Chapter 54 (1/2)

Chapter 54: Chapter 6 Sudden Change-2

There was no way that they would let her go when she was this weakened. The pain that had given her an adrenaline rush would soon pass, and she would surely fall unconscious soon, so running wasn't an option. The best way was simply to get rid of all of them as fast as possible.

She flew at the men and landed among her enemies. The old cross bag she was wearing drooped heavily below her as she flew into the air. The brown eyes beyond the white hair glimmered with menace.

The first to fall was the man who swung an ax at her. Surprised by her sudden movement, he stood in a defenseless position, which made him an easy target for her to plunge her knife into his stomach. A knife stabbed nothing but the air in which SoYoon had been standing. Having achieved nothing, he ended up charging at his fallen comrade.

SoYoon attacked the man who stood horrified by what he had done. Several weapons all charged at once and pushed down against her. Crouched, she was able to use her strength to hold them all back and eventually fling away the cage of weapons around her. Those holding the flailing intertwined weapons soon lost their lives.

She wondered for how long she had been fighting. At one point, her vision blurred. She felt pain in her side, and she instinctively swung her sword. When she stepped back and looked down, she saw a sharp-thorned knuckle lodged inside her.

This is not good, she thought. If she wasn't able to register that a close-range weapon like a knuckle had hit her, it meant that her acute alertness was fading fast. She bit her lip as she continued to fight the never-ending stream of enemies. Even the knuckle lodged in her side didn't send a wave of adrenaline to kick her senses back.

A sword and hand ax came at her from either side. She was able to defend against the hand ax coming from the right pretty easily, but to block the sword from the left at the same time was too much for her. The sword bounced off her knife but swung back around. When she turned to concentrate toward it, the hand ax came at her again from the right.

The hand ax aimed for her arm; the sword aimed for her heart. It was obvious which one was a more imminent threat. She turned to face the man with the knife as she kicked out at the man with the hand ax. At least it would force them to change their direction of attack.

The moment SoYoon attacked, the enemy charged her also. The heaviness of the specific weapon caused pain to shoot up her back. Luckily, it only grazed her, so it didn't hinder her movement. She flipped her knife backward and stabbed the enemy with a backward swinging motion. It penetrated his liver, and he fell.

SoYoon tossed the heavy corpse off her body and looked at her surroundings. Even Cheshire would have a limit to how many men he was willing to risk for this cause. There were not many left now.

”We're going to keep going, right?” she asked him.

To hide her trembling hands, she stabilized them by gripping tightly onto her sword. Cheshire's men looked at each other. When she stepped forward, they slowly started to retreat, then turned their backs to her and ran.

”Ha...”

Was it finally over? she wondered. She sighed in relief, then looked at Cheshire. After getting patched up, he was sitting when their eyes met, and he flinched.

His good-looking face flushed gray. He was preparing himself for the possibility that he might meet his end. But he was Cheshire. He could not die yet. SoYoon ignored him and forced herself to walk.

Away from the place full of abandoned warehouses, she finally came out to the streets lined with buildings. SoYoon dragged her drug-induced body between the buildings to hide. The sleep she had resisted was taking over.

She took out medication and bandages and haphazardly treated the biggest wounds before she practically fainted into a deep sleep.

***

The sun had come up. Upon waking up, she realized that it was past the patch's expiration time. She hurriedly searched her cross bag and swapped out the patch for a new one, then immediately left the place.

The stark white space, the medicinal smell in the air, the cold experimenting table, the gaze of those looking at her like an object of study—if she was to think about them now, she wondered how she had dealt with them all.

It was unlikely that they would be monitoring her signal still. Reassuring herself of this, she hurriedly walked toward Wonderland. She didn't notice any of the surprised looks she was getting from the passersby.

It was then that she heard the familiar sound of her phone ringing. The moment she answered it, she heard Heart's voice.

”It's me. Where are you now?”

”Outhouse. I'm heading over to Wonderland now.”

”Your voice doesn't sound good. Are you hurt?”

”Nothing serious. But the request I got was a trap. Cheshire's.”

At her answer, there was silence. Heart asked how long it would take to return home. She checked the time and replied, ”About an hour.”

***

When she arrived at Heart's house, he escorted her to his office as usual. He gasped as he saw SoYoon.