Lord of Annihilation

Chapter 23: Caught!

Lucius kept running at his top speed, while he wanted to test his body, his number one priority was to make it out of here alive.

Indeed, while the men had come here to capture him alive, that might change due to Lucius' subsequent killing of their companion.

According to Lucius estimation, 5 people followed after him.

"Quick, TURN!", a voice anxiously reminded.

Lucius heard the voice and without questioning it immediately jumped sideways to the nearby roof.

Swoosh!

A sharp object tore through the air. It was significantly faster than the dart that was used to shoot Lucius at the beginning.

"They are starting to use live ammo. You must escape from here as soon as possible." the voice, which was coming from his pocket instructed him.

Lucius' brows furrowed. While he did consider that they might try to kill him, the resoluteness in their actions was unexpected. It seemed that the order to capture him 'alive' was not important.

Dropping the idea of playing with these men and testing his body, Lucius immediately started running towards the public areas.

He kept jumping from rooftop to rooftop and never ran straight.

Swoosh! Swish! Swoosh!

Multiple projectiles kept missing Lucius in a very narrow fashion. If it was not for his recently improved body and the soul power that was assisting him, Lucius would have already fallen. He kept evading and made feints to confuse his enemy. Alas, they seemed to be experienced in the art of chase.

Just as Lucius jumped over a slightly taller building a fast object reflecting the bright moonlight came from the front.

'Fast!!?', the thought crossed Lucius' mind as he saw the object.

It was perfectly placed in front of him and aimed directly at his head. If he remained unmoving he would surely die. While this bullet would not have been a problem for him, if he was on the ground, currently he was mid-air. Making maneuvers in the air was very difficult, one had to factor the air resistance, centre of balance, gravity and many other such factors.

Lucius mobilized his soul power and moved his head in a very strange manner.

Crunch!

His neck twisted horizontally and his head suddenly fell. The sound of bones cracking in his neck was heard. As his head was no longer vertical, the bullet narrowly missed it and grazed the adam's apple on his throat.

Once Lucius' body fell to the ground, he immediately used his hands to twist his neck back in place. Cold sweat lined the top of his forehead and this face was unnaturally red. After he landed, Lucius immediately rolled from his position just to see a sharp bullet hit the stone flooring.

Back there, Lucius had used his soul power to wrap the nerves and blood vessels lining his throat to protect it from breaking. Lucius had then proceeded to break his own neck to dangerously dodge that bullet. If he had not done he would have surely lost his life back there.

Still this minor delay had caused Lucius' pace to completely break down as his enemies had caught up to him. Still there was no panic or even the slightest stirring in his eyes. It still carried it's look of indifference.

Seeing that he no longer held the advantage on the rooftop, Lucius rolled down and fell to the ground.

By now, he had entered the slum areas of the city. While Lucius' did want to head to the more populus locations his pursuers did not give him much of a choice.

His current objective was to remain alive.

Using the building on the sides as the cover , Lucius continued his run. Dropping to the ground had placed him in an even more unfavorable position. His enemies had the high ground and he did not have a clear visual on their positions.

Lucius hence closed his eyes and relied completely on his ears. Since the beginning of the chase, rain had already started falling. Due to the presence of the rain, Lucius had a constant stream of sounds entering his ears. While most would consider the rain as a nuisance, it was currently a gift from God to Lucius.

Using his ears and the feedback of the sound from the raindrops, Lucius could roughly estimate the positions of his enemies.

Turning around the corner, Lucius broke through the nearby window and entered the building. The interior was devoid of light and was absent of people. Lucius backtracked a little. he then suddenly paused at a certain spot and waited quietly.

Waiting for a few seconds, Lucius suddenly exerted strength into his legs and jumped up. He mobilized the entirety of his soul power and broke through the shoddily built structure.

"What the?!", a surprised voice was heard and the speaker felt a iron like grip catch his foot. Noticing the grip the man tried to pull away, but alas he was pulled into the building.

"HEL...!", before he could finish his words he felt a great force being delivered onto his neck.

Kacha!

A sharp noise was heard and the man's head dropped lifelessly. His body which was standing erect and full of power, lifelessly collapsed. It looked similar to a puppet whose strings had been cut.

"4 remaining.", Lucius concluded to himself as he immediately left the location.

The structure be had broken through, although weak was still much stronger than wood or it's kind. It was a kind of concrete which was not exactly known for its strength.

Breaking through it to kill that man had drained Lucius' soul power by quite a bit. He had also sustained some pretty heavy internal injury. While continuing to run wasn't a problem, escaping had become much harder.

The other pursuers had been alerted by the noise and had immediately changed directions. Seeing the absence of one more of their brethren seemed to further induce their anger as their shots had become much more frequent.

Although Lucius tried his best to dodge the majority of the bullets, he no longer had the soul power required nor the uninjured state of his body. They only reason he continued to move could be attributed to his exceptional mental resilience.

A bullet had hit him in his thigh and one had hit him in the abdomen. If not for mobilizing his soul power in a timely manner and making minimal movements to his inner organs, he might have already punctured a lung.

'Lucius this cannot go on for longer. You barely have any more energy left.' , Ka'lor'ah analyzed his body's state and told him. Right now, she hated the fact that she was in the form of a crystal.

'If only I had my divine sense activated earlier. We might not have landed in this situation.' she blamed herself.

One of the functions she had unlocked was called, 'Divine Sense'. It was similar to a detection field in which she would be able to detect all the objects within a certain area. Although such an ability sounded miraculous, it had a sharp drain on the energy consumed. Right now, she could barely have it activated for 15 minutes before running out of power and going into her sleep state.

Although she had reminded him, Lucius knew better than anyone else the state of his own body.

'I can no longer escape.', he calmly concluded. 'I cannot die either.'

'Therefore my only option is to get captured right now.' he reaffirmed his thoughts and slightly moved his right leg's direction.

"Ahh!! My leg!", he cried out with an exaggerated tone.

Lucius body immediately crumpled and he curled himself into a fetal position while holding his legs. The men after him heard this and stopped near him. They had their firearms armed at him and were about to shoot.

"Stop!" , a voice loudly resounded.

"But Leader, he killed two of our brothers. Let's kill him!", a man retorted with an angry voice.

"I know that, but we are paid to take him alive." the leader replied.

He then took a deep breath and slowly replied, "Plus, do you want him to have such an easy death."

Hearing this the other man shook his head.

"That's why we spare him right now.", the leader stated.

One of the 4 remaining men asked, "But why? If he is to suffer shouldn't we torture him?"

Upon hearing this, the leader flashed a cruel smile, "Oh, he is going to tortured alright. Just not by us."

"Who then?", another curiously asked.

"Our orders are to send him to 'The Pit'." he then paused for a second before continuing, "And all of you know, what kind of a place The Pit is."

Hearing this the rest of them shuddered.

The leader smiled at their reactions and spoke, "He should have heard enough. Knock him out and bag him."

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