Ririko ran with him dragging her along for a while, glanced back at the spreading gas, then turned to him again. "What about your collar?"
Still running, Jerome raised a hand and fiddled twice with the electronic collar's connector. The collar sprang open and fell into his hand.
"You mean this thing?" He casually tossed the collar into the roadside bushes.
He had figured out how the device worked while infiltrating the police force under his Jeremiah identity.
He had kept wearing it only to make those idiot cops think it was still working.
Ririko kept pace with him. "You really are a bastard."
Jerome snickered.
After they had run some distance, Ririko glanced back toward the maglev train, only to discover that the police operation seemed to have failed.
The Laughing Gas Bombs and Fear Toxin had not been completely neutralized as expected.
The officers trying to approach the train began moving sluggishly when they came into contact with the gray gas, then collapsed one after another.
The train did not stop.
Fear Toxin was spreading along the ground on either side of the tracks, dispersing faster than before.
The train kept moving forward like a monstrous beast, releasing more pale yellow gas along its route, which the night wind carried into more distant neighborhoods.
Jerome looked back toward the train and muttered a curse. "Not even a little respect, huh?"
The two of them could not outrun the spreading Fear Toxin.
Pale yellow gas kept churning, swiftly engulfing the entire neighborhood.
Ririko ran a few more steps, and the light before her eyes began to warp and distort.
The last thing she saw was Jerome's face as he turned toward her. He seemed to be saying something, but his voice sounded as though it had to pass through