I Possess the SSS Skill: Future Sight-Chapter 50: The Assassins

— Valesira’s POV —

I directed the wave of fire toward them.

But... the moment the flames touched them, their black armor glowed with a counter light.

They absorbed more than half of the fire’s power! The material of their armor was designed to reflect Eitra-based heat!

"What?!"

One of the assassins took advantage of my shock, slipped beneath the remaining wave of fire, and swung his broad blade with savage speed toward my abdomen.

I leapt back, but the white blade grazed my waist.

Slaaash!

The white coat and the silk shirt beneath it were torn apart, and I felt the blade’s heat slice through my skin, reaching the muscle layer on my left side.

A long, deep wound opened, and blood gushed out, soaking my black pants.

"Aaagh!" I groaned in real pain, dropping to one knee on the frozen, blood-stained asphalt.

[Are you kneeling?] the entity mocked inside my mind, its laughter growing more cruel. [Like an obedient maid! This is your true place! You are nothing without the power you borrow from me! You’re just an empty shell!]

"Shut your damn mouth!"

I slammed my good hand against the ground with force that nearly cracked the pavement.

The pain in my shoulder and waist was scattering my focus, and the spatial anchor prevented me from using my most lethal abilities.

I was forced to fight like a trapped animal.

The three assassins advanced to finish me, raising their blades to cut me into pieces.

The remaining two in the back prepared their rifles to ensure I wouldn’t escape.

I lifted my head, blood pouring from my waist and shoulder, mixing with the white snow.

My crimson eyes were no longer cold—they burned with pure sadistic madness.

"You want a dirty fight?" I whispered, hot tears from the pain of my wounds glistening in my eyes.

"I’ll give it to you."

I didn’t try to use fire or spatial rifts.

I focused every remaining drop of Eitra in my body on one thing only: "gravity."

And as the three blades descended toward my head to cleave it—

"Cruuush!"

I screamed at the top of my lungs and spread my arms violently as if tearing the air itself.

A spherical gravity wave, terrifyingly concentrated, erupted outward from my body.

It wasn’t a repulsion wave—it was a "burden" wave.

Within a ten-meter radius, gravity multiplied a hundredfold in a fraction of a millisecond!

The three assassins who were mid-air crashed down as if meteors had struck their backs.

Kraaaaaaash!

They slammed into the asphalt with overwhelming force.

Their heavy armor didn’t protect them from the internal pressure.

I heard their bones shatter, their tendons tear, and their organs rupture under their own weight, which had become equivalent to tons.

The asphalt itself caved in, forming a deep circular crater beneath me and them.

One of the assassins resisted the pressure, trying to lift his head, blood leaking from cracks in his helmet.

I crawled toward him, my face smeared with my blood and theirs.

I grabbed his helmet with both hands and injected gravity into my palms alone.

"Die!"

I pressed inward.

His helmet and skull were crushed together like rotten grapes. Brain matter and eyes splattered, sticking to my hands and my torn coat.

I lifted my head, panting.

Two remained.

The assassins who stood outside the range of the intensified gravity.

They realized close combat had failed.

They aimed their rifles at me, red light glowing in the barrels.

I didn’t have the energy for another gravity shield.

The wound in my waist was bleeding so heavily I felt dizzy.

[You’re going to die,] the entity whispered coldly. [And you’ll die a pathetic death.]

"Not today!"

I used my foot to kick one of the dead assassin’s swords into the air, and with a desperate acrobatic motion, I struck the blade with all my strength toward one of them.

The glowing sword flew like a comet and pierced straight through the fourth assassin’s neck, penetrating the armor at the weak point between the helmet and shoulder.

He collapsed, choking on his own blood.

The last assassin didn’t hesitate.

He pulled the trigger.

Bam!

The red bullet shot toward me.

I couldn’t fully evade it.

I twisted my body, but the bullet pierced my right side, grazing my ribs.

"Aaaaaaaaaaah!"

