Chapter 145 You're This Weak, and You Think You Can Take Me On?

Vane turned to look at Big E, who was currently sweeping up the wreckage of a shattered TV.

If Trajann, Malcador, or any of the others were here, their jaws would absolutely hit the floor seeing Big E like this. The Emperor had become so irritable and short-tempered—and he was actually doing his own chores. It completely shattered the image of the Master of Mankind they were so used to.

This has got to be his humanity returning, Vane guessed, observing the outburst.

Realizing his ultimate mission was to take down the four Chaos Gods, the Emperor had stripped away his own humanity to avoid getting bogged down by petty emotions. Now that the threat of Chaos was gone, all those suppressed human traits were naturally bleeding back in. In a way, it was probably for the best.

“Lord Neos, what’s got you so fired up?”

Keigo Masaki—CEO of Cytech Corporation and a man carrying the same ultra-ancient warrior genetics as Daigo—strode through the door.

After wiping out the four kaiju and dumping the hard truth about the world onto Daigo, Vane and Big E had headed straight for Kumamoto to track Masaki down. Compared to the utterly average Daigo, Keigo Masaki was a textbook golden boy. He held Ph.Ds in physics, mathematics, and aerospace engineering, and single-handedly built Cytech into a globally renowned tech powerhouse.

In the original storyline, this guy built a mechanical shark to uncover subterranean ultra-ancient ruins. Then he snatched the Sparklence right out of Daigo’s hands, rigged up a light-particle converter, and successfully turned himself into light. Unfortunately, his twisted sense of justice caused him to lose control. He went full Evil Tiga, got his ass handed to him by Daigo, and ended up rotting in a prison cell.

But when the Great Old One, Gatanothor, tried to wipe out the Earth, Masaki had actually stepped up. He piloted a submarine loaded with his light-particle converter straight into the abyss to recharge a petrified Tiga. It didn’t completely pan out, but it still took some massive balls and showed he was genuinely willing to sacrifice himself for humanity.

When Vane had initially found him, he gave a quick intro, slapped a synthesized Sparklence on the table, and hit him with the million-dollar question: “Keigo Masaki, you want to become light?”

Feeling his ancient DNA practically vibrating in sync with the device, Masaki had instantly dropped to his knees, hugging Vane’s leg like a desperate fanboy, babbling incoherently.

“I want to become light so bad, I… I literally dream about it… Lord Traveler!”

With Vane pulling the strings, Masaki located the giant stone statue buried beneath Kumamoto. He nailed the light-particle converter build and transformed into a giant of light born from the darkness: Ultraman Lux.

Maybe because he’d gotten a front-row seat to the sheer, terrifying power Vane and Big E packed, Masaki didn’t lose his damn mind this time around. He didn’t run around ranting unhinged garbage about being a ‘new breed of human’ or a ‘god.’ Instead, he kept his head down, ground out his training, and focused on mastering his new powers.

Big E dumped the dustpan full of shattered TV glass to the side before finally answering Masaki’s question. “Those Kyrieloids are getting way too arrogant. They actually think they can rule this planet.”

Masaki nodded in agreement. “They’re definitely mistaking humanity’s current state for weakness, which is why they’re running their mouths.” He turned to Vane. “Lord Traveler, just give the word. I’m ready. We need to teach these alien freaks a lesson.”

“It’s good that you’re pumped, but we aren’t going in blind,” Vane said. “Go dig up whatever intel you can on the Kyrieloids first, Keigo. When it comes to war, you either don’t start one, or you swing hard enough to cripple your enemy in a single blitz. Since the Kyrieloids had the balls to declare war on humanity, we’re going to completely scrub them off the face of the Earth.”

“Understood.” Masaki slammed a fist over his heart in a crisp salute and marched out of the room.

Big E originally wanted to tag along for the investigation, but Vane shut that down fast.

“Let’s fix the stability issues with your Ultraman Atum transformation first.”

