: The Scheming Frog 1 - Touching Your Belly

Saitama's face instantly darkened. He completely ignored Tornado's insults, instead turning around and pointing at Tornado with a look of disgust, asking Genos:

"Genos, who's this brat? Who did he come with? Don't his parents care? He's so rude!"

"Teacher," Genos quickly explained:

"She is the second-ranked S-class hero, the esper Tornado. She was also present at the last emergency meeting."

"what?"

Saitama was confused; he looked Tornado up and down.

"This brat who can't even drink alcohol and is so arrogant is also S-rank?"

"Who says I can't drink?"

Tornado was provoked by a B-rank nobody, and the combination of shame, anger, and the stimulation of alcohol made her instantly intoxicated.

She snatched the bottle from the table, poured herself a full glass of strong liquor without regard for her image, tilted her head back, and forced down the spicy, throat-irritating liquid in one gulp, causing tears to well up in her eyes instantly.

A few minutes later, the atmosphere of the banquet had reached its climax. Boros was raising his glass, preparing to savor the amber-colored wine, when suddenly, his keen senses detected a strange fluctuation of spiritual pressure.

He looked up and saw that the heavy solid wood dining table in front of him was suddenly enveloped in a rich emerald green light. The silver candlesticks, wine glasses, and exquisite plates on the table instantly lost their weight and floated shakily into the air.

"Um?"

The moment Boros frowned, the entire dining table, along with the lavish dinner on it, crashed over. Expensive red wine spilled, leaving large, dark stains on the carpet, and steaks and lobsters rolled across the floor, creating a scene of utter chaos.

"Hahaha—!"

A burst of maniacal and unrestrained laughter erupted, and everyone stared in astonishment at the center of the hall. There stood Tornado, the second-ranked S-class hero and a superpowered individual, drunkenly hovering three meters above the ground.

She radiated a dazzling yet unstable green light, like a runaway green comet. She clutched an empty wine bottle, her cheeks flushed with the smugness of drunkenness, her eyes glazed and wild. Pointing at Boros and the metal baseball bat below, she shouted:

"See that? See that? That arrogant metal baseball bat, and that self-important, cocky Boros! I'm in a good mood today, and I'm going to teach you two ignorant fools a lesson! Ahahaha!"

The metal baseball bat below, looking at his head that had almost been hit, and then at the mess on the ground, shouted angrily:

"Hey, hey, who got her this drunk? She's completely intoxicated, huh?"

"Who said I'm drunk! I'm not drunk at all!"

Upon hearing this, Tornado became even more agitated, like a cat whose tail had been stepped on.

She shook the empty bottle in her hand, a flash of light appeared beneath her feet, and she swayed and somersaulted in the air, yet remained steadily floating, laughing wildly with drunken eyes.

"Hahaha! Watch me send you flying like trash! Hahahaha!"

Immediately afterward, Boros felt a surge of psychic power rushing towards him, attempting to overturn him and the chair beneath him and throw them towards the ceiling. With a thought, he dissipated the force into nothingness.

However, the metal baseball bat beside him was forcibly lifted up by that out-of-control psychic force, his entire body enveloped in a blinding green light. He kicked his legs in mid-air, his face ashen, and shouted:

"Hey, you guys, get this kid under control!"

Just as the metal baseball bat was about to crash into the crystal chandelier, Boros vanished from his seat. The next second, a gentle breeze ruffled the ends of her curly hair, and Boros reappeared behind her like a ghost.

Looking at the girl in front of him who was still grinning foolishly and trying to make more furniture fly, he flipped his wrist and delivered a swift and clean chop to the back of Tornado's fair neck with precise control.

"Let her rest in peace for a while; it's too noisy."

"Well……"

The green light in the tornado's eyes dissipated instantly, its drunken smile froze on its face, and then its head tilted to the side, collapsing limply into Boros's arms. Its floating body also lost its light and slowly landed.

"Such speed..."

It was only at this moment that everyone in the hall reacted, and they were all shocked at the same time. Even the S-class heroes had not been able to catch his movement at all.

