Became a Failed Experimental Subject-Chapter 34: Hero
“KYAAAAAA!!”
“WAAAAAH!”
Boom, boom, boom—the crowd swaying to the outdoor club’s music erupted in excited cheers as a massive shockwave thundered through them.
Pink, purple, and green lasers pulsed through the smoke trails of gunpowder blooming in the sky.
Beneath a diagonal roof made of pounding lights, Yu Anna crouched, catching her breath as she intensified the pulse of her power.
Hot winds swirled—rusty metal beads clinging to her body were incinerated in the high-temperature flames that surrounded her. As they fell to the ground, red welts bloomed across her skin.
Yu Anna cracked her neck, one side, then the other, and glared toward the rooftop across from her.
“Phew... You fucking bitch...”
“Aha! As expected of an S-Class Hero! You’re more of a monster than the monsters!”
BOOM! From the opposite rooftop, Gu Seoryong launched herself into the air, inhaling sharply as she rose.
Then—POP, POP, POP!—flaming orbs blasted from her mouth. Yu Anna scowled and slapped them aside with her hands.
But hidden inside the flames was a sticky glob of poison that splattered across her skin.
“Grrk! Filthy bitch!”
“Ahahaha! There’s no such thing as clean in a fight!”
Whoosh! Gu Seoryong landed in front of Yu Anna, delivering a talon-tipped kick, spun into a heavy tail swipe, and followed it with a flurry of claw strikes from both hands.
Seeing the venom coating Seoryong’s claws and feet, Yu Anna dodged fast, evading the attacks.
Seoryong dropped to all fours, glaring at Yu Anna with sharp, animal eyes and clicking her tongue inside her mouth.
Snap... Snap... Snap...
The sound echoed as her power of confusion washed over Yu Anna.
Yu Anna, still focused and wary, watched the unmoving Seoryong—only for the villain’s claws to suddenly appear right in front of her.
“Kh?!”
Yu Anna jerked her head back in time to avoid the strike—
—but Seoryong’s foot slammed into her stomach.
The claws had been an illusion; the real attack came from a low spinning kick, body flattened to the ground.
Lifted into the air, Yu Anna instinctively curled up as the air around her turned sharply cold.
She was sucked into a pre-prepared fog of ice—and with a soft pop, the second capacitor shot fired.
BOOM!
CRACKLE!!
A second thunderbolt tore into Yu Anna’s body.
“Not used to fighting humans, are you? Your guard's wide open.”
“Kh... huff... hahh...!”
“You’re still alone. So you really came by yourself, huh? I figured. Starlight acts cold, but deep down, she’s hot-blooded and way too soft. Unlike you S-Class types, the other heroes can't ignore the higher-ups’ orders. She probably came alone so none of her teammates would get hurt.”
Lightning surged through her—crackling, flickering.
Yu Anna’s vision blinked in and out.
Gu Seoryong strolled across the sky upside down, tail swinging lazily behind her.
She shimmered like she was underwater, suffocating Yu Anna’s senses little by little.
“Starlight’s powers are flames and light, right? Plasma... something like that? Speed and firepower—both top-tier. Hitting her’s hard, and most attacks don’t work.
But if you can pin her in place—or hit her with something as fast as light—there’s plenty of ways to land a shot.
That flame wall of hers might block most things, but it can't stop shockwaves that come from the inside. Just like Cage, the other S-Class from A-City—zero resistance to illusions.”
“Hahh...! Haa...! You know... a lot about me, huh?”
“Of course. You’re the most dangerous enemy in W-City. [N O V E L I G H T] Ohoho... So? How are our capacitor shots treating you? Hurts like hell even for an S-Class, right?”
She wasn’t wrong.
Even just those two lightning strikes left Yu Anna’s limbs tingling.
The agony scorching through her insides, like her entire body had been lit up from the inside out—
She’d never felt pain like this before.
“The pain’s serious, but it’s nowhere near fatal.”
“Exactly. If regular means worked on a Despair-Class, they wouldn’t be called Despair-Class, would they?”
“DIE, STARLIGHT!”
BRRRRRRRRRRRRRT!!
Three villains stationed at an anti-aircraft turret on the rooftop fired triple machine guns toward Yu Anna.
KRRRANG!
Bullets slammed into her side, piling into a lumpy steel plate that fused over her arm.
Another barrage hit and sparked.
The weight of this hit was different from a sniper’s.
Yu Anna ducked behind a concrete structure on the rooftop—
And beside her, Gu Seoryong squatted down and cradled her face with both hands.
“S-Class heroes are despair itself for monsters. If you die from just a bit of lightning... then you were never despair to begin with.”
“Shut up!”
Whoosh!
Yu Anna swung her arm and tore apart the illusion—Gu Seoryong’s image distorted and sank back into the shadows.
From the oily black shadow that remained, tiny clones of Gu Seoryong bubbled up by the hundreds.
They gathered around Yu Anna’s feet and sang in perfect unison:
“““Tired yet?”””
