Ch.145Why Now, of All Times?

“Just in case, everyone should prepare. I’ve already informed the W City government…”

“No way… that can’t happen, right?”

“If it really does, we’re in big trouble.”

Yu Anna, already stressed from personal matters, was gripped by an ominous feeling before she could even collect her emotions.

B City, G City—illegal refugees who had come from two cities in a single day.

Surely, this wouldn’t be the end of it.

[Senior, more refugees from the west…]

[127 additional refugees from G City.]

[This time three heroes came as refugees from B City?]

[Is this… is this even allowed?]

[Southeast! Refugee group spotted! Looks like about 300! Need support!]

[It’s a villain organization. They’re surrendering—what should we do? Should we accept them?]

As expected, before long, increasing numbers of refugees began heading toward W City.

Heroes who had been resting thanks to Black Cat now moved even more busily to cover a wider area than before.

These were reckless people who had left their fortress cities just because of Black Cat, but the heroes were determined to save them first and ask questions later.

[What the hell are they doing!]

[Accepting refugees who haven’t gone through proper procedures and haven’t even lost their fortress cities!]

Some refugees who had settled in W City informed their respective cities of their safety through their own phones or videos taken by W City residents.

Although they were living in cardboard box homes, residents couldn’t help but be stirred up after seeing their neighbors who had been with them until recently now safely arrived in W City where Black Cat resided.

Should they relive the nightmare of fleeing during the early monster era to reach Black Cat, or stay safely in their fortress city?

Among them, more and more people began preparing for a life-risking relocation.

Monster attacks occurring daily and casualties increasing day by day.

If they stayed here, they would die eventually anyway.

So why not risk death once to relocate?

And so, numerous technicians, ordinary citizens who should be working in their cities, and even heroes escaped from fortress cities.

A-rank and B-rank heroes abandoned their cities to head toward closed zones, resulting in many deaths.

All to reach W City where Black Cat resided.

[Is this how they plan to steal our city’s technicians!]

[This is terrorism! Terrorism!]

[Heroes are leaking out of the city, and I heard three of them died on their way there!]

Inside the government building of W City, in the mayor’s office.

The city leaders were furious about the situation where already scarce heroes were voluntarily risking their lives.

Receiving the glares of holographic mayors, the W City mayor laughed while drinking beer with potato chips.

“Hehehe, this is quite troublesome.”

[Take action immediately! As a mayor, you need to take responsibility and lead your citizens!]

[What the hell is W City doing!]

[Do you think you can do this just because you have Black Cat!]

“Hmm hehehe~”

Laughing inappropriately in such a serious situation, the W City mayor wiped his greasy hands covered in potato chip dust on his white hair and mocked the other city mayors.

“Hmm~ Isn’t it you all who failed to properly manage your citizens, causing them to flee outside the cities?”

[What did you say?!]

“If you had eliminated the smuggling routes created by villains in time, this wouldn’t have happened.”

[You think that’s as easy as you make it sound!]

“Or you could have deployed police forces appropriately. Or made heroes not want to leave the city by giving them what they want.”

[How many cities do you think have surplus police forces!]

[You think W City heroes stay because you’re doing a good job! You’re just a lucky old man!]

“Huh hehehehe~”

Laughing with his mouth wide open at being called lucky, the mayor finished his remaining beer and gestured for Yu Anna to step forward.

Seeing this, Yu Anna sighed and thought to herself.

The W City mayor was the oldest among all city mayors, with little interest in city development or management, only caring about eating delicious food and living comfortably—an irresponsible human being.

However, ironically, this kind of person got along well with heroes.

The W City mayor dumped all work and authority onto heroes and technicians, while he simply occupied the position of mayor and played around every day.

After Black Cat became Annihilation-rank, the mayor played even more diligently.

Knowing that Yu Anna already held most of the city’s authority, the mayors shifted their target to her and clicked their tongues.

[Starlight, what are you planning to do?]

[Are you really going to keep accepting refugees like this?]

“Are you saying we shouldn’t accept them? Are you telling me to send back those who risked their lives to reach W City?”

[Yes! That would stop people from secretly leaving the cities!]

Yu Anna partly sympathized with the mayors’ words and couldn’t refute them.

“That would be inhumane.”

However, she couldn’t accept the suggestion to stop receiving refugees either.

[Inhumane? You call that a response?]

[These refugees are all appearing because of you. If you just take proper measures, they wouldn’t appear!]

“If by ‘proper measures’ you mean abandoning citizens who risked their lives to escape their cities to die, then I won’t take such measures.”

