Nick jumped from rooftop to rooftop.
He was on his way to Manela's training spot.
Nick was only carrying three of his spears with him.
He had already told Manela about his current situation, and she had allowed Nick to only travel with three of his spears.
Like this, he could still move around with quite a lot of agility.
As Nick jumped from rooftop to rooftop, he looked forward with narrowed eyes.
It had been several days since the meeting with Cycle.
Trevor and Jenny had already moved to the warehouse and remained inside most of the time.
The only one traveling around outside was Nick since he still wanted to train.
Of course, that drew the attention of certain people.
For example, right now, Nick's ability wasn't active, even though he had left for the training spot before Manela would be there.
This meant that someone was currently looking at Nick while he jumped from roof to roof.
Yesterday had been the same.
His ability only reactivated when he was close to the training spot.
Nick was sure that the person following him didn't dare to get too close to Manela.
They probably always remained at least two kilometers away from the training spot.
Sure enough, when Nick was closing in on the training spot, his ability reactivated.
Even when Nick stood alone on the roof of the tallest building, his ability didn't deactivate.
The person who was keeping watch over him didn't even dare to look at him while he was there.
'They don't even dare to look at me,' Nick thought with furrowed brows. 'Looking shouldn't hurt, right?'
'Are they this scared of Manela?'
Yes, they were.
What Nick didn't know was that yesterday, Manela had seen the person following Nick.
So, before she went to the training spot, she actually secretly arrived near that person and told them not to bother them while they were in the middle of training.
Otherwise, Nick wouldn't be able to focus on training.
They could attack Nick on his way to or back from the training area, but the training area itself was off-limits during training hours.
Naturally, Manela's appearance spooked the person to their very core, which was why they didn't dare to go anywhere close to the training spot or even look at it.
On the rooftop, Nick waited for a couple of minutes until Manela arrived.
Their training started without any delay and passed without any incidents.
After Manela left, Nick jumped down the tall building, but he didn't leave the training spot.
Instead, he went into the training spot.
With practiced ease, Nick arrived inside one of the houses that hadn't been destroyed yet.
Nick went to one of the corners and sat down.
The house had several holes through which sunlight could stream in, but none of the holes directly pointed at the corner Nick was sitting in.
This meant that the corner was a bit darker than the rest of the house.
"You're going to die."
A whisper appeared in Nick's ears.
"They're going to come for you."
"They're going to bury you in here."
Naturally, this was the Nightmare.
Luckily, the corner was not dark enough for the Nightmare to unleash its actual powers.
Right now, it could only whisper in Nick's ears and slightly distort his vision.
It wasn't dark enough to create illusions or to fool Nick's other senses.
"You're going to get killed."
"There will be many enemies."
"They are all looking at you."
Nick just remained sitting in the corner with his eyes closed.
Nick had been doing this for a couple of days.
He wanted to give his opponent a chance to attack him.
The place where Nick was sitting was only visible through the door of the house.
So, if someone saw him, they had to be looking at him through the door.
Naturally, Nick would be able to tell when somebody was looking at him due to his ability.
And when his ability deactivated, Nick would also know in which direction his opponent would be.
This would give him the best shot at winning against his opponent.
Sadly, nobody had shown up the last couple of days.
Either they were afraid of coming close to the training spot, or they knew that this was a trap.
Probably both.
The training spot was surrounded by taller buildings, which meant that any enemy had to be either inside the training spot or on one of the taller buildings near the edge.
This was Nick's turf, and he knew how to move around here.
Nick wanted the fight to happen in here, and his opponent most likely knew that.
But that actually wasn't so bad for Nick's enemy.
After all, they could position several people around the training spot.
They didn't have to fight Nick one-on-one.
If they wanted, they could surround the training spot and shoot at him from several different areas.
But it was a risk.
If they actually decided to fight here, this would turn into an actual battle and not an assassination.
That made it riskier.
Alternatively, they could just attack Nick on his way back to Dark Dream.
Or attack one of the other Extractors.
There were many ways one could go about this situation.
But for now, no way would be chosen.
After around an hour, Nick's ability still hadn't deactivated, and he was getting sick of listening to the whispers in the dark.
Nick left the house and climbed the tall house.
His ability still didn't deactivate.
'They're gone,' Nick thought.
So, Nick decided to travel back to Dark Dream.
Nothing peculiar happened.
The next day, Nick felt himself being followed again, but he wasn't attacked.
His training with Manela passed by without any incidents, and Nick once more entered the house in the training spot.
The whispers returned.
Minutes passed.
Would this be another hour of pointless waiting?
Nick waited in silence.
More minutes passed.
Suddenly, Nick opened his eyes.
His ability had just deactivated!