The wind tilted the heavy monster to the left, moved it a bit to the left again, and now it was coming down. Not near Axel, but just a few steps away from him.
Axel didn't hesitate to stand up very quickly—so briskly, you wouldn't even see his shadow moving.
In his inventory was the ultimate weapon he would use to defeat this monster, and then…
He slowly raised his hands up and clenched them, closing his eyes a bit.
A single crack of lightning did it. Striking his hand, the lightning ignited a sword. The sword, coming onto Axel's hand with the similitude of a streak of lightning, jerked the holder backward.
Axel seemed to move backward a bit, but that was it. With his speed (another superpower), everything became slow in his sight. So slow, the falling of the monster looked like the falling of a snail.
At that moment, everything became anticlimactic.
And then, thrusting his left foot forward, Axel cut through the wind.
SWOOSH.
His motion came with a flair, and so his robe-like clothing swayed backward with the wind. Axel smiled—perhaps he did so unconsciously—because a split second later, he was wearing a frown. A frown so deep, it gave his already flame-lit face wrinkles.
Axel raised the sword upwards, and as he did, it was lit with flames. This was the sword. The sword he removed from the rock. The sword that gave him his powers.
It was the Inferno Sword.
That blade was the most valuable thing in his inventory. He knew it alright, and he acknowledged the fact that it was useful. Even though at times it magically disappeared from his hands, he didn't know where it usually went, but he knew it went back to his inventory.
The villainous monster was slowly falling now—his motion, to Axel, slow and like a movie scene slow-motion droplet of water falling onto sodden ground.
To Axel, he would relish this moment. He was going to take revenge against his uncle. But now, in this slow-motion scene, he cogitated. Was this worth it? Aren't heroes meant to save the day and not take revenge? Aren't superheroes supposed to even forgive villains?
In that slow-motion situation, Axel rebuked the thought. This wasn't an ordinary villain. This was a monster! Superheroes he read about in comics and watched on TV fought villains. And by villains, they fought people with superpowers—human beings with superpowers who, instead of doing good, decided to do bad.
Well, this was a monster, and even though it felt like a bad thing to do, as he had never killed anyone before, he had to do it.
The Inferno Sword up in the air. The villainous, gigantic, enormous monster falling down.
SLASH!
Axel sunk the sword into the villain's midsection.
"ARRGH!"
The monster's voice tore out loudly in the air.
Axel somersaulted—his main reason for doing so was to dodge the monster falling on him.
THUD!
The monster landed on the floor.
PLUMPD!
Axel's feet were on the ground, just a bit away from the monster who, except for the earlier "ARRGH!", said no word again.
It was done.
Axel had killed the monster.
Axel had killed, and so, for the first time in his life.
Everything felt mellow. He heard sounds—not really sounds, but instead emotions. And so he knelt and embraced his resolution. His resolve.
He was about to sigh, at least to give out an expression that he had just saved his life, when he heard the loud, head-throbbing sound of propellers. He was shocked, actually, and so he looked upward to the skies. And what he saw left him bemused.
It was the propellers of helicopters—green helicopters, to be precise. Around four in number. Surrounding him.
"Hey, you!" A loud voice thundered from one of the helicopters. From the sound, it was coming from a microphone.
Axel, feeling languorous, found the shouting at him from the helicopter unnecessary.
"Put your hands up in the air," the voice thundered. "I repeat, put your hands up in the air."
"Is this an arrest?" Axel asked, trying to steady himself on the ground as the wind from the propellers was seemingly fierce enough to lift him off the ground, noting that it came from four different helicopters.
"Apparently!" the voice thundered.
Axel twisted his face into an expression that was a mixture of surprise, shock, and astonishment.
"Why? I mean, I just saved the city!"
"This is not exactly an arrest, but looking at it, it might seem like one. The thing is, the government acknowledges your efforts, but you are a product of this apocalypse. In short, the government wants to experiment on your powers—how you got them, the nature of them—and then make you work for them."
Axel let this sink in. It was hard to, though, because he was just noticing that the helicopters had front lights, and all were pointing at his face, directly into his eyes, so he had to squint to see.
He couldn't make out their motive for turning on the front lights because, to him, it was just stupidity. Why turn on blinding lights in broad daylight? He dismissed the thought, though. It would take ages to process stupidity of this height.
Axel finally spoke. "You want me to surrender myself so the government can experiment on my powers and then make me work for them?"
"Yes!" the loud voice thundered in reply.
Axel furrowed his eyebrows. He didn't know that the government was this cruel. Why arrest a hero for saving the day? The same government that should be finding solutions on how to stop the monster pandemic was now arresting heroes who were trying to stop it.
Axel weighed his options. If he surrendered, the whole city would know his secret identity. Second, he might be killed. And third, he didn't know what they would do to him—perhaps they could turn him into a monster.
Axel decided, at that spot, that he was going to run. He knew he would be chased, but perhaps he might just have a bit of fun.