A real, completely human scream of pain tore from my throat.

I fell onto my back inside the crater, gasping, my vision blurring.

Three lethal wounds.

The bleeding was no longer drops—it pooled around me.

My white coat had turned completely red and black with blood and gore.

The last assassin—the massive one carrying the spatial grid control device on his waist—walked toward me slowly.

He knew I was finished.

He stood over me, pointing the barrel of his rifle directly at the center of my forehead.

"Target neutralized. Executing termination." he said in his mechanical voice.

I stared at the gun’s muzzle as snow fell onto my burned and torn face.

[Will you beg me now?] the entity whispered, ecstasy filling its voice. [Will you ask for my help? Say it. Say that you’re weak and pathetic, and I’ll tear him apart for you.]

"Go... to... hell..." I muttered weakly, blood seeping from my lips.

I would not beg. I would not ask for his power.

Even if it cost me my life.

The assassin raised his finger to pull the trigger.

And in that timeless moment...

I extended my blood-soaked left hand—and instead of attacking... I grabbed the burning-hot barrel of the rifle!

The flesh of my palm burned and sizzled, but I didn’t let go.

The assassin was stunned for a fraction of a second by this suicidal move.

Using my arm as a lever, and with every ounce of remaining raw strength and Eitra, I yanked the rifle downward violently, forcing the assassin to bend forward and lose his balance.

And with my right hand... where I gathered the last spark, the final drop of blue fire...

I drove my burning hand straight into the gap beneath his chest plate—where his abdomen was exposed!

"Buuuuurn!"

The searing blue fire didn’t erupt outward—it was injected directly inside his body!

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!"

The assassin’s scream tore through the frozen sky. The blue fire devoured his insides, boiling his blood and melting his organs.

His body convulsed violently on top of me, black smoke rising from the cracks of his armor, carrying the stench of cooked flesh.

He kept screaming until his vocal cords burned away, then his fully charred, heavy body collapsed over me like a dead tree.

I shoved his corpse off me with extreme difficulty.

I sat in the middle of the crater filled with gore, blood, and shattered asphalt.

With the death of the last assassin, the device attached to his waist broke.

Bzzzt... Crash!

The crimson spatial grid in the sky dissolved and vanished. Space returned to normal.

But the cost... was far too high.

I was gasping like a dying dog. My shoulder was torn, my waist split open, and my side burned.

The coat that had been a symbol of my elegance had turned into a filthy rag soaked with blood.

My entire body trembled from blood loss, shock, and Eitra exhaustion.

[You survived... barely,] the entity said in a disgusted, irritated tone, as if disappointed I hadn’t died. [But look at yourself. You’re pathetic. Just a bleeding prey.]

I ignored his cursed voice.

I braced my trembling hands against the frozen ground and forced myself to stand.

My knee nearly gave out, so I leaned against a nearby concrete wall.

I looked at the shattered and burned corpses around me.

This wasn’t a random attack.

Nor was it an attack from a rival guild.

These killers knew my combat style.

They knew I relied on spatial rifts—so they brought a spatial anchor.

They knew I used fire—so they wore armor resistant to Eitra-based heat.

I had been studied with surgical precision.

And who possesses the resources to create an assassination team with such terrifying cost and accuracy?

"The Volders..." I muttered, cold tears mixing with blood on my pale face.

They knew I was investigating Saint Hilarius Hospital. They knew Alpha Squad was close to uncovering the truth.

"They decided... to eliminate us before we reach them."

I coughed violently, drops of blood falling from my mouth onto the pristine white snow that had begun to fall again.

Time is running out.

If they sent this team after me... then what did they send after the rest of the squad? Damien? Eva? Sia? Kyle?

I have to go back. I have to gather them.

With great difficulty, I moved my left hand and opened a small, trembling purple spatial rift—unstable due to my weakened state—then threw my shattered body into it, leaving behind an alley filled with the stench of death and bloodstained snow.