Toronto police are warning the public after a teenager says he and his friend were attacked by a stranger with a knife in what is believed to be a random assault in broad daylight.

Achsuthan Puvee said he noticed someone following him and his friend as soon as they stepped off the city bus at their stop in the area of Jaguar Street and Meandering Trail in Scarborough on Tuesday afternoon. The pair of 15-year-old boys were on their way home from school when the attack occurred.

He said the man, who was unknown to them, was following behind them at an uncomfortably close distance for approximately eight minutes before he felt an arm around his neck.

“He came up behind me and grabbed me. I knew it was him,” he told CTV Toronto on Wednesday. “I kind of shoved him off me and when I shoved him off me, I felt the blade slice my neck.”

Puvee said the man had already cut his friend’s shirt and pushed him to the ground by that point.

“I said [to the man], ‘What do you want?’ and he said, ‘I want your life’ and he flipped open the knife and then he ran away,” Puvee recalled.

After the man ran off, Puvee said he didn’t realize his neck was bleeding until his friend pointed it out to him.

“My friend told me, ‘You’re bleeding! You’re bleeding,’” he said.

The teenager said he passed out at that point and his friend carried him home and called 911. Later, Puvee said the doctor told him he would have died if the cut had been a centimetre deeper.

“I’m confused,” Puvee said. “I’m just wondering why. That could have been anybody. It could have been a little kid, a girl, just walking down the street.”

Police have been searching the area for the suspect and canvassing the neighbourhood for more surveillance footage.

“We have two young boys walking and are being attacked with a knife in the middle of daylight in a residential street where you would expect to be safe, so we're obviously very concerned, we have a lot of officers out working on it right now," Det. Sgt. Jim Gotell said.

Police called the man “violent, armed and dangerous” and warned the public against approaching him. He’s described as a white man with an average build who is about 5’8” in height. He had a full beard and a buzz cut hairstyle and was wearing a cream-coloured jacket and black pants at the time of the assault.

With files from CTV News Toronto