A Sniper

"Are you the one that sent your escort to me the other day?" Anna asked.

"ehm- ehh- I- hmm..." Karl went silent he stared into Anna's eyes, "as I thought I can't do this" He said, turned away and left.

"What weirdo" Anna said to herself.

"Anna! Anna!, the the white hair freshmen ask you out?" her friend said to her as soon as Karl left.

Anna ignored her and entered into the classroom, 'what did he mean, 'I can't do this'...'

"Anna come on, tell me... that freshmen has been the talk of the school" Anna's friend Joanne said while grabbing a seat and bringing it over to Anna's side.

"What do you mean?" Anna asked.

"Don't you know? hmm as expected of my studious friend Anna, you are so focused on your studies and duties as a council member that you do not care about the rumors"

"What rumors?" Anna asked with a little bit show of urgency.

"Well, firstly that freshmen had a clash with Alturio..."

'So he's the one...' Anna said in her mind.

Joanne continued, "...rumours say his the one that killed Chimpolo, and also got Bryce expelled"

"Uh? the student council president? that's impossible..." Anna said.

"Yes... it's impossible unless he is one of them..." she said.

Anna's eye widened, 'she has a point, but if he's one of them why will he be sitting in our class...'

"You agree right" Joanne said with a smile of accomplishment.

"Nah, it's gibberish, stop listening to gibberish and deep your head in your studies maybe your grades will even go up a bit, at this rate how will you make your father proud."

She turned away with a spouted mouth, "you didn't have to talk about that."

Anna took out her book and got busy but with a worried face.

.....

"Hmm... he's not in school today... I hope he's okay" Karl said to his okay.

"Who? is it four eyes Dimitry?"

Karl suddenly heard a soft voice behind him as he looked for Dimitry through the window, with with scent he recognized who it was. He turned around with silence, '...what is wrong with me? I was not always like this, I was very good with girls I even got Yeonhwa jealous on many occasions, all the ladies from the brothel were always screaming my name, why is it that I can't speak well in front of one little kid.... haa! kid, that must be why, even though I'm in the body of a thirteen, my consciousness is over forty years old, if we then add my seven thousand years in solitude, then I think I can see why I can't talk... my mind can't just accept the fact that I want to talk to a kid, hm hm hm, that must be the case' Karl was already grinning before he knew it, as a result of the reasons for his timidity he come up with.

"What's funny? and that smile is ugly, you can do better than that" Anna said to him.

'...what? my smile is ugly, ladies used to love this smile back in my days' Karl was still silent but was not grinning anymore.

"Are you going home? let's walk together" Anna said and turned to start walking.

Karl's leg moved before his brain and he was already beside her. Both of them walked from the front of the class 2 classroom to outside the school gate without saying anything before Anna then sighed and turned back. "Hey!! are you that shy?!!!"

"ehh?! m-m-me?" He got all flastered.

"Even if you are shy what the hell did you mean by 'as I thought I can't do this'...huh? what did you mean by that?!" Anna asked him while loosing her cool due to the annoyance Karl's timidity gave her.

Suddenly the atmosphere around Karl changed, he was flustered and blushing but he's expression suddenly changed and he seem to be serious, Anna noticed it immediately.

'Huh...what happened to him?' Anna thought.

Karl's eyes seemed fixed on somewhere else, Anna turned her back to see but she could not find anything noteworthy.

"What is -"

"Move" Karl said before she could complete her sentence.

She couldn't deny the firmness in his speech that made her want to urgently obey but she was a stubborn on.

"Hey!! you can't just cut in when I'm- "

~whoosh~

Karl swung her backwards and immediately...

~Banggg~

...the sound of a gunshot followed.

Karl had put his hand in front to block which caused blood to splash out of it.

"...the bullet entered before I was able enhance my qi on my hand...tricky, the bullet was faster than the sound" Karl said to himself.

