The Guardian Of The Multiverse: A Hero's Burden

Disappointment

(Marvel, DC, images, manhuas, and every anime that will be mentioned and used in this story are not mine. They all belong to their respective owners. The main character "Karito/Adriel Josue Valdez" and the story are mine)

It was a sunny day in Piltover.

Which felt almost insulting, considering the City of Progress was currently choking on the consequences of progress.

The streets still looked clean from a distance—golden stone, polished ironwork, glass catching sunlight like it had something to prove—but everything under that shine was tense. Tight shoulders. Quiet voices. Doors shut quicker. Faces turned away faster. Like the whole city had learned how to flinch.

Jinx had seen to that.

First came the explosions—multiple hits across Piltover's ventilation systems. Before that, the attack at the celebration: Shimmer-induced beasts released into a crowd meant to be untouchable, meant to be safe. Meant to be above consequences. Wealthy people screaming the same way everyone else screamed when fear got teeth.

Zaun had always been a thorn in Piltover's side, even before Silco. But now? After Jinx? Piltover had slammed its borders shut and called it survival.

A state of emergency.

An elite capture team deployed—small, ruthless, and armed with Hextech spheres slotted into their weapons like portable miracles. They moved through Zaun's hotspots and did what Piltover always did when it got scared: they turned the Undercity into a problem to be purged.

They weaponized the Gray.

A highly unstable toxic aerosol born from industrial pollution, then refined into something deliberate. They manipulated the ventilation systems to pump it into key areas—places Jinx frequented, places her people hid, places that mattered. The purpose wasn't subtle. It was a message: we can poison the air you breathe whenever we feel like it.

Most of it amounted to nothing. Jinx slipped the net like she always did.

Eventually, Vi and Caitlyn found her. Sevika was there too.

Two versus two—Vi and Caitlyn came out on top. But Vi couldn't finish it. Not when a child threw herself into the fight, standing between Vi and the person she still couldn't bring herself to kill.

Jinx.

Vi's hesitation cracked something between her and Caitlyn that couldn't be patched with apologies. And Jinx—already spiraling, already burning—took that fracture and turned it into gasoline.

She sabotaged a large vault holding the Gray.

Blew it.

Reversed the flow into Piltover's own filtration system like she was rewriting the city's lungs. She'd planted colorful Shimmer-laced canisters designed to rip the vents open and push the tainted smoke upward. A sick kind of artistry—bright, toxic, impossible to ignore.

The Gray went up.

Piltover went down.

To say shit went batshit crazy was an understatement.

Adriel didn't learn any of this by "asking around."

It arrived all at once—clean, organized, and cold—slotted into his brain the way a file snaps into a folder.

Passive Knowledge.

The skill was a cheat code and a curse. It was the easiest way to pinpoint exactly where in the story he'd landed.