"Beat him to death!"
"Break his legs!"
"Get him!"
"Damn thief!"
Backlund's East Borough was always steeped in an unsettling atmosphere. Fights, robberies, even murders in broad daylight were nothing unusual.
Sno wore jeans and a plaid shirt, an ordinary working-class outfit that, set off by his handsome face, made him stand out like a male model stepping off the cover of a fashion magazine.
Someone like him appearing in the East Borough would generally vanish within half an hour. Perhaps a month or two later, he might turn up in some great noble's basement, or in a special room on one of the old pleasure streets.
Yet at this moment, not one of those people so poor they would gladly sell their own mothers had any thought of laying a hand on him. It was not because the cap on his head hid his face, nor because all the East Borough gangs had gone bankrupt, but because they simply failed to notice anything unusual about Sno.
Though he still did not know the true name of this ability that everyone believed they could see through, it possessed an effect similar to psychological invisibility. It could not completely erase his presence, but it could plant the thought, He's just a passerby, in the minds of everyone who saw him.
That being the case, forget having a handsome face—even if he dressed like a Decoy User, no one would find it the slightest bit strange.
Like a ghost, he drifted through the streets of Backlund's East Borough, searching for a suitable target.
Before long, he spotted a young man, a young man like a stray dog. His right arm hung limply at his side, and judging by the bruised, swollen forearm, it had likely been injured for some time. He had