“Hey, you aren’t busy, so come with me to get some coffee in an hour! I’ll meet you at the entrance!”
Priska looked up from her paperwork as Ceriena slid past her door and went to the building’s entrance. The paperwork Priska had to deal with was actually just her bills since there was very little to do at the office.
The only things on her desk were the bills, a laptop, and some other files. It was basically void of all fun, save for the laptop with some decals on it. The other files were mainly just organizations that she had disabled or crippled in the past. Nothing too extraordinary.
Priska was friends with Ceriena, but she didn’t like coffee and how many times Ceriena asked her to hang out at a nearby cafe. The bitterness of coffee was something that Priska absolutely hated and, whenever they went out, she usually got hot cocoa or a milkshake if they had it.
She looked back to her bills and started to work on them once again.
Ceriena was a mix of half Wind Nymph and half Fire Nymph. Her specialty was throwing weapons and she had joined the sector a year ago. She was quite friendly with others and almost everyone in the office was her friend. There were some, like her manager, who don’t quite get along with her.
After an hour, Priska went downstairs to meet up with Ceriena who was reading something on her phone. She looked up and grinned as she placed her phone in her purse.
“So, shall we head out now?”
“Sure. Where to this time?”
The pair started to walk through the double doors and Ceriena made a left when they reached the sidewalk.
“It’s a place called the Inu Cafe. They named it that since the owner has a dog that gets along well with customers…”
Another slightly annoying aspect of Ceriena was that she liked to elaborate on subjects that most people wouldn’t care or even think about. Although, she would also usually stop talking if she noticed that the one she was talking to was not focusing on her. In this case…
“Huh? Oh, you looking at the pet shop again?”
Priska had turned her head to look across the street to find the small pet store that had always been there. It had all sorts of pets now, not just cats and dogs, and was now a chain store.
“Yeah.”
She spoke without focusing on what she really was saying. She was more focused on the cute animals that slept in the store.
Ceriena tapped her chin a couple times before asking her a question.
“Cats or dogs? Which, of the two, do you like more?”
They kept walking as Priska started to ponder the subject. She did like dogs as they were playful and energetic, but she also liked cats since they were fluffy and were lazy.
“If I had to pick… Cats. They are fluffy, can catch mice, and won’t track mud into your apartment.”
“Oh. Was it “that time”?”
“Yes.”
Priska shivered as she remembered the time when she was taking on three part time jobs at the same time. For one of them, she was a dog walker and she had been doing it for only a couple days before the “incident” that made her change her mind.
There was a dog who was quite large with the name Pups. The owner had wanted to thank her for taking him on some walks while he was gone and brought Pups over to her apartment. The owner gave her a box full of cookies and she thanked him before saying goodbye. Mere moments after they had left, she realized that the area around her front door was covered in mud and filth and it took several days to clean.
The two of them approached the cafe after a few more minutes and a waiter seated them. Both of the two women were single, but only one of them was looking for a man. The second the waiter left the table, Ceriena leaned in and spoke in a soft tone.
“Don’t you think he was hot?”
She spoke while still eyeing him up. Priska just sighed and picked up the drink menu. This was another thing she had to deal with when around her. She could get a guy easily with her looks and charm, but she eventually got dumped due to her terrible manners and habits.
“Did your last boyfriend dump you?”
Ceriena sighed deeply while leaning back in her chair and looking upwards towards the sky. The area they were seated in was outdoors, in a slightly fenced off area with half of it covered by the overhang. Currently, Priska was in the shade while Ceriena was seated in the sun.
“I’ll take that as a “yes” then. Wait, wasn’t that one the punk?”
“No, that was the one before this one. This one was the smart-ass.”
“Ah.”
They were silent for a while until the waiter came back to receive their orders. And, being the woman desperate to not be single once again, Ceriena tried to give a pick-up line.
“Anything you want to drink?”
“I’ll have you.”
Priska sighed, shook her head, and face palmed. That was easily one of the worst ways to give a pick-up line that she heard in her life.
“She’ll have a black coffee, no sugar, and I take a triple chocolate sundae. Sorry for my friend.”
“N-not at all!”
The waiter wrote down their orders and bowed. His face was flushed red, but not because of the awful pick-up line Ceriena gave. No, it was because he had a look at Priska close up. She was actually voted Most Beautiful Person in the office, ergo more beautiful than Ceriena.
Since Ceriena was half Wind and half Fire Nymph, she had both white and redish pink hair. Her hair was basically snow white with four streaks of hot pink, two on either side. One of her eyes was slightly glowing red and the other glowed a pale white color, but both were a shade of dark pink.
Priska was a whole head and shoulder taller than her, but she was only a little less than the average height of most females, not including races who were inherently small. Her hair was on the long side, but was usually tied up in a single, large braid that went over her right shoulder.
The clothes she wore now were casual clothes: a light blue blouse with frilly edges, an open jacket that went down to just above her hips, and some shoes that had heels to them. Her blouse was enough to cover down to just above her knees and, if needed, she could still run. Underneath, there were usually several different assortments of throwing weapons as that was her speacialty.
“Rude!”
Ceriena pouted at having lost her chance at her 32nd boyfriend.