“God, your powers are fucking annoying.”
“Aha! Thanks for the compliment!”
Ting. Ting. Ting...
The sound of rolling metal.
Then—
Light burst out from beneath the swarm of Seoryongs.
A modified flashbang.
The explosion of intense light only stunned Yu Anna for a second, but the ringing in her ears made her stagger.
Seoryong slipped through the gap and dove at her in the middle of the chaos.
“Kh...!”
“Aaand you missed again~♥”
Yu Anna threw a straight punch—
But from behind her, the real Gu Seoryong appeared and jammed her claws into Yu Anna’s neck.
Slice.
Yu Anna instantly slapped her hand away, breaking off the knuckle.
Plop.
The severed finger oozed poison as it wriggled inside her neck, still injecting venom.
Was this another hallucination?
No—this one was real.
The toxin seeped into her fast, and Yu Anna’s power reacted violently, trying to burn it out.
But the poison spread faster than she could purge it.
“Just like they said—no real combat experience with humans, huh? Falling for every trick? You’re kinda cute.”
“What the hell is this...?!”
“Aha~? Let’s see... what should I call it? Stimulant? Sensory amplifier? Aphrodisiac? Pick one, I don’t care.
What matters is... is... what matters... mat... matters...”
“You. Can’t. Handle. Me.”
“Not for long, anyway.”
Thump. Thump.
The beat of the music merged with her heartbeat.
The lights that once shot straight into the sky now bent, scattering like they’d lost direction.
They tangled with Yu Anna’s flames.
Shapes began to form—
Human silhouettes drawn in beams of twisted light.
Hair glowing white, streaming like fire, the figure shoved Yu Anna.
Dazed and flailing, she slipped and fell from the rooftop.
The lasers in the night sky embraced her.
Then, softly—
Like she was wrapped in clouds.
But when gravity struck like ice shards, the twisted lasers shaped themselves into a massive serpent and lunged for her.
“Guh—haah...!”
Creeeeak.
Metal twisted and snapped.
Yu Anna opened her eyes on the ground—
And there stood Gu Seoryong, lit by moonlight, eyes gleaming.
Her pupils were slits.
She grinned like a predator.
Both feet fell, claws extended—
WHAM!
Gu Seoryong’s stomp crashed into Yu Anna’s gut, bending the steel bars until they melted and shattered, locking Yu Anna inside a cage of twisted metal.
“WAAAAAAAH! WAAAAAAAH!”
“KILL HER! KILL HER! KILL HER!!”
Clang! Clang!
Steel girders hit the ground.
Plop. Plop.
Poison kept pumping through Seoryong’s claws, even as she stood on Yu Anna’s chest.
Yu Anna was on the floor—
But it felt like she was still standing.
Her head spun.
Gu Seoryong, arms wide, soaking in the cheers of the crowd, crouched over her and spoke:
“Stay with me, Starlight. You’re gonna lose like this.”
“Don’t... fucking mock me...!”
“KYAAAAAA!”
Fwoooooooosh!!
Yu Anna thrust her fist toward the moon—
And a massive pillar of fire blasted into the sky.
Gu Seoryong backflipped, screaming as she clutched her charred arm and gaping belly.
“My arrrrrm! My bellllllly! AAAAAAAAH!!”
But then—
Grinning mischievously, Gu Seoryong popped her hand open again.
She peeled her own skin off with her claws like it was a costume.
Underneath, a new, snow-white hand.
She lifted the one blocking her stomach, revealing a flawless, rock-hard abdomen beneath.
“Perfectly fine~ Aha!”
“Ahahahahahaha!”
“Seoryong! Seoryong! Seoryong!”
“Huff... huff... huff...”
“Ooh, I think I heard that last one! Or not? Ahahahaha!”
Where exactly did the illusions start and end?
Gu Seoryong’s calm attitude.
The villains aiming guns and powers.
The citizens, drunk and drugged, laughing in delight.
The moaning of prostitutes.
The pounding club music tickling her overstimulated senses.
Yu Anna, hands resting on her knees, tried to bring her hyper-extended senses back under control.
“Hey now, Hero lady! If you don’t take off flying again, the next lightning bolt’s gonna hit right in the middle of the crowd!”
“WAAAAAAAH! AHAHAHAHAHA!”
“Fly, bitch! C’mon, do it already!”
“You filthy whore...!”
But Gu Seoryong didn’t give her the chance.
She spread mist over the crowd.
Sssshhhh— The white haze hissed out, blending with the lasers streaking through it as the crowd cheered.
Yu Anna, flying up through the fog to avoid the civilians, was instantly hit with another sniper bombardment.
Then—ice mist surged around her.
But it wasn’t ice. Not this time.
It was a stimulant, dispersed in a fog-like form.
The villains with sniper rifles had lured her right into it.
Hidden by Gu Seoryong’s illusions.
“Jackpot~♥”
Bang! Gu Seoryong mimed firing a gun—
And the esper hidden among the crowd fired a capacitor round.
