Miles didn't have time to process what an "Echo Step" was.
He didn't decide to move.
He just… moved.
It wasn't a dodge or a roll.
For a split second, the world seemed to stutter, to lag like a bad video feed.
He felt a weird pull, like something invisible was pulling him to the side.
CRUNCH.
The leader's boot slammed into the greasy pavement, right where Miles's skull had been a microsecond before.
The impact made cracks through the concrete.
Miles was now three feet to the left, lying in a heap, staring in disbelief.
The three thugs froze.
They stared at the shattered pavement, then at Miles, then back at the pavement.
Confusion warred with anger on the leader's face.
"What the hell?" one of the others stammered, his bravado evaporating like mist. "How'd you…?"
Miles didn't have an answer. He was just as baffled as they were.
The leader shook off his surprise, his expression hardening into pure rage. "He's fast! Grab him!"
The other two, their confidence restored by the command, lunged at him.
Miles scrambled backward, his body screaming in protest.
He was on his feet, swaying, his vision swimming with black spots.
One of the thugs, a hulking brute with a shaved head, got to him first.
He grabbed Miles's left arm, his thick fingers digging into the worn fabric of his jacket.
Miles tried to yank it free, but the man's grip was like iron.
With a grunt of effort, the thug twisted his arm viciously.
A sound, wet and sharp and sickeningly loud, echoed through the alley.
SNAP.
A universe of pure, white-hot agony exploded in his arm.
It wasn't like the dull, crushing pain of his ribs. This was a shriek of torment, a bolt of lightning that shot up his arm and detonated inside his brain, wiping out all thought, all reason.
He screamed, a raw, ragged sound torn from his throat.
[WARNING: CATASTROPHIC STRUCTURAL DAMAGE DETECTED IN HOST'S LEFT ULNA AND RADIUS]
The system's voice was a pinprick of cold data in an ocean of fire.
[PAIN RECEPTORS EXCEEDING OPERATIONAL THRESHOLDS]
[STRESS-INDUCED MUTATION PROTOCOL... TRIGGERED]
The thug grinned, pleased with his work, holding Miles by his now-limp, broken limb. "Not so fast now, are you, bookworm?"
But the system wasn't finished.
[EVOLVING SKILL: 'BASIC STRIKE']
A torrent of new information, of raw potential, flooded Miles's senses. It was a language he didn't understand, but his body did.
[MUTATION COMPLETE. NEW SKILL ACQUIRED: PULSE BREAK LVL 1]
The leader was moving in again, his fists raised, ready to finish the job.
Rage, primal and absolute, surged through Miles, momentarily drowning out the pain.
He didn't think.
He reacted.
He swung his good arm, his right arm, in a clumsy, desperate arc toward the man who still held his broken one.
[DIRECTIVE: NEUTRALIZE IMMEDIATE THREAT]
[ACTIVATING: PULSE BREAK]
As his fist moved, something shifted in the air around it.
A pale blue light, faint as a phantom, flickered around his knuckles.
A ripple, like a heat haze off hot asphalt, pulsed outward.
His fist connected with the thug's chest.
It didn't feel like a normal punch. There was no satisfying crunch of bone on bone.
There was only a dull, resonant THUMP.
Like hitting a bass drum.
The thug's eyes went wide with shock.
And then he was flying.
He wasn't just shoved backward; he was launched, his feet leaving the ground as if he'd been hit by a car.
He soared through the air for a full ten feet before slamming hard against the brick wall of the alley.
He slid to the ground in a boneless heap, silent and still.
The alley fell into a stunned silence, broken only by Miles's ragged, painful gasps.
He stared at his own hand, half expecting it to be shattered.
It was fine.
It tingled with a strange, humming energy, but it was fine.
What… did I just do?
The leader stopped dead in his tracks, his mouth hanging open.
He looked at his fallen comrade, then back at Miles, his face a canvas of disbelief and a new, dawning terror.
This wasn't a bookworm.
This was something else.
Something impossible.
Miles staggered to his feet, using the wall for support. Every nerve ending was on fire. His broken arm hung uselessly at his side, sending waves of nausea through him.