[What?]

“A hero is someone who protects humans, not someone who kills them.”

Yu Anna glared at the holograms of the elderly mayors with her eyes fractured like stars due to her ability.

“I only kill monsters.”

The mayors clicked their tongues one by one at Yu Anna’s firm answer.

“I will continue to accept refugees who have already left their cities. I don’t want citizens to die either. Please manage your cities properly and thoroughly.”

In the end, the refugee crisis was caused by poor city management.

If they had just properly stationed their military and police forces, which they were using as personal guards for their own protection, so many refugees wouldn’t have been able to escape the cities.

When Yu Anna blamed the mayors’ incompetence, they began hurling insults one after another.

[You claim to protect humans, yet you encourage citizens to rush toward death like moths to a flame.]

[Just a girl who luckily awakened superpowers, thinking you’re something special?]

[They say when a hen crows, the nation falls—the old saying is absolutely right!]

[You monster girl, not knowing your place, influenced by that bastard Cage.]

[Disrespectful bitch!]

After the emergency meeting ended amid the mayors’ vitriol, Yu Anna sent the mayor off to drink and returned to the hero headquarters.

“How’s the refugee situation?”

“Well… the central park is already at full capacity.”

“The prison is packed with villains who came from other cities and surrendered.”

“Haah…”

Although she had told the mayors she would continue accepting incoming refugees, W City was already approaching its limit.

The spacious city had places to stay, but that was all they had.

“If people keep increasing like this, we’ll truly face food shortages.”

“Black Cat’s Cat Tower aside, we need to expand the food factories.”

“To expand factories, heroes need to bring resources from closed zones, and we need Meister and technicians.”

With refugees pouring in from all directions, W City was once again short on heroes.

Heroes busy protecting the refugees flooding into the city had no time to explore closed zones.

Bringing a Meister from A City was currently impossible.

Even though Black Cat had become Annihilation-rank and created a safe zone, they were still overwhelmed.

Yu Anna held her head alone in her private room, facing a situation with no solution.

“We’re short on heroes, short on time… resources too…”

Muttering the same words Cage often said, Yu Anna quietly sighed and thought of Cage, who still hadn’t regained his senses.

If only Cage were here, if there were just one more S-rank hero.

…If that man, Park Deun-deun, would become an S-rank.

Just as Yu Anna was considering asking Park Deun-deun again to become a hero, when they needed even one more strong hero…

“Come in.”

“Um, Senior?”

Iron Might, the man who knocked on the door of Yu Anna’s personal room that she used as an office, entered with a complicated expression.

“What is it? If it’s not urgent, come back later. I’m thinking about what to do with the refugees right now.”

As Yu Anna, busy contemplating combat methods for rescuing refugees approaching W City and how to settle refugees within the city while reviewing various numerically organized data, spoke, Iron Might tightly closed his eyes.

“Huuuu…”

A long sigh—sensing something was wrong, Yu Anna slowly lifted her eyes from the documents to look at Iron Might.

Like a steam train releasing trapped steam, he tilted his head back and repeatedly exhaled, “Huu, huu…”

Iron Might, tightly gripping his phone, heightened Yu Anna’s anxiety.

“At a time like this, I’m really sorry… but I have something I must tell you. Could you spare a moment?”

“What is it? It’s not… dangerous news, is it?”

Surely not wanting to retire at a time like this?

Is there a problem with his ability, is his health poor, has someone caused trouble, has someone done something strange to Black Cat again?

As Yu Anna recalled various bad possibilities in a flood, Iron Might standing before her closed his eyes tightly and slowly turned over the phone in his hand.

“…Huh?”

The screen showed something Yu Anna recognized.

Two lines, an object defined by just those words.

Something that deserved even more fervent blessings in the monster era than before.

“Huh? W-who? Which of our people is having a baby?”

It was a photo of a pregnancy test announcing a pregnancy.

“Um… well… yes…”

“Who? Minji? Juyoung? Hyesu? Doyoung?”

Yu Anna rattled off the names of female heroes she knew had boyfriends or husbands, but Iron Might just silently sighed.

His trembling fingertip pointed at himself.

“…Huh? Huuuuh?!”

Yu Anna was shocked at the gesture indicating Iron Might.

“It’s your child?! But you don’t have a girlfriend! When?”

“Well… about that.”

“Wow! C-congratulations! How did this happen? Who? How did you manage to date someone secretly? Wait, didn’t you say just recently that heroes don’t have time for dating? Ah! Marriage? Is this important talk about a wedding?”

