Was this really how every night went in Seyfelt? Gncing at the asphalted floor as an increasingly enticing mattress, Nukir found herself yawning a fourth time.

  “Really?” At this point, Zoral looked back at her not in anger, but in something closer to disbelief.

  “What do you want from me? I’m not used to being this bored.”

  “Well, sucks to be you. You came to our city to ‘help’? You py by our rules!”

  “Zoral, you’re getting too loud again.”

  Surprisingly, it was Artasia who was all business, to the point of not compining about Nukir’s behavior or even showing any discomfort.

  “R-Right, sorry…”

  Were these two really siblings? He could afford to fight back a little, ignore her reprimand for a little and keep the squabble going. It was certainly more fun on its own than whatever Nukir had been enduring for the st two hours of waiting for Last Empire’s people to do anything.

  The building they were allegedly in was unassuming, simir to countless others she had seen since arriving in Seyfelt, a week ago. Four stories, nearly as wide as it was tall, and very well-maintained both in terms of its integrity and cleanliness.

  With its fresh paintjob and immacute windows, most people probably did not notice that the lights inside never seemed to be on. Some standard, medium-sized business must have been conducted within, but would they be able to answer if asked what that business entailed? Definitely not.

  The disguise was not bad at all, even if Nukir expected something different after hearing from them. For a gang so focused on state-of-the-art technology, whether stolen or developed by themselves, it was definitely on the simplistic end. Maybe a fancy skyscraper, even with the dozens of front companies they could come up with, would still draw too much attention?

  Nukir only sighed this time, but still heard the click from Zoral’s tongue right after. If most Shadow Spot members in Seyfelt were this uptight, what with their nearly uniform dark gray fatigues and face-masks, she might just explode before getting the approval to go on business alone.

  She rolled her eyes, brushing her white-golden, ear-length hair across her forehead, only for the incessant breeze to mess it up yet again. She needed to endure it, however, and still had not stopped looking around as attentively as she could.

  All of the annoyances, whether coming from her fellow elves or even the season itself, would be worth it if she managed to find the person she was looking for. Once that happened, she would finally be able to go back home… or settle down in Seyfelt.

  One week, three outings… Damn, it feels like I’ve been waiting for much longe—

  Nukir’s eyes and ears were torn away from their search by light and noise alike, both coming from the building they had been staring at for far too long.

  “The hell?”

  Even the no-nonsense Artasia seemed surprised by the violent burst… no, bursts that eventually caused more than one of those beautiful windows to pop.

  People flooded out right after, whether from the door at the building’s bottom or out of those very windows, running away or… flung outside. They numbered about nine in total, men and women alike, though Nukir could not determine ages very accurately considering what they wore.

  She already considered the extent to which Seyfelt’s Shadow Spot dressed up to be kind of ridiculous, but Last Empire made her ugh out loud before she even realized it.

  Headwear that looked like a cross between an Eastern spy’s hood and a spacefarer’s helmet, linked to some sort of vest that appeared oddly flexible for the amount of wiring and buttons on it.

  Not shirt buttons, but rather the type found in machinery. Once they pressed them, they—

  “What are you waiting for, Nukir!?”

  “Attack! We won’t get a better chance than this!”

  Oh right, the battle had just begun. Oopsie.

  Now that the enemies were out in the open and so vulnerable, Zoral’s aggression was perfectly matched by Artasia whom Nukir could finally see as his actual sister. Sizable amounts of green prana seeped from within the two, almost minty for the former while the tter was much more of a jade shade. The contrast with the near identical, wispy missiles they unched made for quite the beautiful show, she had to admit.

  But enough Last Empire goons were ready to meet their attack, even if barely. Once two specific buttons on their vests were pressed, a whitish translucent field manifested to cover the rest of their bodies, with three people managing to spread that field in front of them as a rger, combined barrier.

  It cracked from taking on Zoral’s missiles, allowing Arastia’s to finish the job and break right through, but the resulting impact once they hit the ground and whatever pitiful Last Empire members were still in the way was far weaker than Nukir expected.

  It offset a lot. Goofy as they look, those clown suits are no joke.

