"Ah!"
Jenna's scream tore through the courtyard.
Just a moment ago, the high ponytail athlete who always wore that cool, untouchable expression—the girl who walked through campus like she owned it, who looked down on everyone around her with barely concealed contempt—was now pale as a ghost, utterly terrified, trapped inside Liam's glowing energy dome.
Her palms slapped uselessly against the invisible barrier, the impacts making dull thumping sounds that echoed strangely in the fog. Panic twisted her voice into something high and desperate, unrecognizable from her usual measured tones.
"Liam! Liam, get me out of here! Please!"
The words came out as a sob, her composure completely shattered.
"Jenna!"
Liam's eyes went wide, his pupils dilating with shock and horror. His tough-guy bravado—all that confidence and swagger he'd been displaying just moments ago—shattered in an instant like glass under a hammer.
The girl everyone on campus called the track queen, his untouchable goddess, the woman he'd worshipped from afar for years, was suffocating in the very prison he'd created. The barrier he'd activated, the trap he'd set, had somehow captured the one person in the world he would never want to harm.
How? How did this happen? His mind raced, trying to reconstruct the last few seconds. She was behind me. She was safe. How did she end up—
He rushed forward, panic flooding his face, his hands already moving through the gestures to deactivate the shield. His fingers trembled so badly he almost fumbled the motion.
"Hold on—hold on, I'm turning it off!"
The shield flickered, its green glow pulsing erratically in response to his agitated state. Then it began to dissolve with a soft shhhk.
And then—
He froze.
Because when the dome vanished completely, when the last traces of glowing energy faded into nothing—Jenna was free.
But in midst of chaos.
"You didn't think about it, did you?"
Elric's voice drifted from right behind Liam, low and calm. Each word was measured, controlled, carrying a weight that made the air feel heavier.
"My ability doesn't just swap objects. I can swap people too."
The implications hit Liam like a freight train. His stomach dropped. His blood turned to ice.
No. No, that means—
Liam spun around, his body moving on pure instinct—
—but too late.
Far too late.
Shink!
The knife in Elric's hand—just an ordinary kitchen blade, nothing special, the kind you'd use to chop vegetables—sank straight into Liam's side, right between his ribs.
The feeling was strange. Not painful at first, just... pressure. Like someone had punched him, hard. Then came the burning sensation, spreading outward from the point of impact like fire through dry grass.
For a heartbeat, nobody moved. The entire courtyard seemed frozen in time.
Then blood started to spill down Liam's shirt, hot and bright red against the white fabric, spreading in a growing stain that looked almost black in the dim light filtered through the mist.
The Scream of Agony
"Ahhhh—!"
Liam's scream echoed through the empty campus, bouncing off dormitory walls and dissipating into the toxic fog beyond. It was a sound of pure agony, mixed with disbelief, as if his body and mind were both rejecting the reality of what had just happened.
I've been stabbed. I've actually been stabbed. The thought circled through his mind, surreal and impossible.
Elric didn't hesitate. There was no mercy in his eyes, no remorse, no second thoughts. His eyes were cold as winter ice, his hands steady despite having just driven a blade into another human being.
He yanked the blade free with a wet, sucking sound that made several of the watching students gag. Blood splattered across the concrete, dark droplets that seemed too bright.
Then he raised it again, his arm moving in a smooth arc, and swung.
Whack!
The blade sliced across Liam's arm with the sound of tearing meat. A finger flew off, tumbling through the air in what seemed like slow motion before bouncing once, twice, and rolling into the fog.
The smell of blood hit hard and metallic, coppery and overwhelming, mixed with something else—the scent of fear, perhaps, or the chemical tang of the toxic mist that surrounded them.
Elric had never killed anyone before. Not once. Not even close.
Before the apocalypse, he'd been a normal college student. He'd never been in a real fight beyond that one beating from his roommates. He'd never even hit anyone seriously, never drawn blood intentionally.
But this wasn't the old world anymore.
In this new one—if you didn't have the resolve to kill, if you hesitated when the moment came, if you showed mercy to those who would show you none—you didn't survive.
That was the lesson the apocalypse had taught him in just five days. That was the truth that everyone would eventually learn, whether they wanted to or not.
"Stop—stop, man, please—"
Liam gasped, clutching his bleeding hand, his severed finger leaving a trail of blood as his hand moved. His knees buckled, legs no longer able to support his weight.
But Elric didn't stop.
He stepped forward for another strike, the knife rising again, already calculating where to aim next—
—and then thud!
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