Tanaka Nare had always been reaching for the top.
Not for fame. Not for recognition.
But because his father had taught him to.
Eric Nare wasn't a superhuman. No mutant genes. No cosmic accidents. No government experiments. Just a man with a passion ....the sword.
To Eric, swordplay wasn't just a martial art.
It was poetry.
Discipline. Flow. Precision. A language of the soul spoken through steel.
And Tanaka had grown up speaking it fluently.
By six, the boy could mimic his father's forms with startling grace. By ten, he sparred grown men. By fifteen, he moved like a ghost across the mat....all finesse and fury.
Then... the powers came.
Super strength. Speed. Flight. The "basicpackage" as other powered teens joked.
While others shot fireballs, warped time, or bent gravity, Tanaka could only punch a little harder and move a little faster.
He had envied them.
He had hated that envy.
Until the day it awakened.
Something deeper.
Darker.
Buried in his core..... a second heartbeat of destructive potential. Not flashy. Not pretty. Just raw, obliterating force.
He had discovered it by accident, the first time he was truly cornered in a training exercise. And when it emerged, it tore the simulation apart.
They called it his "Dark Mode."
He never did.
Because he knew what it really was: a limiter removed. A price paid.
The cost?
Three minutes.
Three minutes of unparalleled power....enough to cut through tanks, level city blocks, and fight threats no other sword could touch.
But once those minutes burned out?
His body collapsed.
Muscles locked. Nerves screamed. Movement became agony. For the next twenty minutes, he couldn't lift a finger.
He couldn't defend anyone.
That was the trade.
And so he had saved it.
For emergencies.
For impossible odds.
For battles where holding back meant death.
Like now.
Big Rick.
A monster carved from brute force and malice. Faster than expected. Stronger than most. Smarter than anyone realized.
He had already dropped Steel Alfredo. Broken half the SWAT. Nearly crushed Froststorm underfoot.
And The Blacksmith....Tanaka, had had watched it all from under a pile of wreckage, ribs fractured, lip bleeding, fury rising in his chest like a war drum.
He could feel it pulsing in his core now.
That dark energy… calling to him.
Three minutes.
He took a slow breath.
And accepted the price.
Big Rick felt it.
That pressure.
Like the world had thickened around The Blacksmith. Like gravity bent toward him. Like death itself had been given shape and steel.
The aura pouring off him wasn't just power.
It was dominance.
Control.
Intimidation.
Big Rick's eyes narrowed, cracked with flickers of lava-red energy. He growled — not in anger this time, but instinct. Something primal in him screamed not to charge.
But he ignored it.
He roared and sprinted forward.
Massive. Relentless. A freight train of muscle and hate.
The Blacksmith didn't move.
He simply raised one sword, calmly.
Then swung.
A horizontal arc of black energy screamed from the blade, carving through the battlefield like a tsunami of shadow. It didn't just cut — it obliterated.
Cars split clean in half.
Streetlamps melted at the core.
Even Big Rick—who thought himself untouchable—caught the edge. It clipped his shoulder, and the force of it sent him spinning off his feet, crashing into a flipped armored truck.
He groaned as he pulled himself from the wreckage, one hand clutching his bleeding shoulder.
From the sidelines, Steel Alfredo stared wide-eyed, propping himself up in the debris.
"What the hell…" he muttered, breath shaky. "That wasn't a sword slash… that was a damn storm."
Beside him, Froststorm struggled to sit upright, her armor flickering from exhaustion, hair clinging to her face. But her eyes, her eyes were locked on The Blacksmith.
She had never seen him like this.
No… no one had.
He stood in the middle of the street, cloak billowing in a nonexistent wind, obsidian lightning crawling up his arms and blades.
He looked like something from a myth.
Like death, with a pulse.
.....
Big Rick roared and charged again.
He swung a wrecking-ball fist the size of a truck hood....
.....but it hit nothing.
The Blacksmith had moved.
No… vanished.
"Where'd he go...?" Big Rick snarled, eyes darting...
The Blacksmith's boot slammed into his back from behind, launching him forward into the concrete. Dust exploded from the impact.
Before Big Rick could recover, The Blacksmith was already gone again.
Big Rick's fist swept the air.
Missed.
Another punch....nothing.
He swung both arms wide in a wild haymaker, nothing.
"Behind you…" Froststorm whispered.
Big Rick turned.
Too slow.
The Blacksmith was already there.
He brought both blades down in a devastating X-slash, the black energy trailing behind them in jagged arcs. The blow didn't just hit, it cracked the street and blasted Big Rick into the air.