  They certainly bought them enough time to mount a counterattack, with those same three people attempting to gradually reconstruct their shield while two in the back unveiled a couple of very not goofy-looking cannons.

  Looking a bit like oversized rifles mounted above the shoulder rather than tucked in below, Nukir would have thought something so big would have required some sort of charge time before shooting.

  “Holy sh—!”

  “That’s…!”

  She was very wrong, with the small, nearly imperceptible cartridge reaching the street they stood on before she could even react. The resulting, briefly lived ‘windmill’ of bde-like white prana should have been easier to respond to, but without knowing where it would appear from, Nukir could not prevent a small cut on her leather jacket even after dodging.

  “This cost me three hundred notes!”

  “You’re not going to fight back!?”

  Zoral yelled, his and his sister’s lime green gres almost looking cute in such unison as they clung to the top of a light post.

  “Can’t do it yet. Don’t want to be caught with my guard down.”

  “By wh—!”

  Another shot, and another whirlwind of slicing death with it. They had proven themselves able to dodge it as well, so Nukir did not hesitate to look away from the panicked siblings as she jumped high into the air.

  The spinning bdes of prana spanned around ten meters each, but she could clear well beyond that distance in one leap if she was expecting them.

  If this is all they have, it shouldn’t be a big problem, even for those two. The moment they close the gap, they’ll just…

  The unexpected came right after, when the airborne Nukir allowed her eyes to drift to the side, then down. Toward the back of a rge, bck box truck where something, or someone was also forced to frantically avoid the prana bdes.

  Someone wearing a raggedy outfit with sparse protection and a mask that looked more like the torn remains of a helmet, leaving a head of gray hair free to be tousled by the wind that blew their hood right off. Someone meeting the exact same description she was looking for.

  Nemesis.

  Nukir felt her lips curving instinctively, so much that their corners almost hurt. Despite everything, she had to give the Last Empire some credit for speeding her search up.

  Both of their gangs spanned not just many cities, but several countries even. The difference y in how Last Empire abided by a rigid hierarchical structure, almost like a legitimate business or a military company. Shadow Spot, in contrast, was decentralized and shared little other than the name across its many ‘fragments’.

  As fellow elves united in their disdain for a society that despised them, they sympathized with each other and would lend help if necessary, but there were no real rules that linked them. Being top dog in one city meant nothing in another, and communication was quite limited outside of emergencies or the personal.

  Considering she did not know the name of any members in Seyfelt prior to this week, the fact Nukir knew about their enemies had always drawn some interest from her, especially when one of their main competitors had been a pretty new gang, with only a few members limited to this city.

  The Violet Thorn changed the game, vying for supremacy over Seyfelt’s underworld on equal terms with the Shadow Spot and Last Empire. Without the need for the obscene numbers and experimental technology that the tter were known for, the Unmasked Thorn leaders could fight them toe-to-toe and had delivered the hurt quite a few times.

  When Nukir heard they were gone all of a sudden, she thought her fellow members had fallen for one of the oldest pys in the book, feigning weakness to prepare a lethal offensive while the enemy rexed. Hearing the details on the matter changed her mind entirely, in more than one way.

  For they had not been defeated by either them or Last Empire. Instead, it was the result of them picking a fight with the local knight corps, an astronomically foolish move that no one expected from a gang like theirs.

  Such a small group could not simply rely on brute force to match them for so long, the Thorns were smart too. But they found themselves going for such a risky operation, and while there were several guesses as to why that was the case, there was one common link to all of them.

  That was, an earlier battle against a man with tattered armor and a broken mask. A loss against a viginte the locals called Nemesis.

  “Found you~!”

  With the only reason for her traveling to Seyfelt right in her sight, Nukir refused to wait any longer and pointed a finger in Nemesis’ direction.

  The ray of pink prana she shot was small, thin and crooked, almost like a miniature lightning bolt. While its speed was nothing to scoff at, in terms of strength it not only failed to leave a mark on the asphalt right behind her prey, but also barely made a noise upon impact.

  Which made it all the more shocking when Nemesis did turn around right after she shifted, in time to see her fist coming for his head.

