The uptown district smelled different. Down in the slums or near the university, the air had been a cocktail of exhaust, cheap oil, and ozone. Up here, near the high-end boutiques and mag-lev hubs, it smelled like expensive perfume and filtered oxygen.

  It's also where high end jewelry thieves could be found.

  I saw the front window of L'Aurore Jewelry shatter before the alarm even finished its first cycle. I'd been lucky enough to be nearby, spotting them on their approach. Three guys in bulky, bootleg Meridian Defense Systems power frames were already inside, one of them using a localized gravity-crusher to turn a diamond-reinforced display case into a pancake.

  Deep breath, Kurumi. You're Voltana - you're a superhero. And you're going to arrest these thugs.

  I moved. I wasn't just fast anymore, i was a blur. The pressure in my chest - that weird, surging reservoir of power that I'd been carrying since the Scintilla video went viral - made my legs feel like coiled springs. I hit the first thug before he could even raise his arm-cannon, my palm connecting with the suit's exhaust port. I quickly channeled a sharp, localized burst of electricity that fried the suit's servos instantly, leaving him trapped inside of a heavy suit of armor.

  He went down with a heavy thud.

  The second one turned, but I was already under his guard. I swept his legs out from under him, letting a jagged arc of purple lightning play from my hand across his face, and had him zip-tied to a structural pillar before he finished his yell of alarm.

  I squared up to the third guy, my hands sparking. I felt incredible. I felt like I could take him, the store, and the whole city block if I really let go. Something had changed - maybe it really was the additional attention - but my powers felt charged up to a level I'd never experienced before. I was unstoppable.

  Then, the ceiling exploded.

  It wasn't a tactical breach. It was a localized cataclysm. A massive pillar of ice and graviton-force tore through three stories of luxury apartments above us, raining debris, expensive furniture, and shattered concrete down into the showroom.

  I dove behind a reinforced counter as a shock-wave of frigid air blasted through the store, flash-freezing the sprinklers and shattering every remaining window in the building.

  Through the dust and falling snow, two figures descended.

  The man landed first. He was a mountain in white-and-crimson plating, his cape made of actual, shimmering frost that didn't seem like it would ever melt. Behind him, floating on a localized thermal updraft, was a woman. She looked like she'd stepped off a high-fashion runway in the middle of a blizzard - decked out in furs that cost more than Yuna's apartment building and a bodysuit that shimmered like a glacier.

  The third thug didn't have a chance to surrender. The hero raised a massive, gauntleted hand and unleashed a blast of kinetic cold so violent it didn't just freeze the thug; it launched him through the back wall of the store, through the alley, and into the brickwork of the building across the street, where his body shattered into hundreds of chunks of frozen meat.

  The jewelry store was a total loss. Half the ceiling was gone, the back wall was a crater, and hundreds of thousands of dollars in merchandise was under three tons of ice and rubble. I stared in shock - and horror - at the dead thug, the jagged chunks of what used to be a human life.

  "The threat is neutralized," the man boomed, his Russian accent deep and resonant, perfectly tuned for the drones that were already swarming down through the hole in the roof and spreading out to film the couple.

  "Excellent timing, darling," the woman purred, checking her reflection in a piece of jagged ice. She turned her icy blue gaze toward me, standing amidst the wreckage of the counter. "Oh. Look. A local."

  "Who...?" I trailed off, unsure of what to say. They were incredibly powerful, but they'd totally fucked up my job. I had this under control, I was about to arrest the third guy. Instead, these two jackasses had just destroyed everything.

  "Tundra Rose," the woman said, as if I should have already known that. "And of course you know my husband, the Winter Tsar." Shrugging, I mumbled an apology - having never heard of either of them before. But since I'd only been in this world for a few weeks, that wasn't that big of a surprise. "And you are?"

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  "Voltana," I replied, taking another moment to study the two superheroes.

  The Winter Tsar walked over, his heavy boots crunching through the remains of a diamond necklace. He patted my shoulder with a hand that felt like a slab of frozen granite, nearly knocking me over. "Good girl for keeping them busy. It is dangerous for a weak hero such as yourself to engage them. You are lucky we were patrolling nearby."

  "I had two of them down already," I muttered, my voice tight with anger. "And you just ... you destroyed the entire store. The entire building. There are people living in those apartments upstairs!"