He crashed through a stoplight.
Then a building.
Then the ground.
A crater opened up under him.
Big Rick lay inside it, groaning, coughing blood. The glowing cracks in his skin were dimmer now. Slower.
Fear crept into his eyes.
Real fear.
Up on the edge of the crater, The Blacksmith stood, not even breathing hard. His black aura whipped violently around him, a chaotic storm of pressure.
Steel Alfredo's voice trembled as he spoke. "He's… too fast."
"No," Froststorm whispered. "He's too much."
Big Rick stood again, trembling slightly. He stomped the ground with both feet, causing a mini-shockwave.
He bared his teeth.
And lunged.
This time, he put everything behind it.
Every ounce of weight. Every drop of speed. One final, monstrous punch.
He felt it land.
But then...
No resistance.
His fist had hit smoke.
He turned, confused.
"Looking for me?" The Blacksmith's voice came from behind.
Big Rick whirled....
Too late.
A high-speed roundhouse kick connected with the side of his head, sending him skidding across the asphalt.
Then came the real punishment.
The Blacksmith blurred forward in a flash of black lightning.
He slashed...once.
Twice.
A third, vertical cut that sent an explosion of energy outward in a hundred-meter radius, slicing through trucks, fire hydrants, and even the asphalt itself.
Big Rick stumbled back, blood pouring now from dozens of fine cuts, black steam rising from his wounds.
His breath ragged.
His knees shaking.
He lifted his fists again...
But his arms were trembling.
His hands unsure.
He was still huge.
Still a titan.
But he looked…
Small.
Afraid.
The Blacksmith lowered his blades slowly. Shadows wrapped around him like armor. His eyes glowed like twin stars in a storm.
"You're strong," he said coldly, voice echoing unnaturally.
"But there's nothing I can't cut."
He stepped forward.
One step.
Another.
Big Rick stumbled back.
Steel Alfredo blinked, his mouth open. "He's scaring Big Rick…"
Froststorm exhaled. "No. He's dismantling him."
It had been a long time since Big Rick had felt anything even close to fear.
Rage? Every day. Hate? He carried it like oxygen in his lungs. Pain? He welcomed it.
But fear?
That was rare.
The last time had been years ago, the day he fought The Boulder.
The Boulder was one of the top five Horizon heroes. A living tank of a man with skin like concrete and strength that rivaled tectonic plates. Big Rick had been part of a smuggling operation, shipping weapons into American soil. Thought he was untouchable.
Then The Boulder showed up.
Twice his size.
And yet… he had beaten Big Rick like a toy. Had shattered bones and pride in equal measure. That fight ended with Big Rick in chains, humiliated, broken.
That was the first time he had known fear.
This was the second.
Now, standing before The Blacksmith, watching that monstrous black aura churn around him like a living storm, he felt it again.
That pressure.
That dread.
That death.
The ground itself trembled under the weight of The Blacksmith's power. His swords crackled with dark energy, energy that hummed with finality.
Big Rick limped forward, blood dripping down his sides, molten cracks glowing across his body like broken magma. Still stubborn. Still coming.
But slower now.
The confidence was gone.
His breath was ragged.
His limbs were shaking.
The Blacksmith stood still, calm, swords crossed at his sides.
He was counting.
Thirty seconds.
That's all he had left in this form before the side effects kicked in. And when they did, he'd be done. Paralyzed. Helpless.
He didn't have time for another mistake.
This had to be the end.
He closed his eyes.
Felt the world around him slow.
The heat.
The smoke.
The scent of iron and ash in the air.
He reached inward...not into rage...but into focus.
A reason.
Their lives depended on this.
Steel Alfredo, still bleeding in the rubble. Froststorm, barely standing on shaking legs. The civilians. The city.
If he failed now, they all paid the price.
He clenched both swords.
Focused his energy...all of it, into the blades. The black lightning coiled tighter, denser, hotter.
His arms trembled from the pressure, but he held firm.
He remembered his father's words:
"A blade isn't just about the edge. It's about intent. One clean cut. That's all it takes."
He opened his eyes.
Two burning stars in a sea of darkness.
And then...
He moved.
Not a step.
Just a swing.
SHHHHHING!!
Two arcs of pure black energy erupted from his blades, slicing through the air with the sound of splitting heaven. They expanded outward like guillotine waves,precise, beautiful, unstoppable.
Big Rick saw them coming.
And he couldn't move.
He barely raised his arms before the blades hit....