Meanwhile, within the chaotic ruins of the North Pole, Saitama stepped out of the dust completely unharmed. His expression remained plain and relaxed, his presence so ordinary that he looked no different from an average person.
The intense war background music continued to rise.
In the past, whenever the music played, Lucien always felt invincible. The moment the battle soundtrack began, he believed he could slaughter gods themselves. In his mind, no one could defeat him while the war bgm was playing, because he believed he was the protagonist.
But now that illusion had shattered.
Saitama had endured devastating attacks and still stood there as if nothing had happened. Even if the bald hero had simply coughed up a little blood, Lucien would have felt better.
Instead, Saitama looked perfectly fine.
The sight was painful to witness.
Golden white flames burned fiercely around Lucien. The sky itself seemed to boil with heat, and the vast ice plains beneath them were rapidly melting.
The two fighters now stood at the very center of the North Pole.
Normally, this place remained frozen all year round, but now the temperature continued to rise uncontrollably.
Boom.
Without warning, a blinding white light swallowed the entire region. The frozen landscape lost all sound as an enormous mushroom cloud rose violently into the sky.
Three massive rings of light spread outward from the explosion, expanding both upward and downward. A devastating shockwave swept across the ice plains, covering an area stretching more than a million meters.
Underground seawater and molten magma erupted at the same time.
The once frozen surface of the North Pole transformed into a massive raging tsunami.
"The North Pole... the North Pole has already experienced crustal movement because of the battle between those two."
"This will trigger earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and countless other natural disasters."
News agencies and global monitoring stations were already in chaos.
"Who exactly are those two people? They fought from the southwest region all the way to the South Pole, then even reached the moon, and now they are fighting at the North Pole."
"Are they trying to destroy Earth too?"
All major powers and governments across the planet felt both terrified and furious.
The moon had already been destroyed.
No one knew what kind of long term environmental disasters that alone would cause.
The region stretching from the southwest to the South Pole had also been devastated by constant earthquakes and natural disasters.
In other words, the continental plates of the entire planet were currently shifting.
And the source of all this destruction was the battle now raging at the North Pole.
Through countless monitoring instruments, scientists discovered that one energy signature was still rising continuously.
It had already reached the peak of what they classified as a God level disaster.
There was no higher level beyond that.
However, the person fighting against this terrifying energy was equally abnormal.
Because none of the global instruments had detected any energy from him at all.
Since the beginning of the battle, only one energy signature had ever appeared on their sensors.
"It's already unstoppable."
"At this level of disaster, even S Class heroes are like infants. If they go there, they will simply die."
"We can only leave everything to fate."
The leaders of many powerful organizations had already given up hope.
Humanity simply did not possess the strength to resist a catastrophe on this level.
As for the S Class heroes who had originally tried to observe the battle up close, they had long since fallen behind.
Trying to reach the battlefield was like chasing a mountain that kept moving farther away.
They had come closest when the battle began in the southwest region, but as the fight escalated, the violent shockwaves forced them to retreat again and again.
Earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, and enormous chasms had appeared everywhere.
Heroes who could fly were slightly better off.
Those who could not simply had no chance of catching up.
Later, when the fight reached the South Pole and even the moon, it became completely impossible.
Now every hero had given up attempting to approach.
Even though they knew the battle had reached the North Pole.
Whether it was the second ranked S Class hero, Terrible Tornado, or heroes like Genos and Silver Fang, they could only stare toward the distant polar horizon.
"I never thought I would witness something like this in my lifetime."
On a raised plateau far away, Silver Fang stood at the edge of a cliff. His white hair fluttered violently in the raging wind as he gazed toward the North Pole.
"Can Earth still be saved?"
Atomic Samurai stood beside him, his expression filled with frustration.
The difference between them and those two fighters was simply too large.
Around them stood other S Class heroes.
Child Emperor.
Metal Knight.
Zombieman.
Pig God.
Drive Knight.
None of them spoke.
They did not even know whether the mysterious combatants were allies or enemies.
If the fight continued like this, the planet itself might be destroyed.
And if Earth was destroyed, everything would disappear.
Humans.
Heroes.
Monsters.
All life existed on this planet.
Without Earth, nothing would remain.
Above the North Pole, the atmosphere had already been blown away once.
