Rika, half-dangling from the passenger window, lined up another shot.
BANG.
Another clean hit. The chase thinned.
Caption :
Nero ability: "Cognition Gum"
As the car drove further back in reverse gear, The white and green white that they thought they had lost, drive onto the lane coming out of an alley directly facing the reverse geared black sedan, the driver of the van who wore a beanie and had a black toothpick in his mouth smirked at them and suddenly turned the vehicle a complete 180 degrees driving in reverse just like black sedan, now the back door of the van facing the car.
Its rear doors swung open
Two figures leapt out onto the car.
Black suits. Red ties. Faces smooth, pale, and featureless — like blank paper, almost as if they were wearing a white mask.
They landed hard — one gripping the driver's side, the other clinging to the passenger side, both hanging half-out into the rushing street.
The man hanging onto the driver's side tried to sabotage the steering.
The sedan tore backwards into a four-way junction, horns blaring as trucks and rickshaws screamed past inches from their bumpers.
Kaito fought the sabotage, teeth gritted. "Hang on—!"
Somehow, he threaded the car through the chaos, shooting out onto the opposite road to the road they'd come from — still in reverse.
The man clinging to Rika's side tried to climb in. Rika didn't give him the chance. She glanced at the oncoming vehicles, judged the timing, and shoved her door wide open.
A speeding van clipped it with a deafening CRUNCH — the metal ripped away, door spinning down the road — and with it, the paper man. He tumbled under the traffic, vanishing in the swarm of honking cars.
Without missing a beat, Rika raised her pistol toward the other figure clinging to Kaito's side.
BANG. BANG.
Two shots punched straight into the man's head. His face snapped back, smoke curling out of the neat holes where the bullets passed through.
He paused… then slowly raised his head again.
Two clean, hollow holes gaped in the white, mask-like surface of his face — no blood, no torn flesh. Just paper.
Rika's voice cracked. "What is he?!"
Kaito's tone was flat. "He's made out of paper."
Ayame just stared, eyes wide with horror.
The paper man reached inside his coat and pulled out a bone-white pistol, its barrel swinging toward Ayame in the back seat.
Rika didn't hesitate. BANG. BANG. BANG.
The bullets ripped into his extended arm — severing it completely before he could fire.
Kaito's hand shot toward the dashboard. He yanked out the cigarette lighter socket, its coiled metal glowing red-hot. Without warning, he rammed it straight into the paper man's head.
Flames engulfed the figure up instantly.
"No matter what you are… you're still paper, bitch. Now burn."
Kaito jerked the wheel, sending the sedan into a tight reverse turn into a narrow alley. The car barely fit — metal scraping against both walls. The paper man, still on fire, was crushed and shredded against the concrete until he tore away from the frame.
The sedan burst out the other side onto a different street, battered and smoking.
Kaito slammed the shifter into first gear.
"I think I'm getting the hang of this," he muttered, accelerating hard.
His eyes flicked to the rear-view mirror. The second paper man had just exited the narrow alley — riding hard on a motorbike.
"We need to get out of here. If Paper-cut is involved, it's not gonna end pretty."
"Paper-cut as in the leader of the beggar clan??" rika said, worried.
Before any of them could say anything else.
A trash truck swung across the street out of nowhere, blocking the front. Kaito hit the brakes, then tried turning down the right fork of the Y-shaped junction — only for another trash truck to block that path too.
Behind them, the paper man on the bike had caught up. He dismounted slowly, raising a bone white Uzi, and began walking toward the car — spraying bullets with each step.
The trash trucks weren't filled with trash, it was filled with men. who jumped down — They were filthy, robe-wrapped figures with torn clothing. Each one held a different type of weapon, crow bars, hockey stick, etc.
They began to march towards the car.
It looked like there was no escape.
Until Kaito spotted it.
A ramp. A basement entrance on their left.
He slammed the sedan into reverse, spinning it toward the opening.
The tires squealed. The dirty-robed men lunged, grabbing onto the battered frame of the car, clinging desperately.
"They're persistent," Kaito muttered as the car drove into the basement.
Rika didn't bother answering. She kicked out the half-shattered windshield, leaned back firmly onto the seat, and opened fire.
"I hate clingy people!" she shouted over the gunfire, picking them off one by one.
The ramp spiraled downward, deeper and deeper — past B1, B2, B3, until they reached B4.
The sedan, still in reverse, spiraled down the concrete ramp until it skidded to a halt in front of a blank wall on B4. To the far left — an elevator.
"Out. Now," Kaito barked, shoving his door open. "We need to hit the ground floor and switch transports. Move, move, move!"
The three of them made for the elevator. Their boots echoed on the cold concrete — until the sound of screeching tires tore through the air behind them.
Bright white headlights flared, blinding them for an instant. Kaito spun around just in time to see the blur of a spinning rear motorcycle tire — slam — driving into his gut and smashing him back against the wall.
The bike's rear wheel slammed down, and the paper man riding it twisted into a 180° drift, his head tilting toward Rika and Ayame. He revved the throttle repeatedly — the growl of the engine a taunt.
Rika hammered the elevator button, eyes darting between the paper man and the stubborn metal doors.
The biker popped a wheelie — front tire high in the air — and roared toward them.
SHHNK!
In a single slash, bike and rider split cleanly in two. Pieces clattered across the floor
Kaito stood in the aftermath, blood running from the corner of his mouth. The elevator chimed open with a cold, robotic clinggg.
From the ramp above, a horde poured down — the filthy dumpster mob.
Kaito stepped forward, planting himself between them and the elevator, back turned to Rika and Ayame. "I'll meet you at ground floor."
The doors slid shut on Ayame's wide eyes, Kaito's silhouette the last thing she saw.
The instant the elevator sealed, Kaito charged — blades flashing as he tore through the first wave. He dove into the fire-exit stairwell, slashing down every robed figure who tried to block his path upward.
"I need to get to the elevator before anyone else," he thought, shoving past a crowbar swing and cutting its wielder clean across the chest. "I need to reach ground floor."
More poured down — pipes, rusted rods, even broken bottles in hand. Kaito took hits, but kept moving, climbing and cutting through all of them.
At B1, he stopped for a heartbeat, chest heaving beneath the green neon sign reading [B1]. No time to recover — more bodies came crashing in. He cut them down and pushed through to the ground floor.
Kaito pushes the fire exit door of the ground floor real hard and walks out of it, chest heaving, trying to catch a breath.
Kaito staggered to the golden elevator doors just as they chimed open again. Relief washed over his bloodied face when he saw Rika and Ayame step out.
"Thank god," he panted, hunching over to catch his breath.
Straightening, he turned toward the building's interior — a grand, glass-paneled hotel lobby and started to walk towards the exit, ayame and rika followed.
except it wasn't just any hotel.
Round tables filled the space, each occupied by dangerous-looking men and women. All eyes fixed on the trio as they walked towards the exit.
Rika and Ayame froze as realisation hits Rika. their steps stopped.
"We're at Hollow Crane," Rika murmured, in a low voice.
Kaito's step faltered. "The what?" he said as he looked at ayame and rika quickly over his shoulder, turning his head back slightly enough.
"The Hollow Crane," she said flatly. "A hotel that hoards mercs, bounty hunters, and assassins."
The camera seemed to pull back — revealing the vast number of eyes now locked on them.