“He was probably going to dump you in about a week.”
Priska was actually wrong about that. If he had gone out with Ceriena, he would have dumped her in less than three days. Truthfully, she was saving her from another heartbreak.
“Anyways, did you hear that one of the managers in getting married!? Lucky bastard!!”
She bit her thumb as she spoke, still pissed off about the missed opportunity, but trying to move on.
“Oh, who is it?”
“The manager of Mixu, Ryin, is! Oh, and get this, he-”
Her sentence was cut short by a scream. It had come from the inside of the cafe and, when the two of them looked, it was a waitress who had fallen on her rear.
She had to have fallen for a reason; that reason being that there was a gun pointed towards her. Several people in the cafe gasped as they saw this and most of them either hid in their booths or escaped the cafe. Some were even calling the police.
The gun was a double barrel shotgun with a drum magazine and red laser sight on the underside of the right barrel. The barrel itself was glowing red and, if one dared to look, the shell inside the gun glowed an intense shade of light red.
The man holding the gun was wearing a balaclava with tinted black goggles on and no mouth hole. There were, however, holes for the two horns that were emerging from his head that were black in color.
Behind him, there was a woman and another man dressed in the same mask with each of them wearing the same white blazer with red outlines. They all wore jeans with pistol holsters on them as well. However, they each held different primary firearms.
Ceriena leaned in towards Priska once again.
“This is the part where they start cursing loudly, right?”
And, as if that was an order, the three people with guns started to shout.
“Get on the fucking ground and fill this bag with cash!! If you don’t fill the goddamn bag with all the money you have, we will start blasting you fucks into the ground!!!”
The man who was yelling gave another waitress a duffel bag and pointed his gun at the girl on the ground. The other two were shouting cusses at the other customers and binding them with zip ties.
Ceriena looked down to find the waiter that she had hit on earlier was trying to hide behind their table. She made a disgusted face at the person and reached down… to pick up her cup of coffee. He had both of their drinks and was about to give it to the two of them when the masked people came in the cafe.
Ceriena watched the scene unfold as she took a long sip of her coffee. She wasn’t really concerned about dying herself as the only things that could kill her was an excessive amount of liquid nitrogen or powerful magical attacks.
Priska quickly took her sundae from the tray as it was starting to slip. She plopped it down in front of her and started to nibble on a brownie. Similarly to Ceriena, not many things could kill her, but not because she had very little weaknesses, it was because of how she would react in the situation that would keep her alive.
She looked back at the situation and Ceriena started to speak.
“You gonna help out or something?”
“Why don’t you do something first? You’re the one who pointed out the problem.”
“Well, if I’m not getting paid, I’m not doing jack.”
“Mmmm.”
Priska did want to help out, but she knew the police were already on the way. They have been able to arrest criminals more quickly in the past few decades and they even had access to multitudes of different technologies that helped out in trials, cases, and even some detective work.
“Huh?”
The female robber looked at Priska and glared. Some people disliked Priska by how naturally pretty she looked and, like many others, the female robber also disliked her and decided it was a good idea to point her assault rifle at Priska.
“You! Get you and your friend and that pasty fellow over here now!! Also!”
She walked up and snatched Priska’s sundae from the table. She started to turned the glass over to pour it into her mouth when Priska attacked.
If anyone at the office had learned anything about Priska, it was to, one, not mess with her stuffed animals and, two, do not, ever, take her sweets. Ceriena went wide-eyed as she knew what was about to come.
As fast as lightning, Priska did five different actions in such a small time frame. First of all, she punched the robber in the face, their blood trailing through the air. Then she used the glass and scooped up the sundae before it was tainted by either the ground or the robber. With one swift move, she placed the glass on the table once again and looked at the female robber.
She loomed over the robber as if she were Death incarnate and held her leg up high. She swung it downwards in an axe kick and crushed her lower abdomen. Then, soon after removing her foot, she picked her up by the scruff of her collar and literally threw her outside the cafe and she hit a car and dented it.
There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that she was dead now. The kick would have crushed her internal organs and made her bleed internally. The punch to the face caused her to have a bloody nose and her jaw was also now dislocated. Lastly, after hitting the car that was parked on the side of the street, she bleeding from every orifice on her face and twenty seven different bones, including some areas of the spinal column and skull, were not just broken, but turned into powder.
The cars in 2096 were made of a new material that could withstand trees falling on them and some lower caliber bullets. They were near indestructible, but this one was now dented.
However, with all the reinforcement of the cars came the new safety systems which prevented most collisions and stopped people from hurting others.
Unfortunately, cars still didn’t move to not be hit by people flying through the air. From across the street, everyone could hear an audible scream.
“My car!!!”
The person who screamed that crumpled to their knees and began to weep as that car had been recently bought with their own hard earned money.
“Oh, uh. Sorry!”
Priska cupped her hands around her mouth to shout at the person. She had unintentionally broke someone’s car. What she had truly meant to do was throw the person across the street and into the concrete building which would have shattered their bones as well.
Both civilians and robbers stepped back in unison as they witnessed monstrous power. Priska looked back at the two robbers and took a step forward. They stepped back. When she took a step to the side, she noticed that the customers started to squirm and tried to move out of her path.