Dark clouds soon gathered again, pressing down heavily while lightning flashed violently. Weather systems spiraled out of control as powerful currents collided with each other.
Under the dim sky, the entire surface of the North Pole had shattered.
At the center of the polar region, a bottomless sinkhole had formed.
Magma erupted violently from its depths, shooting into the sky like blazing meteors.
Storms raged endlessly across the ruined land.
At the very center of the devastation, two figures moved continuously.
They leaped across the battlefield again and again, each jump spanning thousands or even tens of thousands of meters.
At first glance, it seemed like they were only staring at each other without attacking.
But if the battle footage were slowed down, the truth would become obvious.
Their attacks were simply too fast.
Within a single second, they had already exchanged more than twenty clashes.
Perhaps even more.
The war bgm was approaching its final moments.
During the battle, Lucien's body had exploded repeatedly.
Sometimes it was his right arm.
Sometimes his left.
Other times both legs were destroyed.
Even his head and chest had been blown apart multiple times.
Before activating the war bgm, one of Saitama's punches could easily destroy half of Lucien's body in a single blow.
But once the battle music began, the damage became slightly less catastrophic.
Instead of destroying half his body, the damage was usually limited to a specific area such as an arm.
This only applied when Saitama used a normal punch.
If he used a finishing move like Serious Punch, the result would still be devastating.
Boom.
Another mushroom cloud erupted.
The surrounding atmosphere was pushed away once again as Lucien's body shot across the sky like a beam of light.
He crashed directly into the giant sinkhole, carving a deep trench through the ground.
Eventually the enormous crater was reshaped into something resembling a giant spoon.
Lucien struggled to rise from the wreckage.
Half of his body had exploded.
Blood poured from his mouth and nose as he coughed violently.
Multicolored threads rapidly stitched his body back together.
But the regeneration speed had become painfully slow.
At the beginning of the fight, his body could recover in two breaths.
Later it required ten breaths.
Then thirty.
Then fifty.
And it was still getting slower.
The true war bgm had only about twenty seconds remaining.
"Saitama, I am going to unleash my ultimate move."
Within the swirling steam and rising heat, Lucien's shattered body finally finished regenerating.
His face looked pale as death, completely drained of blood.
He raised his hands into a cupped position near his waist.
All the Ki in his body gathered together, pouring into a single point.
Lucien was preparing to gamble everything.
At this point, he only had one goal left.
He wanted Saitama to bleed.
Even a single drop would be enough.
"I am serious too."
Saitama clenched his fists.
His costume had already been destroyed during the fight, leaving only the red gloves on his hands.
Unlike Lucien, his clothes could not regenerate.
"Kamehameha."
Lucien roared as he released every last trace of Ki he possessed.
He held nothing back.
"Finishing Move: Serious Series."
"Serious Punch."
Saitama threw an ordinary looking punch.
The fist collided directly with the incoming light projectile.
The scene looked strangely familiar.
Just like when they fought on the moon.
The Kamehameha was split apart again.
Lucien's body exploded once more.
Blood and shredded flesh scattered across the sky.
The two massive torrents of energy separated from the beam and crashed into the center of the North Pole.
Two colossal mushroom clouds rose into the sky.
Immediately afterward, the entire planet began to tremble.
Massive earthquakes spread from the North Pole outward.
Gigantic cracks formed across Earth's surface, stretching across continents.
Tectonic plates began to tear apart.
The crust of the entire planet was shifting.
Hurricanes.
Tsunamis.
Volcanic eruptions.
Natural disasters erupted across the world.
Even so, destroying Earth entirely was still impossible.
However, the North Pole itself had already been annihilated once.
As for the moon, the South Pole, and the southwest region, the devastation there was already beyond description.
"Are you alright?"
Standing on the constantly cracking ground, Saitama crouched down and looked at Lucien with curiosity.
Only Lucien's head had regenerated so far.
The rest of his body remained a slow moving reconstruction beneath his neck.
Saitama tilted his head.
"You are really amazing. Are you immortal?"
Lucien's face was pale as snow.
His head had recovered, but the regeneration of the rest of his body was painfully slow.
At this speed, it would take at least a full day.
If Kuma, Law, and Mansherry were here right now, things would be much easier.
Suddenly, a pack of cigarettes appeared beside Lucien's head out of thin air.
The strange sight immediately caught Saitama's attention.
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