  Nukir hit empty air first, then the box truck that soon broke into two from the prana driven within it. Nemesis stumbled by her side, trying to get back on his feet as quickly as possible.

  “Very nice, but no greeting from you? You’re a rude one—”

  She spoke too soon, crossing both arms in time to meet Nemesis’ boots as he pushed against the ground with both hands not only to stand up, but to kick at her as well.

  Her sneakers dragged noisily across the floor for half a second as she saw him hurrying off, forgoing a chance to follow up with another attack. Nukir frowned, disappointed with his choice as she gathered prana into both hands.

  “Way too rude.”

  From their crossed position, she brought both arms down and to the sides, unching an enormous pink ‘X’ crackling with sparks, exceeding Nemesis’ height at least three times.

  With those reflexes of his, it only took him the briefest of looks back to know it was better to simply y down, allowing the X to travel harmlessly above him. The position was perfect for Nukir to…

  “—!?”

  … or not, as right after teleporting to the best possible position, she found herself briefly blinded by orange light and hit by something heavy, yet fast. He had just read her like a book.

  The intense heat came in second to the blow itself, which despite being mostly blocked by her hand, was enough to push her several meters toward a smaller car. Her nding cracked the windshield like a spiderweb and the arm was downright insufferable to hear at point-bnk. By far, the worst part of the whole experience.

  Damn it, I’m rushing into this way too much!

  It definitely was not the first time she had let herself get carried away with excitement, but that also meant she was used to bouncing back from such errors. No one made it past her unless she let them.

  Nukir caught him in her sight once more, running away just like before. He clearly did not want to fight her, which infuriated her to no end, but she swallowed her anger and decided to chase instead. On her own two legs this time.

  Nemesis was fast for sure, but the battle going on between her companions and Last Empire was an obstacle he could not ignore. Bsts from both sides nded across the parking lot they fought in, cutting him off every so often and forcing him to change directions frequently.

  Of course, Nukir was not immune to such a minefield of a battleground, but she was much better suited to it. Shooting her own prana out created many escape routes for whenever an attack came dangerously close, while also allowing her to keep closing the gap. In less than a minute, she was a mere three meters away from her quarry.

  Clearly aware of his options running out, he made use of his next turn to unch an arc of orange light from his arm, a sshing projectile too low to the ground to slide past, but also too high to simply stride over.

  The only two options were to jump, slowing down her momentum and allowing him to create more distance, or to counterattack. Nukir chose the tter without hesitation, shooting a simir prana wave of her own, only aligned vertically rather than horizontally.

  The csh of pink and orange was extremely brief, with the orange ssh cutting through her prana quite cleanly. Just as Nukir wanted.

  Nemesis’ only visible eye went wide in shock as he saw her teleport high into the air, where one part of her prana ssh continued to travel, then down to the ground right after, where the much smaller second part followed along.

  He attacked then, but had his hand cleanly hit out of the way by the back of Nukir’s own.

  Reflex alone makes you so predictable!

  His warm neck shivered as she grabbed it tightly, then smashed him against the wall by the nearby alley. At first, Nemesis kicked at her and gripped her arm to try and break free, but the pink sparks that soon surrounded it were enough to deter any further attempts.

  He was at Nukir’s mercy now, and he knew it. Which was…

  “Is that all, really?”

  … rather disappointing. Sure, he had not even tried to fight her directly, but this was still a tad too easy. Was he really the one who defeated the Violet Thorn?

  Nukir’s ruby red eyes narrowed as she tightened her grip on his neck, raising her free arm and enveloping it in lightning-like pink prana.

  “Come on, show me more! Moving here was super annoying, so I’ve half a mind to just—”

  But before she could even finish one threat out of the many she had thought of, she was forced to jump away from the inferno.

  Enormous, raging fmes swept in between Nukir and Nemesis, as if a lethal river with the sole intention of keeping her at bay. But the strange part was neither their intensity nor their timing, but rather their color.

  A dazzling, beautiful silver that no fire should have.

  “Don’t mind me. Feel free to finish that sentence. Just what do you pn to do to him?”

  Calm, deliberate footsteps, as if the owner of this new voice wanted to be heard. Nukir’s brow furrowed, intensifying the crackling of the prana on her left arm as she turned around to meet them.

