Chapter 51: Wanda and Magneto
Ethan stopped his attack and released his transformation. The Eternal armor shimmered away, and he was just himself again.
He walked to Wanda, his expression softening into something warm and unguarded. Surprise and affection in equal measure.
"You finally decided to come home, huh?"
"Are you all right? Are you hurt anywhere?" Wanda's first move was to step closer and start checking him over.
"I'm fine, I'm fine. Look — see? Not a scratch."
Wanda circled him slowly, examining every inch to make absolutely sure. Only when she was satisfied did she relax.
Then she turned, her face complicated, and looked at the man slumped against the wall. Magneto.
For a single moment as Ethan had been moving in for the killing blow, Wanda had wanted him to do it. Wanted him to finish off the man who had abandoned her. After all — this so-called "father" of hers had been absent for over twenty years. She felt nothing for him but bitterness. Finding a biological parent and acknowledging one were two very different things.
But at the last possible second, she'd decided to save him.
Because Pietro hadn't met him yet. Because her brother had a right to know who his father was, and to make his own choice.
Across from her, Magneto looked like his heart was breaking. The young woman who'd just saved his life seemed barely able to look at him.
Pyro and Blink hurried forward to support him, helping him stand.
Tony, watching from the side, decided to lighten the mood with his usual subtlety. "Oh-ho-ho, Ethan, is this your girlfriend? Nice work, buddy."
Ethan didn't answer. His eyes hadn't left Wanda. The two of them held each other's gaze across the street, communicating something that didn't need words.
"Ahem. Hey. Hey. Hey. Both of you. There are other people here." Tony was actively suffering through this.
Ethan flushed slightly and glanced around, searching for an out. "How about we move this inside? There's a restaurant right there."
Internally, Ethan had already pieced things together. Wanda must have been searching for her biological father all this time — and she'd actually found him. Magneto. That explained why a man who had no prior connection to Hell's Kitchen would suddenly show up trying to recruit Ethan. And it explained why, throughout the entire fight, Ethan hadn't sensed any genuine killing intent from Magneto.
Wanda was the first to walk into the restaurant. Magneto and his two lieutenants followed shamelessly, filing in behind her.
Ethan turned to Tony. Tony shook his head. "I'm going to pass. Got a lot to take care of back home. Things look secure here, so I'll head out."
He pulled the helmet back into place and prepared to take off.
Ethan called after him: "Tony — wait! Thank you."
Tony glanced back at him for one beat, then launched straight into the night sky.
But the System notifications appeared in Ethan's vision the moment Tony was gone.
「DING!」
「Congratulations, Host! Tony Stark's friendship level has increased to 3 stars.」
「Congratulations, Host! Item acquired: New Element Schematic.」
「Congratulations, Host! 20 Friend Points awarded.」
Ethan blinked in surprise. This time the reward wasn't a skill or attribute — it was an actual schematic. A blueprint.
He could just hand it to Tony later and let him work it out himself. Although honestly, this reward felt slightly anticlimactic — Ethan already knew the new element was hidden in the video Howard Stark had left behind.
But that was a problem for another day. He turned and walked into the restaurant.
Hell's Kitchen — Midtown — Vongola Family Headquarters
Vongola Primo was running a war on multiple fronts. His enemies tonight were every rival gang in midtown.
His objective was simple: total cleansing. Wipe every hostile gang out of midtown so completely that none of them could ever rebuild a foothold.
That meant the Vongola Family had committed everything to this operation. Of the seven Family Guardians, only Primo himself remained at headquarters. The other six had each been deployed to a different battlefield, leading their own teams into life-or-death engagements.
Primo sat on a richly upholstered couch, his eyes sharp and resolved. There was a calm certainty about him — the kind that came from years of hard experience. His fingers tapped quietly on the armrest, betraying the tension underneath the composure.
"This time," he said softly, "we should finally be able to fulfill our promise to Ethan."
Years ago — back when they were both kids in the orphanage — Primo and Ethan had made a childish, earnest pact: clear every gang out of Hell's Kitchen. Bring peace to the place that had given them nothing but pain.
For Primo, that promise had become more than a memory. It had become a creed.
Ethan, his closest friend, had returned to Hell's Kitchen and taken just one year to clear every gang out of the eastern district. He'd brought genuine peace to that part of the neighborhood for the first time in decades.
But Primo hadn't been able to keep up. Despite mobilizing the entire Vongola Family, despite making real progress in midtown, he hadn't been able to finish the job. That failure sat in his chest like a stone.
He knew Ethan didn't blame him for it. Of course Ethan didn't. But Primo blamed himself enough for both of them. Even after learning that Ethan had returned to Hell's Kitchen, Primo had been too ashamed to face him. He'd kept his distance for months. If it hadn't been for the gang summit a few days ago — the one that had finally given him an excuse to reconnect — he might have stayed away even longer.
"But after tonight," Primo murmured, drawing in a deep breath, "everything starts to get better."
His eyes burned with hope and resolve, as if he could already see the future they'd been promised.
Across midtown, the night was on fire.
Vongola Family soldiers fought with brutal courage, their weapons gleaming in the muzzle flashes. The rival gangs were a chaotic rabble — large in numbers, but completely unorganized. They went down in waves under the Vongola's coordinated assault.
In one corner of the city, the Cloud Guardian, Alaude, stood alone on a high rooftop. He'd refused to bring backup. He'd cleared an entire enemy gang by himself.
He was speaking into a phone with cool disdain. "Next time, do not call me back for trash work like this."
His voice was thick with impatience.
In another sector, Vongola foot soldiers had dismantled an enemy gang without their Guardian even needing to lift a finger. The Guardian in question — the Lightning Guardian, Lampo — was lying flat on the ground in the middle of the battlefield, fast asleep, completely indifferent to the violence around him.
When the Mist Guardian, Daemon Spade, returned to headquarters with the other Guardians at the end of the night, he dropped lazily into a chair and addressed Primo with a sly grin.
"Midtown isn't enough, you know. Why don't we just absorb the rest of the districts while we're at it?"
His eyes glittered with ambition, as if the entire world were just sitting there waiting for him to take it.
By the end of the night, the Vongola Family had become the single largest underworld power in midtown Hell's Kitchen.
Ethan, distracted by everything happening at the restaurant, hadn't yet seen the System notifications waiting for him.
「DING!」
「Congratulations, Host! Vongola Primo's friendship level has reached MAX.」
「Congratulations, Host! Vongola Primo has become your Family.」
「Congratulations, Host! 1 Family Point awarded.」
「Family Members: 6/10.」
☆☆☆
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