Supervillain Idol System: My Sidekick Is A Yandere-Chapter 523: Show Of Force (Part 5)

Don ran.

Not the clean sprint of a track or a corridor—but the ugly kind. Boots hit dirt that wouldn’t stay still, his stride adjusting on instinct as the forest tore itself apart around him.

He vaulted a fallen pine that still steamed where its roots had been ripped free, landed hard, rolled once to bleed momentum, then pushed back up without breaking pace.

Ahead, the ground split open in jagged seams, some narrow enough to clear, others wide enough to swallow a vehicle.

He chose without slowing—long steps, short leaps, one hand brushing a shattered trunk for balance as the earth shifted again beneath him.

Debris littered everything. Shredded tents. Twisted metal ribs from collapsed structures. A transport crate lay on its side, cracked open, medical supplies spilled and crushed into the mud.

Don cleared another fissure, boots skidding on loose gravel at the edge before catching grip. He didn’t look back.

Above the treeline, Starboy cut through the air in a hard glide, body angled forward, eyes flicking between Don below and the towering sprout in the distance. The thing dominated the horizon even from here—too large to ignore.

Something else moved beneath him.

Fire.

Starboy slowed midair, head snapping down.

Pyro streaked through the forest just under canopy height, flames streaming behind him in controlled arcs as he escorted a cluster of people across broken ground. They moved fast—but not fast enough to outrun another rupture if it came.

Dr. Gadget was among them, coat torn, glasses gone, one arm slung over the shoulders of a taller, thick-built man who limped badly, blood dark along his calf. Others followed close, heads down, moving when Pyro gestured, stopping when he did.

Starboy halted and hovered.

Pyro spotted him instantly and rose, flames flaring brighter as he gained altitude. The group below slowed, bunching together near the remains of a transport truck.

"Did the other camp get hit too?" Pyro called out to Starboy, voice tight.

Starboy shook his head once. "No. Still safe—for now." He glanced toward Don, already farther ahead. "Me and Don are staying back until backup arrives."

Pyro’s eyes dropped to the people below.

Dr. Gadget looked up through blood-streaked vision, breath rough but steady. He shifted his weight against the man supporting him and spoke clearly anyway. "Go with them," he said. "If you’re able."

Before Pyro could answer, another deep roll passed through the forest—trees creaking, loose soil sliding into cracks with a wet rush.

Dr. Gadget tightened his grip and forced the words out. "Just go," he said. "And please—be careful."

Pyro hesitated a fraction of a second longer. Then he nodded once and launched skyward.

Starboy was already moving again, accelerating hard as Pyro fell in beside him. Below them, Don kept running—faster than any normal man ever could, but measured now, choosing his landings, clearing broken earth in long, punishing arcs.

They flew over a stretch where the forest had been flattened outright, trunks snapped and driven into the ground at odd angles like thrown spears.

Pyro glanced sideways, then forward at the sprout. "So," he asked, "what’s the plan?"

Starboy didn’t look at him. His eyes stayed locked on Don. "There isn’t one."

He surged ahead.

Pyro blew out a breath. "C’mon, dude. Are you serious?"

Then he pushed harder, fire roaring as he chased after him.

They reached the main camp minutes later.

What had once been organized chaos was now just chaos. No lines. No stations. No order left to recognize. The ground was chewed apart, vehicles overturned or crushed, tents reduced to shredded fabric tangled around twisted frames.

Bodies lay where they’d fallen.

Some pinned beneath slabs of concrete. Others half-buried in dirt, hands visible, fingers curled and still. A few were mercifully covered with jackets or tarps. Most weren’t.

The earth hadn’t stopped moving.

Starboy hovered a few meters above the wreckage near Don, air pushing outward from him in low, steady bursts that rattled loose debris. Pyro touched down fully, boots sinking into churned soil as his flames dimmed.

All three took it in.

Starboy broke first. "So," he said, gaze lifting toward the distant sprout, "how do you wanna do this?"

Don looked at him, brows drawn together. "Do what?"

Starboy’s jaw tightened.

In a sudden burst, he shot forward and stopped inches from Don’s face—the shockwave tipping a damaged transport onto its side and sending loose debris skittering across the ground.

"Then why the fuck are we staying back?" Starboy snapped. "You really want that thing to hit us first?"

Pyro glanced between them and said nothing. He folded his arms instead, posture loose but alert. He’d seen this before. Everyone had. Starboy burned hot and fast—always had.

Don didn’t move. Didn’t blink.

"We’re staying back to save as many lives as possible," he said evenly. "If that thing attacks while we’re doing it..." His voice dropped a notch. "...then we fight."

Something settled.

Pyro nodded without thinking. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah... there’re probably still injured people at the outer camps. And the town’s not far. I doubt they’ve got enough people to handle something like this."