  The approaching woman was rather tall, around Nemesis’ own height or maybe just a tad shorter. Her hair was a brown vivid enough to be clearly apparent even after the fmes died down and darkness returned, tied into an eborate crown braid. Her arms were crossed with both hands covered in bck gloves, which coupled with her rubber-tipped boots, dark jeans and a leather jacket much like Nukir’s own, gave off the impression of an old-school biker.

  Most strikingly, her face was hidden behind an eborate mask of the sort Nukir had probably seen in movies, polished gray with the lower half sculpted to look a fanged maw. Only a small triangur opening, like one left after cutting out a slice of pie, revealed anything about the person behind it, in the form of a right eye in pristine turquoise.

  The st in particur shocked Nukir like a spsh of cold water, but she did not mind in the slightest.

  A second Nemesis, huh?

  In fact, it made her feral smile return in full force.

  “Nothing now, that’s for sure. I apologize, it seems I misunderstood things. The one I’ve been looking for seems to be you.”

  Everything made sense now, even after experiencing only one attack. If there was one person she could imagine kicking the Thorns out, it would have to be this woman.

  “Fine by me. Alpha, you can go on ahead. I’ll take care of her.”

  “Oh, so he’s Nemesis Alpha now? Then I guess you’d be Nemesis Bet—”

  Another silver fsh darted through the darkness, superheating the air in its path to a degree that was downright visible. Despite dodging it, Nukir was so surprised that she could not avoid whistling in relief.

  “That’s Omega for you.”

  Now that was just adorable. To say such a thing, after almost charring her head right off…

  This is going to be the best!

  Edmond wasted no time as soon as he noticed the elf’s attention leaving him entirely, rushing off no matter how pitiful his form might look until he could catch his breath.

  Damn it, that’s some grip! I don’t think she was trying to choke me, but still…

  As the light-headed feeling gradually left him, he turned around toward the light show that had already begun. An exceedingly dangerous move when Shadow Spot and Last Empire members were still viciously fighting so close by, but if it was just one second to check…

  Okay, never mind. Both the elf and Tatyana herself were now barely visible behind the curtain of fmes and lightning, their cshes raising the nearby temperature massively and turning the few hapless cars that had been parked nearby into exploding, molten scraps.

  Some of those ferocious attacks almost reached Edmond, but his main concern was Tatyana, and she… seemed to be doing just fine. Whether against the elf’s destructive force or her terrifyingly quick teleports, she was at least not falling behind.

  He could trust her… no, he should trust her. She had earned at least that, but still…

  When did the Shadow Spot get someone like her!?

  … things were changing so fast, that he could not help but worry. The lightning woman’s manner of dress was strange enough by Shadow Spot standards, but it was her abilities that convinced him of her being a new addition to their ranks, and she probably would not be the st.

  Ever since the Violet Thorn’s defeat and capture, their territory and resources had become ripe for the taking by the remaining two of Seyfelt’s top gangs. As expected, their activities had become far more aggressive than before as they refused to give an inch, and with both groups being rger than their presence in Seyfelt alone, they were receiving unprecedented amounts of support from outside.

  Shadow Spot had brought in a new member who could seemingly fight Tatyana on equal terms, while Last Empire had unveiled no less than five new pieces of experimental technology in the st three weeks. That was just for what Edmond himself had seen, and just thinking about what he was still in the dark about made him shiver.

  But they were not helpless, and tonight was an opportunity to deal some good damage back. Stopping grunt after grunt during their regur, street-level activities was a mostly fruitless effort on its own, but the information that could be obtained was the real prize. Not because those grunts knew that much, but they often answered to someone who knew more, that person would in turn be linked to someone even higher up, and so on.

  Of course, taking on people who knew important things carried the most risk, but the recent help of Tatyana, Cude and even Kloel had been a game-changer on Edmond’s own end. Never before had he managed to find one of Last Empire’s distribution centers, let alone before they could even deliver the newest tech!

  This was an attack that could make a real difference, and while the interference of Shadow Spot people had certainly made things a lot more problematic, it was nothing he could not handle… with Tatyana’s help on the field.

