The rumbling echoed across the city, and Elliott stood in the center of the street, showing signs of uncertainty, as if he had been disoriented after eluding the agents.
"I feel like I was here already, and now I can't decide in which direction I should go. Come on, think..."
He obliviously gazed around in the hopes of finding the right path and carefully considered it, but he was helpless when he realized that walking in any direction would lead him either to a group of agents or to being lost again.
"This is dumb! This city looks the same from every direction I look at it! Why does it have to be so massive?!"
Irritation overtook him as he screamed in the air with uplifted arms, his voice piercing several city streets, prompting the intervention of several agents who gathered around him and eventually located him.
"There he is! It's one of those pirates! Hurry up and strain him!"
Elliott's eyes dotted back, and he gulped quickly, his eyeballs practically exploding out of his eye pockets. He fled in the opposite direction, fleeing with an army of agents trailing behind him.
"Just when you think it's clear, more of these guys show up out of nowhere!"
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Natan had been walking down the street like everyone else when he came across another agent who was backed up by a gang of underlings, of which he appeared to be the leader. He was armed with a mace and appeared enraged, having been summoned by the agency to put pressure on the pirates who had been wrongfully accused.
"I guess they started to employ the agents with more experience and perhaps tougher than those whom I've encountered..."
He took out his handgun, reloaded it, and pointed it forward. He fired a series of bullets that swirled through the air and collided with the agent in front of him, who had no reason to move and instead lifted his right arm for the mace to fly and counter the bullets by redirecting them into the side wall, causing an explosion and shattering the wall into tiny pieces on the floor.
"Surprisingly, I didn't expect for that mace to block the bullets..."
Natan prepared to reload the pistol, but before he could do so, the agent swung the mace in a linear motion from one side to the other, releasing a pressurized wave of pulse that gathered the fragments around it. Natan knelt and pushed his feet into the ground to jump to the side, desperately sensing the pressure flowing by him, only to observe that it collided with the wall and entirely shattered it on collision.
Natan swiftly regained his balance and rotated the pistol on his fingers for a faster reload. He then stretched his right arm and activated the pistol's scope, which began searching for the agent's weak point, which it quickly discovered.
After a few moments of watching, the top agent swept his arm to order the underlings to assault, causing a cacophony of yelling as they charged into fight with their cutlasses.
The bullets were fired once more, and the agents began to cry in terror and anguish. Some were thrown into the air by every sixth bullet when it burst, while others plummeted to the ground. It forced the other agent commander to prepare for a clash with Natan.
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Karisa exhaled deeply, exhausted from the whipping attacks she had gotten from Naeve's huge whip, which seemed capable of breaking the earth and causing massive injuries to a human's body. Karisa knew the struggle wouldn't be easy with the pole in her hands, so she went on the offensive by sprinting forward while spinning the long pole in her hands.
Naeve ignored Karisa's confidence and offensive maneuvering and instead delivered a straight whip to Karisa's face, who managed to duck and roll on the ground in the midst of the attack and then hurriedly moved forward, only to see the whip change movement and slap from the top of Karisa's head in preparation to ram her entire body into the ground.
Karisa instead hurriedly stretched her arms and shifted into a forward roll, escaping the onslaught by a fraction of a second, but she could still feel the weighty whip slamming into the floor like an antique wood without a sturdy body. She was engulfed in dust, with some particles flying at her exposed skin, and she suffered mild bruising, which brought Karisa's attention to the blood dripping from the opening.
Naeve pushed the whip back as it drove its elastic through the dust, causing Karisa to experience excruciating pain in her back as the whip slapped her exposed back, knocking her to her knees and dropping the pole next to her.
The strike had left her skin, scarlet, and it resurrected its attack by swinging into Karisa's neck, which she couldn't avoid due to her back discomfort. Despite the fact that she nearly damaged her spine, she concluded the fight by clutching the pole on the floor and standing up, breathing a heavy, painful, and sad breath that convinced her to flee behind one of the corners.
"Running are we?"
Naeve began to trail Karisa, laughing and calling her name as she swung her whip around like a lasso. She slammed at the walls to damage them at times, and she slammed into the ground at other times, attempting to get Karisa to come out of hiding.
"Oh, girly girl, where are you? I thought we were supposed to fight..."
Naeve was fast becoming irritated as a result of her grumpiness, and she began to call out loud for Karisa, who never emerged from her hiding location. Naeve began slamming her whips into the walls and raging through the alleyways, startling Karisa, who had been hiding among the dark passageways, holding her damaged arm and sweating from the strenuous action.
"I'm not going to be able to battle her one-on-one. I'd be useless guarding her because she has range. After a few hits, my pole would be completely ruined. That whip she wields is just too difficult to avoid, and those spikes remained unanswered earlier. How did she turn them on, and how did she manage to do so without touching the wall?"
Karisa gently peered around the corner and found Naeve looking for her; unfortunately, she was spotted, to which Karisa gasped and looked forward with dotty eyes, hearing Naeve's laugh.
"There you are, rat!"
Karisa froze and blinked in astonishment as Naeve dragged the whip backwards over her shoulder and twirled it around. Suddenly, Naeve whirled forward, preparing to ram Karisa's head. Karisa reacted with a loud cry and a side hop, her arms pressed together in horror. The whip, as before, smashed the ground and missed, causing Karisa to flee screaming in the opposite way.
"That was way too close! Stop trying to kill me, ah!"
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From the intense running and nonstop movement, Karisa breathed loudly, trying to catch her breath, but still had to stay calm in terms of having a close eye on Naeve who continued to rampage through the towns.
"I would need an appropriate weapon to deal with Naeve, but there isn't a perfect weapon that I could use. I wish Ayuka was here, she'd definitely know what to do about this pushy agent..."
"Where the hell did you go, goddammit?! Show yourself, you stupid rat! If you want to run, run in the marathon, not in a battle!"
Naeve swung her whip to the side instinctively when she heard a noise on her right side. "I found you!" The whip shattered the wall and reduced it to rubble, only for Naeve to see that the noise had been created by a cat fleeing in a loud meow.
"Damn it. Just a stupid cat... Show yourself already!"
She then began slamming her fists against the street's walls on both sides, when she heard a noise from the front. She swung without hesitancy, smiling. The whip cracked the wall, forcing Karisa to leap out of the dust, slipping on the floor and falling forward, twisting her ankles and causing excruciating pain, while her pole slid to the side as she pushed her knees together and sweated.
"You should've realized hiding wouldn't last long. Take a look at where it got you. You're in a helpless position, unable to move or reach for your prized weapon. Let's get this over with as soon as possible. I don't have the entire day. I still need to track down the rest of your crew."
Karisa's mouth shivered as she realized Naeve was approaching with a pre-prepared whip, ready to deliver the finishing blow. ("I need to think about something. What options do I have...?") Karisa began crawling toward her pole fast, but owing to her injuries, she was slow, and before she could reach the pole, she heard a huge roar in front of her and saw the whip's shadow distorting off the ground.
Naeve drew her whip and took a step forward. She immediately launched her whip into the air and prepared to smash Karisa's body like a bug, with an attack capable of murdering her in a matter of seconds.
"Say your prayers!"
To be continued...