Chapter 1878: Chase
With the car’s sudden disappearance, Ning was atop nothing but air. He tumbled forward, rolling through the street, asphalt scraping against his suit. He caught himself and stood up, looking around with a confused look.
The car reappeared a small distance away, still moving at full speed.
Ning stared at it for a moment, confused. Teleportation? He couldn’t imagine how the car could teleport at all. ’But if it teleported, why did it take so long to reappear? It’s like…’
Just as Ning thought of something, he saw a shape through the tinted windows. Large beastly horns silhouetted against the interior light for a moment, the shape very different from Forgath.
The minotaur’s head was unmistakable.
Ning sighed as he realized that Vanisher was in the car.
“I should’ve known,” he told himself. “He wouldn’t leave without some safety.”
Ning didn’t know what the Vanisher’s power was. As far as he was aware, he had the ability to disappear and reappear someplace else, which was why he had his name. Aside from that though, he knew not much.
A part of Ning wondered if the Vanisher was part of the group that was after him, but he threw that idea away immediately. He was just protecting Forgath.
’Does he not have the power to defend himself?’ Ning thought curiously.
This wasn’t the time to stand around and wonder. He flew after them again, faster this time. He knew what to expect now.
He landed on the roof above, fingers beginning to dig into metal. Just then, it vanished again, and Ning landed down on the asphalt. He came to a running stop and waited for a few moments, counting. Exactly 4 seconds later, the car reappeared again, momentum unchanged.
’It takes 4 seconds to teleport from here to…’
Something about that struck Ning as strange. If there was in fact teleportation happening here, then why would it appear so much later? And if it was just going invisible instead, then how did it disappear from under him?
’Oh!’ Ning realized just then that neither of them was likely happening. ’Vanisher— his power allows for things to go invisible and intangible. It’s phasing through me.’
As soon as Ning realized, he chased after the limo again. Just as he was about to reach it, the limo vanished again, only appearing around the corner, just where it would’ve been had it gone normally.
’Was that shorter too?’ Ning wondered.
Vanisher was supposed to be able to vanish for hours, so the fact that he was only doing it for a couple of seconds likely meant that he didn’t have the ability to vanish things other than himself for more than a few seconds. Ning wondered if weight or volume of the object he vanished ate into his time limit. Making a limo invisible for more than a few seconds drained him quickly.
Ning rushed back toward it, now ready to reach the limo. Since Vanisher had already used his power just now, he likely couldn’t use it again so soon.
Just as Ning arrived, a hand emerged from the window at the last second. Unlike the beastly minotaur or the demonic imp, the hand was pale and frail. Ning saw a hint of blue sleeve for a moment before the fingers lit up.
A beam of white light shot toward him at a speed that dwarfed even Ning’s perception. It pretty much moved at the speed of light and was thus impossible to dodge.
The light landed on Ning’s left shoulder, sliding sideways past his arm. Where the light hit, ice spread across that path instantly. The left half of Ning’s arm was suddenly full of ice, freezing solid from shoulder to fingertips.
The cold didn’t bother him, but that did not mean that he wasn’t surprised. He stared at the limo with no small hint of surprise.
Frostveil was in the car too.
’Two of the top 3 ranked heroes are in that car right now?’ Ning thought. He wondered how it would come off to the news when they learned that he was against two of the most well-loved heroes in the city. That would not be fun to explain to the agency.
Ning flexed his body, the ice on his body shattering into a million shards, scattering across the road. He dashed forward, now knowing that he couldn’t just get on the limo and hope they gave him the time to get inside. Between Vanisher and Frostveil, it was pretty much impossible to stop the limo the normal way.
This was a challenge, which Ning very much accepted.
His speed increased beyond anything he’d shown before. He blitzed through the street, moving so fast that he let out a sonic boom through the street, the pedestrians surprised by the sudden sound.
Frostveil looked out the window, staring in Ning’s direction before firing more beams, but not a single one of them could touch Ning at all. Even as she tried, Ning passed her and moved to the other side, where she couldn’t attack him.
“Where did he go?” she asked inside, looking all around, feeling useless.
Vanisher was useless as well, unable to use his powers when he hadn’t the smallest idea as to where Ning even was.
Ning circled the limo, moving constantly around it, going from side to side. Frostveil shot her ice beams when she could, but she could hit nobody at all. She also had to be careful not to hit the pedestrians or leave sleet on the asphalt for other cars to slip on, so she didn’t feel very helpful.
“We should stop,” she suggested. “I can’t protect you if I can’t use my powers properly.”
The limo swerved just then, and something bumped against the right side of the limo, pushing it away. Frostveil barely managed to see an incoming ditch on the side of the road and warned the others.
Ning watched from the side as the limo fell into the ditch, more or less intact.