LETHAL EXTRACTION

You're Very late Vance

The two remaining syndicate enforcers did not wait to see if Vance was bluffing. Panic quickly replaced their brutal street conditioning. The taller man pulled a heavy caliber pistol from his soaked leather jacket. The shorter thug lunged forward with a sharp switchblade gleaming dangerously under the dim street lamp.

Vance saw them move, but everything felt completely different. Before the System awakened, their movements would have been a terrifying blur of lethal speed. Now his newly enhanced perception processed every subtle shift of their weight and every tiny muscle twitch with perfect clarity. The raw strength coursing fiercely through his veins demanded an immediate release.

He did not take a single step back in fear. He stepped directly into their space.

The tall thug violently raised the heavy black gun, aiming right for center mass. Vance shifted his weight, pivoting on his back foot with a deadly grace he had never possessed before. He closed the short distance before the man could even pull the heavy trigger. Vance grabbed the wrist holding the gun and squeezed with all his new might.

The wet crunch of breaking bone echoed loudly in the dark alley. The thug screamed in agony, dropping the weapon as his wrist was crushed into an unnatural angle. Vance did not hesitate for a single second. He used the forward momentum to pull the injured man closer, driving a brutal knee straight into his stomach. The enforcer folded completely in half, gasping for air that would not come, and collapsed face first into the muddy puddles.

The third thug with the switchblade hesitated for a fraction of a second. His dark eyes went wide with pure horror as he watched his brutal partner dismantled in mere moments. That tiny hesitation was his final fatal mistake.

Vance spun around, letting his body act entirely on the borrowed instincts of the street brawling skill he had just extracted. He ducked smoothly under a wild slash of the sharp blade. Coming up close and stepping directly into the guard of the man, Vance delivered a devastating upward punch perfectly aimed at the jaw. The massive impact lifted the man completely off his feet. He hit the concrete pavement with a sickening thud and did not move again.

A heavy, suffocating silence descended on the narrow alleyway once more. The quiet was broken only by the relentless heavy rain splashing against the garbage bins and the flooded asphalt.

Vance stood perfectly still in the downpour. His chest heaved up and down as he stared intensely at his own two hands. They were covered in thick mud and dark blood, but for the very first time in years, they were no longer shaking. He was always the victim meant to be crushed by the strong. That era was permanently over.

The glowing blue interface flickered brightly back into existence, projecting a harsh artificial light against the wet brick walls.

[Multiple Hostile Targets Neutralized. Initiating Secondary Extraction Protocol.]

Two streams of bright blue energy erupted from the unconscious bodies of the remaining enforcers. The glowing light flowed directly into the chest of Vance, filling him with an intoxicating warmth that pushed away the biting cold of the winter storm.

[Extracting Target: Low Tier Enforcer. Extracting Attribute: Enhanced Agility. Extracting Skill: Knife Combat Proficiency.]

[Extracting Target: Low Tier Thug. Extracting Attribute: Minor Stamina Boost.]

Vance gasped loudly as his muscles twitched and tightened all over his body. He felt incredibly light on his feet. The heavy sluggishness that usually plagued his undernourished body vanished entirely. A sudden flood of lethal knife fighting techniques, complex grip variations, and vital point targeting downloaded directly into his brain. It was overwhelming, terrifying, and absolutely magnificent.

He closed his eyes and breathed in the damp city air. He was a predator now. The System had turned him into something that grew stronger by consuming the weak.

A new notification chimed in his mind, sharp and urgent. The floating text shifted from a cool blue to a dangerous glaring crimson red.

[Warning. Host Energy Reserves Unstable. System Maintenance Requires Continuous Power.]

[Main Quest Initialized: The Price of Power.]

[Objective: Eliminate the local syndicate boss Marco and clear the outstanding debt. Failure to comply will result in the System extracting the life force of the Host to sustain operation.]

[Time Remaining: Forty eight hours.]

Vance opened his eyes, the harsh reality of his situation settling over him like a heavy lead blanket. The System had saved his life, but it was not a charity. It was a parasite that demanded a constant feed of power and violence. If he stopped hunting, the very thing that saved him would eat him alive from the inside out. He had two days to kill a man protected by an army of elite fighters.

He looked down at the three unconscious men bleeding in the rain. A dark part of him wanted to finish them off completely, but the loud wail of distant police sirens echoed through the towering concrete canyons of Veridian City. The noise was getting closer.

Vance knelt down and searched the pockets of the scarred thug, pulling out a thick wad of damp cash. He tucked the stolen money into his torn pants and picked up the dropped switchblade. He twirled the weapon effortlessly in his fingers thanks to his new combat proficiency, then tucked the blade safely into his waistband.

Pulling up the hood of his soaked jacket, Vance turned his back on the alley and walked out into the neon soaked streets. He moved with a new dangerous purpose, blending seamlessly into the late night foot traffic.

His destination was his tiny rundown apartment on the absolute edge of the industrial district. He needed to change out of his blood soaked clothes and plan a suicidal assault on the underground arena of Marco.

The cold walk took thirty minutes. The towering rusted apartment complex looked like a rotting tooth against the dark city skyline, a grim reminder of his utter poverty. The hallway lights flickered erratically, casting long unsettling shadows across the peeling yellow wallpaper.

Vance climbed the concrete stairs to the fourth floor. He reached into his deep pocket for his house keys, approaching his door at the very end of the narrow corridor.

He stopped dead in his tracks.

His apartment door, which he always locked with three heavy deadbolts, was slightly ajar. The solid metal frame around the handle was completely mangled, bent inward by an immense unnatural force. Someone had not picked the lock. They had casually crushed it with their bare hands.

Vance held his breath, his right hand instinctively gripping the handle of the switchblade hidden under his jacket. He pushed the broken door open the rest of the way with the tip of his wet boot.

Sitting calmly in the only chair in the center of his dark cramped living room was a towering figure wrapped in an immaculate tailored suit. The strange man was slowly polishing a long gleaming silver sword in the shadows.

"You are very late, Vance," the man whispered softly in the dark.