Chapter3

I stepped out of the air-raid shelter through the shattered concrete and headed west along the burning street. Thick smoke from the overpass obscured the sunlight, turning midday into dusk. Cars on both sides of the road were overturned, some with open doors, some with shattered windows, and one black SUV had half a body stuck inside.

On the access road, more than a dozen figures emerged from behind abandoned vehicles.

They arrived faster than I expected. Or perhaps they were just lucky and happened to bump into me while wandering around the area.

Elena pushed her way forward. Her face still bore the arrogance of her past life; her chin was slightly raised, and she scanned me from head to toe, checking for any missing limbs. Seeing that I was unharmed, the muscles around her eyes twitched noticeably.

"You're despicable!" Her finger trembled as she pointed at my nose. "You stole our abilities while we were reborn! Give us back my fire element and his wind element!"

I stopped, my gaze sweeping over her dust-covered face. There was a fresh scratch on her forehead, and a tear in her left sleeve revealed a bluish bruise on her forearm. She looked utterly disheveled, but she seemed oblivious, still holding her head high, maintaining that "chosen one" posture.

David squeezed through the crowd, his right hand gripping a machete, the blade pointed directly at my chest.

“In your past life, you were just a piece of trash we protected.” He licked his chapped lips. “Hand over your powers now. Out of respect for the past, I might spare your life. Otherwise—” He brandished his knife, “You know what I’m capable of.”

The thugs behind David weighed the iron bars in their hands. Nine people, including Elena and David, made eleven. Four were armed, the other five carrying dismantled metal pipes and wooden planks. They surrounded them from three sides.

I stood there, looking at the couple who were so determined to make their vows, as if I were looking at two uncivilized barbarians.

They actually believed those powers "belonged to them." They stood there aggressively demanding I return them, like two children throwing a tantrum at their neighbor after losing their toys.

"Your special abilities?"

Before the words were even finished, a crackling sound of thunder exploded at his fingertips. Purple arcs of electricity spiraled up his arms, from his fingers to his wrists, from his forearms to his shoulders, like two purple snakes coiling around his bones. The air distorted from the intense heat, and the asphalt beneath his feet cracked.

Crimson flames shot skyward. The flames enveloped his right arm, leaping upwards and exploding into a ring of fire above his head. On his left arm, dark blue frost condensed into scale-like armor. Around him, cyan wind blades spun, cutting through the air.

Wind, ice, earth, wood, and light. Seven rays of light bloom simultaneously in this one second.

The oppressive force transformed into an invisible, gigantic wave, crashing down upon the area ahead. The air was gripped and compressed by a giant hand, emitting a muffled thud as if it could not withstand the pressure. The bridge trembled, the streetlights swayed, and the alarms of vehicles on both sides were triggered by the blast, screaming in unison.

The thugs in the front row buckled at the knees and slammed heavily to the ground. The iron bar slipped from their grasp and rolled a considerable distance with a clatter. One of them tried to brace himself, but his hand was crushed the moment it touched the asphalt, the bones cracking.

David's machete slipped from his hand and fell to the ground. His wrist bent as if gripped by an iron clamp, and he bent over at the waist, his knees slamming onto the bridge with a thud, before he collapsed face down. His face was pressed against the mud, his back arched, as if a mountain was pressing down on him.

Elena's proud demeanor vanished. She screamed and tried to back away, but before she could take a step, an overwhelming pressure shoved her into the mud, forcing her to kneel and prostrate herself at my feet. She struggled to push herself up, but each time she could only lift her head a centimeter before being pushed back down.

Her eyes were filled with shock, her lips trembled, and she made incoherent, breathy sounds.

I took a step, my military boots splashing in the puddles, and stopped in front of them.

“If I hadn’t given you my essence in my past life, you would have rotted in the sewers on the first day of the cataclysm.”

David opened his mouth and tried desperately to breathe, but could only manage hoarse gasps. His fingers dug bloody marks into the ground, and his fingernails were filled with mud.

"You really think you're the chosen one?" I bowed slightly. "Without me, you're nothing."

silence.

Sporadic gunshots rang out from under the bridge in the distance, but the bridge itself was deathly silent. The rioters lay prone on the ground, not daring to even breathe.

I retracted the oppressive force of the source core.

The immense pressure that had been pressing down on everyone vanished instantly. David and Elena collapsed to the ground, coughing violently, writhing and convulsing like dehydrated fish.

I turned around, my military boots stepping down the stairs.

David's hoarse shout came from behind: "Go... let's go... we must not have reached the time for our second awakening yet!"

He gripped Elena's wrist tightly, dragging her up from the ground. "As long as we find a safe place, your powers will return! Rebirth won't be meaningless!"

Watching their hurried retreating figures, I didn't chase after them to finish them off.

With a slight twitch of her fingertips, a barely perceptible wisp of wind-like energy clung to Elena's lapel. Thin as a layer of water vapor, light as a feather, without temperature or color, it vanished with them into the shadows beneath the bridge.

Killing them like this would be too boring.