Chapter 342: Chapter 43: The Monster Association, Revealed!
"So that’s the Monster Association, huh?"
Ron’s lips curved into a faint smile.
"Hiding in the shadows... what’s the point of that?"
He raised his hand, and a blood-red longsword—thin and gleaming like autumn water—formed in his palm from condensed blood energy.
With a casual swing downward—
Several crimson slashes, thin as thread and swift as lightning, flashed through the air and vanished into the ground below.
BOOM! RUMBLE RUMBLE!
The earth quaked violently.
Four straight, canyon-like fissures tore through the ground, splitting the entire abandoned zone from the rest of Z-City as though measured and cut by an invisible ruler.
In Ron’s heterochromatic eyes, golden divine light flashed. His left hand clenched in midair—and with it, the awakened powers of the Float-Float Fruit surged into their third phase!
"Come out."
As his voice echoed—
The ground trembled again.
A deafening roar, like the rumble of the earth itself, filled the sky.
The entire abandoned zone began to rise from the surface, lifting slowly into the air!
—
At Saitama’s home—
The vibrations hit, and suddenly the lights went out.
Saitama, who was lying sideways on the floor watching TV, blinked in confusion.
"Hmm? An earthquake?"
Genos narrowed his eyes, alert.
This tremor... was it really just an earthquake?
The violent tremors rippled outward from the abandoned zone, reaching across all of Z-City.
Panicked citizens rushed out of buildings, thinking it was a natural disaster.
"Wh-What is THAT?!"
A terrified man pointed with a trembling hand.
Everyone turned to look in the direction he was pointing.
There—from the abandoned zone—a massive slab of land, with entire streets still intact, was floating upward into the sky. Broad on top, narrow beneath, it looked like an upside-down mountain suspended in midair.
Bathed in twilight—
The massive piece of land rose like a drifting island, floating ever higher.
It was a sight so surreal, so impossible, that the entire city fell silent. No one could even utter a word.
"Am I... dreaming?"
—
At the Hero Association.
The moment the alert came in, the association scrambled to access live footage.
When the aerial camera focused on the scene—
Everyone at the Hero Association headquarters froze.
"The abandoned zone... is floating?!"
"What in the world is going on?!"
Cold sweat beaded on the forehead of a bespectacled staffer.
Suddenly—
The screen revealed a massive creature emerging from beneath the earth.
A colossal centipede, thousands of meters long, burst forth from a pit under the floating landmass. It slithered skyward, its monstrous body coiling toward the now-airborne district.
"It’s a Dragon-level monster—Elder Centipede!"
A staffer shouted in shock.
"It was hiding under the abandoned zone all along!"
"Alert Tatsumaki and all other S-Class heroes—immediately!" the middle-aged supervisor barked.
"Yes, sir!"
"And notify the residents of Z-City to evacuate—now!"
"Yes!"
But just as the supervisor finished issuing orders—
The screen flashed.
A crimson sword-light descended from the heavens.
Like divine judgment, it pierced straight through Elder Centipede’s enormous skull with unmatched power.
And yet, despite the devastating blow—
Elder Centipede refused to die.
It thrashed wildly, its massive body writhing, armored scales vibrating violently. Then, it began to shed its skin.
The gaping wound in its skull was forcefully compressed—healed through sheer regenerative might.
But the very moment it completed its shedding and healed itself—
Another sword-light descended from the skies.
This one—longer, sharper, and vastly more powerful than the last.
As the sword cleaved down, the entire sky turned a blazing fiery red.
With that one slash, Elder Centipede’s titanic body was severed—and bombarded by countless sword auras. Its tough exoskeleton shattered, its form disintegrated—erased into nothingness.
Above the abandoned zone, a red rift thousands of meters long was left in the sky—splitting the sunset in two.
Z-City’s citizens stared blankly at the apocalyptic sight.
At Hero HQ—
No one could speak. Every person watched the monitor in utter disbelief.
"With just one strike, he killed Elder Centipede..."
The middle-aged supervisor’s forehead was drenched in cold sweat.
"What kind of existence... is floating above that abandoned zone?"
—
Beneath what was once ground level—now exposed to the open sky—
The Monster Association lay in full view, its underground base no longer hidden, completely revealed by the floating landmass.
"Elder Centipede is dead? Who did it?!"
Psykos (Gyoro-Gyoro) extended her psychic senses upward.
She had a feeling.
The one who lifted the ground and struck down Elder Centipede—had to be the same person.
And in her mind, there was only one capable of such overwhelming power:
The strongest esper—Tatsumaki the Tornado of Terror!
But when her spiritual perception reached the skies—
She discovered the truth.
It wasn’t Tatsumaki.
It was a teenager.
A silver-haired boy, standing calmly in the sky, his dual-colored, slitted eyes gazing down like a god among mortals.
A divine and oppressive presence surrounded him.
And as if he sensed Psykos’s intrusion—
The boy smiled at her.
"Pretty bold of you."
A sudden, paralyzing fear gripped Psykos.
She tried to retreat her mental projection immediately—
But it was too late.
An overwhelming, unimaginable conqueror’s aura exploded from the boy’s body.
The skies changed.
Psykos’s psychic link was shattered. Her real body trembled as her consciousness blurred.
Inside the crater—
Countless monsters of the association collapsed under the pressure of that terrifying Haki, fainting on the spot like dominoes.
Even the Monster King, Orochi, roared in fury as he was swept by the Haki’s edge.
"Daring to challenge me? You dare!"
An immense pressure burst from Orochi, meeting Ron’s Conqueror’s Haki head-on.
Two monstrous auras collided, distorting the air with rippling bloodlight and violent gales. Stones tore through the air, howling.
Only the Dragon-level monsters could withstand it. The rest screamed in agony, their minds nearly torn apart.
Psykos regained consciousness, her face pale. She immediately issued a command through her Gigantic Eye.
"We’ve been exposed. The plan moves forward. We attack—now!"
"Shake the world! Let the name of the Monster Association strike terror into the hearts of all!"
"The day has finally come, huh?"
"I’ve been itching to kill those damn heroes!"
"Massacre! Let’s massacre them all!"
"Goo-goo!"
The Dragon-level monsters stepped forward—
Black Sperm,
Gums,
Natural Water,
Evil Natural Water,
Gale Wind,
Hellfire Flame,
Homeless Emperor,
Overgrown Rover,
Phoenix Man,
Fuhrer Ugly,
Psykos,
Monster King Orochi...
All revealed themselves!
And this moment—
Was captured clearly by the Hero Association’s surveillance.
The staff stared, horror-struck.
"S-So many monsters?!"
"The underground... it’s a freaking monster nest?!"
"This is... completely insane!"
"Where are the heroes? Have the heroes arrived yet?!"