In the distance, Sigmarus saw the men drag Grace out, followed by Merci. His face turned stone cold. His expression was completely placid, yet Mason felt an air of danger from it.

“I really didn’t want to hurt anyone who wasn’t too involved in this, but...” Mason said, trailing off and looking toward Sigmarus.

Sigmarus barely glanced his direction before dashing off with enough power in his step to crack a chunk of old asphalt beneath his foot. Mason raised a brow upon seeing that, and immediately dashed forward as well. His foot flashed in front of Sigmarus’ chest.

Sigmarus raised his arms to guard. The heavy kick slammed against his forearms, stopping his advance and forcing him to backpedal a few steps. He glared at Mason and said, “Don’t stop me.”

“Even my boss wouldn’t be able to reach them from here in time. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like we’ll be able to be friends.”

“Agreed.”

Sigmarus darted forward and thrust toward Mason’s chin with his fist. Mason retreated a few steps. Halting his own movements, Sigmarus felt the tingle of danger he had grown accustomed to during his spars with Shad. He looked around and noticed the other sixteen men surrounding him.

Mason sighed and said, “I didn’t want to do this but… Guys, break his legs and throw him in the sewer. I’ll go try to stop those guys.”

A cacophony of acknowledgment echoed around him. Sigmarus’ eyes narrowed. None of the sixteen looked particularly strong, but numbers were numbers. His cold gray eyes landed on each of the sixteen men one by one before landing on Mason who broke off into a sprint toward the three men who were dragging Grace and Merci in different directions.

This guy is faster than me… and the rest blocked my path really quickly. It doesn’t seem like this Mason guy wants them to get rid of Merci, which could go in my favor, Sigmarus thought. Then, he focused on the men charging in on him, raised his guard again, and thought, I never wanted to kill anyone again, but you guys are forcing my hand here. Sorry.

Circulating energy into his fist, he struck toward the chest of the nearest opponent. The opponent tried to guard, but widened his eyes when an intangible force smashed against his sternum and continued inward toward his heart. His face paled, and he stumbled backward. Blood trickled from his lips, and he fell to his knees with shallow breaths. A few of his cohorts raised their brows. Three who planned to tackle Sigmarus hesitated and changed to a more careful and coordinated assault of fists and feet.

Several punches and kicks landed on different parts of Sigmarus’ body. He only managed to fully avoid one and lessen the impact of another two. The rest hit hard, cracking against his skin. Shoulder blade. Upper arm. Lower back. Right hip. Left thigh. Right shin. Dull pain rumbled through his muscles and bones from the multiple impacts. He exchanged one attack for six in the blink of an eye. Even if he could feel the attacks coming with his perception, he couldn’t avoid them in this mess.

Damn. It hurts, Sigmarus briefly thought, his eye twitching from the pain.

Ignoring it, he pulled back his arm in time to guard his chin from someone’s quick jab. Another two kicks landed on his shins. Another punch smashed into his gut. His face paled slightly, but he stood his ground. He punched out again. The target dodged, but then the guy panicked and clutched his stomach before collapsing and coughing blood.

The rest of the Green Devil members furrowed their brows or widened their eyes at the sight. One of them who looked a bit older yelled, “Try not to get hit and knock him down fast!”

Fervor gradually burned within their eyes, and their attacks became more intense and frantic. Sigmarus struggled to stay on his feet since they kept kicking his knees and shins. Anytime one tried to tackle him, he focused all his effort on avoiding it. He tried to weave around the attacks as much as possible, but moving in a crowd proved difficult. Sweat trickled from his brows. His heart pounded in his chest hard enough to sound like thunder in his ears. He threw sharp jabs laden with origin energy several times, quickly knocking down another seven men within half a minute. Weariness started to wear him down. His steps dragged. His breathing turned rough and ragged.

Don’t fall. Focus.

He tried to utilize his energy the same way as he had at the beginning, but it wasn’t moving properly anymore. Exhaustion made it feel like cold molasses. He punched once more. The man buckled over and retreated a few steps to catch his breath. Again, the others fervently kicked his shins and knees during the exchange. He focused enough to punch the same man in the gut again. This time, the guy fell over and coughed blood.

