Gandi fleeing without even putting up a real fight made Maeve pause for a moment. In that brief lapse of focus, a streak of blue flashed past the corner of her eye, and she saw Homelander crash out as well.
But his exit was far more violent than Gandi's. He smashed straight through an entire section of wall, exposing twisted rebar around the breach.
Maeve shook her head and followed.
Outside the department store, Alex floated in midair, watching Gandi land in the parking lot, right under the sunlight.
Suddenly, Gandi jumped back as if electrocuted. The areas of his black skin that had been exposed to the sun instantly turned red and burst into flames.
Gandi flung his arms, finally shaking the fire off. The charred skin then quickly returned to normal.
"Really does look like a vampire," Alex muttered quietly.
On the ground, Gandi looked up at the blue figure in the sky, then began scanning his surroundings.
At this moment, Queen Maeve jumped out through the opening on the fifth floor, whooshing down to the ground and smashing a shallow crater.
By the time she stood up, Gandi was already charging toward a sewer entrance. He reached out and flipped the manhole cover up, hurling it like a frisbee.
Then Gandi jumped straight into the sewer.
"Don't even think about it!"
Maeve frowned and chased after him, but before she could jump into the sewer herself, two deep red beams suddenly shot down from midair.
The beams then swept forward, cutting across the parking lot. In the next second, along the path they traced, pillar after pillar of dark red fire erupted in rapid succession.
The chain explosions produced a deafening roar. The ground was pried open, countless cars in the parking lot were blasted into the air, and the ones that barely escaped destruction had their alarms triggered, sharp wails overlapping into a single piercing cacophony.
Crash! Crash! Crash!
All kinds of debris and chunks of stone rained down like a storm.
Standing less than three meters from the sewer entrance, Maeve looked up at Alex, who was slowly descending, and spread her hands, "Seriously? Were you planning to blow me up too?"
Alex smiled, "How could I bear to?"
"Look, aren't you perfectly fine?"
He then pointed with his chin toward the place Gandi had jumped down.
"Besides, it reeks down there. You don't want to spend the next week soaking in the bathtub, do you?"
Maeve rolled her eyes.
Alex passed by her and moved into the thick smoke rising from the blast zone. His eyes faintly glowed red as he scanned the area, then locked onto Gandi.
He wasn't dead yet.
The man was curled up on the ground, clutching his head. His clothes had almost completely turned to ash, with only a pair of pants left.
His body was a mess of torn flesh. A large amount of muscle had been blown away, and in some places bone was exposed.
But his head was intact, and because of that, the injuries to his body began to heal almost instantly.
Gandi quickly scrambled to his feet. Realizing that running like this wouldn't get him anywhere, he let out a roar, and the muscles all over his body began to writhe.
Alex let out a surprised sound.
"Huh? He can still keep mutating? Or did this guy leave something in reserve?"
While he was speaking, Maeve had already jumped into the blast zone, down into the sewer that Alex had blown to pieces.
As she passed by a length of rebar, she yanked it out of the concrete, roughly straightened it, and then hurled it with all her strength.
BOOM!
The rebar shot out like a cannon shell, flying straight at Gandi's head.
Gandi sensed the danger and ducked sharply. The rebar skimmed past his scalp, carving a bloody trench across his back before disappearing into the depths of the sewer.
The torn muscle on Gandi's back didn't close up. Instead, new tissue bulged out from the wound, rapidly stretching and forming into two arms.
By now, Gandi had swollen up a full size. His muscles bulged grotesquely, and on his face, new eyeballs sprouted one by one from his brow and cheeks.
In the blink of an eye, Gandi turned into a monster that was half human, half spider. With all his limbs pushing off at once, he leapt out of the sewer.
He landed on the ground, right in the sunlight. His black skin immediately glowed red, and flames flared up again.
"What the hell is that thing?"
"Take pictures, hurry! You don't get chances like this."
"It's ugly as hell."
Voices rang out one after another. It turned out to be the reporters stationed at the front entrance of the mall. Hearing the explosions in the parking lot, they had immediately moved over and now saw Gandi in his monstrous form.
Ignoring the danger, they raised their cameras and video recorders, shooting frantically, eager to capture this rare scene.
Gandi moved into the shadow of the building, avoiding the sunlight, and the flames on his body finally went out.
He glanced at Homelander floating in midair, let out a hiss, grabbed a nearby pickup truck, and with a violent heave, hurled it straight at Alex.
Alex scoffed and fired his laser eyes, slicing the pickup cleanly in half.
Letting the wreckage pass by on either side of his body, Alex raised his voice.
"My offer still stands. What do you say? Still not going to think it over?"
Gandi answered with action.
He picked up another car and smashed it forward.
At that moment, Maeve burst out of the sewer, stepped on the flying car in midair, and used it to launch herself toward Gandi.
All the eyeballs on Gandi's face lit up at once. He raised all four arms and slammed them downward.
A crackling series of sounds exploded overhead. The many electrical wires and cables on the building's exterior suddenly snapped, spraying sparks as they shot down like tentacles and wrapped around Maeve.
The sparking cables electrocuted her. It wasn't enough to kill her, but the intense current made her convulse uncontrollably, leaving her no strength to break free.
Thankfully, two laser beams swept across her body, cutting the cables apart. Only then did Maeve fall to the ground.
Her body still twitched slightly. The shock left her legs weak, unable to stand, temporarily incapable of dealing with Gandi.
"Leave it to me," Alex said softly as he passed by her, then lunged at Gandi.
But at that moment, Gandi suddenly shouted, "Don't come any closer!"
"Or I'll kill them!"
It turned out that while Alex was busy freeing Maeve, Gandi had used his abilities to control items on the reporters. Their ties, camera straps, even the necklaces hanging around their necks.
He manipulated these items to tighten around the reporters' throats, using them to threaten Alex.
But Alex showed no intention of stopping. It was as if he hadn't heard the threat at all. With a loud bang, he slammed straight into the spider-like man.
Gandi's chest caved in almost completely. His body was sent flying into the air, and then ripples inexplicably exploded in front of him, flinging him even farther away.
Alex whooshed forward, caught up to Gandi as he was blasted away by the "second impact," grabbed one of his arms, spun several times, and used the momentum to hurl him into the parking lot.
BOOM!
Gandi flew in from midair into the parking lot, smashing through car after car. Dazed and battered, he could no longer maintain control over those objects.
The reporters felt the pressure around their necks suddenly loosen. They instinctively sucked in a breath, only for the air hitting their lungs to make every single one of them break into violent coughing.
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