I’m Not That Villain

78 – Black Mamba (6)

Armed police and Enforcers.

They swarmed after us like rabid dogs.

“There they are!”

“Stop right there! Pursue!”

But tell me, then.

Could they truly hope to catch us, hurtling between buildings at such velocity!

Roads barricaded by armored vehicles. Movement restricted by the buildings themselves.

The two together conspired to render our pursuers completely lost from sight.

Only a handful of buildings remained, and the Hundred Eyes headquarters.

Of all the high-rises, only that absurdly tall, eye-catching skyscraper was left!

Having switched buildings several times, I pulled Baek So-yeon closer, holding her tighter, sensing her unusual quiet.

No. We didn’t exactly need to be riding together anymore…

Yet we rode together, naturally.

“Are you alright? You don’t feel unwell, do you?”

“…Mmh…”

She said nothing, just gripped my waist tightly.

Thanks to my enhanced physical abilities, I was fine, but…

That. I kept feeling it in certain places. It was already considerable, and she was pressing it right against my upper body.

Ahem. This was… troublesome. If the situation wasn’t so dire, I might have odd…

“Master!”

I snapped back to attention. Instantly, I shifted my weight onto the tool…

Accelerating our descent.

Shkk!

A sharp sound, and for a moment, my body lurched. The rope we had just passed snapped immediately, causing our bodies to pitch forward.

“Shit?!”

One side of the tether had broken. The consequence was obvious.

I hastily grabbed the remaining line with my bare hand.

The line I held began to plummet downwards. Our bodies fell endlessly, and then…

thug!

It slammed into the roof of a strange car, one tumbling along the road.

“Krrgh?!”

An unimaginable jolt seized me, a pain blossomed in my lower abdomen. Or, perhaps, I should be thankful it only ended in pain.

“Bae…Baek So-yeon?! Are you alright?!”

“In… in this situation, you worry about me first?! Are you truly an idiot?!”

Baek So-yeon, scrambling up from amidst the shattered glass, began to assess me.

“What about you?! Are *you* alright?!”

Perhaps it was the energy rebounding as a defense against the impact.

The force was less than I’d anticipated. I, too, scrambled to my feet, forcing my aching limbs to move.

“I’m fine… but things have become seriously twisted…!”

That was an energy crystal forged with the strength of almost any metal. What’s more, it was situated impossibly high above ground, making it near impossible to strike with a gun.

Yet, someone had severed it…

An ability.

It must have been severed by someone’s ability.

Flap, flap.

For a moment, a sound like the beating of a bird’s wings. I whipped my head around, searching for the source.

There. On the rooftop of a low building. Something, shaped like a person, with dark wings perched there.

“…This is…”

It seemed to be sizing me up. Its head tilted, scanning me from top to bottom…

Black feathers, like so many fallen omens, rained from the heavens.

“Bloody hell?!”

The Sea of Void.

A curtain.

The orb devoured the scattered energy instantly, weaving a barrier that enveloped us.

Thung! Thung! Thung!

The curtain shredded, unable to withstand even a few stray feathers. I yanked Baek So-yeon back, hastily layering more barriers.

A gnawing hunger bloomed within me. No, this power was never meant for defense! Absolutely not!

“Baek So-yeon! Get out of here! Back!”

“…What?”

“I’ll hold them off! Just go!”

“No, what kind of…”

“Just go! I’ll be fine!”

I had ways to slip away, more than one. Like that smoke bomb I’d conjured before, using that applied energy.

Escaping belatedly wouldn’t be hard for just me, even if it was for both of us.

So, if we were going to waste time, it was better for at least *her* to escape quickly…!

“Hey.”

My head was pressed down.

By her hand.

“……?”

I turned to look at Baek So-yeon. Her face, seen only belatedly, held an expression I couldn’t quite decipher.

As if she didn’t want to admit something but had no choice, her eyes were widened, yet the corners of her mouth twitched with an emotion I couldn’t place…

Truly a peculiar expression.

As if suppressing her emotions, she spoke to me in a voice thick with restraint.

“…Where do you get off, posturing so?”

“I’m not posturing, it’s just…!”

“Enough. Back away. You’ve come far enough.”

Baek So-yeon stepped forward, emerging from the curtain of shadow. She shook off my hand, which had tried to hold her back, and fully revealed herself beneath the black wings.

The opponent, too, seemed to notice the change, unleashing an overwhelming torrent of black feathers as if to end it all at once.

A storm of projectiles that threatened to engulf my entire vision.

Baek So-yeon did not evade. No, she didn’t even show the slightest hint of a dodging motion.

She simply reached her hand forward. Gripping the empty air as if to seize it.

And yet, with just that…

“You dare challenge me alone? What is the meaning of your gall?”

*Crinkle.*

As if a black serpent devoured its path, the space before her was torn away in its entirety.

“What?”

