Chapter 119

  The rain shed down oy. The rge droplets pounded against the rooftops, creating a cacophony of hat echoed through the desote streets below. Jake remained crouched at the er of the roof as the raindrops assaulted him. The rainwater beaded up on his irregur body, only to roll down his skin in rivulets that followed the tours of his textured skin. The rain striking his hunched form didn’t bother him in the slightest. her the downpour nor the cold caused him any disfort.

  He was as motionless as a statue, peering down. The heavy raied a lot of noise, drowning out most sounds. However, his acute hearing had mao pick up something else. At first, the sound was hard to identify, but as it gradually grew louder, he soon realized it was the rumble of an engine. Even though he couldn’t see it yet, he khe vehicle was nearing the building on the rooftop of which he erched.

  Sure, a vehicle driving through the night was nothiraordinary, but he could already tell that something unusual was happening. His acute senses picked up other noise over the downpour—the spshing sounds of something or someone who was sloshing through waterlogged streets. So, Jake remained where he was, watg the streets below through the heavy veil of rain.

  As the water cascaded off the edges of buildings, it flooded the sidewalks, turning them into wetnds. The dirty water swirled and eddied iters, carrying with it pieces of various debris. Perched precariously on the edge of the high-rise building, Jake tio gaze at the rain-soaked city below, waiting patiently.

  The relentless downpour created a veil of water that obscured his view, with the droplets ging to his eyes, dist his visio causing him no other disfort. The wind whipped through the torrential downpour, sending sheets of water crashing against the buildings, shing out at the tall grass pushing through the cracks in the asphalt, and creating a maelstrom of hat should’ve drowned out even the fai sounds from below. Despite that, Jake could clearly hear the spshing from runni as well as the rumble of the vehicle engine in the distance, growing louder with each passing sed.

  Then, a group of survivors burst from an alleyway onto the main street. They paused for a moment, and Jake watched through the rain’s curtain as they whispered among themselves, casting furtive gnces in both dires. Then, they bolted toward the building where he erched on the roof. With every stride, they sent rge spshes of muddy water flying in every dire.

  The group of survivors kept running, sloshing through the water, their ragged clothes soaked and ging to their frames. Occasionally, they gnced over their shoulders at the alley from which they’d just emerged. It wasn’t long before a bck, futuristic-looking motorcycle shot out of the same alley. The bike’s powerful headlight cast a bright beam that pierced through the darkness.

  The rider was a tattered leather coat with the hood pulled up, and a red bandana cealed the lower half of the rider’s face. From the tours of her body, it was clear the rider was female. She slowed her speed, whipping her bike in the dire the survivors had taken, sending waves of muddy water spshing around her. Once she pleted the turn, she immediately accelerated again.

  One of the survivors let out a panicked scream upon seeing the bike quickly closing in on them. Another extended a hand back, holding a pistol in it, and popped off several hasty shots. The bullets struck a magical barrier surrounding the rider, dealing no damage to it at all. The person tio fire blindly while running, causing the rider’s shield to spark with fshes of blue light at the points of impact. Each shot ricocheted off the magical barrier, leaving it unscathed. The survivor kept pulling the trigger until the handgun ran dry.

  Suddenly, a pickup truck with a heavy-caliber mae gun mounted in the bed surged from a side street, screeg to a stop directly across the main road, effectively blog the survivors’ escape route. The female rider followed suit, bringing her motorcycle to a halt a dozen yards behind the group. She unslung what looked like a submae gun and aimed it at them, holding the on one-handed.

  The person manning the mounted mae gun leveled the on at the survivors and shouted, “Don’t fug move, or you’ll die!”

  The group aowledged the danger and froze, their eyes fixed oeical parked several yards in front of them. At that moment, they received orders to drop their ons, which the survivors relutly obeyed. Another pickup truck—this ohout a mounted on—pulled out from the same side street and halted behind the teical. Two men stepped out and advaoward the survivors, who were huddled together, trembling from either fear or the chill of the air, but likely both.

  The rain tio pour, drumming against the pavement and Jake’s skin as he emotionlessly watched the se unfold below him. In this dangerous and wless world altered by the System, he was just a silent observer. He had no iion of intervening in the events oreet ten stories below. What was taking pce there had nothing to do with him. Whatever humans chose to do was their own . Uhey attacked him a him no choice but to fight back, he saw no reason to involve himself in their affairs.

  Each attacker sported a red bandana or had a red scarf ed around their neck, indig their affiliation with Los Demonios. The two Demons who had just emerged from the sed pickup truck quickly tied the survivors’ hands behind their backs. The motorcycle’s engine growled to a stop as the rider dismouo assist her panions iraining their victims. The survivors were then ordered to climb into the bed of the sed trud lie down on the boards. The two Demons joihem in the bed, sitting on the benches across from one another aing their boots on the backs of the helpless survivors sprawled on their stomachs.

  The gunner in the first truck’s bed turoward the female rider standing nearby and shouted to be heard over the downpood job, Catalina! Yht them right to us!”

  She aowledged his words with a nod. Then, the two pickup trucks turned and rumbled dowreet, disappearing from sight. The rider slung her submae gun across her shoulder and made her way back to her motorcycle. Just as she mou and was about to follow the trucks, something prompted her to tilt her head bad look up.

  Catalina squinted against the raiing her skin. The lower half of her face was cealed by the red bandana she wore, leaving only her eyes visible. She peered into the rainy darkness and seemed to lock eyes with Jake ten stories above her. For a moment, he was vihe darkness of the night and the downpht hide him from her sight. However, he then noticed her body tense, a clear indication that she’d spotted him.

  Before she could react, though, Jake stood up and spun around. He bolted across the roof and leaped to another building, vanishing into the rainy night.