Not So Bulletproof

The man in the beige suit looked down at me with cold eyes as he shot, aiming straight at my heart.

I dodged immediately. Or rather, attempted to dodge.

Somehow I managed to avoid a critical injury, but I was still hit in the chest.

For a split second, my mind went blank and I almost collapsed.

Things were not looking good.

I deflected the bullets that followed right after, although with some difficulty, and ran out of the staircase, hiding behind the wall.

There was no time for me to heal myself, but I needed to at least stop the bleeding. I pressed my hand against the wound and took a deep breath, trying to focus. The sharp pain in my chest made it difficult, but my location was currently well-known, so I only had a few seconds at best.

And I needed to close the wound straight away, unless I wanted to bleed out to death. I was not immortal after all.

As expected, they didn't give me any time to rest. The man in the beige suit materialized in front of me again.

He quickly looked around, and as soon as he spotted me, he pulled the trigger and shot at me.

However, I was also ready to act at any moment. Right when he appeared, I lifted my hand and collapsed the ceiling.

He teleported out, but not before being hit by a piece of falling rubble. Unfortunately, I also got hit. This time in my thigh.

There were still at least a few teams remaining in the building, making it difficult for me to move quickly if I wanted to go unnoticed. But I knew I couldn't just stay in place. That man was no joke.

I stretched out my arms and focused. Then, I caused a large portion of the building to collapse. All the falling rubble made a ton of deafening noise, providing a great cover for my movement. I quickly jumped down, finding a place to hide two floors below. I pressed my hand against my thigh, stopping the bleeding.

I needed to rethink my approach, especially considering the man in the beige suit.

I could probably defeat him one on one. He was rather strong, but still nowhere near my level. The biggest problem was his teleporting.

How was he even doing it anyway?

There was something I noticed about the trans-reality travel. Each time I was pulled out of one world and thrown into another, I landed in the same place. That is, the exact same coordinates on Earth. Based on that ping pong sniping incident, I assumed the same applied to the members of the organization.

Was the man not bound by this rule?

That might not necessarily be the case. After all, there was always at least a few second delay between his disappearance and reappearance. Approximately the time he would need to walk from one location to the other.

So, my theory was that this rule applied to him all the same. He simply teleported out of this world, moved to the place he needed to be next, and then teleported back.

If I was correct, this would be doable.

When a team spots me, they would likely send him a signal. Which meant, I just needed to get rid of them and move on before he was able to get there. I would leave dealing with him for another time.

I was seriously wounded. Although I avoided getting my heart or lungs pierced, a shot in the chest was no joke. On top of that, my leg was hurt as well. I was probably able to remain conscious only thanks to the adrenaline rush. My current priority was to escape and heal, only taking out anyone that was in my way.

It seems I might have underestimated them a bit. But how could I not, considering the sloppy job they've been doing so far?

I heard the crunching sound of stepping on debris nearby. I guess it was time to act.

If I counted correctly, I should be on the second floor. I should take out this team and then jump out of the window. There was a metro station just around the corner, I should easily make it there. My bloodied appearance might cause a commotion, but so what.

Making sure not to make any noise, I moved closer to get a look at the assailants.

They were slowly walking around, surveying the area, maintaining some distance between each other. That would make it harder for me to take both of them out.

I grabbed one of the two remaining knives I had and threw it at the guy further away from me. However, it seemed that my weakened state caused by my injuries significantly impaired my abilities. I missed. The knife only slashed his shoulder.

I immediately jumped out of hiding, grabbed the other guy, and cut his throat with my pocket knife before he had a chance to react.

The wounded guy started shooting at me, trying to press some buttons on his walkie-talkie at the same time. I ran straight at him, holding the dead guy in front of me as a meat shield.

I grabbed him by the throat and slammed him against the wall, stabbing his arm to make him let go of the gun.

My sight was getting slightly blurry. It was increasingly difficult for me to think clearly. I was running out of time.

The guy was so young, 15 years old at max. Not that I cared, but… Seriously, were they so lacking in manpower that they had to send off kids to fight?

Well, I was even younger when I started destroying the worlds, but that was a completely different matter.

A split second later, before I could even finish him off, I felt the familiar pull. The feeling of the trans-reality travel.

Fuck. That was definitely not good.

He was undoubtedly going to be teleported to whatever world they were all stationed in. Meaning there would be plenty of the organization members around. I wanted to go to their base eventually, but right now I was not in a good condition for that.

I let go of his neck and stabbed his walkie-talkie.

But it was too late.

The space contracted and sucked both of us out of this world.