The next day, in the afternoon.
Bang.
"What's that kid doing with the Zapdos?" The woman sitting on the couch hugged the "Leib" in her arms and spoke with curiosity as the door closed.
Inside the elevator, Kaminari, having finished his daily routine of morning jogging, reviewing electromagnetics, and strength training, silently watched the floor numbers change.
He was heading to the rooftop. The training hall was too small for his purposes. Last night, he had tested the controllable range of his new Quirk.
It was approximately forty meters. That forty meters referred to the diameter with him at the center, including height. This led Kaminari to suspect the conversion ratio might be something like: one year of age equals ten meters.
In terms of diameter, the training hall was fine. But for altitude testing, it was insufficient. After all, forty meters was equivalent to the height of a fifteen-story building!
So the rooftop was the best option. Normally, the rooftop was locked to prevent people from using it to commit suicide, but—well—he had purchased full management rights for the entire building complex.
Click!
As soon as he entered the code, the electronic lock clicked open, and Kaminari soon arrived alone at the empty rooftop, where the wind was strong.
"Let's begin."
After scanning the area and glancing up at the clear blue sky, Kaminari tossed the Poké Ball from his waist into the air.
Bang!
With a flash of white light, a two-meter-tall bird with golden, pointed wings appeared. Its eyes were surrounded by black rings, and it had a long, sharp orange beak.
"Zapdos!!"
"He really is cool, huh."
Watching Zapdos cry out proudly into the sky, Kaminari chuckled with interest—though the sound caught in his throat slightly. Then, he looked down at the golden bracelet on his right wrist.
"Pikachu, come out too."
As soon as he said it, his battle suit—enhanced by I-Island's high-precision nanotechnology—emitted a soft golden light, transformed into "Pikachu," and dropped to the ground.
"Alright, you two are going to hit me with an electric shock in a moment. Keep the output at one hundred thousand volts!" Kaminari smiled at them.
Everything was ready. Kaminari took a deep breath and braced himself for the incoming shocks. Soon, the two Pokémon created with the world's most advanced technology launched their attacks.
"Zapdos!!"
"Pika!"
Crack!
Two thick golden currents surged forward at high speed, one from above and one from the right. But as Kaminari raised his right hand slightly, the currents stopped in midair.
Anyone else watching might subconsciously frown—this was a natural reaction when something moving at high speed suddenly came to a halt.
'Black Hood was right—this Quirk really is the natural counter to all electricity-based Quirks.'
While toying with the two currents, Kaminari pondered the potential of this new ability. Overall, it felt very comfortable to use.
In the past, he had gone to great lengths to extend his attack range. Techniques like "Super Railgun," "Thunder Dragon's Roar," and later the "Ame-no-Murakumo Sword" had all been born from those efforts.
But those were the results of his refined micro-manipulation skills. This new Quirk allowed him to effortlessly create effects he had once painstakingly trained for—exceeding his expectations several times over.
"Hard work might not lose to talent, but it's definitely not as easy as having talent…" That was how Kaminari felt now.
As for the Quirk—although the title "natural enemy of all lightning-type Quirks" sounded impressive, it actually had limited value.
From a pure combat standpoint, if you didn't happen to face an electricity-based opponent, the Quirk's usefulness was questionable.
After all, how often is there exposed current floating around in the air for him to control?
He had tested this last night and confirmed he couldn't extract electricity from wires or batteries through the air. So unlike some electricity-based characters, he couldn't freely control an entire city's power grid.
That's why both All For One and Kaminari believed this Quirk was most suitable for him. He could manually or automatically recharge, store electricity within his body, and even generate it freely.
With that, the Quirk had no obvious downside when it came to reliance on external electricity!
"Zapdos, come back down."
At Kaminari's command, Zapdos landed next to Pikachu.
At the same time, the two floating currents were drawn together under Kaminari's control and transformed into the shape of a thunderbird, flying upward.
"Pikachu, calculate the height and display the data!"
"Pika!"
Soon, a light screen was projected from Pikachu's eyes, displaying a stream of rapidly changing blue numbers.
12 meters, 15 meters, 20 meters, 25 meters, 34 meters, 38 meters, 42 meters, 48 meters, 53 meters…
When Kaminari felt he had lost control of the current, he ignored the thunderbird dispersing in the air and turned his attention to the screen.
"63 meters? Seems like the Quirk is adapting well. In a few days, based on my age of fifteen, the range should reach at least 150 meters."
The reason he said "at least" was because his body had undergone a great deal of physical training. As mentioned before, Quirks—just like organs—could be improved with training, but would weaken with long-term neglect.
"Maybe 200 meters? That's already outside my line of sight. No matter how far the Quirk can reach, if I can't see it, I probably can't control it, right?" he guessed uncertainly.
He couldn't test that theory yet, so it would have to wait until the Quirk fully adapted to his current body.
"Now that I've got a general grasp of the Quirk, let's start developing a few techniques." Kaminari's eyes lit up with excitement at the thought—what flickered inside them was the fire of 'youth.'
"For starters, I should be able to recreate the basic techniques of 'God of Thunder' Enel!"
"Alright! Let's go, Thunderbird!"
Crack!!
"Next, Thunder Beast!!"
Crack!!
"Hahaha, now for Brontosaurus!!!" Kaminari had completely lost himself in the moment, eventually shouting a ridiculous name.
"And finally… Thor!"
Boom!
He released all the remaining electricity in his body and condensed it into a four- to five-meter-tall 'fat man' above his head.
The form looked exactly like Enel's Thunder god transformation—both resembling a sumo wrestler. Except his wasn't a "blue fat man," but a "golden fat man."
It looked more like the transformed form of Sengoku the Buddha!
"Hmmm…"
Kaminari dispersed the Thunderbird and Thunder Beast, then looked up at the Thunder Dragon and Thunder God clashing in the air with a wide grin.
It was like watching two Thunder Fruit users in battle. The sound effects were satisfying, and the visual effects were stunning.
"But the power is still too weak. There's no way it compares to Enel's hundreds of millions of volts…" he sighed.
"The Thunder Dragon is fine… but shouldn't this 'Thor' have a different look? I mean, I'm me, and Enel is Enel. Why do they look the same?"
"And there's also the issue of renaming this Quirk…" Kaminari looked up at the sun and clouds, deep in thought.
"If I rename it, I'll have to report the newly 'discovered' abilities of 'power absorption' and 'remote power control.'"
"That's basically revealing all my cards."
"For example, U.A. will definitely find out immediately…" For some reason, he felt like U.A. shouldn't fully understand him.
"At present, besides All For One, the outside world should still believe that my Quirk requires manual charging. They think the power in my body is fixed and doesn't change, no matter how much I use."
Thinking about that, Kaminari slowly closed his eyes and murmured to himself, "That… might not be a bad thing…"
(To be continued.)
***
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