Chapter 57 Broad Daylight

I stole my way back into civilization, shedding the sea-soaked remnants of my survival for something sharper. A stylish cashmere suit sat better on my shoulders than anything I had ever owned, though it felt almost mocking. To finish the look, I grabbed a porcelain mask, a bonnet-style cover for my head, and a broad hat to break my silhouette. Playing cards filled my pockets, props and weapons alike. The world expected Eclipse to make a statement, and I planned to carve mine in blood.

BunnyBlade’s fixer didn’t ask questions. He simply handed me the stuff I requested from him from the grenades, the grappling hook, and the claymore. After that, he pointed me to a military transport aircraft, and treated me like another problem to ship out of sight. Inside the steel belly of the plane, the hum of engines drowned all thought until he pressed a sleek watch into my palm. “We’re almost there. Precision drop. According to Bunny, you want to land on a rooftop. Did I hear that right?”

I gave him a sharp nod, wearing the watch around my wrist.

“Good. That watch’ll guide you. Built-in program, tells you if your fall’s on track. Don’t waste my time… I won’t repeat myself. Got it?”

“I got it.”

The back hatch yawned open, and the world became nothing but roaring wind and light. The air tore through the cabin like a beast unchained, rattling metal, tugging at everything not bolted down. He leaned close, voice strained against the gale. “One minute before the drop. Here’s your chute.”

“I don’t need it.”

He froze, his expression twisting in disbelief. “What the hell do you mean, you don’t need it?”

“This kill needs to be fast, not clean. A parachute’s too obvious and peculiar at this situation. Any cape worth his salt would spot it.”

The fixer cursed under his breath. “Are you insane? Can you even fly?”

“No.”

His voice cracked between panic and rage. “Then you’re just diving to your funeral!” He shoved the parachute against my chest, desperate. “Take the damn thing!”

I glanced at the countdown ticking on the watch. Ten seconds left. My pulse matched the rhythm, steady and cruel. “You can keep it,” I told him, sliding the chute back. His eyes burned with disbelief, but I was already moving.

Five seconds. The watch vibrated softly.

Three seconds. I stepped to the edge, wind pulling at my coat, tugging me into the void.

One second. I leaned forward, every muscle set, and every nerve alive.

I dove headfirst into the sky.

The world became a rushing blur, blue and white streaking past as gravity seized me. The watch came alive, a small holographic figure projected above its face, a humanoid model tilting in place, charting my descent. A faint line of light stretched below it, guiding me toward my target. I leaned left, air clawing at me, and the watch glowed green. On course.

Daylight burned across the horizon. The city spread wide below, its towers like teeth waiting to chew me apart. Somewhere beneath the glass and steel waited my mark. Somewhere down there, history would remember what Eclipse dared to do in the open sun.

I tightened my mask, cards pressing against my ribs. I was falling, and I was smiling.

The city was spread beneath me, every glass pane glittering like a dagger in the daylight, but my eyes locked on the one structure BunnyBlade had burned into my memory. The SRC’s office was disguised as nothing more than a call center, a bland tower stuffed among a hundred other corporate blocks. I had memorized the files, memorized the layout, and memorized the man I was supposed to kill. BunnyBlade had even done me the courtesy of picking a target with a filthy history, some bureaucrat tied to black sites and human trafficking. He must have thought that would make it easier for me. As if I gave a damn about the moral gloss. A corpse was a corpse, and I had a job to finish.

The wind shredded against my suit, forcing the fabric to snap and ripple. My watch lit crimson, the tiny holographic figure shifting its weight. I angled right, chest twisting against the pull of gravity, and the light flicked green again. Good. Just a little further, just a little lower.

The rooftop surged toward me like a wall. At the last second, I phased, my body passing through the hard concrete as if the building itself were mist.

Gasps erupted around me. A blur of shocked faces whirled past as I crashed through floor after floor. Screams followed in my wake, workers pointing and cursing at the impossible sight of a man falling through solid matter. Phones dropped, chairs toppled, and the sound of confusion became a rising tide. None of it mattered.

The basement waited.

I burst through the final layer of concrete and found him exactly where the intel promised: a dark-skinned man in a loose shirt, sipping coffee beside a photocopy machine. The universe had decided, for once, to favor me.

