Chapter 5: Burn, My Little Cosmos! (Please Add to Favorites!)

Past midnight!

On the rooftop of the apartment building.

Hawk was throwing punches.

There was no punching bag.

Nor were there any combat techniques.

Hawk didn't even move his feet; he just stood in place, eyes slightly closed, and as if in a trance, he threw punch after punch into the air before him.

This time, he was no longer pursuing speed, but seemed to have fallen into a state of epiphany.

Although before this, every time he threw a punch, there had been a strange feeling in his heart.

But tonight, that feeling was even stronger.

Hawk felt as if he had entered an existence that was infinitely dark from every angle he observed.

But...

With every punch he threw, this infinite darkness would bloom with a glimmer of light.

If Hawk were to look up and observe at this moment, he would discover something even more peculiar.

And that was—

The Bronze constellations—Pegasus, Draco, Cygnus, Phoenix... Lacerta, and the others among the forty-eight constellations that dotted the night sky and were visible to his naked eye—were also responding and flickering with every punch he threw.

Yes.

It was not a single constellation responding, but all of them.

All forty-eight Bronze constellations were responding to Hawk's punches.

One punch, one punch... and another punch.

Hawk was punching very slowly this time, yet at the same time, very quickly.

Although he ensured that he fully retracted each punch before throwing the next, the afterimage of the second punch would often appear before the afterimage of the first had completely vanished.

Following that, the third, fourth, and fifth punches, until now.

The sky was filled with shadows of fists!

Just then, abruptly, a roar echoed in Hawk's mind.

The sound was faint and barely audible, yet it felt like the tolling of a great bell.

Bang!

A wisp of flame appeared with this sound, and as this flame emerged, the stars—which had been reflected through reality into the infinite space by Hawk's relentless punches—rippled outward, quietly parting the thick black curtain of the night.

At first, it was just a flicker of agitation.

Then, this agitation suddenly expanded, as if it were the primordial Big Bang of the universe, and the stars dotting the infinite dark sky suddenly burst forth—

Within Hawk's body, an intangible, formless wall collapsed under the energy released by this cosmic explosion, and a power that had been dormant for billions of years suddenly awakened.

Swish!

Hawk, who had been keeping his eyes slightly closed, opened them.

The moment he opened his eyes, the flame deep within them no longer bloomed and then quietly extinguished as it had before.

This time, the flame bloomed completely.

Boom!!

Hawk felt as if the blood throughout his entire body was surging and roaring, and every tiny cell within him was trembling frantically, as if ten thousand stars were expanding simultaneously; under this violent vibration and expansion, every inch and every bone was constantly being crushed and shattered, only to be reshaped in the blink of an eye by this terrifying, immense power that felt like the birth of a celestial body.

Hum!