Chapter 163: Broken Promise (2/2)
“Of course, they don’t have much durability left. So keep on shooting.”
“Roger that!”
Just like Alpha said, it did not take long for the portable walls to hit their limit. The moment their force field armours were down, they were turned into just simple metallic walls that offered almost no defensive value against bullets. Although most of the barrage from Akira only ricocheted off the armours of the guy with the heavy augmented suit since he had retreated behind the portable wall, Akira’s CWH anti-material rifle did not find any resistance in plowing through them. Eventually, the guy with the heavy augmented suit could not take it any longer, a bullet ripped through his armour and straight to the guy’s torso. Even after 3 shots of battle stimulants and medicines, he could not save his own life.
The other guys who realized that they had lost one of their friends shot back at Akira in a frenzy, but of course, it was not enough to hold Akira back since he had regained Alpha’s support now. The portable walls that had hit their limits were quickly shredded to pieces while the grenades made a short work of them. The explosion also blew off some of the guys behind the walls and rendered them unconscious, but those showered with bullets drowned in their own blood and died there.
Those who were still alive started thinking of running away, they grabbed Alna and put their bets on the small chance that they could sneak away from Akira who was shooting at them from the other side of the mostly destroyed portable walls.
Unfortunately, they lost that gamble. But that was because of something that neither Akira nor they were expecting.
As Akira came out from behind the destroyed portable walls, chasing for those people, he could not help but frown when he saw what was in front of him. The guys who were running away from him were already lying dead on the ground. Furthermore, not too far from them, Katsuya was hugging Alna.
Katsuya reached the hangar a bit after Akira. He noticed Akira was fighting against the Ezont family’s soldiers inside the hangar, so he decided to take a detour to avoid them as he sneaked into the hangar. After that, he hid while waiting for the right time to come out.
The adrenaline rush from the fight just now and the surprise from that sudden turn of events prevented both of them from reacting to what just happened. Akira and Katsuya just stood there, looking at each other. Both of them did not give any friendly look at each other. But unlike Katsuya who was looking at Akira with obvious hostility, Akira’s expression was more of an exasperation.
Akira sighed.
“You again? Or is that it’s your hobby to get in my way when I’m already so close… Haah, I guess I’ll try to say this to you one more time.”
Akira sent a sharp gaze at Katsuya.
“Give her to me.”
“I refuse!!”
Katsuya refused without showing any fear and tightened his hug on Alna.
Seeing that, Akira’s expression changed from exasperation to questioning as if he could not understand the person in front of him.
“…I really can’t understand it. Why are you trying so hard to protect her? I can understand why you did what you did back then. At that time, I wasn’t using an augmented suit and I didn’t carry any powerful weapons. It was fully understandable that you told me off just with a little intimidation. I’m sure I only amounted that much in your eyes back then. But that’s not the case right now, is it?”
Akira slightly moved both of his rifles as if to show them off to Katsuya.
“Since then, I gathered enough money to buy new weapons and a new augmented suit. These things cost me about 400 million Aurum. I don’t know how much your equipment cost you, and they might be better than mine, but at least the gap between our equipment has already considerably reduced. Not to mention, you have someone pulling you down and you have no friends with you right now. Or is it that you still think you can easily win against me even in this situation?”
Katsuya slightly raised his guard without saying anything back, Akira looked at Katsuya with confusion.
“Even if you can easily win against me, what exactly do you get from saving that girl to make you even come to this gigantic base all by yourself? Is she actually a rich lady from some big family or something and you’re offered a huge amount of money for rescuing her?”
Katsuya looked at Akira with scorn and yelled at him.
“It’s not for money!! I’m sure someone like you will never understand it!!”
“Then, is it like you actually knew her before and you’re indebted to her, then she meeting you in the lower district’s street the other day was not a coincidence, but it’s because you told her to come to you if she’s in trouble or something?”
“That was the first time I met her!! All of your guesses are wrong!!”