As Boros casually tossed the tornado to the arriving staff like a sack of potatoes, the little incident caused by his drunkenness quickly subsided.

Metal Bat scrambled to his feet, brushing the dust off himself and grumbling as he sat back down. Seeing the farce resolved, everyone quickly adjusted, raising their glasses and continuing their toasts as if the dramatic scene had never happened.

........................

As the banquet ended, the boisterous noise gradually subsided with the departure of the guests. Moonlight poured down like water into the empty courtyard.

Boros stood alone under the pavilion, intently practicing the "Water Flow Rock Shattering Fist." His movements were natural, each punch accompanied by the sound of wind breaking, appearing particularly powerful in the quiet night.

Suddenly, a dull thud echoed from the depths of the corridor, interrupting his rhythm. Boros paused slightly, his brow furrowing, before unleashing a powerful burst of mental energy to probe in that direction.

In the mental perception, he saw that the tornado he had knocked unconscious earlier had woken up at some point and was now floating in mid-air. Although it had taken a nap, it still exuded a drunken aura and looked exactly like a demon king reborn.

She somehow acquired a sharp long knife and, relying on instinct, was repeatedly and indiscriminately stabbing the defenseless zombie man.

"Those B-rank trash... and that arrogant Boros... die, die, all of you die..."

Tornado's eyes were glazed over, and she mumbled incoherently, clearly still resentful of the previous humiliation, but she was taking her anger out on the zombie man in front of her.

Boros's senses swept over the zombie man, leaving him speechless—this guy had drunk an unknown amount of alcohol and was now completely drunk and unconscious. He had lost all feeling of pain in the face of the tornado's "torture," and even collapsed to the ground, emitting soft snores, and had simply fallen into a deep sleep.

Seeing this absurd scene, Boros shook his head, withdrew his mental energy, and ignored the farce in the corridor. He took a deep breath and continued to immerse himself in his world of boxing, and the wind from his fists howled in the night once again.

As the first rays of sunlight streamed into the courtyard, a piercing, distorted scream suddenly erupted from the camp. The sound was incredibly penetrating, instantly shattering the morning's tranquility and jolting everyone still fast asleep from their hangovers awake.

"What happened?!"

Everyone rushed out of the room in a panic, heading towards the scene of the incident following the sound.

The zombie man lay stiffly sprawled on the ground, a gleaming longsword embedded in his back, its hilt trembling slightly in the breeze. The grass beneath him was soaked with dark red blood; he lay motionless, a gruesome sight.

"Who...who did this?"

Just as everyone was filled with doubt and speculation, a young yet calm voice pierced through the noisy crowd.

"Please keep quiet, everyone. Let me analyze this."

Child Emperor pushed up his non-existent glasses on the bridge of his nose, instantly adopting Conan's "There's only one truth" mode.

He squatted down next to the "corpse" and pretended to examine it. Then he stood up, his eyes scanning the entire room with sharp eyes, and gave a seemingly logical analysis to everyone present.

"First and foremost, this weapon,"

Child Emperor crouched down, gently poking at the longsword stuck in the zombie man's back with a small wooden stick, and analyzed in a mature tone:

"The blade still had a faint smell of alcohol, and the cut showed extremely subtle vibrations, indicating that the killer was not only drunk when he swung the sword, but also possessed extremely strong explosive power."

He stood up, his gaze sweeping across everyone present like a searchlight, offering a convincing clue with each person he touched:

"Metal Bat had a verbal altercation with Zombie Man last night, so he has plenty of motive; Tornado may be completely drunk, but her telekinesis allows her to silently control a sword to injure someone; as for Atomic Samurai... his weapon is his weapon, maybe it's just reverse thinking, Sexy Prisoner himself is a prisoner... blah blah blah..."

With his seemingly logical yet coincidental reasoning, everyone present became a suspect.

After Child Emperor's gaze swept across the crowd several times, he adjusted his non-existent glasses, a cold glint in his eyes, and confidently delivered his final conclusion:

"The cunning frog keeps touching your belly~ Boros didn't show up. This unusual absence is most likely because he's guilty and has already fled to avoid punishment."

"How hasty..."

Everyone fell silent.