Fighting along the sides of the buildings gave her an advantage.

She could sprint across walls and change angles smoothly while Francis had to dig his claws into the concrete and pull his heavier body upward.

It slowed him significantly, cutting down the terrifying speed that normally made escape impossible.

The worst part was that the military personnel who had stayed back until now finally opened fire at his rear, turning the chase more complicated.

No amount of trajectory reading could help when he was being treated like a target at a shooting range.

He could only utilize Parashift and Kinetic Dampening to minimize the damage and harden his back, which in turn consumed even more energy.

[Energy: 23/70]

Francis dragged himself over a ledge and onto a narrow platform running along the sixth floor. He looked up and watched her cross to the next building.

’I was trying not to reveal too much yet, but dealing with her is a pain.’

The original plan was to show only small parts of his power so they would be less prepared in the future.

Unfortunately, not everything went according to plan.

The Defense Force agents, were obviously far more experienced in fighting monsters than the individuals he killed from Dark Chain.

Francis’s expression turned darker.

’I need to end this.’

Done being careful.

He drove both arms into the concrete and launched himself upward.

Each grab tore chunks from the wall. Each push sent him rocketing past windows.

The soldiers below lost their firing efficiency almost immediately, their rounds sparking off one empty walls after another.

She heard him accelerating and glanced back.

He was already closer than he should have been.

She pushed harder, vaulting a drainage pipe, angling toward the next rooftop gap.

Then he stopped and opened his maw.

She noticed the silence a half-second too late.

"RAWWWWR!"

She dismissed it as the cry of a cornered beast, just another intimidation tactic meant to shake her focus.

That mistake cost her everything.

An invisible force struck her mid-step, dead center in the stomach. Her balance was pushed too far forward to recover.

"No!"

The world snapped sideways, and she started falling fast.

Francis’s big mouth was already below, waiting to catch her.

CRACK!

Only half of her body hit the ground.

For a few seconds, the spectators couldn’t process what they had just seen.

"What are you doing? Fire at it!" the gauntlet user roared in frustration.

BOOM!

The first RPG round detonated against the fifth floor. Then the second.

A tank round followed, and the entire facade of the floor was swallowed in a wave of fire and pulverized concrete.

Francis headed deeper into the building, stood by the fire, and looked down at the smoke-filled street.

The whole block was now blocked off, and helicopters continued circling overhead.

[Energy: 15/70]

’Tsk.’

He wanted to continue the hunt, but the drain on his energy was already approaching a dangerous threshold.

More liver was meaningless if it got him cornered.

If another high-level agent arrived now, escaping alive would become far from guaranteed.

Using the thick smoke as cover, he retreated deeper into the building instead.

He slipped into a random room and allowed his monster form to recede, his distorted bones gradually shrinking back into human form.

After a brief search, he found a fresh set of clothes and changed quickly, the last traces of his beast appearance disappearing soon after.

He stepped out into the street without hesitation.

The road was already breaking apart—sirens, shouting, the distant thunder of collapsing concrete.

Francis didn’t stand out. He became part of it.

He forced his breathing to match the others around him.

Quick. Shallow. Human. His shoulders tightened, his steps unsteady, his eyes darting like every other civilian trying to understand what was happening.

To anyone watching, he wasn’t a hunter retreating.

He was just another terrified survivor.

"Move! Move!" a military personnel member shouted, not even looking at him properly.

And that was the opening.

He slipped through the gap in their formation like he belonged there, brushing past armored shoulders.

Behind him, the smoke sealed the street like a closing door.

Roughly 15 minutes later, the city looked normal again.

Few people stood outside, watching the smoke rise like it was happening somewhere else entirely. That distance made everything feel safer than it really was.

Francis adjusted his pace to match them.

No rush. No tension.

Just another body in the flow of movement.

He crossed two more intersections, then slipped into a narrower street where the crowd thinned out.

Here, the noise from the battlefield became a background hum.

With time to spare, he began checking his haul so far.

For normal humans, he had obtained 145 livers, which was not bad at all.

The blade user gave him 160 points, which meant he was relatively strong, but he was killed due to carelessness. Among the agents there, he was the most pathetic.

As for his innate talent, it was actually Kinetic Calibration, but at such a high level that it upgraded his existing ability by several tiers.

[Force Calibration IV]

Reading it gave him better control, meaning he could perform more aerial maneuvers in the future. Not bad at all.

But it wasn’t that good either. It lacked the game-changing impact of Momentum Breaker and Instant Drive.

The second was the whip user. She gave him 90 points, and as he had already anticipated, it was only Reinforced Spring Joints.

Lastly, the one he was most interested in—the shooter. She gave him a whopping 190 points, and her innate talent didn’t disappoint.

[Anchor Shift: A skill that lets the user lock their feet to any surface by redirecting force into the ground. While standing still, it anchors their body so much that they can resist up to 10,000 pounds of pushing or pulling force without being moved.]

With this, he didn’t need to overpower enemies.

He just needed to refuse to move.

In practice, it opened up brutal, almost unfair applications.

A charging opponent? He could take the hit head-on, plant his feet, and let their momentum break against him instead of being thrown back.

Even heavier enemies would feel like they were trying to push a mountain that didn’t acknowledge them.

In close combat, it turned his stance into a trap.

If someone committed fully into a strike—kick, tackle, charge—he could absorb it without displacement, then counter immediately without ever losing positioning.

No recoil, no stumble, no reset.

But the most dangerous application wasn’t defense.

It was control.

The same way she used her movement, treating walls, debris, and broken terrain as if they were flat ground, Anchor Shift extended that principle further.

It didn’t matter what angle he moved across.

It didn’t matter if the surface was vertical, fractured, or unstable.

To him, it was all the same now.

Ground.

’Yeah... killing her was worth it.’

Eventually, the streets became quieter, but just as he thought he was clear, he heard footsteps following him in an alley.

He quickened his pace until he reached a dead end.

Slowly, he turned around and saw three people wearing either hoodies or caps.

They were clearly trying to hide their appearance since most of them wore dark gray, unassuming jackets.

But Francis didn’t look at appearances.

He listened.

Their heartbeats didn’t match the normal rhythm of a human or even the special categories.

No—it was something far more controlled, to the point that if they weren’t standing right in front of him, he would think they were corpses.

"W... Why are you following me?" he asked, deliberately making his voice stutter.

The man in the black cap stepped forward and tilted his head, revealing brown hair and matching eyes. He had a handsome face that fit his tall frame—easily around 6’4

"You don’t have to pretend. We know you’re responsible for that commotion earlier."

Francis dropped the act instantly.

"So, you’ve been following me. How?"

"It’s a trade secret," the man said evenly. "But don’t worry. We’re not your enemies."

A brief pause followed.

Then he spoke again.

"My name is Nathan. I’ve come here to formally extend an invitation... to our organization."

"Organization?" Francis repeated. His mind was already calculating escape routes that would cost the least of his already depleted energy.

"Please, no need for things to escalate," Nathan said. His eyes flared—glowing orange.

His right arms followed.

Skin darkened, twisting as muscle and bone reconfigured beneath the surface. His shoulders bulged upward with a sickening shift, joints realigning with a crack.

By the time the transformation settled, his right arm was no longer human. It was beastlike, reinforced, built for tearing rather than restraint.

"See," Nathan waved it as if to demonstrate. "We’re the same. We can turn into beasts too."

Francis didn’t relax.

If anything, he became more guarded.

His eyes narrowed slightly as he studied the transformed limbs, not with surprise—but with reassessment.

’Who are these people? And why can they transform like me?’