The air shifted.
Not wind.
Not pressure at first.
Something else—the way a room feels different when someone steps inside who doesn't belong to the same rules as everyone already there.
"Oh my god…"
A new voice cut through the chaos.
"I made it in time."
Pressure slammed down—absolute.
It wasn't violent.
It wasn't loud.
It was final.
Like the world itself had been reminded who owned the ground beneath our feet.
My lungs seized. Not crushed—held. Every breath stalled halfway, my ribs locked in place as if the air had thickened into glass. The rain hesitated mid-fall, droplets stuttering, catching light before finishing their descent a fraction too late.
And then—
Someone stood there.
Not rushing.
Not descending.
Not arriving.
She had simply claimed the space between moments.
It felt like the world had been forced to acknowledge her presence—like reality itself had stepped aside without being asked. The pressure wasn't aimed at us. It was imposed on everything equally, a reminder that whatever rules had governed this place until now were no longer in charge.
My vision swam as I tried to focus. Blood loss made the edges of the world pulse dark and red, but even through the distortion, I could tell—this wasn't another assassin.
"…Who are you?" I whispered.
Another enemy…?
She didn't look at me.
That was the first thing that scared me.
Her attention wasn't drawn by my sword, my eyes, the blood pooling beneath my knees.
Her gaze was fixed on Jacklin.
The way someone looks at a problem they've already solved once before.
"…I knew it," she said quietly.
Her voice wasn't loud, but it carried—clean and precise, cutting through rain and sirens alike.
"Same signature," she muttered. "Different mask."
I didn't know what that meant.
But the way Jacklin's fingers twitched—barely, involuntarily—told me she did.
Then the woman turned to me.
When she looked up, my breath caught.
Her eyes gleamed silver-blue—too clear, too still. Not reflective like glass, not sharp like steel.
They were calm in a way that only came from certainty.
The kind of certainty that didn't ask questions anymore.
"…Wow," she said dryly. "You really picked a good girlfriend."
Something in her tone twisted inside my chest—not judgment, not mockery.
Recognition.
A knife snapped through the rain.
Fast.
Precise.
Silent until it wasn't.
It came straight for her throat.
I tried to shout.
Nothing came out.
My body was too slow. My thoughts lagged behind the moment, dragged down by pain, blood loss, and the strange delay that had haunted me since the absence first tore me apart.
I could feel it again—that half-beat delay between intention and movement. Like my body existed a fraction of a second ahead of my awareness, and reality was struggling to keep up with both of us.
She didn't flinch.
Didn't tense.
Didn't even look surprised.
She stepped half a pace aside.
That was all.
The blade missed her throat by a breath and buried itself into the concrete behind her with a sharp, cracking thunk, sparks flaring briefly as steel met stone.
She didn't look at it.
Didn't need to.
She stepped forward.
The air bent.
Not warped—compressed.
Pressure rolled outward in a suffocating wave, heavy and undeniable, like the world itself had inhaled and forgotten how to breathe out. My ears rang as the ground vibrated beneath me, the sound of rain dulling, stretching, losing clarity.
Her scarlet hair clung to her face, darkened by rain, strands plastered to her cheek as she unsheathed her blade.
Not to threaten.
To warn.
The blade's presence wasn't aimed at Jacklin or the assassins—it was aimed at the space between them. A declaration, not an attack. Cross this line, and the world will end for you.
The difference was terrifying.
Jacklin, barely conscious, forced her eyes open.
I saw it.
Her lashes fluttered—slow, uneven.
Not in panic.
Not in pain.
Her gaze slipped past the scarlet-haired woman.
Past the blade.
And locked onto me.
For the briefest moment, her expression changed.
It wasn't the look of someone facing death. It was the look of someone realizing they had miscalculated something fundamental—and that it was already too late to correct it.
Not fear.
Relief.
The kind that hits when you see something familiar just before everything ends.
My chest tightened painfully.
Rain poured down her face, streaking across her eyes, blurring everything—but for a second, it looked like she was crying.
Then her jaw tightened.
Whatever had surfaced vanished.
Buried.
Understood.
Escaped.
The scarlet-haired woman moved.
One step.
The assassins froze.
Not because of fear.
Because their bodies refused to obey them.
I felt it ripple through the air—an invisible constraint snapping shut around muscle and nerve, locking joints mid-motion. Blades hovered inches from skin. Feet half-lifted never touched the ground.
She moved like someone who had done this hundreds of times.
And never failed.
Twice.
She didn't swing wide.
Didn't overextend.
Her blade moved in tight, efficient arcs, precise as punctuation.
Two assassins fell.
Clean.
Final.
No blood sprayed. No screams followed. Their bodies simply collapsed, strings cut, rain splashing softly around them as they hit the ground.
The rest broke.
Instinct took over where training failed.
They ran.
Not tactically.
Not coordinated.
They fled like animals realizing too late that the hunter had arrived.
Their retreat left a vacuum behind them—not silence, but the kind of quiet that follows certainty. The fight hadn't ended. It had been decided.
"Rule one," she said calmly, eyes never leaving me. "Never trust the one standing closest to you."
Her grip tightened slightly on her sword.
"Especially," she added, "when she smiles while holding a blade."
The hospital's emergency bay fell silent.
No rain thundered now—just a steady, hollow patter against concrete and steel. Sirens wailed somewhere distant, muffled, irrelevant. The smell of blood and ozone hung heavy in the air.
She turned fully toward me.
Her gaze moved to Renya—still clutched tight against my chest, small body trembling, breath shallow but steady.
Then to my wounds.
Then to the sword.
Her expression didn't change.
"…You're in bad shape," she said quietly.
I knew that already. My body had been screaming it for minutes. But hearing it said out loud made something inside me finally stop pretending.
My knees gave out.
The strength holding me upright vanished all at once, like someone had finally unplugged whatever was keeping me standing. Pain surged in a brutal wave—every cut, every tear, every broken signal screaming at once.
I tipped forward.
She caught me before I hit the ground.
Her arm was solid under my weight, steady in a way that made the world feel briefly anchored again. Renya clung tighter, his small fingers digging into my shirt as he whimpered softly.
As darkness crept in from the edges of my vision, I saw her raise a hand toward one of the fallen assassins.
Fog-like strands peeled from the body.
Thin.
Curling.
Almost delicate.
They weren't blood.
They weren't breath.
They looked like something else—something that shouldn't have been visible at all.
They flowed into her palm like smoke drawn into a vacuum.
The air around her hand dimmed slightly, like light itself was being thinned out. Whatever she was taking wasn't meant to be seen—only the absence it left behind.
She absorbed them without effort, without ceremony.
For a second, her silver-blue eyes flickered.
Deeper.
Storm-like grey churned beneath the surface, then settled.
I didn't understand.
I didn't have the strength to ask.
My eyes burned.
My body went cold.
The world narrowed to fragments—rain, breath, warmth—each slipping away one by one. Sound dulled first. Then weight. Then even the idea of pain let go of me.
The last thing I felt—
Renya still breathing.
Warm.
Alive.
Then—
Nothing.
Silence.
✦ END OF CHAPTER 15 — THE SAVIOR ✦