  Tundra Rose let out a soft, tinkling laugh that made my skin crawl. "Property can be rebuilt, honey. Branding is forever. Now they know not to mess with heroes." I had so many things I wanted to say to dispute that, so many arguments about the reckless show of force only serving to create more villains, but I bit my tongue as the drones continued circling us, filming the store and our interactions.

  She drifted closer, her eyes scanning my bodysuit with visible distaste. She leaned in, her voice dropping so the drones wouldn't catch the sneer.

  "And speaking of branding, you really should see a consultant. This suit? It's a bit crass, don't you think? It's far too tight in all the wrong places. It looks desperate. You should take more pride in yourself if you ever want to leave the gutters of the rankings."

  I felt the violet tattoos on my arms begin to hum, a dangerous heat rising in my blood. I wanted to blast the smug look right off her perfectly contoured face.

  "Don't end up like that 'Scintilla' creature I saw on the boards this morning," Tundra Rose continued, flipping her hair over a fur-clad shoulder. "Total disgrace. A complete slut, using cheap titillation because she lacks actual talent. She's dragging the reputation of every female hero into the dirt for clicks. I'd die of shame if I were her."

  I stood there, forced to nod and keep my mouth shut while she insulted me to my face. I had to look like the 'grateful junior' for the cameras, pretending my heart wasn't hammering with rage and the urge to see just how much electricity I could pump into this woman.

  "Anyway," the Winter Tsar said, waving a hand dismissively as their private transport - a sleek, white-and-gold VTOL - hovered in the street out in front of the store. "Keep up the good work, little Volt. Maybe one day you will earn enough for a proper cape."

  They boarded the craft, followed by their fleet of camera drones, leaving me standing in a ruined jewelry store, shivering in the cold they'd left behind.

  I looked down at my hands. They were shaking - not from the cold, but from the sheer effort of holding back. I'll bet that the insurance companies were going to blame me for this mess, too.

  Just you wait, I thought, a spark of Scintilla dancing in the back of my mind. One of these days, this 'slut' is going to show you exactly what a real power surge looks like, as I shove a lightning bolt up that ass.

  The silence that followed the roar of their engines was deafening, broken only by the groan of shifting concrete and the occasional crack of ice. I stood in the wreckage, my breath fogging in the sub-zero air they'd left behind. They hadn't even stayed to check the upper floors of the building that they had destroyed.

  A muffled scream pierced the quiet. It came from the back of the store, near the walk-in vault.

  I scrambled over a pile of frozen mannequins, their plastic limbs shattered like glass. The Winter Tsar's blast had hit the vault door dead-on, flash-freezing the moisture in the air into a three-inch thick seal of solid ice.

  "Hello? Is someone in there?," I shouted, slamming my fist against the door.

  "Please! It's freezing cold! I can't breathe!" A girl's voice, thin and terrified.

  I may not have had the A-Rank power that the Winter Tsar and Tundra Rose possessed, but I was no slouch anymore - and I had precision. I pressed my palms against the ice seal. I could feel the new reservoir of power within me - so much bigger than when I'd successfully tested as a D-Rank hero - pushing outward, begging for release. Usually, I'd throw a spark, maybe a bolt, but now I felt like I could find a way to charge the atoms themselves. I let the electricity hum at a high frequency, turning my hands into glowing violet heating elements.

  The ice hissed and screamed, turning to steam in seconds. With a final surge, I kicked the vault door's handle and it swung open heavily on its hinges. A young clerk, probably not much older than me, stumbled out, shivering violently.

  "I've got you," I whispered, pulling her away from the frozen wall and holding her closely.

  She looked up at me, her eyes wide. "Did ... did they catch them? The heroes?"

  I looked around at the ruined boutique - the shattered lives, the destroyed livelihoods, the millions in damages for a three-man robbery I'd already handled.

  "They finished the job," I said, my voice flat. "But they didn't stay for the cleanup."

  I spent the next twenty minutes as a glorified construction worker, using localized heat to melt safe paths through the structural ice so the residents upstairs could evacuate before the building's support beams gave way. No drones filmed this. HeroHub didn't pay me for my time. In fact, by the time the HeroHub 'Janitor' crew showed up to take away the two captive thieves and the dead third, I was just another exhausted body, blending into the shadows.