Because Herman knew all too well that danger could strike at any moment in Marvel's New York, he had given Wanda a communicator not long ago.
He hadn't expected it to be needed so soon.
On Herman's custom-made phone, Wanda's distress signal suddenly went off.
"In the suburbs?"
He frowned as he pulled out his phone, the alarm chiming. Wanda's coordinates showed up outside New York City. His expression turned strange—what on earth was that girl doing in the suburbs?
At this time of day, Wanda should have been at school.
"What a troublesome girl."
Herman knew Wanda wasn't the type to prank him with something like this. If she had triggered the distress signal, then she must be facing something she couldn't handle. He didn't tell Quicksilver—who would have gone into an uproar—but instead walked straight out to the balcony of his office.
With a leap, his body, wrapped in telekinetic force, shot into the night sky like a cannonball.
To lock down Wanda's location, Herman soared above the clouds, hovering at an altitude of ten thousand meters.
The divine body he possessed granted him unmatched vision. Even at night, even through the cover of clouds, he could see the earth below with terrifying clarity. From this height, the city lights looked no larger than sesame seeds, yet every detail of New York at night was laid bare before his eyes.
He could even make out the smallest happenings on the streets: a couple tangled in an alley in ways unfit to describe, a gang in Hell's Kitchen playing live-action CS.
But none of that held his attention.
"Let's see... where exactly is the signal?"
Herman checked the locator watch on his wrist, calibrating it with the signal feed while he hovered silently above the clouds.
His gaze swept across the brilliant glow of the city. Behind him, the broken crescent moon spilled its pale light across his body.
This was the first time Herman had looked down on the world from such a height, and an indescribable feeling welled inside him. From here, it was as if everything below existed only to bow at his feet.
Blood surged in his veins. It felt like if he stretched out his hand and clenched his fist... he could crush the world with ease.
"No wonder those who can fly all like to call themselves gods." A smirk tugged at his lips. He suddenly understood why so many arrogant villains carried themselves the way they did.
In this moment, all of creation felt small beneath him.
If not for Wanda's signal, he might have lingered in the sky just to savor this transcendent feeling.
"There."
Cross-checking the signal, Herman locked onto an abandoned construction site. His body plummeted from the clouds like a meteor, cutting through the air faster than the eye could follow, faster than the speed of sound, even faster than fighter jets.
For Herman, this was the quickest and most efficient way to travel.
But he'd forgotten one crucial detail—
This was New York City.
The beating heart of America.
And tonight was bound to terrify countless people.
...
"Director, our S.H.I.E.L.D. satellites just picked up a strange heat signature moving at over Mach 15!"
On the Helicarrier, a technician monitoring the instruments shouted in shock to Nick Fury.
"Damn it! What now—a monster? Or an alien?"
Nick Fury had been sitting at his desk, feet propped up, casually snacking on bear-shaped cookies. But the moment he heard the report, he jolted upright, rushing over to the monitoring station.
"Redirect every satellite we've got onto that target. I want a clear image of what it is!" Fury barked.
"Target image locked. Transmitting now. Data decoding... we've already lost the target's trail."
The technician's fingers clattered across the console.
Nick Fury fixed his gaze on the LCD display.
At first, only a blurry image appeared. But as the calibration completed, the picture sharpened rapidly.
A figure.
A human silhouette.
Soaring through the night sky like a shooting star. Plummeting toward the earth like a meteor.
Nick Fury's pupils constricted sharply—he recognized it instantly.
Wasn't that the billionaire director he'd been trying to recruit into the Avengers Initiative?
"Homelander!"
Agent Hill, who had rushed over, also recognized Herman's identity.
"Is... is this really possible? A person flying through the sky? At that speed? What kind of bug has our world glitched into?"
The technician, being lower ranked, wasn't cleared to know Herman's files. All he could feel was the sheer horror of what his instruments were showing him.
A speed exceeding Mach 10.
Could a human body truly withstand such velocity?!
It was precisely because he was well-read that the technician found it absurd. It overturned everything he knew about physiology and the laws of physics. Even Nick Fury, who had always taken Herman seriously, felt shaken to the core.
After a long silence, the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. finally spoke in a low voice.
"Seal all footage into one file. Access level... Level Eight."
Nick Fury didn't want too many people learning about Herman.
The technician blinked, snapping back to himself, though his face was still locked in stunned disbelief. He nodded stiffly and mechanically carried out Fury's order.
"A man this powerful... how is he any different from those gods in fiction?" Hill whispered, staring at the endless stream of data on the monitor, awe in her eyes.
"There's a difference. A big one," Fury rasped. "A god walking among men is far worse than some untouchable deity."
His mind was a mess.
Herman's powers and physical traits were a near-perfect match for Homelander in The Boys. It was almost confirmation that The Boys was, in fact, a documentary. The thought forced Fury down a dangerous train of speculation.
That scene in the show—Homelander tanking a nuclear strike... could that be real too?
"No... impossible. That's too exaggerated."
Fury shut down the thought immediately. He didn't dare let his mind linger there.
...
"Contact!"
S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn't the only one to spot Herman. The U.S. military had also detected the unidentified flying object almost simultaneously.
It was New York airspace, after all.
If the military couldn't catch something here, they'd never have won World War II.
"Alert! Alert!"
In the New York command center, alarms blared as piercingly as those on the Helicarrier.
"Unidentified flying object!"
The monitoring officer's face drained of color.
"My God... what is that thing?! It's moving at more than ten times the speed of sound!" a soldier cried out in shock. "It's still accelerating! Damn it... how can anything fly that fast? What kind of aircraft exists at that level?!"
It was clear.
The military's imaging tech lagged behind S.H.I.E.L.D.'s.
All they had was confirmation of an unidentified object over New York. Within seconds, it was gone—beyond tracking range.
A heavy silence filled the command center.
The atmosphere grew thick with dread.
Soon, high-ranking officials rushed in.
"I think this might be a secret new aircraft developed by Russia! Or maybe China's pulling strings behind this!"
An Air Force Major General spat the words with conviction.
His claim was met with immediate agreement from colleagues.
"We need funding! The enemy already has weapons like this! If we don't catch up, we're dead!"
A Lieutenant General stood up, stoking the panic further.
And just like that, a meeting meant to assess the threat level of an unidentified aerial vehicle turned into a free-for-all debate on how to leverage the situation to squeeze Congress for more funding.
Unsurprising.
This was the U.S. military's usual playbook.
...
Meanwhile, Herman had already vanished from S.H.I.E.L.D. and military surveillance.
After startling half the nation's upper ranks, he landed straight at an abandoned factory on the outskirts.
He could sense the minds of a strange group inside—along with Wanda's panicked thoughts.
Herman knew he wasn't too late.
He was right on time.
...
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