John Wick - Chapter 126: Six Hours in Hell (Part 3) (Patreon)

12:22 a.m., on the pedestrian street in front of Rome’s Trevi Fountain.

Nate had been walking for almost ten minutes without running into a single assassin. John was getting sleepy up above, so Nate told him to head over to the Baths of Caracalla and scout the area first. He was not needed here anymore.

Maybe that earlier blast had wiped out most of Rome’s assassins. Either way, the only ones Nate had encountered along the road came in twos and threes. They were not even interesting enough to get his blood pumping.

With one hand in his coat pocket, Nate rolled a metal playing card between his fingers while studying the system panel floating in front of him and checking the upgrade requirements.

[Early Warning: Fatal Danger Triggered 2/5]

Nate glanced at the kill feedback. The four assassins he had encountered earlier had earned him a little over six hundred Resource Points in total. Only the woman in red had counted as a High-Threat Unit.

Every time someone tried to assassinate him, Nate had deliberately waited until the image of his death appeared in his mind before fighting back. [Early Warning] had no usage limit at all. It was absurdly overpowered.

The System might be a rip-off, but the Traits it gave him were genuinely good.

As [Early Warning] continued to level up, its effects became more and more ridiculous. Ordinary assassins no longer posed any real threat to Nate.

Three seconds was enough time for him to run ten meters and still throw another handful of cards. Tonight, he was going to try to max out [Early Warning] in one go.

Nate’s gaze settled on another Trait. [Adrenaline Rush: Training Progress 19/20]

Huh? Nate frowned. How exactly did this progress bar increase? Did using every daily activation count as one training session? That could not be right. A few days ago, he had burned through every use just to adapt to the ability, and he had done the same yesterday. Yet today, the progress had suddenly gone up by one.

Maybe he just had not used it enough?

A sudden vision cut through his thoughts. In it, a bullet struck him in the head and sent him crashing to the ground. Nate looked toward the source and saw a blonde woman playing the violin by the street. She had just flipped the instrument over and had not even managed to pull the gun hidden inside it yet.

Nate was starting to get annoyed. With a trace of irritation, he whipped a stream of metal playing cards at her. A series of wet impacts sounded from the woman’s body as the gleaming cards buried themselves in her flesh, and blood ran down along their edges in thin red lines.

She stared blankly at herself. Several vital areas had been pierced through. Her head swayed once, then she braced a hand against the wall and slowly collapsed.

The pistol slipped from her hand and discharged when it hit the ground. The stray round punched through a screen beside the wall, leaving a bullet hole before the display went dark. Only then did the nearby pedestrians realize something was wrong. A moment earlier, some of them had apparently thought the two were putting on a performance.

Nate lowered his head and switched his phone to silent. Another location alert had just sounded, and hearing the thing constantly ring this late at night was starting to irritate him.

People screamed and fled down the street in the opposite direction. The pedestrian street had been crowded only moments earlier, but after a burst of chaos, it became quiet almost instantly.

Nate stopped in front of a café. A few customers inside had not managed to escape. The moment they noticed him looking their way, they hurried into a corner and crouched down together, trembling.

Before Nate could even step onto the café’s stairs, another vision flashed through his mind. This time, three men burst out of a bar fifty meters away and riddled him with bullets.

At least these guys had gotten smarter. They were using rifles now, laying down sustained fire. In the vision, Nate took more than a dozen rounds.

But that was only the vision. In reality, the three men had not even come out of the bar yet, and Nate had already drawn both pistols and started pulling the triggers.

The first man had barely made it through the doorway when a string of bullets tore into him before he could even find his footing. The two men behind him froze in shock and immediately ducked back inside, not daring to show themselves.

Nate sprinted toward the bar while continuing to fire. Bullets hammered the exterior wall and kicked loose chips of stone, but the other two assassins stayed hidden inside and refused to come out.

The wall was too thick for 9mm rounds to penetrate. Nate could not hit them through it.

He could not hit them directly, but what if he changed the angle?

A thought flashed through Nate’s mind. [Adrenaline Rush], activate!

In an instant, adrenaline and endorphins flooded his body. His heart rate shot past four hundred beats per minute, and time seemed to slow around him.

An 80% increase in muscle strength, combined with 20% self-acceleration, let Nate do things ordinary people could barely imagine.

For example, curving a bullet.

Nate smoothly swept the pistol in his right hand through a semicircle. The 15% increase in reaction speed let him catch the exact instant he needed.

He pulled the trigger.

The sharp snap of his wrist gave the round in the chamber horizontal acceleration. A 9mm bullet burst from the Beretta M9 in a flash of muzzle fire, its golden tip tracing a smooth arc through the air before curving through the bar’s entrance.

One of the assassins inside dropped immediately. The last man stared in disbelief.

“No... where did that come fr... Ugh!”

Stunned by what had just happened, the man did not even finish his sentence before another curving round punched through his chest. Blood sprayed as he collapsed.

