Chapter 488 (1/2)

Hank could see that Heath was becoming incensed, and it amused him to no end. It was a good way of relieving all the stress he had from dealing with Alan earlier in the day. Although the plasma shield could defend against the piercing ability of the reinforced bullets, it was pretty simple for Hank to pepper the other man with bullets.

The first time that Hank had worked his way through his twelve bullet clip in his repeater, Heath had roared triumphantly, but Hank had calmly used his Quick Reload Skill, and within two seconds, his gun was restocked with bullets and firing.

In truth, Hank could have done it even faster than that. But as he could use the Skill while he was Dodge Rolling, he saw no need to reload without doing a quick check of the gun’s other mechanisms. Even in pleasure, Hank was extremely serious about caring for his weapons, fastidiously checking every moving part.

There were problems, with the fight, however. Hank was burning through his Stamina relatively quickly. At the same time, Heath was ripping even faster through his Mana, flashing the plasma shield on and off to block bullets, and using a small amount of Mana to power the suit constantly. Heath’s power suit had a slot for an external battery, but he had the sense to not use it; a bullet there would cause a small plasma explosion, and he would likely lose a chunk of flesh from his back for that mistake.

They paused in their game of cat and mouse, both catching their breath.

“Are you just going to run?” Heath demanded.

Smiling, Hank whistled a tune as he drew his right revolver, his father’s. He didn’t like to use it when he didn’t need to, because the 6 bullets within it took about 4 hours of work to properly infuse. Even though Hank had a high Skill Level in the process, there were occasional failures, and they would leave him with a headache that lasted days.

“Bang, bang,” Hank whispered, for luck. Then he rushed forward, raising both pistols to point at Heath. The other man straightened, which was the wrong move.

He kept the right pistol trained on Heath’s chest as a decoy, but his left pistol flashed, once, twice, five times in quick succession. Now, the bullets ripped forward towards the knees of the powersuit, aiming to dent the sides, crunching the delicate machinery there that allowed him to move easily.

Although the System improved human Perception and Reaction, they were still a hair away from reaching the point where they could truly dodge bullets, especially from this close distance. However, Heath had good instincts and hadn’t been slacking in his training, so he was able to throw himself to the side, making all but one miss. This last bullet slammed into the side of Heath’s knee, but it hadn’t hit as hard as Hank would have liked.

Although he would be slightly hampered, it wouldn’t be enough. Hank fired four more bullets, but Heath just built on his momentum, continuing to run to the side. The bullets skittered of Heath’s hand, which he had thrown out to protect his knee joints, which were already groaning from the earlier damage.

Both men reached the same conclusion at the same time.

“Deadshot,” Hank said, holding the pistol completely still. The bullet zipped out of the barrel, traveling at least twice as fast as the previous bullets, slamming directly into the side of the knee.

At the same time, Heath roared, and the power suit began to glow red. He twisted and powered towards Hank with surprising speed, even as he was forced to hop somewhat, as his knee was now locked into a partially bent position.

‘I reckon’ it’s time to finish this,’ Hank thought, as he raised his right pistol towards the red, glowing metal man. He almost seemed like an incarnate of lava, all molten metal and unstoppable momentum. But never for a moment did Hank doubt who would be the victor.

He pulled the trigger.

Things began to happen very quickly. Heath tried to dodge, but Hank had used Deadshot again, and the bullet moved too fast to be dodged. But a figure interposed himself between them, the Asian man, who had drawn his sword. Before the man could act, however, a voice cried out behind Hank.

“Pierce!”

A flash of bloom erupted from the Asian man’s shoulder, and he faltered in his movements. Then, he was slammed to the side by the winds gathered around Hank’s powerful shot, knocked away like a piece of paper on a windy day.

But that had delayed the bullet just slightly, and Heath had raised a hand, which was glowing with concentrated energy. The two forces met.

Or rather, Hank’s bullet ripped through everything, shooting through Heath’s arm and skidding through the rest of the parking lot, before it shot into a low field and created a small crater about 1000 meters away.