Akira did not believe that Katsuya lied there. Because of that, he just could not understand Katsuya as he was making a rather troubled face, he then said in a rather serious voice.
“So why then? It’s not for money, not because you’re indebted to her, and she’s not your friend. I can’t understand why would you go this far for a total stranger.”
Akira’s gaze was sharp, it was as if he was trying to see through something that he could not understand at all.
Katsuya felt slightly pressured under that gaze, but when he felt Alna shaking under his arm, he made his resolve and yelled at Akira as if to shake off his fear.
“It’s because I’ve promised her that I’ll save her! I don’t need any other reason!!”
Akira looked slightly surprised there. Then his expression changed as if he finally understood what was going on although he still found it surprising.
“You’re indeed a good person.”
Someone who had the pride of fulfilling just an oral promise, not because of money nor debt. For Akira, it was something understandable, as a matter of fact, it was something that he could respect. Even more so when it was a goodwill promise to save someone. Hostility vanished from Akira’s gaze for a few seconds.
Katsuya was taken aback by what Akira suddenly said. Akira’s short sentence was nothing more than just a compliment and he felt that too. His resolve slightly wavered thanks to that.
But Akira’s next sentence completely reverted it.
“Unfortunately, you won’t be able to keep that promise.”
Akira was there to kill Alna. Respect was not enough to change his mind. There was no ill-will nor hatred in his eyes. But he was looking at Katsuya with hostility simply because Katsuya was blocking him from killing Alna.
Two people stood there, confirming each other’s intention. One came there in order to kill Alna, while the other one came there to rescue Alna. And both of them were just one step away from accomplishing their goal.
Even the slightest hesitation would lead to certain death. If any of them made a move, they would be able to kill their opponent, but if any of them made any slight moves, it would get them killed. Because of that, both of them only stood there without making any moves as the tension slowly rose between them.
But a third party suddenly appeared in that situation.
A black powered suit broke through the shutter and stormed into the hangar. Akira’s intuition told him to get away from that place, but due to the tension from just now, he could not move his legs that quickly, and the same happened to Katsuya too. That small opening was enough for that black powered suit to close its range on both of them.
Rogelt saw Akira and Katsuya through the external camera of his powered suit and immediately yelled in anger.
“Damn brats!! I knew it, both of you are actually working together, huh!! Taking me for a fool like that, I’ll kill both of you!!”
In his head, Rogelt thought that Katsuya only accepted his offer in order to buy time while Akira went to save Alna before regrouping.
Because of his misconception, there was no chance to straighten his misunderstanding now, Akira understood at least that much. Katsuya also thought so, but his train of thought was different from Akira, so he made a suggestion to Akira although it was against his will.
“…Hey, let’s work together here. How about a truce until we can do something about that powered suit and get out of this place?”
Akira replied back instantly without any hesitation.
“No thanks.”
Katsuya was dumbfounded, he did not expect that Akira would refuse in that situation.
“You… Are you serious?!”
“I’m here to kill that girl. Something like this is not enough for me to change my priority and help you save her. If you really want my help no matter what, that would be after that girl is dead.”
Akira replied so casually. But if Katsuya would accept that proposal, he would not be in that place in the first place. So Katsuya inadvertently yelled back.
“Are you kidding me?!”
The pointless exchange was forcibly cut short when the black powered suit raised its arm. The chainsaw-like weapon made a loud ringing sound as its teeth spun fast. Akira and Katsuya inadvertently looked at that chainsaw, then that powerful-looking chainsaw came down at them.
Its first target was Akira. Akira matched the movement of his Alpha-controlled augmented suit to evade that chainsaw and jump away from that place. Just a split second after he jumped off, the chainsaw came down at the floor where Akira was standing a few milliseconds ago. It left a huge crater on the floor and threw pieces of the floors all around the area. Some of the big pieces hit the equipment inside the hangar and made loud banging sounds which showed how hard they were thrown.