  She’s going to be so smug when we’re done here…

  He could picture her face so well that he may as well be seeing it right in front of him, but somehow it only made him smile.

  Besides having to dodge bits and pieces of sheer destruction from the nearby battles, Edmond had a mostly clear path to the building Last Empire had been using to gather their new prototypes. He had not seen anyone coming out since the fighting started, but looking up at its torn windows still unsettled him a tad.

  Why had those Empire members been shot out so violently? Edmond’s first thought was that maybe a Shadow Spot insider had started the whole offensive, but that did not fully make sense considering the focus of the three outside. They were not even trying to approach the building yet.

  Maybe one or more pieces of equipment had malfunctioned and misfired? Perhaps. With the technology Last Empire prioritized being experimental and not avaible to the public, usually acquired via their own research and development or the bckest of markets, safety and consistency was very often a secondary priority.

  Whatever the reason was, Edmond had to tread lightly and prepare for the worst. He took a deep breath, focused prana on his legs, then jumped toward the window’s edge.

  The sharp pieces of gss that remained failed to leave a dent on his suit’s gauntlets, allowing him to pull himself up without any discomfort. Only peeking with his head at first, Edmond peered into the building’s second floor for any signs of danger.

  He found no signs of life while at it, without any Empire members visible within the sooty and cracked room. Most of the lights had been destroyed, mattresses were turned into charred shreds, and half of one wall had completely colpsed.

  Just what happened here?

  Had it really been a misfire? Why in a room that was clearly for the members to sleep in, then?

  There was no danger to be seen, but Edmond could not shake off a really bad feeling that just taken ahold of him. Still, he forced himself up and through the window, stepping into the dusty floor that had once probably been a very clean white.

  Trying his best to ignore the loud battles outside and focusing on whatever was inside the building, he advanced with slow, careful steps. At least all that noise would help mask his own… right?

  Edmond shook his head, trying to get rid of useless worries as he readjusted his suit reflexively.

  Wildcard had taken it to the warehouse where she had held Tatyana and him captive, and Kloel had recovered it after her battle with Phantom. Compared to what it had taken during his embarrassing loss against the Thorns, a colpsed building was honestly pretty tame, but even after some fixes Edmond was starting to think it might reach the end of its useful days soon.

  Better than no protection, I guess…

  Only the likes of Tatyana could feel comfortable fighting these people in a normal outfit and mask, but it was becoming increasingly apparent that neither him nor Kloel would ever manage to convince her against it.

  In the end, the best way to keep everyone safe was to just wrap everything up as quickly and effectively as possible. Not wanting to make that more difficult by revealing his presence, Edmond held back a sigh of frustration and pressed onward.

  Despite all that had happened, there were people still present in the building. He could hear their voices, even if barely due to both the noise of the battles as well as his distance from them. The building itself was extremely average in its structure, barely modified for Last Empire’s purposes, so it was not too difficult to guess where they were coming from.

  There was a hallway right outside the ‘bedroom’, opening the way to three different directions. The restrooms were to the left, going off the symbols atop the doors, down the center there were so many doors that Edmond could only imagine they each led to a different testing area, while on the right he saw the stairs leading to the floor above, as well as to the ground level.

  He walked down the center, tentatively touching the wall beside each door and hearing the voices more closely after each second. Upon reaching the sixth door, Edmond knew he was in the right pce. Having found all the traps and security measures disabled, he did not hesitate to open it and enter.

  He never could have expected what he saw within.

  “What the…?”

  The voices were still unclear, but not due to distance this time. Judging from their access rings, these five people were Last Empire members, all shackled to the walls of the rather spacious experiment room. Their bindings were nearly solid, almost metallic in nature, but the way they shifted like an unstable screen image made Edmond think of a spell instead.

  Locked on top around their arms and torsos, on the bottom around their legs off the ground, even their eyes and mouths were covered as they shivered, understandably uneasy about the new arrival they knew nothing about.

  Edmond decided to ignore them for now, not only because they could cause no problems in such a state, but also because there was another door further into the room. One that had been blown right off its hinge, in as many pieces as most of the other equipment in the room.

