Jonathan dashed across the city, leaving craters in his wake. He moved at his full speed, crossing the city in a few minutes, most of which was spent trying to navigate the place. He cleared the city a moment after, and was out into the open ash, free and clear. Or so he thought.
There was a buzzing hum, and then something landed on the sand in front of him, blasting him backwards. A massive ballista bolt, about twenty feet long, stood vibrating in the ash in front of him. It had come from the air. He looked up, and saw that there was what looked to be a flying ship hovering in the air about a mile above him. It looked like some wooden galleon from the 1700’s back on Earth, but it was somehow flying. There was no explanation of the flight, and it simply looked to be a ship floating in midair. Massive ballistas and other projectile weaponry studded its form, and another one was loosed at Jonathan as he stared up at the ship.
He took off, zigzagging to avoid the strikes. Jonathan was unable to avoid the sight of the galleon however, and it followed him across the ash, firing off its projectiles at him as it went. The ballista bolts came perilously close to hitting him, and they moved so quickly that he could barely dodge them in time. A few minutes later, he saw a dark speck jump off the side of the ship, and land on the ground a few hundred feet away. It was the shape of a person, and they were clearly quite high level, given the powerful appearance of the armor that they wore. It was made out of some midnight black leather, and was so highly polished that it gleamed in the light. They also wore a black mask, and Jonathan could not tell anything about them. The armor seemed to shift and warp in Jonathan’s vision, rendering him unsure of where the wearer actually was.
More and more of the black shapes dropped down from the ship, and Jonathan took off running. He could have stayed and tested his luck, but there was no reason to do so. He spared a glance behind himself, and saw that the figures were coming in hot pursuit, and they were moving quite quickly. One of them lobbed something at him, and he swerved to the right as it came in, dodging the attack. The object landed a few dozen feet away from him, and exploded, turning the ash to glass with its heat.
Jonathan whistled, and kept swerving, now having to worry about both the attacks from the ship and from his pursuers. There was no shelter in sight, and Jonathan wasn't sure where he was going to go to escape from this situation. It wasn't looking good. His stamina bar was starting to drop, and it was edging closer to halfway full.
Jonathan took a few deep breaths and kept running, focusing on his movements. Behind him, his pursuers did not flag, running after him as if they were on a simple morning jog. They were clearly specialists in Dexterity, given their speed and the armor that they were wearing. It looked as if he was being chased down by some sort of assassin group. Jonathan was starting to feel the exertion by now, and if it went on like this, he would have to add some points to Dexterity. It was comforting to know that he had the option though. Jonathan would have been able to fight his opponents if not for the ship hovering above, proving ranged support. One of those tree-like ballista bolts would seriously injure him.
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Jonathan began to slow down as he continued running, and the gap between him and his pursuers was slowly narrowing. At this rate he was going to be caught. With a sigh, Jonathan placed eighteen points into Strength and Dexterity, boosting both his speed and stamina significantly. With his multipliers, it was as if he had placed thirty points into each stat.
His footsteps suddenly began to pick up, and he felt a new well of energy burgeon inside him, fuelling his movements. Jonathan let out a whoop of delight, and started to accelerate, leaving his assailants behind him. However, this was not to last. He was still in the middle of nowhere, with nowhere to run to and nowhere to hide. He was able to evade his pursuers for now, but such a feat would not last forever. He would eventually tire, and then would be caught.
Jonathan gritted his teeth and moved faster, trying to force his body to use every last bit of his stamina that he could. It felt like he was trying to lift a mountain with his bare hands, but he was able to eke out a little bit more than he normally would have been able to. As it turned out though, this was all for naught.
A different sort of projectile slammed down into the ground in front of him, this time not a ballista bolt. It was a glass orb filled with some sort of murky solution, and when it burst, it sent out a billowing cloud of noxious gas that went straight into Jonathan’s pores, corrupting his body. Jonathan gasped in shock and pain as the poison began to spread through his system, and he slowed down, stumbling as he tried to move. Behind him, the black clad figures were beginning to catch up again, and he turned around desperately, trying to muster a defense against them. However, he began to fall, and then darkness claimed him.
Jonathan climbed back out of the dark abyss some time later, groaning as the mother of all headaches wracked his body. He was lying on a smooth wooden floor, and he was wearing some sort of strange bracelet on his right hand that pulsed regularly with a gentle blue light. He tried to access his mana to light up the room around him, but nothing happened. The blue band pulsed brighter for a moment, and then went back to normal. It seemed that it was inhibiting his mana.
Jonathan got to his feet, and looked around the room, trying to figure out where he was. The gentle rocking sensation from the world around him told him that he was on the flying ship that had been chasing him down earlier. Jonathan shook his head in exasperation, and tried to find a door. It looked as if he had been sealed in here somehow, and he was missing all of his armor, his weapons, and his storage device. Jonathan growled low in his throat as he examined his predicament. He had been utterly defeated. At least he was not dead. He could always escape late on, but if he had died, then it would be over. It seemed that Granath or whoever was in control here was eager to gloat over their victory over Jonathan.