Although the bullet hadn’t penetrated the bone thanks to the exoskeleton, the impact caused a wound with tissue trauma and muscle contusion. He felt his right arm suddenly grow heavy and numb, a result of impaired mobility caused by the partial destruction of superficial nerve fibers.
’Crap, I forgot that in the real world my body still still tendons that can be crushed,’ Lohan thought, a grimace of pain crossing his masked face.
Seeing their target wounded, the three remaining guards advanced with renewed confidence, believing they had finally found the "monster’s" limit.
"HE’S BEEN SHOT! FINISH HIM OFF!"
Oscar, seeing the "demon" get hit, felt a spark of hope, but the bad trip pulled him back.
Lohan’s wounds, in Oscar’s hallucinogenic vision, didn’t bleed red; they exuded a faint neon-blue smoke that floated through the hole lightly like an aura of death.
Oscar began to laugh hysterically and drool, as he watched the walls of the penthouse transform into a hellish slaughterhouse.
Lohan, ignoring the pain in his shoulder thanks to the structural stability that forced his muscles to stay together, decided it was time to end the game.
Lohan leaned his body sideways, feeling the heat of the bullets pass through his hoodie, and with his mind working dozens of times faster than that of an ordinary person, he waited for the right moment while "observing" the surroundings with his eyes closed, when suddenly he stood up and fired two shots.
PHUT! PHUT!
A shot to the nearest soldier’s knee to break his stance, instantly followed by one to the same man’s neck, where his armor was thinnest.
The man fell to one side, gushing blood, as he tried in vain to hold his throat.
In Oscar’s warped mind, he no longer saw Lohan firing a pistol; he saw a deity of death pointing a finger and erasing lives.
The sound of the techno music now seemed like the scream of thousands of souls being processed. He tried to back away, but his limbs felt as heavy as lead, and the pool water began to look like boiling blood.
"WHAT ARE YOU?!" A soldier bellowed, desperately retreating behind a glass table. He was the veteran, the man who had shot Lohan in the shoulder.
Lohan felt the burning in his shoulder intensify with the effort, but his Slime side forced cellular regeneration to the limit.
He didn’t answer the question. Using Monocular Telescopic Vision to track the guard’s arm through the gap in the table.
Lohan fired a single shot, the bullet striking the metal hinge of the designer table. The impact sent the furniture crashing violently forward, exposing the guard for a split second. That was all Lohan needed.
PHUT!
A single shot to the forehead and the veteran fell backward, knocking over a fake gold statue that Oscar loved so much.
At that point, only the leader remained.
He stood frozen beside the broken-down door, having just watched three professionals get taken out in less than eight seconds by a kid who clearly didn’t even know how to use a gun properly.
Although he had stolen a gangster’s gun-handling skills, Lohan’s skill level was on par with his target’s—that of a gangster who had learned to use a gun without any formal training.
Sure, compared to an ordinary person, that level was impressive, but between a gangster and a trained professional, Lohan seemed like just someone who didn’t know how to use a gun properly.
The terror was so great that the man forgot his training, feeling that exchanging fire from a distance was useless, and he dropped the rifle and tried to draw a vibrating knife, his hands shaking violently.
Lohan walked toward him with slow steps, yet laden with an authority that made the air around him seem thick.
His red eyes, remnants of his previous meal, glowed intensely beneath the hood.
The leader tried to advance, but Lohan didn’t want to get into hand-to-hand combat; he simply raised the pistol in his left hand.
PHUT!
The bullet pierced the man’s wrist, shattering the communication radio and the hand holding the knife. Before he could scream, Lohan fired again, this time at his chest, right where the heart was beating frantically, careful not to destroy the man’s brain, which might yield a good reward.
Silence finally returned to the penthouse, broken only by the hiss of the holograms and Oscar’s disjointed sobs.
Four trained security guards had been killed with an ease that defied the logic of this world.
Lohan tucked the pistol into the pocket of his overcoat. He looked down at his own shoulder; the bullet hole was covered by a black crust of hardened biomass, and the bleeding had stopped completely. Mobility was slowly returning as his body rewired the severed nerves.
He walked to the edge of the pool.
Oscar was curled up in a fetal position in the shallow water at the steps, crying and laughing hysterically. To the man, Lohan was now a mystical monster shrouded in an aura of flames and black shadows.
The bad trip he was experiencing was insane; he saw the corpses of his guards turning into zombies trying to pull him into the depths of the pool.
"PLEASE... please... the gods... the gods..." Oscar stammered, blood from his broken teeth dripping down his chin.
Lohan looked at the man with indifference.
Now he felt no hatred, only the need to remove an obstacle to his growth.
Oscar wasn’t a master, he wasn’t a leader; he was just a parasite who tried to feed off a Predator.
"To be honest, Oscar, all of this could have been avoided..." Lohan murmured, his voice sounding deep and disappointed.
The man was practically mad, looking around in terror at everything he was seeing, unable to believe he would be next.
He wasn’t even sane enough to form a response.
"Don’t worry, I’ll get my payback with my own hands," Lohan said, as he removed the hologram from Oscar’s eye, ignoring the bloody mess that process caused, while a satisfied smile spread across his face.