  He ventured onward, toward a strange light at the very end. It continued to dim on each of his steps, condensing into a smaller form, shaped like a person. When he reached the next room, a big dead end except for the window in front, the light had died down and he could see everything very clearly.

  A person he could not identify in any meaningful way, whether age or sex, due to the yered suit covering the entirety of their body. Most of it consisted of glossy dark blue ptes, linked by a more organic-looking, shifting silvery mesh underneath that was mostly present around the joints. The color scheme was broken by the dark gray pting on its gauntlets and boots, albeit those in turn gave way to glowing, vein-like linings of a simir silver color.

  But most striking of all was the helmet, electric purple in color and reaching all the way down into the back, stopping right above the abdomen. As they turned around, Edmond got to see the vaguely Y-shaped visor lit up in cyan, as well as the chest piece linked to the helmet just like the back.

  In a different situation, he could have felt envious of such a spectacur armor, remembering the extremely brief time his own had before being ruined. His priorities were elsewhere, however.

  “Do I have you to thank for what happened back there?”

  Edmond asked casually. If the Empire people outside were anything to go by, the strange figure and him shared at least one enemy.

  With them still here, I’d much rather not fight…

  The almost-cyborg tilted over slightly, hand to their hip in a stretch back, then straightened up as they replied.

  “No need. They just had something I wanted and didn’t want to part with it.”

  Their voice was as unidentifiable as their looks, altered by a myriad of filters that miraculously did not make it much harder to understand.

  “Was it the suit?”

  “You know it. Quite fancy, eh? Makes a lot of things easier for me, but depriving Last Empire of it is a nice bonus.”

  Makes things easier… What things, though? Edmond’s eyes narrowed warily, unsure of how dangerous the suit could be.

  “I take it you’re Shadow Spot, then?”

  Laughter, or perhaps more of a chuckle. One that sounded oddly natural despite the modifications to their voice.

  “You think too highly of me, Mr. Nemesis. I’m just like you, a lonesome reject still trying to find my way in this crazy, topsy-turvy world.”

  … It really was taking him some time to get used to the whole ‘Nemesis’ thing, the name having become rather popur seemingly overnight after the Violet Thorn disaster, but ‘reject’?

  That was just rude, for no reason.

  “… What should I call you, then?”

  “I’ve been liking Lord Titor.”

  Quick. Really quick, in fact. Was Edmond the weird one for starting out without even thinking of a fake name? It would expin a little of how fast ‘Nemesis’ caught on.

  “Okay then, Titor—”

  “No, not like that. Lord Titor. The ‘Lord’ is very important.”

  “…”

  Well… maybe he was weird, but there was no way he was as weird as this ‘Lord’.

  Edmond sighed, then spoke up again while gauging the abundance and consistency of the nearby prana. Unsurprisingly for a facility that developed and tested such technology, he had nothing to compin about as a sorcerer, though the power was gradually thinning out.

  The broken window had probably compromised the controlled environment, if he had to guess. Nonetheless, it was more than acceptable.

  “Alright, Lord Titor. I appreciate you taking care of the violent part before I came here, but I’ll still need you to leave that suit and whatever else you’ve taken from the Empire behind.”

  His helmet-covered head tilted just a tad, almost imperceptibly. Edmond was beginning to worry more and more that he could not read anything at all about this person.

  “Really? Come on, isn’t it better for everyone if these guys lose their technology?”

  Even his voice, natural and human as it was, gave him nothing to work with. Edmond breathed in slowly, then exhaled in an attempt to keep calm.

  “Yeah, that’s true, but I don’t know you at all. As far as I’m aware, you’re a solo criminal who’ll do something just as bad with that tech.”

  “Now that’s way too harsh. What if I said I’m a cop? You really want to interfere with the w?”

  Lord Titor replied quite casually, despite the severity of Edmond’s words. Was he not even trying to make the lie believable?

  “Lots of cops aren’t wful at all, and even for those who are, it doesn’t mean they’re good people.” Edmond said with a slightly harsher voice than he intended, then quickly tried to rectify. “Still, Seyfelt’s department has done well as long as I’ve been here. Show me your ID and I’ll leave you be.”

