The goon's knuckles cracked like small branches breaking in a fire.
He grinned, a horrible sight, and reached for the shop owner's trembling arm.
Miles didn't think.
He didn't weigh the odds.
He just acted.
He shoved hard against the metal grate above him.
It gave way with a screech of protesting metal and a shower of rust and dust.
He dropped.
He landed on the floor of the small office with a heavy thud, his knees bending to absorb the impact.
The room went completely, utterly silent.
Four pairs of eyes swiveled to stare at him.
The goon froze, his hand hovering just inches from the shop owner's shoulder.
The shop owner himself stared, his tear-filled eyes wide with confusion.
Spike, standing behind his metal desk, just looked baffled.
It was as if a pigeon had just crashed through the window during a very important meeting.
For a moment, the only sound was the hum of the single bare lightbulb.
Miles slowly straightened up, brushing the dust from his hoodie.
His mind was surprisingly, unnervingly clear.
The cage of fear was holding.
[Silent Will LVL 1], he thought. Best three-word horror story I've ever lived in.
Spike was the first to recover, his confusion melting away into a kind of amused disbelief.
He leaned back in his chair, a smirk spreading across his thin lips.
"Well, now," Spike said, his voice dripping with condescending curiosity. "Look what fell out of the sky."
He looked Miles up and down, taking in the hoodie, the cargo pants, the youthful face.
"Did you get lost on your way to a school field trip, kid?"
The two big thugs chuckled, their confidence returning now that their boss had set the tone.
"Must've taken a wrong turn at the library," one of them grunted.
Miles said nothing.
He just stood there, his eyes scanning the room, logging the positions of the three standing threats.
He cataloged the exits.
He noted the single, heavy desk that could be used for cover.
His stillness seemed to bother Spike more than any bravado would have.
Spike's smirk tightened.
"Cat got your tongue?" he asked, pushing himself out of his chair. "Or are you just stupid?"
He began to circle around the desk, moving with a wiry, predatory grace.
"You've got ten seconds to tell me who you are and what you're doing in my office before my friends here decide to use you as a new mop."
Right on cue, the system's voice appeared in his head, calm and clinical as ever.
[ANALYZING PRIMARY HOSTILE.]
[SCANNING FOR SYSTEM SIGNATURE…]
[SIGNATURE DETECTED.]
Oh, goodie, Miles thought with a surge of bleak sarcasm. He's one of us. A member of the 'superpowers and bad life choices' club.
[HOSTILE POSSESSES: TIER-1 STRENGTH ENHANCEMENT SYSTEM.]
[THREAT LEVEL: MODERATE.]
Miles almost snorted.
Moderate.
The thugs who had nearly killed him in the alley were probably rated 'Mildly Inconvenient.'
He wondered what 'Severe' looked like. He probably didn't want to know.
"Time's up," Spike said, his voice hardening.
He nodded to his two thugs.
"Get him."
The two men moved at the same time, separating to flank him.
They were big, but they were slow.
They were used to intimidating shop owners and beating up kids in alleys.
They weren't used to fighting a ghost.
The first one threw a clumsy, haymaker punch aimed right at Miles's head.
Miles didn't even flinch.
[ACTION: ECHO STEP.]
The world did its little stutter-step.
He felt the familiar, jarring pull.
The thug's massive fist sliced through the empty air where Miles's head had been a fraction of a second ago.
His momentum carried him forward, and he stumbled, completely off-balance.
Miles was now standing three feet to the left, his hands in his hoodie pockets.
The second thug, seeing his friend miss, charged forward like an angry bull.
He was going to tackle him, to crush him with his sheer size.
"So predictable," Miles whispered to himself.
[ACTION: PHANTOM DRIFT.]
He pushed off his back foot, and the world seemed to smear.
He left a shimmering, ghostly afterimage hanging in the air for a split second.
The thug, his eyes fixed on the fading mirage, barreled right into his friend who was still trying to recover from his missed punch.
The two collided with a wet, meaty thud.
It was like two bulls crashing into each other.
They went down in a tangled heap of limbs and surprised grunts.
The rescued shop owner, still kneeling on the floor, stared with his mouth wide open.
This wasn't a fight.
It was a magic show.
Spike had stopped moving.
His smirk was gone, replaced by a look of wary disbelief.
He had seen the shimmer.
He had felt the subtle shift in the air.
This wasn't just some random kid.
"A speed-type," Spike breathed, his eyes narrowing with understanding. "Figures."
He cracked his knuckles, a sound much sharper and more dangerous than his subordinate's.
"Alright, kid," he said, a new, more serious tone in his voice. "Playtime's over."
He took a step forward, and the floorboards creaked under his weight.
He wasn't just heavy. He felt… dense.