“He’s weak! Knock him down!” The same guy roared upon noticing that Sigmarus needed more than one hit to knock them down now. He charged in again alongside his fellows with renewed vigor.

Finally taking Sigmarus off guard, the man charged and dove toward his legs. Sigmarus barely moved one foot back to brace himself. The man wrapped his arms around Sigmarus’ upper legs and tried to tackle him down. The impact shifted his weight, but he didn’t fall. He dropped a freedom palm-imbued elbow on the man’s back three times before feeling warm liquid splattering on his pants. However, two more guys tackled him, finally knocking him to the ground.

The two guys wrapped around his legs and pulled sideways with all their might. Sigmarus tried to resist with every muscle in his legs while throwing more punches with the small amount of origin energy he could still muster. Moments later, a crack echoed around. Then another.

“AAAAARGHAAHHH!” Sigmarus yelled as both his legs snapped at the knee. He ground his teeth. His face reddened from both pain and anger. He threw several more desperate punches until the two who broke his legs fell unconscious with blood trickling from their mouths. The remaining four tackled onto him to restrain his arms. He grit his teeth and sucked in a sharp breath. The pain quickly worsened despite the adrenaline.

Fuck… I was too worn out to resist it. Been a while since I broke a bone. Forgot how bad it fucking hurts!

“Goddamn monster! Where did those damn weeds find this guy! He’s almost as bad as that weasel!” One of them exclaimed while holding him down.

“Doesn’t… matter, cough,” The more experienced man said, rolling onto his back. “Just go throw him in the sewer.”

“But… shouldn’t we just kill him here?”

“Cough. Mason said throw in the sewer. You know what he’s like. Just do it.”

The four nodded and pulled Sigmarus over the rubble of Shingle Alley toward the hole. Broken stone, brick, cement, and other debris scraped his legs and stomach. He chuckled to himself, sending a shiver down the spines of the four Green Devil members.

Guess I’m still me, huh. Still not free. I’ve got a long way to go.

Moments later, he heard a gasp, followed by the sound of his name. The blood thumping in his ears somewhat drowned out the sound, but he still looked sideways to see Grace with a stunned and frightened expression.

“Oh, hi,” He said through grit teeth.

Grace struggled under the grip of the Green Devil members who were looking at Sigmarus with strange gazes as though they didn’t know whether or not to be happy or scared. Unfortunately for her, they kept a strong grip on her hair and arms.

“I’m fine, kid. Take care of yourself,” Sigmarus said with the strongest voice he could muster.

“No! They’re going to kill you!”

Grinning to himself, he thought, Heh. I doubt it. Agh! Damn, this hurts… Then, he glanced toward the hole and thought, Still, this is gonna suck. He sighed before looking back at Grace and said, “See ya later, kid.”

“Wait, no! Please! Stop! Not him too!”

I forgot how emotional kids can be, Sigmarus thought, not minding how hypocritical such a thought was when his own heart was pounding with a fervid anger. As Grace’s screams drifted into the distance, he sighed.

Before long, he saw an expected face looking down at him with a complicated gaze. Mason looked back and forth between Sigmarus and the group of men squirming on the ground in the distance. The man next to him, whose face was starting to swell with bruising from someone’s fists, also looked back and forth the same way, but with a totally fearful expression. After all, he was the young member who had yelled at Sigmarus earlier. Unfortunately, Sigmarus didn’t see Merci with them.

This guy wasn’t fast enough to stop these idiots.

Eyes narrowed, Mason muttered, “I must say, I didn’t expect so much damage...”

“I bet,” Sigmarus weakly mumbled before grunting due to the pain coursing through his broken legs.

“Should we just kill him, Mason?”

“No. Toss him in. Leave it to fate.”

“Seriously, why do you always do that for people outside the gangs? This is why people’ve been looking down on us these days.”

“Do it, or lose a finger,” Mason said in a cold voice.

“Ugh… got it.”

Sigmarus locked eyes with Mason as the men started dragging him down into the hole. There wasn’t any palpable hate or anything, but Sigmarus showed a clear distaste for the man as much as he could. The latter shrugged and turned around as though this was no longer any of his business. The young guy behind him who had initially been dragging Merci around followed Mason with drooped shoulders.

I'll see you bastards again later, Sigmarus thought.