“Run! Hurry!!!”

His mother’s words still echoed in Rhode’s mind.

The moment she said that and shoved him away, the boy started running without the slightest hesitation.

With his pen, with his notebook, after only one glance back at his mother, he left.

It was so clean, so decisive, that even now Rhode found it a little unbelievable.

Why had he been able to be that resolute...?

That was his mother.

Shouldn’t he have hesitated, even a little?

At the very least, shouldn’t he have frozen for a moment?

The prison siren quickly drowned out that sentence in Rhode’s head and filled his ears.

He sprinted wildly, abandoning every stealth technique he knew, running nonstop to escape this prison.

He wiped away the tears falling from the corners of his eyes, all while running with a blank expression.

He was too strange. No, strange wasn’t the right word.

Cold-blooded was.

The prison lights fell on Rhode, and the guards swarmed after him in pursuit.

Many of them were even firing at him from a distance.

Gunshots, roars, and sirens tangled together into a hideous symphony.

“Don’t let him get away! He’s Rhode Carasco!!”

“Block him off!”

“He’s climbing the wall!”

“He’s heading for the rooftops!!!”

The guards shouted one after another.

Rhode’s calm at the start gradually gave way to a bedraggled struggle.

And through it all, Black Sword said nothing.

At a time like this, the only one who could save Rhode was Rhode himself.

The night should have been pitch-black, yet the lights forced it bright.

Rhode pulled out his dagger and headed straight for the main gate.

After driving back the guards at the entrance, he forced his way through the front gate and escaped the prison.

It was far easier than he had imagined.

Probably because... in Rhode’s imagination, he was supposed to be leaving with his mother.

After stepping out through the prison gates, the boy gasped for breath.

“Hah... hah...”

But he had no time to steady it. He immediately ran for the alleyways.

The entire Queen’s Road had turned stark white under the lights. No matter where Rhode ran, someone was waiting there.

He climbed onto a rooftop, only to find that even up there, people were aiming guns at him.

Bang!

A bullet tore through the night and struck his right arm.

Rhode gritted his teeth and held back any cry.

His azure eyes, gleaming like gemstones in the dark, sent a chill through the air.

He was only a fifteen-year-old noble boy.

And yet the guard who had shot him instinctively took several steps back.

As if what he had just seen was a wolf of the night.

Rhode paid no attention to the guard’s reaction and chose to jump straight down.

He did his best to let his blood soak into his clothes instead of dripping onto the ground.

If too much blood was left on the ground, it would be easy to track him.

He absolutely couldn’t be tracked.

He had to stay alive, save his mother, and save Shilo and his father in the Imperial Capital.

Bang!

Bang!!!

Unable to catch up to Rhode, the guards began firing nonstop at his hands and feet.

More and more wounds opened across his body.

Most of them were light injuries, but together they became a crushing burden.

“Huff... hah...”

Rhode used the breathing method Hagart had taught him, keeping himself from losing too much blood and slipping into a haze.

But because his mind hadn’t gone hazy, he could clearly feel his body temperature dropping.

He could feel it vividly.

Am I going to die...?

This was the second time the boy had asked himself that.

Don’t joke around.

He still had so many things to do.

Serious things, not-so-serious things, all kinds of things.

He hadn’t read enough books yet. He still hadn’t met Waymen again...

Life still had a long, long road ahead.

Leaning against the wall behind him, he tilted his head back and kept taking deep breaths.

Several guards passed right by him without noticing Rhode, who was only inches away.

Using a few crates and the corner of the wall, Rhode stayed out of the light.

But he couldn’t stay here forever.

If he remained here, he’d just be waiting to die.

He had to get to Teacher Hagart’s place.

Right. The sewers.

Rhode still remembered the hidden passage in Hagart’s house.

As long as he found the matching spot in the sewers, he could get back into that house.

With that thought, Rhode started looking around.

He had to find a sewer entrance now.

Very soon, by the moonlight, he spotted a manhole cover in the alley.

He jammed his dagger under it and pried it open with force, then jumped down with the cover in hand.

Rhode tried to use it to close the opening again, but he could only say one thing.

He’d been too optimistic.

He did manage to put the cover back.

But it sat crooked and uneven.

Anyone passing by would notice something was off.

And once that happened, the guards would immediately search the sewers for Rhode.

Splash!

After jumping into the sewer, Rhode was so weak that he lost his footing and fell straight into the filthy water.

“Cough, cough...”

He coughed a few times and immediately climbed back out of the sewage.

He knew himself that the cover had been put back badly, and it had made noise too.

The guards would probably realize soon enough that he had entered the sewers from there.

But at least he had bought himself some time.

Even if they found out in the end, it wouldn’t be immediate.

Even ten minutes later, even one minute later, would be enough for him to get farther away.

And so, Rhode began his journey through the sewers in search of the hidden passage.

Unfortunately, the boy had lost far too much blood.

Even though he kept using the breathing method Hagart had taught him, his consciousness still began to blur in the end.

His field of vision narrowed more and more.

The edges that should have been his peripheral sight were swallowed completely by darkness.

Little by little, he became unable even to deliberately control his breathing.

It fell into chaos beyond his control.

His feet trudged through the filthy water, inching forward with painful effort.

But in the end, he was exhausted.

He couldn’t keep walking.

Thud—

Rhode pitched headfirst into the sewage and lost consciousness completely.