  Would he try to go for the ‘undercover’ excuse now? It would not be a bad choice at all, making Edmond’s request for identification useless. But after implying to be a police officer already, was there even a reason to refuse him?

  Calling any given situation a ‘checkmate’ was just asking for a turnaround, but Edmond did not think he could have done much better, which made Lord Titor’s nearly immediate response all the more unsettling.

  “Fine, fine, you got me; I’m not w enforcement or anything noble. This suit? All for my own dastardly deeds, yep.”

  Even if his choice in words was frustratingly nonchant, to say the least. Edmond tried to move past his annoyance and brought a hand to the sheathed, gamma-css shortsword buckled by his waist. He did not pull it out just yet, but readied himself for the worst.

  “Got it… Well then, leave the suit behind, as well as anything else you’ve stolen. If you do, I won’t have to tell anyone about you being here.”

  “Oh, but you misunderstand, Nemesis…”

  Lord Titor raised his left hand, causing Edmond to twitch before he even felt the prana gathering around it.

  It shone a royal blue before drifting away from him, and toward Edmond himself. A sheathed gamma-css weapon would probably not be very effective at countering a spell, so he responded as quickly as he could with a counter-shot.

  A rapid, simirly-sized bullet of orange light darted far quicker, and when they cshed—

  —gnashed his teeth, purple and red invading his view.

  Edmond swung his shortsword faster than he could ever remember, while his legs appeared to tear from his own rushing pace. He tried to use the sturdiness of the crystal to his advantage, bouncing off his blocks and parries to move faster and more unpredictably, but there was only so much that could do for him.

  A deeper gash was left on his shoulder, so dangerously close to his neck, while his waist was cut on both sides. Worst of all was still the ssh at his thigh, compounding onto the pain of his broken femur and making him see pure white.

  He would not make it. That much was clear now that the next spike pierced right through his shoulder.

  After that, with his body locked in pce for just one second, the rest was a foregone conclusion. Left knee, right thigh, left hand, ribcage, upper back… Normally, Edmond would have been surprised he could identify all the spots he had been stabbed through, despite a pain intense enough to wipe his mind of nearly any other thought.

  That ‘nearly’ was the key, though. For even after being impaled beyond the point of survival, let alone movement, his eyes and thoughts remained only upon Hellbound’s hand.

  One that held a bloodied, broken Tatyana, her eyes empty and her throat without a voice, as more red tainted the violet crystal that had just split her into—

  —He fell to his hands and knees. Edmond shivered as if lost in the coldest tundra, dripping as much sweat as during his most intense training.

  “… I don’t mind the fame.”

  That voice. Lord Titor.

  Yes, he had been confronting a criminal he had never seen before, who called himself that. He countered his attack, and the floor… was that from a Last Empire supply center, not… Hellbound’s…

  Edmond tried to stand up, but could not bring himself to. His body simply refused his will, and even his attempts to merely stop shaking.

  The most he could do was to slowly bring his head up, blinking away traces of tears to reveal the image of Lord Titor.

  “Wh-What… What even… are you…?”

  His voice a mix of both fury and dread, Edmond only trembled more as he saw the almost robotic visage approaching. Hearing step after echoing step, he became more unsure about what emotion dominated.

  “I told you already, didn’t I? I’m just—”

  Light filled the room before he was done speaking. Coming from outside, and only visible through the window behind Lord Titor at first, he did not react until the room itself shone in roughly equal parts pink and silver.

  Accompanied by enough force to shatter the window and its surrounding wall, Lord Titor barely managed to turn around before being swallowed by the almost blinding light. But within it, Edmond saw something that forced him to stand up.

  It appeared like even if his body would not obey his commands, reflex was enough to make him react and at least try to catch her.

  “—Shit, fuck!”

  Tatyana flew into him at such a speed he lost his footing immediately, knocking him down to the floor as he slid all the way to the door in the previous room.

  Having closed his eyes due to the air being knocked out of him, Edmond opened them in sudden panic as he realized what may have just happened. The Empire members… were still trapped, and squirming in an even greater panic than before, but they were unharmed.