I snapped my power off, phasing through the ground with force. The ground spat me upward like a slingshot, propelling me back into the open space. My lungs seized with the pressure, my teeth rattling from the force, but the propulsion hurled me exactly where I needed to be. The target stood there, dropping his mug, hot liquid splattering across the tiles as his eyes bulged with panic. I caught him by the throat before he could scream, driving him down, phasing his body through the floor as if I were personally digging his grave. His mouth opened in a strangled sound, half his torso already submerged in the cold concrete.

Murder hummed in my veins. I pressed harder. I wanted him buried. I wanted him erased.

Then the world stilled.

Cold steel kissed my throat, gently pressed against my skin.

“Let him go.”

The voice was rough, commanding, weathered by years of violence. I looked up into the sharp eyes of a middle-aged man in armor marked with the Vanguard insignia. Sword Meister. His power was as infamous as his name, wielding swords he could control with impossible precision and speed. One of those swords was now on my throat, and though my body was intangible, I could feel it, as if it had cut past the very rules of my ability.

So much for good luck.

At this point, many of the other employees had run off.

I slowly loosened my grip, but my other hand slipped into my coat. A card pressed against my fingers, cool and thin. My pulse thudded.

In one motion, I flicked my wrist, flinging a flurry of cards while half-phased, the paper flashing like knives in the dim light.

The blade moved before my eyes could follow. A streak of silver blurred across the space, slicing every single card to ribbons. In the next breath, the same sword reappeared against my throat, its edge unmoving, as steady as death itself.

The porcelain mask I wore cracked under the vibration of the strike, a splinter breaking free and tumbling to the ground. Bits scattered at my feet, my disguise fragmenting piece by piece. If not for the bonnet mask layered beneath, I would’ve been exposed right there, under his unflinching gaze.

“I suggest you don’t try anything funny, kid.”

Sword Meister’s blade lingered at my throat, close enough that I could feel its weight like a steel shadow pressing against my skin. One flick of his wrist and I’d be nothing but another corpse in the basement of an SRC front office. The message was clear. He could kill me if he wanted to, and he wanted me to know it.

I smiled beneath the porcelain mask. “I’m not even trying,” I said flatly. My grip tightened on the squirming man beneath me, his torso sunk halfway into the concrete. His legs kicked desperately, coffee still dripping from his hand where he’d dropped the mug. If I released him now, his upper body would remain fused with the floor, organs crushed, bones shattered, and dead in an instant. I had his life dangling on the edge of my decision, and Sword Meister knew it.

The veteran hero didn’t flinch. His eyes stayed sharp, unwavering, as though he’d seen a thousand moments like this before and was unmoved by all of them. He wasn’t Markend’s most famous cape, but fame wasn’t everything. Experience was. Sword Meister was one of the oldest heroes still standing, a relic of earlier wars who’d managed to stay alive by sheer pragmatism and ruthless efficiency.

I forced myself to recall what I’d studied about him. Speedster-4, Enhanced-4, Bruiser-2. There was definitely more, and I could tell SRC embellished his numbers to make him look weaker. Still, I believed I knew enough.. His ability wasn’t about running laps or lifting trucks. His gift revolved entirely around swords. Every blade he held became something more… sharper, faster, more durable, sometimes even stranger. And he didn’t just wield them; he commanded them. His swords could strike with superhuman speed, cut with absurd precision, and, as I had just learned the hard way, they could interfere with powers like mine.

The katana at my throat hummed faintly, vibrating with potential violence. I realized quickly that this was no ordinary blade. Normally, Sword Meister carried two or three weapons at once, each one gaining its own minor quirks when under his control. Today, he only carried this katana, and that told me everything I needed to know. If he’d gone into this situation with one sword, it meant this was his best one, the one he trusted above all others. I was staring down the sharpest edge of his arsenal.

A small crack spidered across my porcelain mask where his blade had grazed earlier, fragments dropping onto the floor. If not for the bonnet mask underneath, my face would’ve been exposed already. Sword Meister had tested me, cut a card out of midair, then returned his blade to my neck before I could blink. He wanted me to understand the gap between us.

“Eclipse,” Sword Meister said at last, his voice calm, almost bored. “You are under arrest for multiple counts of murder, vigilantism, and terrorism under the Council’s statutes. You have the right to remain silent, though I doubt you’ll take it. You have the right to a fair trial, though I doubt you’ll live long enough for it.” His katana pressed closer, the cold bite of its edge stinging against my throat. His tone hardened as he continued, “Give up while you still can, kid. Because if you force my hand, you won’t walk out of here alive.”