If Akira got hit by that, there was no question about it, he would have turned into minced meat. He could feel a chill run down his spine as he made a stern face and evaded the incoming pieces of the floors inside his distorted time perception.
“Why is he coming for me?! Shouldn’t he prioritize taking on that guy since he has someone slowing him down?!”
But Alpha replied back calmly.
“I’m sure he plans to kill everyone, so he decided to go for you first since you have nothing slowing you down.”
“Isn’t it a better idea to go for the one whom you can kill for sure first?”
“That kind of decision varies from person to person, you see. So it’s not like I can do anything about it even if you complain to me.”
For Akira, it was normal for another person to aim for him first given the option. So he was not really that surprised when it happened, he just ran as fast as he could toward the hole on the hangar’s wall.
“Let’s run into the mansion first. I’m sure that black powered suit won’t come chasing for you all the way into the mansion.”
“How about that guy then?”
“I’m sure he’ll run into the mansion too, we’ll kill that girl there.”
“And if he doesn’t?”
“If he decided to run outside the mansion, I’m sure that black powered suit would catch up with them and kill both of them. If that happens, it means that you’ll have your work cut short.”
Akira jumped out through the hole and exited the hangar. Immediately after that, the black powered suit forced its way through the same hole, chasing after him. There was no need for Akira to look back to understand what happened, he just kept on running toward the mansion. He then jumped and broke through one of the glass windows of the mansion which was already cracked from all the fighting.
Akira found himself in one of a big hall. As he went straight to go deeper into the mansion, he could see Katsuya and Alna also jump into the hall from the other side. Akira who noticed that immediately shot at both of them out of pure reaction.
But his aim was interrupted by Alpha. Because of that, his shot landed away from Alna on the wall next to her.
Right at the next moment, a huge blade suddenly grazed the air right in front of Akira. The black powered suit cut into the mansion from the outside with its huge blade. But that attack did not only cut through the wall, it simply destroyed the whole wall. Akira could not help but frown.
“If you want to kill that pickpocket, do it once we are deeper inside the mansion.”
“Got it!!”
Alpha controlled Akira’s augmented suit to get him back on his feet and Akira immediately blazed into the mansion after that, away from the black powered suit’s melee range. Behind him, the black powered suit exchanged its melee weapon with a heavy rifle.
Akira was still running as he forced his hand to shoot his A4WM automatic grenade launcher behind him without even looking back. Of course, the grenades did not have enough firepower to destroy the black powered suit. But the explosions were enough to disrupt its aim.
The black powered suit released a powerful shot using its gigantic gun. It went right past Akira and hit the wall in front of him, turning it into a pile of rubbles. Akira used the hole made from that shot and vanished into the mansion. He could not help but frown after witnessing the power of that shot.
“What the heck was that? It’s not something that you would normally use against normal humans, you know?!”
“It was a warhead designed to fight gigantic monsters and powered suits. So judging from that, it’s indeed not something that you would use against normal humans. If you have the time to be surprised, you need to hurry up. If you get shot by that, no amount of medicines would be enough to save you, you know?”
Akira ran as fast as he could into the mansion to get away from the enemy’s line of fire.
Rogelt was furious inside his powered suit. Even after he used his prided powered suit, both Katsuya and Akira were able to get away from him. That fact really ticked him off. He opened a line to all his men and yelled an order to them.
“I’ll send you the location of those brats!! Find them and kill them!! If any of you encounter them, immediately send your location to me!! I’ll snipe them from outside the mansion! If you can’t handle them, drive them outside the mansion and I’ll take care of the rest!! Y’all got it?!”
The black powered suit made a loud sound as it moved away. It patrolled around the mansion while using its information-gathering device to scan the inside of the mansion. And when he found some of Haurias men inside the mansion, it angered him even more so he cut up the mansion wall. His powerful blade turned the furniture together with the Haurias men, who were even using a sturdy augmented suit, into mincemeat in an instant.