Stanley stopped for the briefest moment, confused as to what had just happened. He tried to make sure that the time was in fact slowed down, but his power to tell the rate of time said that it was.

It was so clearly slowed down, which just begged the question. How did the young man in front of him just block his attack?

The young man pulled back his spear and thrust it forward at a speed that was simply abnormal for someone in slowed time.

5 illusory spears appeared from the red spear, each of which flew toward Stanley.

Stanley quickly hit the side of his sword, activating the sword’s internal machines that made it a plasma sword.

Even as the plasma covered the entire sword, he was already swinging at the incoming illusory spears.

Stanley didn’t understand what was happening exactly. He couldn’t tell what those 5 holographic spears were and how the young man was moving so fast in slowed time.

He moved to the side and struck two of the spears that would’ve hit him, destroying them while the rest flew past him and into the wall behind him.

The destroyed holographic spears still somehow and enough force to make Stanley’s hands grow numb. His chest grew heavy as he hadn’t breathed in quite some time.

He stared at the young man who was looking at him with curious eyes as well.

Stanley slowly let go of the slowed time to take a few breaths.

The young man looked at him and did nothing at all. To him, nothing had really changed at all. However, in what felt like a second later, he noticed something odd about everything.

The speed at which things moved wasn’t... normal.

Stanley attacked before the young man could realize any further and swung at him.

He had made the young man’s perception of time slow down while he used the time to take his breath, and now he needed to attack while he was still under that very perception.

Stanley moved at a speed that was simply imperceptible to the young man’s current perception. When the sword arrived on his neck, the young man was still looking at where Stanley stood just moments prior.

The burning sword landed on the young man’s neck and delivered an impact that threw the young man into the ground.

The young man’s crashed through the floor and fell 2 floors down before he stopped.

Stanley looked down and saw the young man in a pile of broken floors. ’My sword didn’t go through,’ he was surprised. ’How did he withstand my attack?’

That wasn’t the only weird thing here. The young man had also kept up with his speed previously. That was quite weird.

Not to mention the 5 holographic spears that held quite the strength themselves.

’Is he a Nova too?’ Stanley thought.

"Why haven’t you left yet?" Sheila’s voice came through the earpiece.

"I don’t think I can," Stanley said, looking at the rubble that moved below him. "A very annoying opponent just showed up."

The young blond-haired man stood from within the rubble and cracked his head. He moved his hand to the side and the red spear flew into his hand.

Then, in a single leap, he arrived back on the floor Stanley was in through the hole that was created.

The young man grinned and look at Alex. "In the 20 years since I was born, I have never found someone that landed such a hit on me," he said. "You are the only one that has put up enough of a fight to be troublesome. Congratulations."

Stanley frowned. "Who are you?" he asked. "I don’t think I saw your name."

"Me? My name is Max," the young man said. "What’s your name?"

"My name..." Stanley paused. He couldn’t give out his name as he wished. "I can’t tell you."

"Is that so?" Max smiled and pointed his spear at Stanley. "Then you’ll die without a name. Let’s go."

Stanley saw the young man strike him with his spear. He tried to move to the side but the vision kept on changing. No matter what he did, the young man would follow and his attack would land on him.

Stanley put his sword in between and was slammed so hard that he went through the wall behind him, freely falling through the air outside of the building.

He landed on the roof of a smaller building that was to the side and quickly rolled before standing up.

Max landed right in front of him and swing his spear at him.

Stanley blocked the attack with his sword again and realized that the attack was way too strong for him to just block.

He was sent flying through the air, slamming into a building in the distance before stopping. He was stuck to the building, with his sword still in his hand.

He quickly pulled himself out of the wall and slowed down time to run down the side of the building before landing with so much force that it left a crater and a few cracks on the floor.

"Urgh!" he cried out in pain. His back hurt from being tossed around like that and his hands were numb from the force they were blocking. His left arm might have been broken too. It was hard to say right now because of all the adrenaline in his body.

He quickly looked around, searching for a red-clothed person, but searching for a particular red in a city during the evening was simply impossible.

’Screw this, I need to get out of here,’ he thought. He had done the work he had come to do, so his priority would be running away.

He turned around and ran in a direction without waiting for the young man to show up. His speed left cracks on the sidewalk, as well as a strong gust of air as he ran through the evening streets.

Some police cars tried to follow him because of the disturbance, but he was simply too fast.

Sheila was saying something in his ears, but with the slowed time, it was hard for him to hear what she was saying. Each second lasted as long as a minute, and that made it hard to understand any of them at all.

He removed the slowed time multiple times during his run to breathe, but other than that, he only stopped it once he was outside of the city and in the forest that surrounded it.

He finally stopped and sat next to a tree, huffing because of how far he had run. He kept alert, but it didn’t look like the young man had followed him at all.

He was thankful for that.

"Why aren’t you answering me?" Sheila’s voice came through. "Can you not hear me?"

"Sorry, had to run," Stanley said. "What were you asking?"

"What is happening? I see that you’re outside of the city. Is that right?" she asked.

"Yes," Stanley said, continuing to huff as he was out of breath. "Someone showed up, and I had to run."

"Who?" Sheila asked.

"Someone strong," Stanley said. "Too strong. I think he was a No—"

"There you are!"

Max arrived next to Stanley who quickly turned around and got ready to fight. Only, this time around, Max had an 8-year-old girl on his arm.

Stanley quickly got up and pointed his sword forward. He tried to hold it with both his hands, and that made it obvious that his left arm was most definitely broken somewhere, and it didn’t look like Varinox was going to be of much help for it.

"You didn’t think you could get away with kidnapping my little sister, did you?" the young man asked.

Stanley frowned. "What?" he asked. "I didn’t kidnap anyone."

"Tsk, tsk, tsk," the young man shook his head. "You gang members lie so easily. Have some self-respect, some dignity."

"I’m not a member of the gang," Stanley said. "Aren’t you the gang member here?"

"Gang member? Me?" Max frowned. "Why would I be a part of your stupid gang?"

"I’m not a member of the gang," Stanley said.

"Why are you lying?" Max asked. "Meera, is this one of the bad people?"

The little girl looked at Stanley. "No," she said. "I’ve never seen him before."

"Huh?" Max frowned. "He’s not from the Gang?"

The little girl shook her head.

Max turned to look at Stanley. "Are you really not from the Hunters gang?" he asked.

"No!" Stanley said. He was surprised to see that the young man wasn’t either.

"Then why were you at their place?" he asked.

"I was killing them," Stanley said.

Max’s mouth widened. "Oh! So that’s why there were so many corpses. I thought you guys had some internal conflict," he said. "If not the Hunters member, then who are you?"

Stanley frowned. He couldn’t answer that.

"Stanley! What’s going on? Speak to me," Sheila spoke.

"Stanley, huh? Is that your name?" Max asked. "Let’s see what else I can find about y—"

Stanley frowned. ’He can hear Sheila’s voice from where he is? What can’t this guy do?’

"Wait, that badge! It’s the AAA’s badge, isn’t it?" Max asked. "Does that mean you’re from the AAA?"

Stanley’s eyes narrowed. ’He knows about the AAA?’ he thought.

"Where’s your uniform?" the young man asked.

Stanley said nothing.

"Don’t be so worried," he said. "I’m a friend of the AAA. My sister works there."

Stanley still didn’t say anything.

"Well, since you’re not an enemy, then I have nothing to do with you, goodbye."

Max turned around and walked back into the city along with the young girl in his arm.

Stanley could do nothing but watch him leave, confused as to what had just happened.