Chapter 21
Lower District, Central City.
The clear night sky carried the cool touch of autumn. The full moon's gentle silver light slanted across the old, dilapidated buildings, illuminating their decay and ruin. The areas the moonlight couldn't reach fell into even deeper darkness.
In a dark, damp alley, piles of discarded food waste rotted together, emitting a nauseating stench. Flies buzzed in lazy figure-eights above the mess, preparing to feast.
The sound of gunshots and rapid footsteps on rooftops shattered the quiet that had just settled after dusk, also scattering the flies' dinner in panic.
Danton Black stumbled into the alley in a panic. Clang! His foot accidentally kicked a mud-covered soda can, sending it rolling and bouncing into the corner with a crisp sound before it tumbled deeper into the darkness.
His heart felt like it was about to explode, pounding violently as if it would leap out of his chest. His legs were heavy as lead, numb and aching. Sweat drenched his entire body, large beads rolling down his flushed face. His eyes were wide with terror, and he gasped for air in desperate, ragged breaths.
He pressed one hand against the crumbling, pitch-black wall, his fingernails turning white from the pressure. Bent at the waist, his spine felt like it was on fire. His legs were so weak they could barely support him, and the soles of his feet burned as if the skin was about to tear apart. Running at full speed for over twenty minutes had left him feeling like his legs no longer belonged to him.
Danton Black panted heavily, sweat-soaked hair plastered to his forehead and temples. A chill of fear and frustration rose in his heart.
He shared a mental network with his duplicates. Within a certain range, he could clearly sense their actions and control them.
Just minutes after ordering all duplicates to flee, they had begun dying one after another. At first, he thought a large police force was lying in ambush, hunting down his clones.
But after more than twenty duplicates died, the visual and sensory information transmitted through the mental network told a different story. There were no other police officers — only one man. A single person was sprinting across the rooftops, chasing his duplicates. Every time he caught sight of one, a gunshot rang out and the duplicate died.
So far, over seventy of his duplicates had been killed. Sixty of them had been hunted down and shot by the mysterious figure on the rooftops.
Actually, starting from the forty-seventh duplicate, that man had run out of bullets.
Danton had thought that without ammunition, he could finally put up a fight. Instead, the deaths became even more brutal. The man's killing technique was terrifying — precise, efficient, and backed by superhuman strength. None of his duplicates could withstand more than two moves.
Fortunately, after the bullets ran out, the killing speed dropped sharply. Alex now had to jump down from the rooftops into the alleys to finish each duplicate. Although the actual kill took only one or two moves, the constant up-and-down movement and searching wasted precious time, allowing Danton to flee farther.
"Does he also have superpowers?"
The figure leaping across the rooftops felt like the Grim Reaper watching him from above. Danton had never seen a human with such inexhaustible stamina. No rock climber or professional athlete could possibly chase someone across more than ten blocks of rooftops until their very bones ached and sweat soaked every inch of their body.
Ever since gaining his own powers, Danton had felt stronger than ordinary people, yet he still couldn't compare to the man relentlessly pursuing him from the rooftops.
Was that man also a superhuman?
Tap tap…
The sound of rapid footsteps striking concrete suddenly reached his ears.
He recognized that sound immediately — someone sprinting across the rooftops, leaping from building to building.
Every time one of his duplicates died, this was the sound that preceded it.
By the time he heard it, it was already too late.
Tap tap…
In just two seconds, the person on the roof had crossed another building and was now directly above him.
Danton Black's breathing tightened. Time seemed to slow. The air around him felt frozen. He could clearly hear his own panicked heartbeat. Sweat rolled down his cheeks and dripped onto the ground.
He whipped his head upward in terror, pupils shrinking.
A black silhouette leaped into view from the rooftop above the alley, appearing in Danton's field of vision.
The figure grew larger in his retinas as it fell from the sky. Suddenly, it kicked off the opposite wall, sending dust flying. Using the momentum, the figure spun nearly 180 degrees in mid-air and delivered a devastating downward kick straight into Danton Black's chest.
The entire sequence was lightning-fast. Danton had no time to react. His chest caved inward with a sickening crunch. He let out a miserable scream as he was sent flying backward into a pile of garbage, scattering trash everywhere and disturbing the swarm of flies into a frenzied buzz.
Alex didn't pause for even a fraction of a second. The moment he kicked Danton away, he landed smoothly and strode forward. His large hand shot into the garbage pile like a striking snake, clamping tightly around Danton's throat. With one powerful motion, he yanked him up out of the filth.
"Ugh… cough cough…"
Danton's face turned beet red. Food waste slid off his body as he vomited white foam from his mouth. Alex held him suspended by the neck. Despite his choking, Danton's eyes burned with thick mockery. He tried to speak but could only cough helplessly, his words strangled in his throat.
Suddenly.
The hand gripping Danton's neck went soft. His entire body began to melt like burning wax. His face distorted horrifically, features twisting and dissolving. Wisps of smoke rose from his body.
In just a few seconds, Danton Black dissolved into acidic liquid that poured through Alex's fingers with a sickening splash, pooling in the garbage and releasing acrid fumes.
"Failed."
Alex's breathing was slightly labored. He slowly exhaled, calming the agitation in his body. A thin layer of sweat covered him. His hair at the forehead and temples was damp and stuck to his skin.
Constantly running up and down buildings, leaping across gaps, and maintaining perfect accuracy with the Desert Eagle while moving at high speed across uneven terrain had pushed even his peak human body to its limit. His breathing was noticeably heavier.
He had eliminated every duplicate he could visually locate and reach. This was the last one. The rest had already scattered into the labyrinth of alleys in the Lower District, making them impossible to track. After chasing across more than ten blocks, over thirty duplicates had vanished into the maze-like backstreets.
And the real body was among those thirty-plus escaped duplicates.
Alex steadied his breathing, feeling a slight pang of regret. He hadn't managed to catch Danton Black after all. He shook the acidic liquid off his right hand, frowned at the smoking residue, then turned and walked out of the alley.
He reached into his pocket, pulled out his glasses, and put them on. One corner of the lens was covered in a spiderweb of cracks from the violent movements on the rooftops.
He lightly touched the broken lens with his finger, feeling the sharp, gritty texture.
The glasses were ruined.
With an expressionless face, Alex put on the cracked glasses and stepped out of the alley. Moonlight once again bathed his body. The fractured lens reflected a cold gleam.
It was time to settle accounts.
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