Building off the light-particle converter, Vane and Big E had managed a massive breakthrough. They successfully enabled the Emperor—who had zero ultra-ancient DNA—to become both the primordial light that birthed the universe and the final light that would witness its end. In ancient Egyptian, ‘Atum’ symbolized the end of the old world and the rebirth of a new era.

“Fine,” Big E grumbled, having no choice but to hang back and keep tinkering with the converter.

Meanwhile, Keigo Masaki was moving fast. As the CEO of Cytech and a top-tier scientist, the amount of resources he had on tap made GUTS look underfunded. He hijacked global satellites and scraped databases worldwide, hunting for anything tied to the Kyrieloids.

It didn’t take long to unearth everything: the Kyrieloid breaching TPC headquarters to confront Captain Iruma, their aggressive push to spread their cult globally, and all their delusional claims about being angels and gods. Eventually, he locked onto a guy named Mitsuo Itabashi.

Mitsuo had joined the Church of the Holy Arrival years ago. Three years prior, he’d been in a nasty car wreck and flatlined in the ER. But Masaki’s data scrub showed this supposedly dead guy was still catching flights and moving around the globe.

The real Mitsuo is dead, Masaki deduced. This is just a Kyrieloid wearing his skin to get around.

Armed with a solid lead, Masaki drove over to Mitsuo’s apartment to snoop around. Just as he reached the door, he spotted GUTS Captain Iruma arriving on the scene. He slipped into the shadows to watch.

I’ve gotta hand it to Captain Iruma. Her detective work is sharp if she managed to track him here too, Masaki thought. I’ll lay low and see how this plays out. I can’t risk blowing Lord Traveler and Lord Neos’s operation.

—

Inside the dark apartment, Iruma scanned the room, desperate for any useful clues. Suddenly, heavy footsteps echoed behind her.

Her instincts kicked in. She drew her sidearm and spun around to fire, but she was a second too slow. A terrifying silhouette materialized in the gloom, hurling a blast of energy that slammed her into the wall. Her gun clattered across the floor.

Groaning, Iruma forced herself to sit up. She glared at the man stepping out of the shadows. It was the exact face from her files: Mitsuo Itabashi.

“You’re a Kyrieloid, aren’t you?” she demanded. “Why? Why are you attacking us?”

Mitsuo stepped closer, staring down at her with dead, freezing eyes. “Because you’re trying to validate the existence of those two.”

“Which two?”

“We Kyrieloids were here long before they ever set foot on Earth. They showed up late and yet they act so damn arrogant. We won’t stand for it.”

Right then, the front door was kicked off its hinges. Daigo, who had gotten the tip-off earlier, stormed in with his gun raised. Taking in the scene in a split second, he squeezed the trigger, firing on the Kyrieloid.

The Kyrieloid vanished instantly, the bullets hitting empty air.

“You think you could actually challenge me…”

Suddenly, a blinding flash of light erupted in the room. Keigo Masaki, having transformed into a human-sized Ultraman Lux, blitzed inside. Without missing a beat, he let out a sharp battle cry and fired a searing beam of light directly into a dark corner of the room.

“Argh!”

Mitsuo was violently knocked out of the shadows, crashing to the floor in agony. A second later, his body convulsed and warped, unable to hold the human disguise any longer. He reverted to his grotesque Kyrieloid form.

Masaki held out both hands, palms facing each other, and rapidly conjured a glowing cage of light. Once it materialized, he tossed the cage at the alien, instantly trapping the Kyrieloid before shrinking it down and recalling it to the palm of his hand.

Daigo and Iruma were absolutely stunned, their brains short-circuiting at the chaotic scene.

Another… another new Ultraman?!

It wasn’t until Masaki turned and bolted out the door that the two GUTS members snapped out of their daze. Daigo sprinted after him immediately. Iruma tried to follow, but her injuries from the blast slowed her down. By the time she scrambled to her feet and made it to the hallway, Daigo and the mystery Ultraman were already gone.

—

OR