"Hey?!! you are injured!! a gun shot!! I'll call the police right now!" Anna brought out her phone as her hand shivered she tried to dial the emergency number but the phone fell off her hand, Karl began to run towards the direction the gun shot came from.

"Hey!! wait for the police!!" She said but she quickly got up and began to run after him.

~banggg~

Karl jumped sideways to dodge but the bullet still entered his shoulder, he dropped on one knee.

"This is indeed tricky, the bullet is faster than the gunshot, it seems the enemy has found me quite a formidable opponent, hm hm, I see... does he want to play from that distance."

Karl put his hand together and a blue ball began to form, after some seconds he shot it towards the building the gunshot came from.

~boooomm~

The building exploded.

'...I thought that bastard said he was not an Esper...how is he able to shoot blue explosives from his hand' Senan thought as he stood up and picked the ranged rifle he was using, he walked deeper into the ruined building, "I have to observe him further"

"Hey!! I just saw you shoot out that thing from your hand, there's no way?! you are an esper!"

"No... I'm not but more importantly why are you here kid, don't you know this is a danger zone!" Karl said to her.

"I couldn't just watch someone in front of me get hurt" she said.

"Hmmm, I see... so what is your ability?" Karl asked her.

"Uh?" she looked at Karl with a clueless look on her face, "me? I'm not an Esper?"

"..." Karl looked at her back, "...what did you come to do here?" Karl asked her.

"Let's find somewhere to call the police!" She grabbed Karl's hand and began to run.

'...this clueless kid, she's trying to save me even though she does not know me! is this what they call love at first sight like we watch in movies, heiiishh, in my wildest drea- '

~bang~

Anna fell on the floor and Karl was awakened from his thoughts, her leg had been shot and she was screaming hard.

"dammit!!" Karl said, he bent down and dipped two fingers into Anna's wound, she screamed and grabbed his ear, as he pulled out the bullet, he tore the arm of his uniform and tied the wound.

"Don't move recklessly and just stay still" he said and ran off. 'first I'll move away from her as far as possible to prevent this from happening again'

"Hmm, trying to not let me kill her, well if I planned to kill her, I would've shot her in the head, but his reaction to emergency is excellent, I find it hard to believe that a kid like me will deep his hands into an open wound like that and remove a bullet. Well I'm different since I grew up in quite an harsh environment." Senan turned the riffle and continued to monitor as Karl ran.

"What exactly is this guy doing." Senan wondered, "running in an open air when facing a sniper, is he dumb?, if he's an esper shouldn't he know that he should be running in between buildings and shouldn't he have been able to tell my location since, a novice huh?"

~banggg~

Next it was Karl's leg that the bullet pierced, Karl sat on the floor not caring about the wound he just got and began to rub his hand on chin. His level of endurance was not ordinary, even though the injury hurt physically, his mentality was as old as a thousand year if not atleast a forty years old.

"hm hm, I see. Seems it is happening as I feared" Karl closed his eyes there on his seat.

It wasn't that Karl was not confident in his power, but in the fact that his power couldn't neutralize all Esper's ability. Karl was used to bare fighting, even though qi was utilized it was only an extension or an enhancement or at most sword qi, it was all to create diverse attacks or to create extra powerful counters, they were no tricky situation involved or strategies involved in qi manipulation or martial art, it was a simple rule; the strongest wins. But Karl since he reached this world has seen different abilities and how they work and he feared deep down that what if his qi could do nothing about one of these abilities, his fear was right afterall.

He closed his eyes, 'direct all sensory energies to one point'

~clikk~

'found you!'

~banggg~

The sound of the gunshot followed immediately Karl finally enhanced his hearing and heard then trigger sound.

"Whaaaa! he dodged" Senan exclaimed with surprise.

Karl moved immediately he heard the click, since he knew the bullet was faster than the gunshot.

"Hmm, I was able to dodge but it can't always be like that, especially when I'll be running, but thanks to my hearing I've figured out where he is hiding" Karl said as he crouched and sped off at a terrifying speed.