BOOOOOOM!!
A massive explosion tore through the street.
Nearby civilians were thrown like rag dolls from the shockwave.
Some hit the pavement, bleeding. Others lay unconscious.
And some—those only lightly tossed—crawled on the ground, laughing.
A few shouted in wild ecstasy.
“KYAAAAAAAH! AHAHAHAHAHA!”
“KYAAAAAAAH!”
“Gah... huff... hhhkh... nghh...!”
Third lightning strike.
Standing amid the chaos and madness, barely keeping herself upright, Yu Anna clenched her teeth.
Beside her—CRASH!—Gu Seoryong landed on top of a streetlamp and squatted, tail dangling and twitching over the sparking light.
“Daaaamn, that was something! How’d you pull that off?”
“Huff... huff... huff...”
“Did you, like, swallow the lightning or something? I’m dying to know—what trick did you use?”
“You—fucking—bitch...”
The moment the capacitor shot fired, Yu Anna had smothered the flames on her skin.
She pulled all of her power inward—burning the lightning deep inside her at high speed.
The result?
Instead of blocking it, she absorbed it.
It burrowed through her body, and only a fraction of it reached the nearby people—just enough to shock, not kill.
Despite the shockwave injuries, she had minimized the damage.
Given that a lightning strike had just exploded at ground level, the casualties were surprisingly low.
“You know,” Gu Seoryong said, tail snapping like a whip behind her.
“Isn’t it kind of stupid? Why are you trying so hard to protect people~?”
With a flick—WHACK!—she cracked her tail.
And then the Gu Seoryong on the lamp began to fall backward.
But instead of one, two, then three, then dozens more fell like shadows through the colored lights.
The club lights reflected off their bodies in violet, crimson, and green hues.
“This whole tactic?
It doesn’t work at all unless the hero actually gives a shit about the humans.
We use them as meat shields, see?
That’s what this is—a hero-specific tactic.
I was honestly thinking of ditching Guryong Fortress if you just came charging at me with your ‘eraser’ or whatever, killing humans be damned...
But this is working way too well.
It’s almost disappointing.”
“Hah. So just like there are monster-exclusive tactics, now you’ve invented hero-only ones?”
“To us, heroes and monsters aren’t really any different.
You just barge in and fuck up our fun.”
“Guess that makes two of us—because to me, you villains are no different from monsters.”
Thud. Thud.
The falling copies of Gu Seoryong piled up around the people, creating the illusion that the ground itself was rising.
Yu Anna clenched her tingling arm and tried to push through.
All around her, the Gu Seoryong copies kept multiplying.
And one of them, smiling sweetly, cooed:
“Wouldn’t it be kind of tragic if Starlight lost in such an anticlimactic way?
Why not go all in right now?
Forget the people—just break everything.
Like you would against a real monster.”
“Fight! Fight! Fight!”
“Kill her! Kill her! Kill her!”
“This can’t be your real strength, right~?”
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The drugged-up screams of the citizens tore through her skull.
Yu Anna sighed internally.
They weren’t people. Not anymore.
And yeah—
A part of her wanted to just let loose.
To burn it all down.
But she didn’t.
She wouldn’t.
“The hero I knew...
No matter how annoying people were, they kept saving lives.
Quietly.
Even if it was just one more person.”
The one who shows up at the worst possible moment,
burns everything to stop the monster,
wipes away dry tears,
and becomes the light in the smoke.
Even if people ignored that light—
A hero is still a hero.
“So how about you take your bullshit back to your doghouse?”
“Hmph.
You really are stupid, aren’t you?”
Snap.
Gu Seoryong snapped her fingers—
And all the copies she'd piled up so far floated up like balloons, blocking Yu Anna’s vision.
In that split second, Yu Anna punched straight behind her.
“That was a compliment, dumbass!”
“KYAAAAAH!!”
BOOM!
The real Gu Seoryong’s arms—both of them—melted and exploded backward.
The illusion shattered like glass.
Reality came crashing back.
Yu Anna was already on the ground.
And Gu Seoryong was right behind her.
The sea of illusions and disorientation had been a trap—meant to guide her gently down.
But even in that chaos, she had noticed.
Her feet were touching the ground.
That detail—tactile, real—told her this was no longer a dream.
She clenched her flame-wreathed fist.
“H-how?! My arms—my arms!! Ahhh, AAAHHHH!!”
“M-mistreeessss!!”
“...Huff.”
Gu Seoryong’s arms were gone below the elbows.
She shrieked and broke into sobs.
Her powers unraveled.
The haze cleared.
Yu Anna felt her senses stabilize and let out a slow breath.
She reached for Gu Seoryong, preparing to knock her out cold.
Neutralize.
Arrest.
Done.
But then—
“There you are.”
“...Guh... ah...?”
Gu Seoryong’s arms regenerated in an instant.
And both hands—
plunged up under Yu Anna’s chest.
