Hero looked up.
His mouth fell open.
A foot.
A massive foot made of stone—rough, ancient, covered in moss and cracks that glowed with some kind of pulsing orange energy. It hung in the air above him, blotting out the sun, easily the size of a small car. The golem it belonged to towered stories high, its body a patchwork of boulders and rubble held together by that same eerie light.
Hero stared at it.
Blinked.
Then sighed.
"Oh, this is officially the worst day of my life."
His eyes began to glow.
Not gradually. Not softly. They just ignited—brilliant, electric blue, like someone had flipped a switch inside his skull. Strange symbols flickered across his irises, geometric patterns that twisted and rotated, ancient and incomprehensible. They pulsed in rhythm with his heartbeat.
The rocks around him started to lift.
Small ones first—pebbles, chunks of broken pavement—rising into the air like they'd forgotten how gravity worked. Then larger pieces. A chunk of the curb. A piece of the car's bumper. They hovered, suspended, trembling with barely contained energy.
The air itself felt heavy, charged, like the moment before lightning strikes.
Hero's fingers twitched.
The foot began its descent.
And then—
WHAM.
Someone slammed into the golem's leg from the side.
The impact was tremendous. The stone foot jerked sideways, the entire massive limb knocked off course. The golem stumbled, its body tilting, arms windmilling for balance.
Hero blinked.
The glow in his eyes flickered.
Died.
The rocks fell—clatter clatter clatter—hitting the pavement in a sudden rain of stone and debris.
A figure landed above him.
Literally above him.
She was airborne, hovering for just a moment, silhouetted against the sky. Dark hair tied back in a ponytail. Some kind of academy uniform—white shirt, blazer, and a skirt that was way too short for aerial combat.
Hero's brain, still catching up to the fact that he wasn't about to be crushed, processed what he was seeing.
He could see her panties.
Blue. With little white stars.
His eyes went wide.
She hung there for half a second longer—just long enough for the moment to become very apparent—before her head snapped down.
Their eyes met.
Hero's face went blank.
Her face went red.
She looked away immediately, her entire body going rigid with mortification.
But she didn't have time to dwell on it.
The golem roared—a sound like grinding stone and ancient anger—and swung a massive fist toward them both.
She shot forward, intercepting it mid-swing.
Her fist met the golem's with a CRACK that echoed through the street. The shockwave rippled outward, shattering nearby windows. The golem's arm buckled, stone fracturing, orange light spilling from the cracks like blood.
She didn't stop.
She followed through, driving her shoulder into the creature's torso, pushing it back. Her feet—bare, Hero noticed distantly—glowed with the same energy that surrounded her fists. Each step left cracks in the pavement.
The golem stumbled backward, away from Hero, away from the wrecked car, its massive form crashing through a parked hover-vehicle.
"Get out of here!" she shouted over her shoulder, her voice sharp, commanding.
She didn't wait for a response.
She launched herself at the golem again, a blur of motion and fury, fists hammering into its chest, each strike sending chunks of stone flying.
Hero lay on the ground, propped up on his elbows, staring.
Gary's voice, shaky and distant, cut through his thoughts.
"S-Sir Hero? Are you okay?"
Hero turned his head slowly to look at the car.
Gary was climbing out of the driver's seat, the airbag deflating around him, his face still pale, his cap askew.
Hero looked at Gary.
Then at the girl fighting the golem.
Then at the sky.
"I should've stayed in bed," he muttered.
Hero pushed himself to his feet, stumbling back a step. His legs felt shaky, his head still spinning from the whole "launched through a windshield" experience. He kept his eyes on the fight, backing up slowly, putting distance between himself and the chaos.
The golem roared, pulling its massive arm back for another strike.
It swung.
The wind from the punch alone was insane—a gust that rattled nearby cars, sent loose debris tumbling across the street, and made Hero's torn jacket whip around him. The air itself seemed to scream.
She moved.
Dropped low, flying under the fist as it passed overhead, close enough that her hair whipped from the displaced air. She didn't stop—used the momentum to spin around the golem's arm like it was a maypole, spiraling upward, faster and faster.
Then she launched herself from its shoulder, fist pulled back, glowing with that same fierce energy.
Her punch connected with the golem's face.
CRACK.
The sound was like a building being demolished. The golem's head snapped back, cracks spiderwebbing across its rocky features. It roared—pain, anger, something primal—and staggered.
"Wow," Gary breathed, suddenly standing next to Hero, eyes wide with awe. "She's strong."
Hero turned his head slowly to look at him.
"You're a very bad driver."
Gary's smile faltered. He looked away, scratching the back of his head nervously. "Yeah, uh... sorry about that. I'll... I'll work on it."
Hero turned back to the fight.
"She is strong," he said quietly.
The girl didn't let up. She was on the golem like a force of nature, fists hammering into its torso, its arms, anywhere she could reach. Each impact sent chunks of stone flying, orange energy bleeding from the wounds. She moved with precision, with power, every strike calculated.
The golem tried to grab her—massive stone hands reaching, grasping.
She dodged, twisting mid-air, impossibly agile.
Came back with an uppercut that lifted the creature off its feet for half a second.
Hero's eyes narrowed.
"But she's doing little to no damage."
It was true. For all her strength, for all the cracks spreading across the golem's body, it wasn't breaking. The orange light pulsed brighter with each hit, like it was healing, reinforcing, adapting. The golem was tough. Too tough.
The creature swung both arms inward, trying to clap her between its palms.
She shot upward, the hands slamming together beneath her with a BOOM that shook the ground.
She dove back down, drove her knee into the top of its head.
CRACK.
More cracks. More damage.
But still standing.
The golem's eyes—empty sockets filled with that burning orange light—focused on her. It opened its mouth and roared, the sound so loud it set off car alarms three blocks away.
Then it lunged.
She met it head-on, fist to fist, the collision sending out a shockwave that rattled windows.
They broke apart.
Circled.
She moved in again—faster this time, a flurry of strikes. Left, right, uppercut, spinning kick that connected with its jaw.
The golem stumbled but didn't fall.
Hero's eyes began to glow.
Blue light spilled from his irises, those strange symbols flickering back to life, rotating, pulsing. The air around him grew heavy again.
Rocks lifted.
Pebbles first, then larger chunks, rising into the air around him like a halo of stone. They trembled, vibrating with barely contained energy.
Gary didn't notice. His eyes were locked on the fight.
Hero watched the girl. Watched her pull back for another strike, fist glowing, body coiled with power.
He timed it.
Waited.
She launched forward; fist aimed at the golem's chest—
Hero snapped his fingers.
SNAP.
The sound was quiet. Insignificant.
The effect was not.
Her fist connected.
And the golem exploded.
Not in fire or light—just broke. The entire structure disintegrated in an instant, massive boulders crumbling into smaller rocks, those breaking into pebbles, until there was nothing left but dust and tiny fragments raining down like hail.
The orange light flickered once—confused, searching—and then vanished.
Silence.
The girl hovered in the air, fist still extended, surrounded by a cloud of settling dust and falling golem debris.
The rocks around Hero fell—clatter, clatter, clatter—hitting the pavement. The chunks of golem rained down too, a cascade of stone fragments pattering against the ground like heavy rain, bouncing off car hoods, rolling into gutters.
His eyes dimmed. Went dark. Back to normal.
Gary's mouth dropped open, a huge grin spreading across his face.
"She beat a golem on her own!" His voice was full of genuine wonder, bordering on fanboy territory. "She's incredible!"
Hero narrowed his eyes, watching the girl slowly lower herself to the ground, looking at her fist like she couldn't quite believe what had just happened.
"Sure, man," Hero said quietly.