A cold air stabbed his lungs.
It wasn't simple cold.
It was an air mixed with the sewer's unique, rank stench, the dampness clinging to the walls, and the smell of despair.
"Damn it... Damn it!"
Leon Bright ran, gasping for breath.
The city-wide alarm blaring behind him felt like a curse aimed directly at him.
'Destroyer of the City.'
'Bounty: 100,000 Gold.'
Just hours ago, he was called the genius who held the city's future. Now, he was a criminal hunted by the entire metropolis.
Valerius.
That old man's vile face flashed in his mind. Crushing his innovation, ignoring the only way to save the city from crisis, and in the end, pinning all the blame on him.
How long had he run?
A massive steel grate appeared before him, blocking his path. A dead end.
There was nothing beyond the grate.
Only the endless, gray cloud sea that drifted through the city's lower levels, stretching into oblivion.
"Kugh...!"
Leon grabbed the grate and shook it violently, but the steel, decades old, didn't budge.
The manhole cover above was the same. It seemed to be sealed tight from the outside.
A perfect trap. A perfect tomb.
It was then.
From the dark passage behind him, the lights of several lanterns bounced wildly as they approached.
"This way! The rat went in here!"
"Don't lose him! 100,000 gold is right in front of us!"
The rough shouts of mercenaries, blinded by the massive bounty. And following them, the disciplined boot steps of the Aether Technicians' Guild Guard, echoing ever closer off the sewer walls.
This was the end.
Leon slumped against the wall, his back to it. His soaked work clothes felt as cold as ice.
Sticky blood seeped from a gash in his side, scraped during the escape.
He clutched the data chip in his pocket so hard it felt like it would break.
This little chip could save the city. The only way to save the very city that had betrayed him was right here, in his hand.
What a terrible irony.
He pulled the heaviest, sharpest wrench from his tool belt.
Resignation and a final spark of defiance warred in his once-brilliant gray eyes.
He wouldn't be dragged away quietly, even if caught. He wouldn't kneel beneath their arrogant, stupid rules.
A moment later, just as the pursuers' shadows stretched around the corner.
Tschk—
Directly above Leon's head, a rusted old ventilation grate cover, one no one would ever pay attention to, swung open without a sound.
And then, a face appeared from the darkness, hanging upside down.
Jet-black hair, sun-tanned skin, and... a playful grin.
"Hey, genius. What are you doing there? Lost?"
It was Jayn Rumor.
She shifted her body inside the vent and stretched her arm down.
It looked like a slender arm, but its grip was as strong as a steel clamp.
"Catch. Explain later."
Before Leon could even hesitate, Jayn grabbed his arm and hauled him up with astounding strength.
The moment Leon's body was sucked into the narrow vent, she silently closed the cover again.
The moment the city-wide alarm had sounded, she had instinctively known Leon was in a trap.
Not the predictable routes like the main gate or the sewer entrance, but the oldest, most abandoned maintenance shaft, one not even on the city schematics.
Ten years of survival instincts, honed by picking apart the guts of Rust Haven, had pinpointed the genius's escape route exactly.
"Hold on tight, crybaby genius."
Jayn started to race through the darkness, pulling Leon along.
This was no longer an ordinary passage.
It was a path that wove through the city's very bones and veins, a path only the 'Ghost of Rust Haven' knew.
The two of them precariously crossed a narrow steel frame, just wide enough for one foot, hidden behind a giant holographic billboard.
Dozens of meters below, the street looked as small as an anthill.
Leon gritted his teeth against the vertigo.
Hss—
Right next to them, an old, disused steam pipe hissed, venting hot steam.
Jayn used the pipe like a slide, dropping down to the next passage without hesitation.
"You're crazy!"
Leon shouted, but Jayn didn't even look back.
They were crossing a rusty external maintenance walkway connecting two high-rise buildings, clinging to it like monkeys.
Creak—
A steel plate beneath his-foot gave way, falling into the void below.
Leon's heart stopped. But Jayn didn't even flinch, simply stepping onto the next foothold and moving on.
Just then, the pursuers' voices echoed faintly from deep in the sewer they had just escaped.
"Damn it, no trace! Did he evaporate?"
A mercenary growled.