  The damage from the explosion had luckily been contained to the room he had confronted Lord Titor in. Still, he could not even rex his breathing until he looked down and…

  “Tat—”

  “Omega… I said it before, no? With that girl… Damn it, that girl is something else. I thought I could just brute force her but— W-Wait, what the fuck!?”

  … saw Tatyana in one piece, angry about something as usual. She was not unharmed, but her body was whole, and she had already begun to stand back up before she was done speaking.

  The only reason she could not was that Edmond had wrapped his arms around her by pure instinct, embracing her tightly as he felt the shivering of his body starting to settle down.

  She’s alive… she’s here… she’s not all…

  Feeling her warm and slightly sweaty body so close to him, awkwardly shifting as if unsure whether to pull back or push him away, he found himself increasingly able to bear with what he had just seen. Still, that harrowing image clung to his mind relentlessly, to the point he did not know whether he would ever forget it.

  “… Can I at least get some context here? Especially about all these people; I’m kind of freaking out here.”

  Her voice by his ear had quite a different effect, reminding him of the full extent of their current situation. Not just that he had hugged her without any sort of warning, but also that they were right in the middle of a very dangerous undertaking.

  Edmond pulled away from Tatyana about as suddenly as he had embraced her, almost like she was burning him.

  “I-I’m so, so sorry. It’s just… this guy, this Lord Titor creep…”

  “‘Lord’ Titor? Okay, these names are going too far.”

  What did he even do, though? Illusion sorcery? It was not unheard of, albeit it was definitely on the higher end of spell complexity. Still, Edmond somehow thought that it felt too… real for it to be a mere mirage.

  Not because of the crity of the sight, nor due to the way in which all the sounds reverberated into his ears, or even the pain he felt all over his body. Rather, it was the fact that it felt like… a memory, more than anything else. As if he had been fighting Hellbound for the first time ‘again’, without even thinking there was anything wrong.

  Could illusion sorcery really do something like that? He had never heard of…

  … Wait. Where is he now!?

  Edmond turned his eyes past Tatyana in a panic, toward the next room. If both she and him had endured the sudden destruction without much of an issue, was there even a chance for a guy like that to be down and out?

  “What’s even the ‘Lord’ thing about? So cocky… Wait, what’s the matter now!?”

  No way. Without saying anything else, Edmond ran past Tatyana and toward the room where everything had gone wrong, and what he saw…

  “… Damn it.”

  … was nothing. Not a single trace of either Lord Titor, the suit he had worn, or of any other technology he may have stolen from Last Empire.

  Even when considering an escape, Edmond expected him to at least open another hole into one of the walls to the sides and exiting through there, but that was not the case either. As ridiculous as the idea sounded in his head, it seemed like he had escaped out of the same opening that Tatyana had been flung through.

  “Look, I’m trying to be patient here but not getting any answers is just making me feel… Huh, the cops are here already? They’re getting faster.”

  Let alone her approach, Edmond did not even notice the bring sirens or the patrol beacons until Tatyana mentioned them. Indeed, their call had been answered sooner than the recent usual, but still…

  They’re too te. No way they’ll find him now.

  “Lucky bitch, I was so ready to pay her back tenfold. Anyway, we should get going… Hey? Look, Edm—Dude!”

  When Tatyana pced a hand on his shoulder, forcing him to turn around, he felt surprise akin to waking up to a cold water bucket.

  “I can tell something huge happened here, but we need to get going, okay? After that, we can all deal with it!”

  Her words were as powerful as ever, and her grip nearly painful. Frustration was obvious in her voice, but so was her concern. Despite him not meaning to do so, keeping her in the dark about what had just happened was clearly not helping anyone.

  She was right that they needed to leave before the police saw them, and considering all they had done in the st few weeks, her offer to help out was meaningful. But if it meant her getting more involved after what he had been made to see…

  “… Got it. I’ll tell you everything when we get back, then.”

  … it was a risk they would just have to take. Regardless of the strange powers Lord Titor showed, Tatyana had already proven beyond a shadow of a doubt how capable she was, and Cude and Kloel were no different. They all made a team far stronger than he could ever be on his own.

  That would never happen, no matter what.