CHAPTER 11: THE CROSSROADS CRASH

Damien took out his phone and picked up the call with a frown on his face.

"Hello?"

"Young Master!"

"White? Why are you using a ran-"

"I’ll explain later, please come here!" White interjected as he hurried Damien.

Damien raised an eyebrow and continued.

"Hmm? Why are you so worked up-"

"Miss A-Anieal... she was attacked."

"...."

Damien turned silent as he heard White’s words.

"What?" Damien asked with a shaky voice as his grip on the phone tightened.

"S-she got into an accident and a few Midnighters came to take her away, but... I don’t remember what happened afterwards," White answered impatiently as he tried to remember what had transpired.

"I’m on my way! Make sure to take care of Anna," Damien ordered as he hurriedly opened a portal and entered through it.

***

A few hours ago-

Anna and Hanna were returning to the Starborne mansion after meeting Zora and her mother. The bold sun had already hidden behind the blanket of darkness, and the shy moon was visible in all of its glory.

Suddenly, Hanna began to experience a severe headache, and her face turned into a grimace. Hanna parked the car at the crossroads beside a relatively safe spot and began massaging her head.

"What’s wrong?" Anna asked with a worried tone

"Just a headache," Hanna replied as she continued to rub her head with her thumb and index finger.

"Should I drive instead?" Anna asked with a calm voice

"No... I don’t want to die yet," Hanna replied and continued to rub her head as she closed her eyes

"Lemme just close my eyes for a few minutes, it will be fine soon," Hanna said in a reassuring tone

"Mhm.." Anna nodded and began to move her hand around the fur of Veylor

"Myu.." the cat called out with half-closed eyes. Soon, however, Veylor opened his eyes and began to look towards the road beside them before turning towards Anna.

Suddenly, a flash covered the car as a truck reached towards their car at a terrifying speed, its headlights blinding all the passengers sitting in the car, and

*Crash*

It crashed into the car’s rear door with terrifying force, causing it to roll over several times. At this point, both Hanna and Anna had lost their consciousness and had a few large and a lot of small wounds all over their body, and blood dripped out from them. But they were still alive.

The truck’s door opened, and four hooded figures emerged from it. All of them began moving towards the car; however, as they were about to reach the car, A bike came towards them at terrifying speed.

One of the hooded figures was unable to react at the time as the bike crashed into him, causing him to lose consciousness.

The remaining hooded figures looked towards the direction the bike came from, and there they saw a hooded figure with crimson eyes looking at them with clear hostility.

He had pistols in both of his hands. He pointed the muzzle of the pistols at them and began firing, much to his dismay; however, none of the bullets reached their intended target as the hooded figures dodged all of them.

One of the hooded figures began moving towards White with a speed above the levels of average humans and landed a punch to White’s chest, but he hadn’t anticipated what came next. White, an unawakened, was able to take his strike head-on and grabbed his head.

White then landed a knee to his face, followed by a punch to his lower abdomen. He grabbed his head and planted it on the ground with as much force as White could muster.

The hooded figure lay down beside his feet, blood dripping from his nose and lips, unconscious.

Seeing White take care of an Apex-Seeker rank Midnighter, while being an unawakened, left both of them stunned. Soon, however, they came out of their reverie as White was about to land a punch to the weaker one of them.

The hooded figure sidestepped and grabbed White’s arms, but just as he was about to punch him, White twisted his body at a weirdly inhumane angle and freed himself.

White stared at both of them with vigilant eyes as he got ready to take on whoever moved first, much to his dismay; however, both of them moved together and began to throw a barrage of punches and kicks.

Seeing the predicament he was in, He tried to make some distance between them, predicting his thoughts, the weaker of the two placed his hands on the ground-

[Earthen Wall]

-and created walls made up of mud, stone, etc, all around them efficiently foiling all of White’s plans to make distance

The exchange continued for a few more moments until the stronger of the two placed his palms together, and flames began to cover his forearm, and he punched the air. A deafening sound was produced from his punch, making White lose his balance

’So that’s the strength of a Midnighter... It’s fun.’ White thought as a grin appeared on his face.

Suddenly, White’s vision began to blur as a punch landed on his face, making him unconscious.

"He is one tough human, huh?" Said one of the hooded figures.

"Yeah... is he even supposed to be like that?" Said another one as he rubbed his still-aching arms

"Forget him.. Go and wake up those idiots." The strongest one ordered as he turned towards the car, which lay trashed due to the crash.

"Yes"

The hooded figure moved towards his unconscious teammates and kicked both of them

"Ugh.." "Ah..ae" Both of the unconscious figures stood up and looked towards White with a gaze full of hatred and hostility.

"Forget about him, remember we are here to take that Starborne girl," Said the strongest one as he began moving towards the car. The other three hooded figures followed behind him.

They moved towards the car as their eyes shone with a sharp glint.