"Dante, I know you're pissed, but--"

The bullet caught him in the middle of the eye. All it'd taken was a flick of my wrist. The gun appeared, and in a split second, it was gone.

Donnie had outlived his usefulness, and he'd dragged me into his bullshit without regard for how it would've affected me.

Besides, he also had a loose tongue. It was only a matter of time before he told someone else Dante Sparda was in Vegas.

As for the underground fight, I already determined it was not worth the risk, at least not until I was much stronger.

I fetched some Alcohol from the store proper and doused the interior with it. I set fire to the building as I took the back entrance out just in case Toad or someone else was waiting for me.

I got free and clear with a new I.D. and tried to store them in my Weapon Vault. It took a minute of finagling, but tying it to the shotgun I stole from Kroul had seemed to do it.

Given what I'd done to get the damn things, I couldn't risk some asshole or pick-pocket stealing it.

I also took Donnie's hard drive because, well, it was sitting there. God knew what sort of goodies I could find if I handed it over to a proper hacker.

By nighttime, I was on my way out of town in a stolen car, head bopping to a song as I replayed the events of the day in my head again.

Donnie's death didn't weigh on me as I feared it would. His gambling habit nearly cost me everything. This wasn't a fucking story. I wasn't going to fold and put my ass on the line just because someone asked nicely.

Now that I was free and clear, I just needed to pick a town in the boonies with a lot of trees where I could set up and...

Is that a guy standing in the middle of the road?

---

A sharp jolt woke me as my back bloomed with pain. Everything hurt. I was on highway asphalt, and my blurry vision caught the car I'd stolen flipped on its head and burning in the distance.

Thank God I had enough sense not to bring my entire stash of money. Losing 30 grand like that still stung, but at least I was alive.

As I struggled to my feet, I noticed half of my face and most of my left side had been scraped raw by the asphalt. I triggered Angel Regeneration.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

"What the fuck." I groaned. "How did I crash?"

"You didn't," A voice said from behind me. Ebony appeared in my hand and swiveled in the direction of the voice, but he was gone before I even looked at him.

"Behind you," the voice said, and I swiveled, facing a teenager in tight-fitting athletic wear, a pair of goggles hanging off his neck, and a wild head of white hair billowing.

"Healing plus weapon summoning," he mused with a thick European accent. "I can't say I dig the build because mine is better, but it's respectable."

My eyes went wide with recognition. Pietro Maximoff. A.K.A Quick Silver. "You ran me off the fucking road?" I growled, summoning Ivory as well. "Give me one reason why I shouldn't pump you full of lead?"

Quick Silver laughed. "You're too slow. I could run you back to Vegas before you can even blink."

Fuck, I knew he was right, but I didn't want to give him the satisfaction.

Talking to him reminded me of Shin. He was yet another self-assured, arrogant prick who had me at his mercy. I'd cowered and bowed my head once, and I was going to have to do it again or deal with the consequences.

Red rage surged in my veins. People used to fucking tremble at the mention of my name. Now, I was just another tiny fish in a big, big pond.

With a steadying breath, I made my guns vanish. If I couldn't punch my way out of this, maybe I could talk instead.

Pietro's eyes seemed to glitter like a school child's when I made my guns disappear.

"I bet that never gets old."

"What do you want?"

"Simple," Pietro said with a smirk. "You."

"Wait—" True to his words, I found myself in a room with the very mutant I was skipping town to avoid, spilling forward at the sudden nausea. I was tempted to use Angel Regeneration again, but a cursory look at my energy bar made me hesitate. I was going to need every ounce of Angelic energy to survive the upcoming fight.

HP: 290/400

SP: 320/350

AE: 80/210

DE: 200/200

"One mutant runaway as promised," Pietro said.

"His abilities?" Toad asked.

"Weapon summoning and enhanced regeneration," he said. "Raven will be thrilled. Just make sure he comes out of the fight in one piece, yeah?"

"You're the one who ran him off the road," Toad hissed, then glared at me. "He can heal. He will live, although he doesn't deserve to after what he did to my men."

"Cry me a fucking river," I growled as I slowly stood upright. I knew I should've kept my mouth shut, but it was the way they spoke about me as if I wasn't even there.

It pissed me off!

"You pass on Donnie's debt because you are a bully trying to recruit me into your super-group of freaks. What did you think was going to happen?"

Toad's tongue lashed out, and I skillfully ducked under it while equipping Ebony. I fired two shots into his chest before his tongue swept downwards, cracking like an oversized whip. Shuffling to the side, I avoided the attack before firing again.

Before I could reposition myself to continue my assault, I was suddenly in the air, hands windmilling, but I still landed on my feet. A slimy tongue snapped around my throat and jerked me up in the air, slowly choking the life out of me. I gasped, clawing at my collapsing airway, but the bastard didn't let up.

Quicksilver stood beside him, worry slowly creeping onto his features. "Okay, that's enough."

But Toad ignored him, so I took matters into my own hands. I summoned the desert eagle and let a rip. I heard the gun boom and saw a white flash, but nothing happened.

Quicksilver was standing in front of the Toad, hand stretched out. Slowly, he opened it and let a smoking bullet dribble to the floor, much to my utter terror. I was about to summon the flashbang when Toad whipped his tongue and sent me out of a glass window behind me.

I fell about twenty feet before I righted myself and landed on my feet.