Chapter 198: The Kill to the Face
In the center of the battlefield, a burly man crouched. Sharp black spines covered his skin, making him look like a humanoid hedgehog. He’d just managed to roll behind a pile of shattered crates, narrowly dodging a sweeping burst from a makeshift machine gun nest.
Panting, he was about to pop up and find his next piece of cover…
Suddenly, he froze.
A bone-chilling cold shot up his spine. The feeling of being stalked. A predator, close, silent.
No time to think. His body reacted on instinct.
He spun around, crossing his arms to block.
The spines on his arms thickened, hardening until they gleamed with a metallic light. A desperate wall of defense.
But…
it was too late.
A scarlet blade, wreathed in a faint blood mist, cleaved down the instant he turned to defend!
Clang—Crack!
First, the sound of steel on spines.
Then, the wet crunch of bone and flesh being torn apart.
“Aargh—!” A short, miserable shriek tore from his throat.
His body convulsed. He staggered back, again and again.
His left arm was gone, severed at the elbow. Spines, flesh, and bone were sliced clean through, the wound eerily smooth. His right arm was still attached, but a deep wound that reached the bone nearly split it in two.
Dark red blood gushed out like a burst dam.
Those spines, which could deflect blades and stop small-caliber bullets, had offered no protection at all.
They were just decorations.
‘If… if I had been a tenth of a second slower…’
A cold sweat broke out on his forehead, mixing with the rain. The excruciating pain and the shadow of death shattered his will to fight.
He’d only just hit Second-Rank. He’d escaped the damn two-year cull.
He didn’t want to die!
For a Second-Rank, a pillar of the battlefield, retreating after a wound like this wasn’t shameful. It was smart.
Live or die? The choice was easy.
Without a moment’s hesitation!
He gritted his teeth against the pain and dizziness, tensing the muscles around the wound to stem the bleeding. He pushed off his feet and spun around.
He fled. Desperately. Without looking back. He ran for the relative safety outside the battlefield.
He just wanted to leave this damned place. To get away from that scarlet ghost.
But…
Maybe the pain had clouded his mind. Or fear had erased his memory.
In that instant of turning to run, he forgot the rule his instructor had drilled into him three years ago. The first rule of being a Hunter.
“Never…”
“never turn your back…”
“…to your enemy.”
The scarlet figure was beside him.
He caught a glimpse of that blinding red in his peripheral vision.
His body locked up. Every muscle froze in that single instant. As if time had hit pause.
Then,
his body, all strength gone, pitched forward with its own momentum. It hit the muddy ground with a heavy thud.
A head, caked in blood and mud, detached from its neck and rolled into a nearby puddle. Its eyes were wide, frozen with a final trace of terror and confusion.
......................
“The distance is almost there…”
“Get ready!”
Wilbur, hiding behind a half-collapsed concrete barricade, was tensed like a drawn bow.
The distance between him and the Scarred Woman was approaching the limit he’d calculated. The sweet spot where she’d have almost no time to react.
He just needed one more opening.
One moment where her attention lapsed.
However…
A breeze, carrying the scent of blood and damp cold, drifted over from the ruined dining area.
The wind was faint, but it carried a whisper to his ears.
“...‘I think that’s about enough.’”
“‘Killed enough for tonight.’”
“‘Aldrich’s in the greenhouse, and these guys don’t seem to have many Blood-Weep Worms on them, so...’”
“‘Better to be safe and leave.’”
The murmur was soft, laced with the exhaustion of a post-battle haze. A normal person, lost in the sound of gunfire and screams, would never have heard it from this distance.
But Wilbur wasn’t normal. His perception was Third-Rank.
Every word the wind brought was as clear as if someone were whispering right in his ear.
But now, those clear words just struck him as absurd!
The Scarred Woman was leaving? Now?
The moment the thought surfaced, the scarlet figure in his line of sight moved!
She didn’t hesitate. Didn’t look back. Didn’t even glance at the ritual node, still locked in its stalemate.
Like a fleeting, blood-colored phantom, she broke through the half-hearted attempts of a few Ascension Road apprentices to stop her. She made a beeline for the eastern exit of the Garden, burning rubber.
And she was fast! Faster than he’d anticipated.
Wilbur’s pupils contracted.
If he hesitated any longer…
if he didn’t move now…
he would lose her. For good.
His mind exploded. A dozen conflicting thoughts crashing together.
Trap? What about Aldrich’s warnings?
But his body had already made the move.
He couldn’t let her get away!
Wilbur pushed off silently from his cover. Even as he gave chase, he stayed low, keeping himself hidden.