Theo had simply been eating his dinner, having just said goodbye to his friends after an amazing win streak.
That’s when his television suddenly flickered to a live report.
The cheerful drama series playing monts ago had completely vanished.
A serious-looking news anchor appeared instead.
Theo paused halfway through lifting his fork.
’’Huh?’’
The expression on the anchor’s face imdiately told him this wasn’t normal news.
Behind the woman, a large red banner appeared.
[BREAKING NEWS!]
Theo slowly lowered his fork.
’’Good evening,’’ the anchor said, her voice noticeably tense. "We interrupt all scheduled programming with a major international announcent."
The screen flickered for a mont.
Then—
A photograph of a middle-aged man appeared on the screen.
He had black hair and wore glasses, with cold eyes underneath them.
Theo’s expression changed.
’What?’ he thought. ’Why are they showing this now?’
Even from the picture, he knew exactly who it was.
In fact, nearly every person on the planet would know.
That’s when another photograph popped up beside the image, this ti showing a mangled corpse barely recognizable as human.
’’...?’’
Theo froze, his eyes locked on the screen.
’’After a successful collaboration between the Arican and Indian Hunters Associations, the official death of the Third Calamity has been confird.’’
Silence.
Theo just stared at the screen.
For a mont, he thought he’d misheard it.
Then another image replaced the ones on screen.
This ti, it showed dozens of heavily ard hunters standing around a devastated battlefield.
Massive craters were everywhere, alongside strange flowers and clearly molten spots from poison.
’’The operation was carried out earlier today following a decade-long international manhunt,’’ the anchor continued. ’’Many heroic hunters suffered in this battle—’’
The rest of the broadcast slowly faded as Theo’s eyes widened.
’They killed him...?’
’Is this real?’
His mind flickered back to the mangled corpse.
Showing sothing like that on live television was pretty unusual.
But it made it very clear that the Hunters Association wanted to eliminate any doubt.
’So... they actually killed one of them?’
Theo’s gaze remained on the television as his mind spun.
The Poison Lord.
From what he’d heard, he’d been a biomana scientist for the Indian governnt until one random night.
After completely destroying the military laboratories, the middle-aged man had vanished from sight.
Only a few days later... reports of mass poisonings began erging all along the Ganga River.
And by the ti authorities understood what was happening, the disaster had already spread beyond control.
Well over a million people died.
And even now, more than five million people were still suffering from its aftermath.
Disfigurent, lifelong impairnts, and the poisoning of a river considered holy by hundreds of millions were only so of the consequences.
Theo exhaled slowly.
He gripped his head as he leaned back slightly.
’’This... is massive.’’
Though the Poison Lord wasn’t the most dangerous, chaotic, or anything of such sorts, it didn’t make it any less of an achievent.
To this date, not a single Calamity had been caught or killed.
Not one.
For years, governnts all over the world had poured trillions into tracking them down.
Countless hunters had died, many of whom were true elites in their countries.
And finally, it had accomplished sothing.
’’Great,’’ he said, smiling. ’’This is great!’’
The broadcast continued for several more minutes, though it mainly repeated the sa points.
It didn’t take long for footage to spread all across social dia.
Countless people cheered, their spirits high for the first ti in weeks.
Even those protesting on the streets couldn’t help but look incredulous. For the first ti in weeks, the anger and uncertainty seed to lessen.
But that was just in the United States.
All over the world, fireworks were being lit.
Even so governnts themselves were celebrating.
But who could bla them?
During the decade-long chase, the Poison Lord had bothered many countries, though nothing on such a large scale as the Ganga River.
Buzz.
Theo glanced down.
Several ssages had already appeared on his phone.
More continued arriving every few seconds.
Apparently, he wasn’t the only one glued to the news.
A small smile appeared on his face.
’Perfect ti for a celebration,’ he thought, summoning all kinds of cakes.
It didn’t take long before his friends arrived.
Heck, even Owen and Jim were there.
Ti passed by very quickly. By the ti everyone went back, it was already very late in the night.
Then, before he knew it, morning arrived.
’Ugh,’ he thought, rubbing his head. ’Definitely stayed up too late...’
Within minutes, he got dressed, ate his breakfast, and was fully ready.
’Let’s see,’ he thought, putting on his shoes. ’The arena opens at 11 AM, so I have three hours remaining.’
After the continuous challenges yesterday, he’d shot up all the way to rank 39.
’I’ll just need to challenge four more people,’ he thought, smiling. ’Then I’ll be number one.’
Tomorrow would be the last day of the tournant too, making everything fall perfectly into place.
’Though I wonder how strong those top 10 students are... surely there’s so SSS-ranks amongst them.’
After a mont of thought, Theo simply shrugged.
’I’ll just have to beat them up.’
With that, he took in a breath and opened his door.
As he stepped outside, he imdiately noticed the difference.
The students were talking excitedly about last night.
Clearly, the news had shifted the atmosphere completely.
’Can’t hear those protest screams either,’ he thought, humming softly.
Theo only had one word to describe all of this.
’Perfect.’
With the death of the Poison Lord, everyone’s spirits were lifted. Even ordinary civilians finally felt protected again.
’The Fifth Calamity’s plan has finally co to an end.’
He took out his phone and couldn’t help but smile as he saw the incoming news reports.
The riots had largely stopped.
Though tension still lingered between civilians, hunters, and the governnt, repair crews were no doubt cleaning up the ss left behind.
Like that, life would slowly begin to move forward again.
Naturally, not everyone could.
So wounds wouldn’t heal.
So families would never recover from the accidents that happened.
But the world itself continued moving.
And for better or worse, most people were eager to leave the nightmare behind them.
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