Yu Anna, who had jumped up at the news that her most cherished subordinate was having a child, slapped the back of Iron Might who was standing stiffly in place.

“Who’s the partner? Hmm… Sujin? Or Jeonghui? You’re close with so many female heroes, I can’t tell! Ah, or is it an ordinary person? I guess heroes together…”

“Senior! Well, um, that…”

“Are you frozen like this because the baby came suddenly? Is this what they call speeding? That’s amazing… don’t worry and get married! No matter how busy, you should get married! I’ll cover for you. Well, you’re not S-rank, just A-rank, so I can fill that gap!”

“I’m sorry!”

“What? Why are you apologizing?”

Iron Might bit his lip and took several deep breaths before dismissing the photo from the screen with hands that trembled unlike a superhuman.

This revealed the messenger screen where the photo had been sent.

Probably a conversation Iron Might had with his lover.

Wondering if she should be looking at this, Yu Anna hesitantly looked at the phone screen held out as if asking her to see it.

Messages asking if he really couldn’t come to A City, saying they missed him and seeming to cling, Iron Might’s cold replies asking why suddenly, if they were feeling lonely lately.

Just as Yu Anna was about to hit Iron Might on the head for such cold replies when a woman said she missed him, she blinked at the most recent conversation.

< What are you going to do? )

( Huh? >

< I’m asking what you’re going to do about this… )

Messages showing considerable panic, followed by the pregnancy test photo.

And right below, a full-body photo of the woman sent immediately after.

Electris, holding her stomach preciously with a face in disarray as if she had been crying until just now.

“Eh?”

Yu Anna looked up at Iron Might with disbelief at the unbelievable photo, thinking, “No way…?” She shook her head slightly, but Iron Might neither nodded nor shook his head, only sighing.

“Huh?”

Boom—receiving a shock greater than a blow from a Despair-rank monster, Yu Anna staggered and leaned against the desk, desperately clinging to her rationality.

This is real.

When on earth did Electris and Iron Might…? How did this happen?

“Huh? When did you two become like that? W-what?”

“That, haah, well.”

“Ah! No! You don’t have to tell me, it’s your personal love life! And why are you sorry! Having a child is a blessing, not something to apologize for!”

While congratulating Iron Might, Yu Anna unconsciously had negative thoughts.

Among heroes, some can use their abilities during pregnancy, but Electris’s case is unique.

Her special physiology means electricity flows through her own body when she generates it—a characteristic of awakened people adapted to their abilities.

Could a fetus withstand that electricity?

Probably not.

So in this situation, one S-rank hero would be out of commission?

They wouldn’t be able to protect A City citizens—should she leave W City entirely to Black Cat and go to A City herself? Would that be okay?

No, then it would be difficult to manage the refugees. If left alone, they might turn into an impure group that provokes Black Cat again, like before.

“Um, Senior. I’m really sorry, but I think I could use that hero cannon thing, so could I, um, go to A City?”

“Huh? The hero cannon? You’d use that?”

“Maria already asked Meister about it. He said that since I have a special ability, even though I’m A-rank, there shouldn’t be a problem.”

“Maria? Ah! That’s Electris’s name? Right, her name was Maria! Of course it’s fine! Don’t worry! W City has Black Cat, right?”

“Huu… thank you. Actually, she suddenly called me crying yesterday and said she would abort the baby.”

“What?! No, no, that’s not right! I’ll issue the transfer order officially and write it up later, so go! Reassure Electris well…”

Shocked in many ways that the Electris would call crying, Yu Anna pushed Iron Might’s back, telling him to go quickly.

After Iron Might bowed his head in greeting and left the room, a moment later.

Yu Anna, left alone in the room standing blankly, grabbed her head with both hands and spun around in place.

“Aaaah…!”

Why now of all times! As if there weren’t enough headaches already!

Words she couldn’t bring herself to say out loud exploded silently within Yu Anna.

Feeling a throbbing headache, how long had Yu Anna been leaning her head against the wall?

“S-Senior!”

Iron Might, who had said he was going straight to A City but had returned, opened Yu Anna’s door without knocking.

Iron Might had never opened a door without knocking before.

“Now, now…!”

Startled, Yu Anna widened her eyes at the phone screen Iron Might showed her next.

The screen was filled with a conversation she hadn’t seen before, as if he had been talking with Electris again after leaving the room.

At the very bottom, one noticeable message appeared.

< Cage has regained consciousness )