairy giant was looking for.
"You already tasked me with finding the Diver, so that’s what I’m gonna do. But that’s not what I was asking."
"Huh?" Jaguar held his laughter and asked a silent question.
Henry held his gaze and spoke, putting effort into sounding serious, even while knowing the ridiculousness of what he was about to say
"How about we crush Black Skull first?"
~[ ]~
A few days have passed since what happened at the fancy restaurant. After meeting with Rose and discussing the changes to their plans, Dante followed it to tie and lay low for a while. This time around, he wasn’t short on things to do, so boredom never visited him.
BOOM!
An explosion resounded through an empty street, causing the surrounding street lights to flicker. A car took to the sky, launched by a powerful blast, but just as gravity began to pull it down, something struck it from below, sending it flying up once more.
The car didn’t make it far before hitting something. An invisible ceiling barred its way—a wall of darkness different from the night sky. Bouncing off of it, the car began its fall, but then it went flying once more. This time, it crashed straight into a nearby building, bursting through a window and into the apartment beyond it.
A short distance away, an armored figure landed gracefully. Though covered in gray metal plating, the armor was much lighter than it seemed. Its joints glowed a faint blue, reflecting off the V-shaped visor of its helmet.
The armor soon lost that glow, only to gain a different one. It disintegrated into countless threads of pure white light before being absorbed into a single point. The gray armor disappeared, and a red-haired youth took its place.
[You seem to have improved significantly.] Said the voice in his head.
"Not enough." The youth replied.
His heart was beating fast, and his breathing was ragged. Seeing him like that, one would think he had been running a marathon, but in truth, he barely took more than thirty steps.
"Damn... I can’t move my legs..."
As ominous as his words were, the grin on his face said he wasn’t too bothered by his current state. His entire body was aching, and he was in pain. Despite that, Dante was smiling.
[Maybe you should take a break?]
"I couldn’t go on even if I wanted." He plopped down in his place and waited for his breath to even out. Opening his Storage, he took out a water bottle and ripped the cap off then squeezed the hollow piece of plastic as he spilled the cool liquid onto his head.
Despite it being winter, his surroundings were strangely hot. The snow had long since melted, but that didn’t mean summer had already arrived. The heat was a result of a mistake he made. Lighting a fire in a perfectly insulated room meant that the resulting heat had nowhere to go. It didn’t matter if said room was several dozen meters across.
With all the free time he got, Dante decided to work on his secret layer. He experimented with 8-4’s Spatial Pocket ability, creating pocket dimensions and seeing the limits of what he could do with them. His latest creation was what he called Hollowstreet. Using every bit of energy 8-4 had, he created a pocket dimension that engulfed one of the wide intersections linking four megacomplexes, replicating a part of the city and everything in it. Unfortunately, he was unable to take in the buildings in their entirety, which left him with incomplete sections that happened to be in the selection zone. Those sections didn’t crumble or collapse, and according to Volcan, creating more pocket dimensions in the same area would expand the first one and complete the buildings instead of resulting in perfectly sliced slabs of concrete.
Hollowstreet was intended to be a training ground for Dante to try on his armor, and that’ exactly what he did. Today, he was working on mastering Type 5-2’s speed, but the day before, he had played around with Type 1 and its armors. Type 1 specialized in hear and fire, so after testing its abilities for some time, Dante came to notice that the air was growing hotter inside the pocket dimension. No matter how much he waited, the heat didn’t dissipate, and despite making use of Type 2’s water abilities to cool things down, it didn’t take long for the heat to return.
Until he finds a proper solution for his predicament, Dante decided to keep using the place as he had intended.