Nate walked into the bar and put a finishing shot into each man’s head. The bartender had not managed to flee. She crouched behind the counter, frozen with fear, watching him without daring to move.

Nate reloaded both pistols, gave the bartender a smile, and turned to leave.

He needed to level [Adrenaline Rush] as soon as possible. Once he got back to New York, he would ask Fox if she could bring him into the Fraternity for a couple of days. Nate knew gun-fu too, and Henry could always give him a disguise.

What Nate really wanted, though, was the formula for that medicinal wax. With that, leveling [Steel Body] would be much easier.

Nate returned to the café from earlier and found a seat. The customers still had not dared to run. Instead, they had pulled the barista into the corner with them and were all crouched there together. Maybe people really did feel safer huddling together when they were scared.

“Can I get a cup of coffee?” Nate asked the barista quietly.

The girl in the café uniform froze for a moment, then timidly raised her head and looked at Nate.

“Relax. I’m not going to hurt you.” Nate gave her what he thought was a warm smile.

The girl hesitated, then finally went over to the coffee machine. Nate noticed that even her hand was shaking as she picked up a cup.

The coffee would take a little while, so Nate pulled out his phone. His bounty had gone up by another five million. It was thirty million now.

The café was small, with only a few round marble tables and faded movie posters hanging on the walls.

The customers remained curled up together in the corner. The barista stood behind the coffee machine with her back to Nate, too frightened to look at him.

Nate placed his phone face-down on the table and waited.

The girl eventually returned with a white porcelain cup, steam still curling from the coffee. As she set it on the table, she yanked her hand back almost immediately, as though lingering for one extra second might get her bitten. The cup struck the tabletop with a sharp clink, spilling a little coffee onto the saucer.

“Thanks,” Nate said.

The girl took a step back. Her hands twisted together in front of her apron, shoulders drawn in. Her eyes flicked toward the door before quickly darting away. She was waiting for him to finish and leave.

Nate reached for the cup.

The instant his fingertips touched the handle, another vision slammed into his mind. Outside the café, at the corner of the street, a man in a black hoodie stepped out from behind a column and aimed a pistol at the back of Nate’s head.

Nate’s right hand had already left the coffee cup.

He drew the Beretta M9 from inside his coat without even standing up and aimed through the café window.

Bang. Bang.

Two rounds punched through the same pane of glass. Cracks spread outward from the holes like a spiderweb, and shards tinkled crisply across the tabletop.

The man outside took one round in the chest and another in the neck. His gun had not even come level before he fell backward, struck the column behind him, and slowly slid to the ground.

Nate turned his head slightly and flicked a metal playing card through the shattered window. It buried itself in the assassin’s head.

The man’s head snapped back, and the light left his eyes.

The café erupted in screams. The women in the corner ducked even lower. Never underestimate how much noise a group of terrified girls could make together.

The barista slapped a hand over her mouth, eyes wide. She stumbled back two steps until her shoulders hit the wall, a few drops of spilled coffee already staining her apron.

Nate slipped the pistol back inside his coat and looked down at the cup on the table. The surface was still rippling.

He calmly picked it up and took a sip. It was a little hot, but he kept drinking anyway. He had an all-nighter ahead of him, and without some coffee, he was not sure he would make it through.

After drinking about half, Nate pulled a hundred-dollar bill from his Backpack and pinned it beneath the cup. One corner of the bill darkened where spilled coffee soaked into it.

Nate stood and pushed open the café’s wooden door. The night breeze caught the hem of his trench coat as he stepped outside. No one living remained in the direction he was facing. Before moving on, Nate glanced back toward the street corner behind him, then turned and continued down the road.

The coffee was still steaming on the table. The barista stood frozen in place, watching Nate disappear into the shadows of the pedestrian street.

[Early Warning: Fatal Danger Triggered 5/5] [Condition Met]

Two people crouched in the shadows around the corner. Both held pistols and stared in the direction Nate had disappeared.

“Did you see that? He just used [Bullet Curving]!” the man whispered in disbelief.

“I saw it. Does that count as a superpower?” The woman’s eyes widened, and her voice rose as she continued.

“Seriously, why are we even needed here? He looked completely untouchable!”

The man beside her nodded emphatically. “I’m starting to think thirty million is still too cheap.”

“What are you talking about? Don’t get any ideas. We’re here to protect him.”

“How could I possibly...” The man’s voice rose, but before he could finish...

“Oi...!”

A young voice sounded from behind them. At the same time, something cold pressed against the back of each of their heads.

“Tell me. Who are you two?” The voice behind them carried a hint of amusement.

“Winston sent you?” Nate stood behind them with a Beretta M9 in each hand, both muzzles pressed against their heads.

“Yes, yes, yes!”

The woman did not dare speak, but the man answered immediately.

“You’re lying.” Nate’s voice turned cold.

“One last chance.” His tone hardened like a blade.

“Who sent you?”