2-A Dorm,
The Heights Alliance
In the dead of the night, Gehrman Sparrow blurred into existence inside Luke's bedroom.
By the time the lights were switched on, all signs of the crazy adventurer had vanished, being replaced by Luke.
Even without taking off the clothes, Luke slumped down on the bed, looking at his hands.
The white glove had already cracked, releasing a bloody, viscous liquid in the pub. Now, even the black glove had gained a similar texture, secreting the same reddish liquid, and was slowly losing its leathery appearance as well.
These were no ordinary gloves.
It had taken Luke and Miss Justice two weeks of precise calculations to come up with Gehrman's unique identity.
First, they had decided to make him a Bounty Hunter.
That would give Luke a playing field which was much farther away from anyone who could relate him to Gehrman Sparrow; far away from any decent Pro Hero, in the thick of the world's crime hubs.
It would also not put local police and Heroes on his tail, even if he were to do questionable acts… as he had done to Kalyo. Well, not at least in the beginning. Once he began upping his game, it would be hard not to attract big fish and bigger nets.
Second, they had decided to limit Gehrman Sparrow to one Pathway, i.e., Seer.
Such a restriction would force Luke to resist his Cryptologist-tendency, giving him more control over himself in the long run. It would also force him to act in stark contrast to his nature, which had been heavily inclined toward using Divination, Decryption, and Deliberation through all three Pathways together, especially since the Training Camp incident.
As such, restricting Gehrman Sparrow to one Pathway would advance the digestion and feedback of the Faceless Potion by a lot, compared to Dr. Blessed's identity, which used all three Pathways as well.
Third, it was to give the Bounty Hunter a unique fighting style of his own.
A Faceless of the Seer Pathway didn't rely on his physical prowess because he didn't have any such prowess. He had sharp senses and sharper reactions, with great emphasis on evasive maneuvers.
As such, Gehrman Sparrow couldn't use the strength granted to Luke by Marauder Pathway.
Nor could he use the plethora of tricks readily available to a Trickster, leading to the fourth point.
Gehrman Sparrow, along with a revolver to counter his lack of strength, would need a trump card.
In Mr. Fool's world, Miss Justice had told Luke that the gap of such Trump Cards was filled by Sealed Artifacts. From low Sequence Beyonders to high Sequence Angels, the use of Sealed Artifacts was ubiquitous, and relying on them to come out victorious in a high-stakes battle was never looked down upon.
However, Luke's world wasn't Mr. Fool's world.
Nor did he have the means to gain Sealed Artifacts.
As Mr. Fool's Blessed, he had already obtained a set of Faux Sealed Artifacts with limited use, making a deal with the other members of the Tarot Club.
Also, it wasn't like Luke having Faux Sealed Artifacts made the deal any better for the Tarot Club members.
To create a faux version of Peaceful Hair Strands, the real Sealed Artifact must be in the Gray Castle, as Miss Justice had informed him.
The same had been the case with Judge Button as well.
So, even if Luke were to ask for a stronger, offensive Sealed Artifact, it would mean the said Tarot Club member letting go of the same.
If it were about a one-time, swift use, then it would have been fine.
But Gehrman Sparrow would need to constantly appear at different locations, for who knew how many months?
Which would, in turn, mean that the real Sealed Artifact must remain in the Gray Castle for the same unknown time period.
In Mr. Fool's treacherous world, this could become a matter of life and death.
So, Luke and Miss Justice had decided to go around the need for the Sealed Artifact, resulting in the birth of the two gloves.
Both gloves were a product of plant-based lifeforms.
Plant because Luke could easily source them repeatedly. Unlike most animals, he didn't feel guilty mutating plant lifeforms, especially when no Intelligence-like Quirk was involved in the procedure.
The white glove was the mutated white bark of a common birch tree.
Luke had bestowed Erasure Quirk upon it… or he had at least tried to bestow Erasure before failing — over and over again.
Erasure was such a ridiculously powerful Quirk that despite Luke knowing its ins and outs, it kept reaching the threshold of Plus Ultra… on the far side, instantly exploding the trees into a mass of filthy goo.
No matter how hard he had tried, Luke just couldn't mutate the tree in the way he wanted to, which would allow Gehrman to use Erasure, suiting his gunman profile.
After days of ruminating over it, Luke had decided to notch it down.
Instead of letting the Erasure Quirk exist for the entire length of Activation Time, he had confined it to a single use. Then, he had also confined the distance between the glove and the target in which the Quirk would be effective.
That's how the Erasure Glove had come into being.
For now, the Erasure Glove could erase a Quirk within 5 meters. And the moment it was activated, Gehrman would need to make sure that the glove's vision landed on the target to erase it, as the mutated lifeform would cease to exist right after, losing the bestowed Quirk as well.
That had come as quite a caveat, especially when life and death were in consideration.
It would mean Gehrman Sparrow would need to be even more strategic in battle, making sure that the moment he used the Erasure Glove, he would be able to finish the job.
The good thing about all this was that Luke could easily create another Erasure Glove for the next time.
Then there was the black glove, much simpler than the white one, but equally important!