DC-PHD-CH3

A few weeks later, in the Pocket Hunting Dimension

Cain was brawling with yet another monster rabbit. However, this time the fight was going in the favor of Cain, who seemed to have improved his physique a lot in the past few weeks and gained a rudimentary semblance of martial art from some movies that allowed him to apply his improved physique in a slightly more effective way in combat.

The man and rabbit kept entwining. One punch, one claw. One was a noob self-taught martial artist, one was a giant rabbit. It was like two chickens pecking at each other with all they had.

After more than a hundred clashes, Cain's fist landed on the giant rabbit's head. There was a thud and the giant rabbit softly fell to the ground. Its brains had been scattered to pieces and it inevitably died. The two orbs it dropped were immediately collected by Cain before he relaxed.

Cain had finally come out victorious in the long protracted fight. Although he had marks on his body and had lost some blood, there was nothing lethal. Yet, his punches constantly struck the giant rabbit's head over and over, eventually killing it.

Cain's hands fell onto his knees as he bent down and panted nonstop. He looked at the body of the giant rabbit and thought that the rabbit's defense was too strong. Even though he was not severely hurt as it was the first time he ever fought these rabbits, it still took him more than a hundred punches to kill it.

'I need to gather lots of orbs and improve my physique even more. Currently, I have a physique close to an Olympic Athlete, yet I am barely matching up to a rabbit, granted a monster rabbit but still a rabbit.'

Before Cain could think anymore about this, one black and one white rabbit, each about the same size as the one he had just killed, appeared on the grass before him. They were rapidly running towards him in a frenzy. There also seemed to be grass rustling sounds coming from behind him.

Cain's face spasmed nervously as he looked back. He was greeted with the sight of another two rabbits of the same size, this time both grey, coming towards him like two streaks of grey. Four rabbits… Their beady red eyes flashed with ferocity as they neared, their powerful hindlegs tearing up the ground as they sped up.

Cain turned and dashed to the right without hesitation. Just one of those huge rabbits had almost cost him all his efforts to defeat without being injured much. If he risks his life, there was a slight possibility of him taking on two at a time. But now that there were four, he really wouldn't be able to handle it.

Cain had used up a lot of stamina in the previous fight. He didn't even try to fight a losing fight and immediately sprinted with all he had, soon getting short of breath due to his desperate running. The sound of the grass rustling behind him had never stopped. Without a doubt, it was the four rabbits chasing him like ravenous rabid dogs.

Cain's mouth was dry. He wasn't a female rabbit in mating season, why chase him?!

The grassy plains looked boundless and never-ending. Cain ran at a flat-out sprint for a few kilometers without rest. He was panting heavily, greedily taking in every bit of oxygen he could intake, having no choice but to grit his teeth and press on. He ran faster and faster, pushing himself to the limits.

As if things weren't bad enough, due to the commotion he caused while he was running, two more rabbits joined the chase. Now, there were six large rabbits behind him. He knew for sure that if he dared to stop for even a moment, he would be torn to pieces mercilessly.

Cain couldn't think about other things at the moment. His chest was on fire and in immense pain, his throat felt dry and scratchy like sandpaper, and his legs were numb as though they weren't his. He was only running forward subconsciously now with only the thought of survival filling up his mind.

More and more rabbits gathered behind him as if he was the pied piper and they were the rats. They lined up uniformly behind Cain like kids running in a kindergarten. Of course, if only these kids didn't open their mouths so big to display their terrifying teeth, they would be pretty cute and cuddly.

Just when Cain's consciousness was blurring out and he was about to pass out from exhaustion, the rabbits behind him suddenly raised their ears and their bodies instantly froze. Barely a moment later, they all scattered into the brushes, running away with the same amount of vigor as when they were chasing Cain.

Cain heard this without seeing it and arduously turned to take a glance. He found that the rabbits hunting him had completely disappeared. His mind relaxed and his body immediately collapsed to the ground as if protesting against his abuse.

After resting for a while and gathering his breath, he slowly sat up. It seemed that when a human came to the grassy plains, they were abused by rabbits. Oh my god, he was almost killed by a horde of bloodthirsty rabbits.

Cain vowed that he would remember this conflict. When he got stronger, he would come back to deal with these huge rabbits, driving them to extinction.

Just when Cain made up his mind, there was a sudden slicing sound and his vision seemed to become weird. Everything started spinning and twisting, making him confused, until he saw his headless body falling backward, just as his vision faded into darkness.