There was no sound, no prelude. Just a literal tearing away. The black feathers that had been flying towards us vanished without a trace, and the black figure scattering the feathers at the end also had precisely its ‘upper half’ disappear.

*Shwaaack!!*

The sound of the remaining lower half of the body collapsing came belatedly. In that chilling scene, I could only blankly stare at the roughly devastated street.

“No, well, I knew about it, more or less… but seeing it for real…”

Isn’t that just an absurd ability?

Space Devourer, they called it, but the very application of that ability is ridiculously powerful, isn’t it?

The enormous, black serpent-like thing that sprung from her body vanished into the air like dissipating smoke. At the same time, Black Mamba’s face turned ashen in an instant, and she mumbled in a voice no louder than a mosquito’s hum.

“Hey. Turn your head.”

“Huh?”

“I said, turn your head!”

I turned my head.

Behind me, there was the sound of someone throwing up a truly monumental meal.

“…Want me to pat your back?”

“If you…look…this way…you’ll…die…!”

Black Mamba, having regurgitated what she’d devoured with her ability, made a sound as she wiped her dirtied mouth. She pulled my body to her, as if not wanting to show me, then raised her hand to my face and whispered.

“From now on, I’m the vanguard. Just look at my back and follow.”

“…In that condition?”

“I’m used to this much. Don’t wander off too far, just look at my back and follow. Got it? Deviate from the path and you’re dead.”

Was that a threat? Or some kind of consideration?

But having just witnessed that spectacle, the thought of daring to refuse her words didn’t even cross my mind.

Let’s just follow for now. Just until the building, hopefully.

“Move!”

After that, I only chased after Black Mamba’s back. Although some Executors did come rushing after that black feather ability user from earlier…

Before they could show a thing, Baek Soyeon’s ability devoured them whole, with a *thwack*.

No Substance.

Just an overwhelming mass of violence, plain and simple.

Since they were the ones who drew steel first, I couldn’t exactly bring myself to object. Still, the sight was so gruesome it made my knees tremble. I mean, the moment you looked, a piece of someone would be ripped off, leaving a chunk of meat to *thud* onto the ground.

“Halt!”

Two Enforcers suddenly burst from the alleyway. Baek Soyeon, who was desperately fighting back nausea, belatedly reacted…

But that brief lapse was easily filled by me.

I rested her custom equipment, shaped like a shotgun, on her shoulder. But frankly, it was a shotgun in appearance only. Its function was closer to that of a ‘railgun.’

Firing various, hastily-made energy crystal rounds at high velocity.

No sound, no warning. Only the hiss of the projectile’s friction against the air grazing the barrel was audible. But when it hit the enemy’s upper body, the sound of an explosion erupted.

*KWAANG!*

“Guh?!”

The violent impact slammed the Enforcer into the wall. It not only created a massive fissure but also shook the entire building.

Knocked out. At least knocked out. Severe or moderate injuries were a given, and its power was certainly enough to render them temporarily unable to fight. That was the essence of this custom ammunition.

I launched the same at the guy who flinched for a moment, staring at his colleague. The same explosive roar, the same upper body slamming into the wall.

Judging by the twitching of his visible lower body, he was still alive. Good. It was important that they were alive.

“Leading the charge while gurgling like that, huh!”

“J-Just indigestion for a moment… *uurgh*…!”

I swapped places with her as the vanguard and we continued forward. The encirclement grew denser, and the enemy numbers swelled, but…

It began to show itself.

The building soared endlessly high, the tallest in this place.

But before it, laid out as if gathered beforehand, were countless cordons.

A multitude of armed vehicles and armed police, seemingly lying in wait. Behind them, a crowd of enforcers overtly displaying their abilities were gathered, I could see.

No wonder the chasers felt like they were gaining on me slower than usual…

They were all here.

“Surrender! Black Mamba! Surrender now and we’ll spare your life!”

A harsh siren blared, and a greatly amplified voice echoed loudly. Standing before that cordon that stole one’s breath just to look at, Baek So-yeon halted.

“…Hey. You. Go back from here.”

She spoke without even turning around. At that sight, my hands moved first.

“Scarlett. Make me a custom, extra-large bullet. The same smoke as before. The thickest kind.”

“I said, go back!”

“Shut up, you idiot. If I was going to be half-assed, I wouldn’t have come this far. I need to see you go inside…”

I slightly lifted my mask.

And shoved a chocolate into my mouth. Anything to stave off the hunger, even a little.

“Just keep your mouth shut.”

“…Ugh…!”

The exorbitant energy being drained just to create a single bullet. With that, the Orb sputtered and completed one extra-large smoke bullet.

Not something hastily thrown together, but a smoke bullet properly crafted with care. I loaded it into my gun, then raised it high into the sky.

The momentary blinding will be the same for them as it is for us. Except, we are fewer in number…

“They outnumber us.”