Don turned, already scanning the ruins. "Then it’s settled." He pointed toward the wreckage. "Flip any cars that still run. Get them onto the road. We’ll move the injured to them and direct anyone who can walk out of the danger zone."

Pyro smiled faintly. "Say less."

He lifted off, fire surging as he headed for the nearest overturned SUV.

Starboy hovered back a few meters. "Whatever," he muttered, then vanished in a violent burst of speed—BOOOOM~—air collapsing in behind him as debris lifted and dropped again.

Don watched them go.

Then he closed his eyes for half a second and opened himself to the noise beneath the noise.

Crying. Shouting. Weak calls swallowed by distance and rubble.

He turned toward the outskirts and started moving again—this time slower—following the sound of people who were still alive.

———

——

Eighteen minutes.

That was all they’d managed to carve out of the chaos.

Eighteen minutes of dragging people from crushed vehicles, hauling the trapped out of collapsed structures, and pulling data drives and sealed cases from what used to be command tents—on Dr. Gadget’s clipped instructions crackling through unstable comms.

It wasn’t a rescue operation. It barely qualified as coordinated. But it mattered. A handful of lives pulled back from the edge was still a win.

Don had spent most of it on the outskirts with Pyro—moving fast, lifting wreckage that still smoked, tearing doors free, passing survivors off toward safer routes. Vines struck now and then, sudden and violent, but nothing they couldn’t dodge or force back long enough to move people clear.

Starboy had taken the air early and stayed there, sweeping Havenridge itself, breaking windows, yanking people out of half-collapsed houses, herding crowds away from streets that looked ready to open beneath their feet.

By the thirteenth minute, Don and Pyro had pushed into town as well.

That was where Don was now.

He vaulted through the shattered front gates of a middle school, boots hitting cracked pavement as alarms wailed uselessly behind him. A moment later, he was airborne again—leaping up and out, a small weight locked tight against his chest.

The girl couldn’t have been older than five.

Dark hair clung to her face in sweaty strands, cheeks streaked with grime and tears. Her left arm was wrapped in a thick, sloppy bandage soaked through in places, the cloth tied off with a strip torn from someone’s shirt. She sobbed hard enough to shake.

"Where’s mommy?" she cried, fingers digging into Don’s attire. "Where’s everyone?"

Don tightened his hold and pushed off the edge of the roof, clearing the street below in a long arc. "Don’t worry," he said, voice steady despite the noise and the shaking ground. "We’ll get you to her."

He landed, didn’t stop, and jumped again—rooftop to rooftop—keeping off the streets where the earth kept collapsing at random points. From above, he could see farther. Hear more. Track movement.

Smoke drifted through broken neighborhoods. Houses leaned into one another at bad angles, some split clean in half, interiors exposed like dollhouses torn open.

Roads were cracked wide enough to see darkness below, cars stranded at impossible tilts. Bodies lay everywhere—some crushed outright, others sprawled where they’d fallen trying to run.

A few had already drawn animals.

The rumbling stayed constant. Low. Never quite settling.

Don cleared another gap and crossed over a residential street that no longer deserved the name.

That was when the ground gave up.

The road split apart beneath him—KRRAAASH~—as a massive vine tore its way out of the earth, ripping through asphalt and soil alike. It surged upward and then sideways, slamming into houses, tearing one free with the land it stood on, foundation and all.

Don twisted midair without thinking.

He turned his back to the blast, curled around the girl, and took the hit himself.

Debris smashed into him—wood, brick, metal—knocking him off his line and sending him spinning toward the street below. The girl screamed, shrill and desperate, clinging to him with everything she had.

Don forced his body around her, adjusted his grip, and snapped his focus downward. He spotted a stretch of road that hadn’t fully collapsed yet—uneven, cracked, but solid enough for a moment.

He hit it hard—knees bending deep to lessen the impact, then launched again immediately, pushing off before the surface could decide to drop out from under him.

They landed on another roof just as the vine behind them tore through more homes, beams snapping and walls folding inward.

Don glanced back, jaw tight.

’Damn.’

’Is another one about to sprout?’

The thought barely finished forming before something else cut through the noise.

A sound he hadn’t heard in a long time.

A wet, scraping noise. Claws on stone. Too many of them, layered over one another.

His breath paused.

He landed on the next rooftop and turned, staring down into the gaping wound the vine had left behind—an open abyss of broken earth and shadow between the ruined streets.

And there they were.

Twisted, hound-like shapes poured out of the dark, bodies warped and wrong, limbs bending in ways they shouldn’t as they climbed over each other in frantic numbers. Too many. Far too many.

Don’s eyes widened.

"Shit," he muttered.