"What… what's happening?"
Siren clutched the window frame tightly with both hands, gripping it so hard that his knuckles turned white. It was as if holding onto the cold metal was the only thing preventing his legs from giving out.
"What the hell is going on?" Havok muttered, swallowing nervously as he stared at the horrific scene outside.
Bodies were falling from the sky.
Agents were dying everywhere.
"It has to be mutants," Hank said with a grave expression. Compared to the others, he remained slightly calmer, though his voice still carried tension. "Ordinary people couldn't possibly do something like this."
In a situation like this, only mutants could explain what they were seeing.
Raven suddenly turned toward Rorschach with a look of disbelief.
"Rorschach… how are you still so calm?" she asked. "How can you act like nothing's happening?"
The base was literally being slaughtered.
Yet Rorschach looked completely unfazed.
"It's simple," Rorschach replied with a mischievous smile. "I'm pretending."
Raven stared at him.
"…Seriously?"
Siren and the others looked at him in stunned admiration.
At a moment like this, he still had the mood to joke. His mental composure was truly unbelievable. Meanwhile, several of them were so nervous they felt like they might faint.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The sound of gunfire suddenly echoed across the base.
CIA agents had begun engaging the invaders in a fierce firefight.
"Back up! Get away from the windows!" a group of armed agents shouted as they rushed into the hallway outside the recreation room.
Each of them held assault rifles and moved quickly to secure the area.
"Return to the room! We're under attack!"
Ironically, the same agents who usually treated the mutants like strange laboratory subjects were now risking their lives to protect them.
Even in the face of death, they still carried out their duty.
At that exact moment, a familiar notification appeared in Rorschach's mind.
[New Mission Generated]
[Mission Objective: Prevent the Black Emperor and his group from taking away any mutants]
[Mission Reward: 300 Origin Points]
Rorschach's eyes lit up slightly.
Another mission had been triggered.
However, his excitement faded almost immediately as he read the reward.
"Only 300 Origin Points?" he muttered internally.
Last time, dealing with a single Sabretooth had earned him one hundred points.
Now the enemies included Sebastian Shaw, the Red Devil, and Riptide—three powerful mutants who were each far stronger than Sabretooth.
And the reward was only three hundred?
The system was clearly underpaying.
But after thinking about it more carefully, Rorschach realized something.
The mission wasn't asking him to defeat Shaw's entire team.
It only required him to prevent them from taking any mutants away.
According to what he remembered from the timeline, Shaw's group would eventually leave with only one recruit—Angel.
In other words, the mission could technically be completed simply by stopping Angel from leaving with them.
There were countless ways to accomplish that.
For example, he could knock Angel unconscious right now.
But Rorschach wasn't planning to do something like that for no reason.
To be honest, he wasn't even particularly worried about Shaw's group.
With his current strength, even someone like Shaw wouldn't be able to kill him easily.
Whether the reward was generous or not didn't really matter.
Three hundred points were still three hundred points.
The system made the rules.
Just as these thoughts flashed through Rorschach's mind—
Whoosh!
A red figure suddenly appeared outside the entrance of the recreation bar.
The Red Devil had arrived.
He stood dramatically in the doorway with his arms slightly spread, striking a pose that looked almost theatrical.
"Behind you!"
"Watch out!"
The mutants inside the room shouted warnings at the CIA agents guarding the entrance.
The agents spun around instantly and opened fire.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Bullets poured out of the rifles like a storm of steel.
But before a single shot could touch him—
Whoosh!
The Red Devil vanished.
In the blink of an eye, he reappeared beside one of the agents.
With terrifying speed, he grabbed the man's rifle and immediately fired at another agent standing nearby.
The remaining agents were stunned.
Before they could react—
The Red Devil disappeared again.
Like a ghost, he jumped from place to place through teleportation, leaving chaos wherever he appeared.
At the same time—
A violent tornado suddenly formed in the courtyard outside.
Whoooosh!
The massive whirlwind swept across the open area and slammed directly into a large spherical structure standing in the center of the yard.
The structure was destroyed instantly.
That machine was Hank's invention—the prototype Cerebro device built specifically to enhance Charles's telepathic abilities.
It was also the one tool Sebastian Shaw truly feared.
That was why Shaw had come here.
Not only to recruit mutants.
But also to destroy the device capable of detecting him.
After crushing the machine, the tornado continued sweeping across the courtyard as if it possessed its own awareness.
Finally, it stopped in front of another window.
A tall man wearing a suit and long hair stepped calmly out of the swirling wind.
Riptide.
Now the situation had become a nightmare.
The Red Devil was slaughtering CIA agents at the front.
Behind the mutants stood Riptide, a terrifying enemy capable of summoning hurricanes and blocking any escape route.
Mystique, Siren, Havok, and the others felt despair creeping into their hearts.
"Rorschach… what should we do?" Siren asked anxiously.
"Yeah, Rorschach, think of something," Havok added quickly.
Without realizing it, they had all begun looking toward Rorschach.
Because Charles and Eric trusted him so much, the others instinctively saw him as someone dependable.
"Stay here," Rorschach said calmly. "Nothing will happen."
"But those agents outside won't last long," Darwin argued. "We should escape while we still can."
"That red-skinned guy can teleport anywhere," Rorschach replied calmly. "Leaving won't change anything."
Darwin opened his mouth to argue, but he couldn't find a response.
"Just stay here," Rorschach said firmly.
Then he moved.
Without hesitation, he rushed forward.
His body shot out of the room like a missile, moving at a speed several times faster than a speeding car.
Those CIA agents had been protecting them without hesitation.
Since Rorschach had the power to intervene, he wasn't going to stand by and watch them die.
Outside in the courtyard—
The Red Devil had just plunged a blade into the chest of another agent.
Blood splashed across the ground.
He was about to kill another agent when suddenly—
A powerful gust of wind rushed toward him.
In the blink of an eye, a young mutant appeared directly in front of him.
Rorschach.
His fist shot forward like a cannon.
But just before the punch connected—
Whoosh!
The Red Devil disappeared again.
Rorschach's strike hit nothing but air.
"What's the point of killing ordinary people?" Rorschach shouted as he scanned the area.
"If you've got the guts, come fight me!"
This wasn't arrogance.
It was a deliberate provocation.
With the Red Devil's teleportation ability, attacking him directly was almost impossible. Even Rorschach's speed wasn't enough to catch someone who could instantly vanish.
The only real opportunity would come if the Red Devil chose to attack him first.
.....
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