But if it becomes a melee, *they’re* the ones in trouble.

Clack!

The machine guns mounted on the countless armored vehicles swiveled. As if they had our position pinpointed, a multitude of spotlights blazed in our direction.

Blindingly intense white light converged. The siren wailed, raw and grating.

An amplified voice bellowed once more.

“This is your last chance! Surrender! Black Mamba!”

I gripped Baek So-yeon’s hand tightly. I felt her flinch for a fleeting moment, but then her fingers quietly intertwined with mine.

“Just hold on. Why are you interlacing our fingers?”

“I-I’m doing it so I don’t let go! So I don’t let go!”

Only raising her voice now.

“Scarlett. Activate the thermal imaging.”

“Understood, Master.”

Subdue all of them here?

Nah. Shit. How the hell would I do that?

But a dash forward is still possible. To run straight through the center, hidden in the darkness, that much I should be able to manage.

The darkness renders us both unseen, but I have Scarlett to pierce the shadows for me.

For a moment, my vision turned black. And with it, the crimson silhouettes of countless high-heat signatures flooded one eye.

Even with this, it’s still a somewhat difficult mission, but…

Will I even die? If I wrap my whole body in a cloak until my stomach sticks to my spine, I might just make it.

“Soyeon-ah.”

“Hmm?”

Baek Soyeon, fiddling with her hands, answered with a start.

“Sorry, but I’m retracting what I said about asking for nothing.”

“…What do you want?”

“When I get inside the building, give me some rice. I’m sorry, but I’ll eat just that and leave. Truly.”

Thung!

He extended his leg the moment he finished speaking.

Launching a massive smoke grenade upwards.

Kwaang!

The extra-large smoke projectile burst as if exploding, scattering endless black smoke from the sky.

Instantly, the view was obscured. The executor’s voice echoed belatedly.

“Fiiiiire!!!”

Gunfire erupted.

I sprinted through the chaos.

Kagagagagak!!

The sound of metal grinding. The sound of bullets raining down, skimming over my head.

Of course, some hit me directly. But the barrier I had pre-applied to my body blocked those few that landed.

Where it broke, it repaired itself immediately. Even so, the hunger I already felt intensified to a maddening degree…

Clenching my teeth, I ignored it, focusing solely on moving forward.

The encroaching black mist, once unleashed, swallowed the defensive line like a tide. A darkness so absolute, proving its claim as a special grade hazard, made even my own movements a struggle…

Thanks to the thermal camera, I could just barely navigate, avoiding the figures and pressing further inward.

KWA-AANG!!

Something exploded nearby. A bolt of lightning, or something akin to it, slammed down beside me. It narrowly missed, yet seemed to know my approximate location, pursuing me with a grim persistence.

KOO-OONG!

A heavily armored vehicle overturned to my left. An unseen, black hand erupted from beyond the veil, flailing wildly, thrashing the space around it. I recoiled, desperately pulling back to avoid being ensnared.

The encroaching abilities were not limited to those two. Even amidst the chaos, dozens of abilities, determined not to lose us, clung tightly to our heels, hot on our trail.

“W-which way did they go?!”

“P.I.A. signatures are indistinguishable! Executors! P-please cease using abilities…!”

“Let them escape here?! Unacceptable! Don’t let them inside headquarters! Barricade the entrance! Now!”

Along with the shouting, a surge of thermal signatures spiked near the entrance. Clearly, they intended to completely blockade the entrance area, eliminating any possibility of entry.

But, you know…

Why on earth would we go to the entrance?

“Soyeon! Clear a path ahead!”

Far from the entrance, I pushed her forward. Shivering and dazed in the darkness, she seemed to snap back to awareness, belatedly extending her hand.

KWA-DEUK!

As if torn away bodily, the wall shattered, leaving a gaping hole.

I threw myself towards the light now seeping out from within.

WOO-DANG-TANG!

I tumbled into what turned out to be a massive hall. The instant we entered the blindingly bright interior, a swarm of armed figures descended upon us…

Thankfully, there was no unnecessary strife.

“B, Boss?!”

They recognized Baek So-yeon, belatedly.

I forced myself upright. Suppressing the encroaching thirst and hunger, I leaned against the wall.

“U, um, block the entrance…”

His voice trembled quite naturally. Wow. Shit. I really feel like I’m going to starve to death. It was all the more intense with the forced regeneration of the barrier in this already starved state.

Chocolate won’t cover this…?

“U, um, some food…”

The members looked at each other.

“…Food?”

“No, suddenly, why…?”

“In the first place, who are you…”

*KWAANG!*

One of the members’ heads was slammed into the ground.

Baek So-yeon dusted her hands.

“Shut your yaps and bring whatever there is to eat! Anything, right now! She said she’s hungry!!”

Ah, jeez.

Worth saving, after all.