The sky cracked open.
Gary had seen his fair share of monsters—things with claws that could rip apart steel, jaws that snapped boulders like fruit, eyes that burned with unnatural fire—but nothing compared to the thing that now rose before him.
Rank A… The Chaos Angel!
It ascended, as though the very world had been waiting for it to shed its disguise.
Wings unfurled like sheets of obsidian fire, each feather gleaming with a sharpened edge that caught and reflected the blood-red light of the horizon.
When it spread them wide, the air shuddered.
So Riders scread and clutched their ears, blood trickling from their nostrils. Others simply fell silent, weapons slipping from their hands as they forgot the will to fight.
Gary's throat tightened as his palms grew slick.
He had always believed himself good at reading situations—and everything about this one scread: Run! For original chapters go to NoveI(F)ire
Run as fast as you can!
The Riders did exactly that.
He watched them scatter, breaking ranks and charging into the distance on their sleek black steeds and rumbling iron bikes. These were n and won who had survived wars and monsters, yet now they ran!
And who could bla them? Even Gary quickly realized that survival might be impossible.
WHUUSH!
The Angel moved once—just once.
Its wings tilted, and the air itself scread, a storm of blades whistling outward.
The first Rider—soone Gary vaguely rembered as Big Jaro—was cut clean in half, his body falling into two equal pieces like at on a butcher's slab.
Another Rider's head spun away, eyes still blinking as it rolled across the sand.
In the span of a breath, five were gone.
By the ti Gary had blinked again, ten more.
The desert was becoming a graveyard.
Gary stumbled backward, his mouth dry as parchnt.
"Shit… shit, shit, shit…" His words ca out as a stamred litany. His mind raced, but not toward action—toward bla.
Toward… regret.
'I shouldn't be here… I should never have followed Sobin!'
At the ti, it had seed smart—profitable, even.
And for what?
'Am I going to die here? After everything?!' Gary clenched his teeth. 'After all I've had to do to stay alive in this cruel world?!'
He thought about the first day he decided to beco a Rider. About the hunger in his gut, the gnawing envy every ti he saw n with roofs over their heads, food in their stomachs, families to laugh with.
He had told himself he was smarter than them—that he could cheat the world, snatch glory and fortune without the grind of the "straight and narrow."
That was why he also chose to walk down the path of cri and beca a Plunderer as well.
Survive! He would do anything to survive!
But looking now at the bodies of the Riders, their screams cut short by blades of darkness, Gary felt the truth burn into him like a brand:
He had been a fool: a greedy, stupid, short-sighted fool.
His legs trembled.
His gut clenched.
All his carefully cultivated bravado, the swagger he wore like armor, crumbled into ash.
His heart pounded so loudly he swore the Chaos Angel could hear it.
"No. No, no, no… I'm not dying here." He shook his head hard, whispering the words like a spell. "I'm not dying here. I won't. I don't care what happens. I won't."
Sothing in him snapped—not courage, but raw, desperate instinct.
Survival!
The one truth he had clung to since the day he first stole supplies from an Outpost and ran before the guards could catch him.
'Live. Always live.'
And to live, he needed Sobin.
Gary's eyes whipped toward the iron carriage where Sobin was locked away.
He sat sowhere inside, silent, contained, as though the chaos outside had nothing to do with him. Gary's fists clenched. It was absurd—unfair—that Sobin, of all people, might live while the world burned.
But absurdity didn't matter. Sobin was his only chance.
Bodies fell left and right as Gary stumbled forward.
Blood sprayed across his boots.
A man scread behind him, then choked on his own breath as a feather sliced through his throat. The sand was wet now—thick with gore—and each step Gary took squelched like mud.
"Move, damn you," he hissed at his own legs, forcing them faster.
He dodged a fallen body, leapt over a severed arm, nearly tripped on a discarded rifle.
He didn't look back at the Angel. He couldn't. The sound of its wings was enough—the constant whistle and thrum of death cutting through the air.
At last, the carriage.
Gary slamd against its side, pounding on the tal with frantic fists.
"Sobin! Sobin, open this thing!" His voice cracked. "Do you see what's happening out here? We're all going to die!"
There was a hiss of gears. The door clicked. Slowly, it opened.
Sobin sat inside, shackled but upright, his gaze steady. Calm. Detached. His dark eyes flicked over Gary as though appraising a stranger.
Gary fell to his knees. "You have to save us. All of us! That thing—" He jerked a thumb toward the chaos without looking. "It's going to wipe us out. You're the only one who can stop it. Please!"
Sobin's voice was even, flat. "I am under arrest. I will not break the law."
Gary's jaw dropped.
"The law? The law?" His laugh ca out shrill, bitter. "Look around you! The law doesn't an a damn thing if we're all corpses!"
Still, Sobin's gaze didn't waver.
Gary's hands trembled as he grabbed Sobin's leg, clutching at him like a drowning man clings to driftwood.
"Please. Please, Sobin. I'm sorry for betraying you. Just give one more chance. Let make things right to you. We're friends, right? We're fellow Riders… colleagues, companions. Please don't forget our bond and abandon now. Just this once. Save us! Save !"
The answer never ca.
Instead, Gary felt sothing sharp and cold pierce his back.
SQUELCH!
"E-eh…?" His breath hitched.
He looked down, disbelief filling his eyes as blood bubbled past his lips.
Dozens of black-feathered blades jutted through his chest, their edges glistening.
The Angel's wings had found him.
Gary coughed, spitting red. He slumped against Sobin, his voice hoarse.
"Help … Sobin… please…" His eyes searched the deliveryman, desperate for a flicker of compassion, humanity, anything.
But Sobin's gaze was as cold as the steel that bound him.
"What are you talking about?" Sobin said, devoid of any emotion. "I owe you nothing."
The words were a final judgnt.
Gary's strength ebbed. His fingers slipped from Sobin's leg. He crumpled forward, collapsing onto the carriage floor.
His last sight was Sobin's impassive face, unchanging, even as his world went black.
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