Chapter 121

  Jake twisted in midair and gracefully nded on his feet, bending his ko absorb the impact. He quickly stood up and turoward the pickup truck. The man in the bed, who was holding dowrigger, swung the barrel downward, stitg a line of bullet holes in the building wall behind Jake.

  He wasted no time in dashing toward the vehicle, eager to deal with the shooter. Just as he was about to jump into the truck bed, a bullet struck him in the left shoulder. The force of the impact wasn’t all that powerful, and the bullet failed to pee more than half an into his body. However, a split sed after the heavy-caliber round embedded itself into his body, it blew up, tearing a rge piece of flesh out of his shoulder.

  The force of the mini-explosion spun Jake around, whipping him to the ground. He colpsed face-first on the unyielding asphalt of the road. Through the roar of the mae gun, his acute hearing picked up the shooter’s ughter as he shouted to the driver, “Got the bastard!”

  Jake quickly calcuted the best course of a. Had the guy iruck’s bed wielded a standard on, it wouldn’t have been able to stop Jake’s approach, and he would already have reached the shooter. But for some reason, the mae gun mounted iruck’s bed was much more powerful than any other on Jake had ever been shot with.

  Running directly for the pickup truck would be a suicide sidering how powerful the on was. The explosive bullets it fired would shred him to pieces long before he could reach the man iruck’s bed. He could try to run around the vehicle and wait for the shooter to run out of bullets in his mae gun before attag him. However, if the other ons the shooter and driver were armed with were half as deadly as the mounted mae gun, he would be in serious trouble.

  So a tactical retreat was called for. Instead of attag the two Demons head-on, he o set up an ambush and lure them into it. This was the only way he could turables in that situation.

  Before the shooter could readjust his aim, Jake sprang to his feet. He pivoted and sprinted away from the truck. Upon reag the interse, he veered to the right, narrowly avoiding bullets that zipped past him. But one of them stung him in the right knee and immediately exploded. Jake lost his band colpsed again. He quickly got ba his feet, but his injured leg was only partially responsive and struggled to support him, which wasn’t surprising at all—when Jake gnced down at it, he saw a huge k of flesh had been torn out of his knee area.

  Jake go the right at the pickup truck. He trated on the shooter. With a thought, he summoned his stats, and they instantly popped up in his mind. He was mainly ied in the shooter’s level, which turned out to be 75. Seventy-five! His own level was only 39. After his transformation, he’d had to level up from scratch. However, as it turned out, he was able to level up much faster than regur survivors, which was why he caught up with them pretty quickly. So his level was currently thirty-nine, and most survivors had about the same level. But for some reason, the shooter iruck’s bed was much stronger. It was safe to assume the driver’s level was close to that of the shooter.

  How e their levels exceeded those of most survivors by so much? The ons wielded by the truck’s octs were likely close to the levels of the two bandits, which expined why the mounted mae gun was so powerful. But this raised another question. The System spawems acc to the current levels of the majority of survivors. How e the two Demons had such high levels, and where had they been able to get high-level equipment?

  However, Jake had no time to think about that. He kept running, though his severely injured right leg prevented him from gaining his top speed. He staggered dowreet, fav his injured leg.

  “After him,” he heard the shooter yell. “Don’t let the bastard get away!”

  Then he heard the rumble of the pickup truck’s engine somewhere behind him. He gnced over his shoulder. He’d put some distaween himself and the interse, and the pickup truck was still out of sight. Although Jake couldn’t see it yet, he khe truck was currently making a U-turn. O pleted the turn, it wouldn’t take long for the driver to reach the interse and catch up with him.

  With a thought, he called up his health points.

  HP: 75%

  He’d only suffered two wounds, but he’d lost twenty-five pert of his health. It was bad. The rge ragged hole in his left shoulder was rge and deep enough to cause his mana to seep out. His Enhanced Regeion was already actively healing the wounds, both in his left shoulder and right knee, but he would lose some of his mana before they were pletely healed.

  Out of the er of his eye, he spotted an alleyway to his right, formed by two tall buildings. He slowed down and turned his head to take a better look. The alley was slightly wider than the pickup truck that was chasing him. Being well aware he o hide and recover before retaliating, he turned and dashed into the alley.

  A dozen yards in, he spotted a ledge protruding from the wall of a building on his left. He jumped and grabbed the ledge with the tips of his fingers. For a brief moment, his feet dangled in the air until they finally found purchase on a horizontal crack just wide enough for the tips of his feet to fit into. Jake then quickly looked around and noticed another handhold just above him. He leaped up and seized it with both hands.

  Utilizing any handhold and foothold he could find, he pressed on with his climb, all too aware of the trugine’s rumble growing louder as his pursuers quickly closed in on him.