But for the first time, the thugs weren't looking at him like he was prey.
They were looking at him like he was a monster.
He took a step forward.
The leader took a step back.
"Stay away from me!" he snarled, but the threat was hollow, his voice cracking with fear.
Miles didn't have a plan. He was running on pure adrenaline and the bizarre prompts from the voice in his head.
[ANALYSIS: THREATS NEUTRALIZED. OPPORTUNITY FOR INTELLIGENCE GATHERING DETECTED]
The system was all business.
[SUGGESTION: INTERROGATE REMAINING HOSTILE FOR ORGANIZATIONAL COMMAND STRUCTURE AND FINANCIAL SUPPORT]
Right. Interrogate, Miles thought, his mind struggling to keep up. Because I'm a superspy now, apparently. Not a kid who's about to pass out from blood loss.
He ignored the screaming pain and focused on the gang leader, who was now trembling.
Miles took another lurching step, his shadow stretching long and menacing in the dim light.
"Who do you work for?" Miles asked. His voice came out as a low, gravelly rasp that surprised even him. It didn't sound like his own.
"W-what?" the leader stammered.
Miles raised his right hand, the one that had unleashed that impossible force. He didn't know how to do it again, but he could feel the ghost of that energy still humming beneath his skin.
He let a little of it flicker at his fingertips, a faint, pale blue corona.
The leader's eyes widened in terror.
"Who. Do. You. Work. For?" Miles repeated, each word a chip of ice.
The leader's facade of toughness shattered completely.
"Nobody! We're the Crimson Serpents! We run this block!" he blurted out, his words tumbling over each other.
"Not good enough," Miles growled.
He lunged forward, grabbing the front of the man's jacket and slamming him against the alley wall. The impact jarred his broken arm, and he nearly blacked out from the pain, but he held on.
"You're small-time thugs," Miles snarled, his face inches from the man's. "You shake down kids for lunch money. But you're organized. You wear a uniform. Who gives the orders? Who pays you?"
Panic flashed in the leader's eyes.
"I don't know anything!"
"Liar."
"It's just Spike!" the man finally choked out, tears of fear and pain welling in his eyes. "He's our boss! He gives the orders!"
"Spike," Miles repeated. The name felt like grit in his mouth.
[NEW DATA ACQUIRED: 'SPIKE']
"Where do I find him?"
"I can't!" the thug sobbed. "He'll kill me!"
Miles pushed him harder against the wall. "Your odds with him are better than your odds with me right now."
It was a bluff. He felt like he was about to fall apart. But the man didn't know that.
"Warehouse 7!" the leader shrieked. "Down by the old docks! That's his base! That's all I know, I swear!"
[NEW DATA ACQUIRED: 'WAREHOUSE 7']
The system processed the information with digital speed.
[ANALYSIS: 'SPIKE' AND 'WAREHOUSE 7' REPRESENT A LOCALIZED THREAT NEXUS. POTENTIAL OBSTACLE TO HOST'S LONG-TERM SURVIVAL AND ANONYMITY]
Miles felt a cold dread mix with the pain. This was spiraling.
Then, a new prompt appeared in his mind, stark and terrifyingly clear.
[SUB-QUEST GENERATED: ELIMINATE THE SERPENT'S HEAD]
[OBJECTIVE: LOCATE AND ELIMINATE THE INDIVIDUAL KNOWN AS 'SPIKE']
Miles stared at the words scrolling across the inside of his eyelids.
A quest.
Like in a video game.
A quest to kill a man.
He released the terrified gang leader, who crumpled to the ground, sobbing.
"Get out of here," Miles whispered. "And never let me see your face again."
The man scrambled to his feet and fled, disappearing into the night without a backward glance.
Miles was alone.
Alone with two unconscious thugs, a broken body, and a mission he never asked for.
He leaned against the cold brick wall, clutching his shattered arm.
He had survived.
But as he looked at his hand, the hand that had just sent a man flying with an invisible force, a horrifying realization began to dawn.
He wasn't just Miles Vane, the quiet bookworm, anymore.
The voice in his head, the impossible power, the quest… something had awakened inside him.
Something ancient and lethal.
And he had no idea how to control it..