Thirty orange-glowing bullets bent reality.
They didn't fly straight. They curved, snapping through the air like living things, all of them turning at once, all of them locking onto Axel Kanzaki.
Axel didn't panic.
His mind went quiet.
Distance. Speed. Curvature. Entry angles.Thirty paths. Thirty outcomes.One second.
The storm hit.
The Hive exploded into dust and sparks as bullets smashed into the ground where Axel wasn't. Crates shattered. Metal screamed. The floor cracked under the force. In that same heartbeat, Axel moved—no, vanished—his body slipping through impossible gaps as if the bullets had decided to miss him.
One second later, silence.
Rika Hayase stood atop an electronic selling booth, boots planted lightly, assault rifle already in her hands. She blended into the darkness, posture low, eyes sharp. The Hive was empty, abandoned, its massive structure echoing only with the hum of dormant machines and flickering lights.
Too bad for her.
Axel saw her.
He took off.
Not forward. Not sideways. Everywhere.
His movement fractured the space around him, afterimages tearing across the Hive like ghosts. Rika's eyes widened just enough for irritation to spike. She raised the rifle and unloaded.
Orange energy flooded the market.
Bullets curved violently, snapping around pillars, bending around collapsed stalls, rewriting physics as they chased Axel through the maze of booths. Watermelons burst. Metal parts exploded into shrapnel. Sparks danced as rounds tore through old tech and concrete.
Some bullets failed, slamming uselessly into debris.
Others learned.
A handful stayed locked onto Axel, hunting him relentlessly, tightening their curves, correcting their angles with every micro-movement he made.
Then—Axel stopped.
Hard.
He skidded across the floor and stood still, five meters from Rika.
The bullets reached him.
And missed.
Every single one slipped past him with surgical precision—under his arms, between his legs, brushing past his ears, slicing the air above his hair. Not a single round touched him. They screamed past and buried themselves into the far wall behind him.
Silence fell again.
Rika stared. Her jaw tightened. Her grip on the rifle trembled, not from fear—but rage.
"…You're kidding me." she hissed.
Axel lifted his head slowly, eyes locked on hers, breath steady.
Rika smirked, unfazed by the impossible miss.
"You know," she said casually, stepping through the smoke, "they told me all about your powers. The army did their homework on you. Very thorough."
Axel's eyes hardened.
"Then you already know you're a dead woman."
Rika laughed softly. "Please. You wouldn't kill your first experience."
Something snapped.
The booth beneath her feet collapsed as if punched by an invisible fist. Rika dropped straight through the roof, metal and glass shattering around her. Axel was already in the air, leg cocked back for a killing kick—
She vanished.
Rika burst forward at full speed, sprinting across the Hive. Axel didn't chase her like before. He followed at a calm, casual walk, hands loose at his sides, eyes never leaving her back.
She reached the far end of the Hive and spun around sharply.
Three high-tech energy molotovs left her hands.
They smashed into the ground and detonated in violent waves of electricity, the floor lighting up like a storm-struck ocean. Both of them leapt instinctively for higher ground to avoid the surging current.
Rika grabbed onto a rusty iron ladder.
It snapped.
The metal gave out beneath her grip, and she fell straight into the electric surge. Her body convulsed as electric energy tore through her. Burns spread across her skin, scorching her arms, thighs, face, patches of hair sizzling away as the current raked over her.
She hit the ground hard, smoking.
"Fuck this," Rika muttered through clenched teeth.
Her hand slid beneath her sports bra. She pressed an orange button.
Everything changed.
The fabric reformed instantly, unfolding into layered silver armor that crawled across her body like liquid metal. Plates locked into place over her torso, arms, and legs. Tiny symmetrical openings lined her limbs. With a mechanical shriek, metallic wings erupted from her back, jet thrusters igniting with a violent orange glow.
She rose into the air.
The armor hummed.
Hundreds of tiny rockets launched from her body, swarming outward before snapping into formation, all of them pointing at Axel from just meters away.
Axel's eyes widened.
He ran.
Not at full speed. Not yet.
The rockets screamed forward, tearing the Hive apart as they chased him. Booths disintegrated. Support beams collapsed. Fire and metal rained everywhere. Still, dozens of orange-glowing rockets stayed locked onto him.
Axel pushed harder.
Reality bent.
In a split second, his speed spiked back into something inhuman. He shot across the Hive just as the ceiling began to fail. Massive metallic sections of the roof collapsed, crashing down into the pursuing rockets.
Explosions chained through the air.
Thirty rockets detonated against falling steel.
Ten remained.
They closed in, only feet from Axel's back—
Then their glow died.
The rockets lost power mid-flight, dropping harmlessly to the ground in front of him like dead insects. Axel stopped. He smirked. Before he could move—
Impact.
Rika slammed into him from behind, armored hands clamping around his neck. The force lifted him clean off the ground as her jets roared.
They blasted through the broken roof together.
Straight into the night sky.