Yusuke Murata's latest retcon in One Punch Man sets up a big Saitama fight

Modified Nov 04, 2024 10:13 GMT

Yusuke Murata — Saitama as seen in One Punch Man anime (Image via J.C. Staff)

With the One Punch Man manga having resumed the Ninjas Arc, the fans were looking forward to witnessing the fight between the two former partners Blast and Empty Void. Fortunately, the manga's latest chapter shows a glimpse of this fight, giving fans an idea of the new power scaling in the series.

As revealed by the manga, Empty Void was the former Ninja Village leader who was defeated by Blast 15 years ago. However, there is a huge difference between the versions depicted by ONE and Yusuke Murata. This manga retcon suggests that Saitama is set up for a huge fight shortly.

Disclaimer: This article contains spoilers from the One Punch Man webcomic and manga.

Yusuke Murata's One Punch Man manga changes Empty Void's power scaling

Empty Void as seen in One Punch Man manga (Image via Shueisha)

For fans unaware of the happenings in the original webcomic, as per the story depicted by ONE, Empty Void was never as big a threat as he has been depicted in the manga. In fact, the webcomic never really even fleshed out his character. To make it worse, he was just another character who was one-shot by Saitama in a background scene.

While Speed-o'-Sound Sonic and Flashy Flash were fighting the Heavenly Ninja Party, Empty Void approached Saitama with his legendary demon blades for a fight. Fortunately, Saitama managed to defeat him with a single downward punch, stripping him of all of his weapons.

Dimension Slash as seen in the One Punch Man manga (Image via Shueisha)

However, in the manga, Yusuke Murata retconned Empty Void's character entirely. While he was defeated by Blast in this version as well, the former ninja village founder had received powers from God. This origin made him effectively far stronger than his webcomic version.

While his Dimension Slash is an exceptional move, capable of splitting the ground apart, the real depiction of his powers is made evident through his small brawl with Blast. As fans must remember, when Blast and Garou fought in the past, Blast's Gravity Knuckles knocked Garou around left, right, and center. But this is not what happened when Blast hit Empty Void with the same attack.

Empty Void as seen in the manga (Image via Shueisha)

In the latest manga chapter, Blast punches Empty Void with his Gravity Knuckles a couple of times. However, Empty Void tanks those attacks easily. Even later, when Blast restrained his former partner with a technique he had prepared for the last 15 years, Empty Void absorbed it.

Soon after, the former ninja village leader stepped into the higher dimension and attacked Blast, Sonic, and Flash with another Dimension Slash.

Such feats of strength suggest that Blast may not be able to defeat his former partner. In such cases, as fans would know by now, Saitama is bound to step in for the fight. While fans can remain certain that Saitama would win such a fight, notably Empty Void was much stronger than Garou. This difference suggests that fans can soon expect a fight much bigger than Saitama vs. Garou in the manga.