[WARNING: HOSTILE IS ACTIVATING SYSTEM.]
A faint, reddish aura, almost invisible, pulsed around Spike's muscles.
The air around him seemed to grow heavier.
"You're fast," Spike admitted, rolling his shoulders. "I'll give you that. But you can't run forever."
He lunged.
It wasn't a clumsy charge like his thugs.
It was an explosion of movement.
He crossed the room in the blink of an eye, his fist cocked back, aiming straight for Miles's chest.
Miles's eyes widened.
This was a different level of speed.
This was a different level of power.
He used [Phantom Drift] again, his body blurring as he shot backward, trying to create distance.
Spike's fist hit the wall right behind him.
BOOM.
It wasn't the sound of a fist hitting wood.
It was the sound of a small explosion.
The plaster cracked, and the wooden studs behind it splintered with a sharp crack.
Spike pulled his hand back from the crater he'd just made in his own wall. He didn't even look at it. His eyes were locked on Miles.
"See?" Spike said, a cruel grin spreading across his face. "Nowhere to run."
He was right.
Miles was fast, but the office was small.
He was a mouse trapped in a box with a very angry, super-powered cat.
The two thugs were starting to untangle themselves, groaning and getting to their feet.
Soon it would be three against one.
[ANALYSIS: COMBAT SCENARIO UNFAVORABLE,] the system noted, stating the painfully obvious. [HOST EVASION SKILLS ARE BEING OUTPACED BY HOSTILE'S POWER AND ARENA SIZE. RECOMMEND TACTICAL RETREAT.]
Retreat? Miles thought, his mind racing. And go where? Back to my apartment so they can hunt me down later?
No.
The mission was clear.
Eliminate the Serpent's Head.
He had to end this. Here. Now.
He needed an opening.
He needed a distraction.
His eyes darted around the room and landed on the metal desk.
An idea, stupid and reckless, sparked in his mind.
Spike charged again, his fist looking to end the fight.
This time, Miles didn't dodge backward.
He dodged sideways, using [Echo Step] to appear right next to the desk.
He put both of his hands on its edge.
[SYSTEM QUERY: HOST INTENDS TO…? LIFT A 300-POUND OBJECT? THIS ACTION IS NOT SUPPORTED BY CURRENT PHYSICAL PARAMETERS.]
Shut up and help me, Miles thought desperately.
He focused, not on his muscles, but on the strange, humming energy inside him. The energy that had thrown a man ten feet across an alley.
He imagined that energy flowing out, not as a punch, but as a pulse.
[NEW SKILL APPLICATION DETECTED: KINETIC PUSH.]
The heavy desk lifted a few inches off the floor with a groan of protesting metal.
It wasn't much, but it was enough.
With a desperate roar, he shoved the desk forward, sending it sliding across the floor right into Spike's path.
Spike, caught off guard by the flying furniture, didn't have time to stop.
He crashed into the desk with a deafening clang of metal on bone.
The impact sent him stumbling backward.
It was the opening Miles needed.
He burst forward, his target not Spike, but the two thugs who were still dazed.
He reached the first one and unleashed the only offensive move he had.
[ACTIVATING: PULSE BREAK.]
His fist slammed into the man's chest.
THUMP.
The thug's eyes went wide with shock before he was launched backward, flying through the air and crashing into the wall with enough force to shatter the remaining plaster. He slid to the floor, unconscious.
One down.
The second thug, seeing what happened, let out a terrified yell and swung a wild punch.
Miles ducked under it easily, his movements fluid and precise.
He slammed his own fist into the man's stomach.
THUMP.
The man folded in on himself like a cheap lawn chair, all the air rushing out of his lungs in a wet gasp. He crumpled to the ground, twitching.
Two down.
It had taken less than five seconds.
He spun around, his chest heaving, to face the final threat.
Spike had recovered.
He had shoved the desk aside as if it were a cardboard box.
But he was no longer smiling.
His face was a mask of pure, murderous rage.
The reddish aura around him was glowing brighter now, pulsing with power.
"You're dead," Spike snarled, his voice low and guttural. "You're dead, you little cockroach."
He didn't lunge this time.
He moved with a terrifying, deliberate calm.
He walked toward Miles, each step making the floorboards tremble.
Miles backed away, his heart pounding. He had used [Pulse Break] twice in quick succession. He could feel the drain, the strain on his system.
He wasn't sure he could do it a third time.
Spike was closing the distance.
Ten feet.
Five feet.
He was too close.
Spike's arm blurred, faster than anything Miles had seen yet.
It wasn't a punch.
It was a backhand strike, aimed to crush his skull.
Miles threw himself backward, using every ounce of speed he had.
He was too slow.
He was going to die.