"This sewer is a dead end. There are no other exits. Not even a rat could get out! Search again!"
The sharp command of the Guild Guard captain followed.
With their confused shouts fading behind him, Leon thought for the first time.
That a world existed, not of the 'rules' and 'schematics' he had dedicated his life to, but a world governed by entirely different laws.
And the ruler of that world was the small figure of the woman just ahead of him.
How much time had passed?
The two finally shook their pursuers and arrived at the top of an old, defunct weather observatory, in an abandoned machine room.
Through the broken window, the night view of Silverin, plunged into chaos without its power, spread out in silence.
"Hah... hah..."
Leon gasped, leaning against the wall. He turned to this incomprehensible woman who had saved him and demanded an answer.
"Why! Why save me? I'm the entire city's enemy now. There's a bounty on my head! You and I are nothing to each other!"
His voice was filled more with confusion and wariness at a situation his logic couldn't possibly understand, than with gratitude.
Why would the very woman he had scorned and dismissed as a 'barbarian' take such risks for him?
Instead of answering, Jayn was silent for a moment, watching the view outside the window.
The image of Rust Haven in flames flashed through her eyes.
Old Barney's junk shop, collapsing under the Empire's red flash. And further back, that day ten years ago. The adults of Arkelos, who had fought and died to protect something more precious than rules. Her mother's last voice.
She slowly turned her head and looked straight into Leon's trembling gray eyes.
Her voice was low, but harder than any steel.
"Are rules more important than people's lives?"
"...!"
Leon was speechless.
That single question felt like a colossal hammer, shattering the world he had spent his life building.
Jayn took a step closer and gripped his shoulder.
The strength in her calloused fingers was slender, but the will within was as solid as rock.
"Even a 'barbarian' like me can see you're smarter than those old men. The rules they made abandoned you. So now, follow your rules."
With one hand, she pointed far into the distance, toward the 'Central Aether Supply Tower' that was intermittently flashing its red warning light. With the other, she pointed to the chaotic streets below.
"You stop that. I'll stop the rest."
Her eyes held an absolute trust, without a hint of doubt.
Leon swallowed.
It was an unconditional trust that no one in the Aether Technicians' Guild, not even his master Valerius, had ever shown him.
Everyone had been jealous of his talent, feared his innovation, and tried to cage him within the fence of their rules.
But this woman before him now, this 'barbarian' he had only met twice, was telling him she would entrust everything to him.
'Clack—'
In that moment, Leon heard something, long locked tight inside his mind, snap open.
It was the exact moment he was finally about to nod.
KA-KWA-KWANG—!
A series of massive explosions erupted from the city's lower levels.
KA-BOOM!
Another explosion followed, along with the sound of shattering shop windows, sharp screams, and the roar of crudely modified firearms.
"Aaargh!"
"It's them! The Chrome Hounds bastards!"
As the two looked down, an armed group that had emerged from the darkness was sweeping the streets.
Grotesque armor made of various scraps kitbashed together. Firearms crudely modified from Imperial and Land Alliance weapons.
They were smashing shop doors, shoving people aside, and looting everything in sight.
The jackals of the sky, the local warlords, the 'Chrome Hounds.'
"...Those bastards... they were the real culprits."
Leon snarled, gritting his teeth.
Paralyzing the city's power, then using the chaos to raid and plunder. It had all been their plan from the start.
Leon no longer hesitated.
He glanced once at Jayn, then gripped the data chip in his pocket again.
His eyes no longer wavered.
"Alright. I won't disappoint this city... no, I won't disappoint you."
He turned and started running toward the emergency stairs that vanished into the darkness, toward the Aether Supply Tower.
Jayn watched his retreating back for a moment, her expression full of trust.
Then, she pulled her alter ego, the 'Sky-Hammer,' from her back.
As the familiar, heavy weight settled into her hands, she finally felt her heart begin to beat.
"Well, then..."
She climbed onto the observatory's broken railing.
The cold night wind whipped her hair, and from below, the sounds of the Chrome Hounds' plunder and the screams of citizens churned together.
"Time to play, doggies."
She threw herself toward the chaos raging below without hesitation.
One man, climbing the tower to save the city's heart. One woman, leaping down to protect its people.
And so, the partnership of two people who break the rules began.