-x-x-x-

In a dark room, Cain suddenly opened his eyes and sat up with a jerk. He gasped heavily while holding his throat, fear could still be seen in his eyes. His dark hair and loose clothes he wore to sleep, were drenched in cold sweat and sticking to his skin.

Moments later, Cain recovered his senses. His eyes looked at the familiar environment of the old abandoned apartment with some relief in his eyes. Cain licked his dry lips with his tongue. Did he just die in the Pocket Dimension so suddenly?

Cain recounted that strange final scene on the grassy plains. His last memory was of his head being cut off his body by something sharp and swift. Not to mention, the culprit of the incident never showed even a trace of themselves.

Even now, his body was wracked with phantom pains from the various exertions, injuries, and the sensation of his neck being cut. It seemed that the feeling from the Pocket Dimension was passed over a bit stronger this time.

Cain guessed it was because of the type of death he suffered. He was still in slight shock, feeling it all more clearly than ever.

Forcing himself to get up, Cain went to the bathroom and turned on the shower. While letting the cool water drench him and calm him down, Cain took out the two orbs and ingested them.

He calmly endured the burning and cooling effects of the orbs and sighed as the slight impurities that were expelled got cleaned by the shower. With every refining session, these orbs did, he had lesser impurities expelled.

He guessed that soon there will be a time when his body will be free of impurities and become extremely powerful.

After he was done with his bath, he called up the Attribute Panel in his head to see his progress.

Name: Cain

Physique: 79 (Tier 10 – Human)

Mind: 10 (Tier 10 – Human)

Spirit: 5 (Tier 10 – Human)

'Hmm, I am close to reaching 100 points in Physique. Upon surpassing that, I will get to the next Tier in the Physique Attribute.' Cain mused as he grabbed a black hoodie, a pair of black slacks, and a plain black half-face mask that also covered his neck. The parts of him that were visible were his hands, feet, and eyes.

Grabbing a worn-out pair of dark-colored sneakers, he completed his outfit and left the house.

Jumping out from the fire escape window, he sailed past the fire escape stairs, tucked into a somersault mid-air, and landed on the ground in a cat-like crouch without much noise.

Ever since his physique had improved, stunts like this became second nature to him. He had almost become a Parkour and Free-running master now without having to practice it. The control he had over his body was beyond belief.

This was because improve Physique didn't just improve his strength and defense, it improved his reflexes, dexterity, agility, and all physical aspects.

This was how he learned to fight so quickly after all, his improved control over his body made it possible. If he wanted, he could become an expert dancer and star in movies as an action star.

Currently, he was dressed like a thug and was going out at night due to his usual routine of acting as a combination of a vigilante and robin hood.

Ever since he started getting stronger, he would patrol certain areas he knew had constant petty crimes and would rob those criminals in turn after beating them up.

Like this, he had gathered quite a sweet sum. He planned to continue this for another week or two until he gathered a certain amount to be able to buy some recording equipment. The reason he wanted recording equipment was that he wanted to record songs from His Earth in this world.

In these past few days, he had noticed that the entertainment quality of this world was pretty bad.

Maybe due to the constant fights between the heroes and villains, most of the entertainment and news was focused on that. A lot of the popular movies, tv-shows, and music were non-existent in this world.

Now he could not do much about the Movies and TV-Shows, but he could introduce popular music he loved from his world to this one. Not to mention, due to his improved physique, he had managed to teach himself instruments like Guitar, Bongos, and Ukulele through online videos and self-practice in a music shop.

With some good cameras and recording equipment, thanks to the advancements introduced in this world by Lex-Corp, Cain would be able to produce High-Quality music videos of himself playing the songs. A bit of practice to familiarize himself with the process and he would be ready.

Cain even decided that once he gets the recording equipment and the amount of money to live a comfortable life for a while, he would leave Gotham and shift to Star City or Metropolis.

This constant patrolling and fighting every day was not for him. He already did enough of that every night when he entered Pocket Dimension through his dreams.

Whether it was Star City or Metropolis, they were much more peaceful and prospering as compared to Gotham. Gotham was just too chaotic and anyone who lived here was not normal.

Keeping the villains aside, even the heroes, the anti-heroes, the vigilantes, or even the regular people, all had a dark side in this place that they kept suppressed as much as possible.

