"Out of the way!"
Lanevus knocked over a vendor carrying a basket, his eyes darting between the soot-blackened brick walls.
Ignoring the screams and curses behind him, he only wished he could run faster.
He felt as though he had never run this fast in his life.
Those damned Mandated Punishers had been chasing him for ages.
They were like hyenas. No matter what he did, he couldn't shake them.
He had never been in such a sorry state as far back as he could remember.
"Stop!"
Lanevus's knuckles scraped against a brick wall, its rough surface stripping away flecks of bloody skin.
The shrill blasts of copper whistles tore through the thick fog behind him. Six beams of kerosene lamplight swept back and forth across the alley. He could even hear his own heartbeat, the pounding between his ribs making his eardrums ache.
"Why is this happening?" He spat out a mouthful of bloody foam. The gunshot wound in his left shoulder kept tearing as he ran, dark red blood seeping out.
Three figures in black uniforms closed in from the right. Lanevus kicked hard against a wall and launched himself upward. Thanks to his physique as a Sequence 8 Beyonder, he easily cleared the wall before him.
Unfortunately, his physical abilities were nothing compared to those of the Storm Pathway Mandated Punishers pursuing him.
"No, the train station is out of the question."
Tingen's train station was just a short distance ahead, but in his current predicament, there was no way he could escape by train as planned.
The thud of the Mandated Punishers' leather boots was already closing in behind him. Lanevus immediately changed course and charged into the bar district beside the station. Its layout was complicated, and all kinds of goods were always piled up