Just as Cain was thinking about this, he suddenly heard the sounds of a woman nervous pleading and sobbing, and a few men laughing and insulting her. Narrowing his eyes in anger, Cain sped up in that direction.

As he arrived, he saw a woman sobbing while kneeling on the dirty floor of an alley while some drunk men were surrounding her, laughing nastily.

-x-x-x-

"Please, don't do this. Spare me." The woman pleaded while sobbing.

"Oh, you know how to apologize now, huh?" one of the men who looked like the leader of the grow said with a sneer, "Where was this attitude earlier when you slapped us and had us thrown out of the club just for touching your ass once?"

"You felt very strong with your "protectors" there, didn't you? Well, now they are not here and you are alone with us." one of the men said, as he came from behind and clutched her long hair roughly.

Another one stepped forward and roughly grabbed her face around her mouth, "Yeah. Try pulling the same stunt now, why don't you?"

"Please. Please spare me." The woman said sobbing, "I will do anything. Just don't hurt me."

"Anything you say?" the leader said with a nasty glint in his eye, "As it happens, I do know one way you could make it up to us."

Following his words, all of the men surrounding her got lustful looks in their eyes as they quickly grabbed her arms and made her unable to escape. Her eyes gained a terrified look as the leader walked closer to her while slowly undoing his belt.

"Hehe, why are you backing out now? Didn't you say you would do anything to solve this problem we have between us? This is the perfect way. We get to have some fun with you while you get to … live. Sounds like a very fair deal if you ask me, much better than what people out in the streets are usually offered."

As soon as the leader said that, one of the men came from behind to cover her mouth tightly with one hand before she could scream while he started undoing her dress with another.

She looked around maniacally with a desperate look in her eyes as she did her best to struggle. But she was unsuccessful due to being outnumbered and outmatched.

Just as the leader nearly took off his pants and his lackey almost completely undressed her, a blurred streak came from the side and slammed into the half-undressed leader. Before the others could get what just happened, something slammed into their chests.

The force that struck them made them leave the woman while stumbling back. They clutched their chests and yowled in pain, before falling to the ground and curling up like a shrimp.

As they looked up to see who was the cause of it, they saw someone decked in a completely black colored outfit, covering up all identifiable signs of a person. He was standing protectively in front of the woman, handing her the dress that was taken off her body a few moments ago by the goon that was covering her mouth.

"Hurry up and wear it. Then run to the nearest police station." The guy in black said. When the woman hesitated, he looked back and yelled at her, "Go!!"

The woman hurriedly wore her clothes and stammered some words of thanks before running away. Once she was gone, the guy in black looked at the thugs and their leader, "Now that the distraction has left, let's get this party started!!"

-x-x-x-

Half an hour later, when the woman returned with a group of police officers, all she saw were several barely conscious men on the ground, severely injured to various degrees, with multiple broken bones, some to such extent that they were not sure if they would completely recover.

The leader in particular was bleeding from between his legs. His condition was severe to such an extent that he was sure to turn into a crippled eunuch, even if he managed to recover somewhat.

As the woman looked at her previous assaulters scattered on the floor, the policemen who came with her sighed.

"Yet another incident to the "Black Hood" list. At this point, we get as many from him as from Batman and Robin." One of the policemen said with a sigh, as this case was as good as closed.

The "Black Hood" was a new vigilante in Gotham, who was just as elusive and efficient as Batman and Robin, if not more ruthless.

While Batman and Robin would capture and deliver the criminals, "Black Hood" simply made sure that the criminals he dealt with would never be able to think of, or perform, another crime.

Seeing that so far the "Black Hood" never killed anyone, the police were unsure how to handle him. On one hand, he broke many of the laws multiple times. On the other hand, it was true that the criminals he dealt with never troubled the police again so far.

The "Black Hood" was responsible for single-handedly reducing 14% of crime in Gotham in the past month. Even Batman could not boast of such a thing recently, especially since most of the criminals now belonged to Falcone, Penguin, Riddler, Black Mask, Joker, or other big names.

There were very few who worked in small groups or solo now, and most of this minority had been dealt with by "Black Hood" in the past month.

"Leave it. This is nothing that small-time policemen like us should worry about." One of the policemen said, "We just have to make the arrests and give the report to Chief Gordon. Let him deal with this headache."

The other agreed and called for a few ambulances to get these thugs. Seeing their current condition, they needed a lot of medical help before they could be put into jail.