“Ohhhh. I get it. You guys are afraid of me because I… might’ve killed one of your friends? Anyways, I’m gonna go back and finish my sundae. If you bother me while I’m eating it, I’ll do ya in worse than the first one.”
Her tone took on a cold tone in the end and everyone nodded. They were all pale as ghosts as they realized she only killed the person due to a petty reason. However, she had spent her own money on the sundae and was not happy when someone threatened or tried to eat it.
Turning back around, she saw the waiter crawling on all fours towards the exit. Priska briskly moved back to her seat outside after opening the door and sat back down.
“Phew! One disturbance removed!”
She reached for one of the spoons already set on the table and started to eat. Ceriena sighed and looked back to the robbers as she drank her coffee.
“Mmmm! This tastes good!”
Priska spoke as gunshots filled the air. The silence was broken and, on the ground, lay a dead waiter. He had tried to reach the entrance to escape, but he was caught and shot. It had taken just one shell from the shotgun and his organs littered the ground.
People screamed as Priska and Ceriena both enjoyed their orders. While Ceriena was crossing another potential boyfriend off the list, Priska was focusing solely on the dessert in front of her. She tuned out the sounds of gunshots and screaming as she took another bite of ice cream.
Since both of these mercenaries were not being paid nor was there any other benefit, they were not taking care of the robbers. They usually let the police earn their pay by doing so and regular criminals were basically small fry for them.
As soon as the other two robbers quieted everyone, save for Ceriena and Priska, with duct tape, they could hear sirens wailing from down the street. The police had come when a person called to announce that someone had shot someone and another had damaged his car.
Drones were already on the scene and were covered in illusion magic that made they basically invisible. They were weak, but they displayed live images of the scene and could easily sneak into places. Of course, magic users were able to see a thin outline if they looked closely enough, but most robbers did not. Instead, they focused on the police surrounding them or the hostages.
In the current group of two people, only one of them could use magic, since the female who died could also use it, and he was more focused on the waitress putting the money in the bag. She was about halfway done and needed to fill it with some more bills.
“Hurry up! Those cops are almost here!”
He shouted at her while waving the muzzle of the shotgun at her face. Tears streamed down her face as she complied with their request.
“Quiet!! I can’t fucking hear myself think with all your wailing!”
The other robber yelled at the hostages that were zip tied and dropped into a pile of people. What had instigated the shouting was the fact that he had kicked the dead waiter to the side of the cafe so that it would be easier for the two of them to escape.
Then the robber managing the hostages put his hand to his ear. He was receiving a call via earpiece. He said “yes” and “okay” several times before ending the call with a “got it”. Turning towards the other robber, he started to speak.
“He’s almost here. We have to hold out for a minute more. I’ll hold off the cops and you focus on the money, alright?”
“Yeah.”
Both of them nodded before turning to complete their tasks. The one with the shotgun kept urging the waitress to put the cash in more quickly while the other ripped a table out from the ground and turned it on its side to act as a barricade.
He crouched down and placed his rifle on it to steady his aim. He pulled on the bolt and readied his gun that was pointed down the street.
A police car came screeching around the corner and the man fired. The bullet rotated through the air and penetrated the windows of the cafe first. Then it sped through the air and hit the police car window.
The bullet wasn’t able to move through the glass, but it hit it with enough force to crack it. He fired repeatedly after that and struck the same place three times more. It seemed that he was a crack shot who was finally able to strike the person in the driver seat.
The vehicle then careened out of control and slammed into a fire hydrant on the side of the road. The car was now dented and the dead driver hung on the front windshield with glass impaling his organs. The officer in the passenger seat fumbled out of the wrecked vehicle and tried to crawl to safety.
The robber, not about to let anyone go other than Priska and Ceriena, shot the person in the head. Brain matter flew from the exit hole the bullet left behind. Then, in a single fluid motion, the shooter reloaded his gun and readied it.
“They’re quite loud, huh?”
Ceriena turned to look back into the cafe once more. She had finished her coffee and had set it aside. To her, this situation was more on the calm side and, to show that, she started to rest her chin in her hand.
Priska finished up the last of her dessert and picked up a napkin to wipe her mouth. She wasn’t a messy eater per say, but she did try to stuff more things in her mouth than she could chew. She looked at the scene again while sipping on the water she poured out for herself. At the table, there was a pitcher of cold water and several glass cups.
“Yeah. Well, I just got my paycheck, so…”
“Yeah, I know. Stuffed animals, right? You gonna get that Black Dragon plushie you’ve had on your mind?”
“Nn.”
Priska nodded as she got up. Ceriena sighed with a smile and took out her wallet. She place ten dollars on the table, partially underneath a water glass, and got up.
“Which place sells it again? Was it Puru Puru or Kosedyr?”
What she was referring to were the two main plushie stores that Priska plundered. Puru Puru was a Japanese branch that had a lot of anime and manga plushies and Kosedyr was a local store that sold plushies of mythical beasts. Actually, Kosedyr employees could always recognize Priska since she had bought things from their store since she was little, and always at least four at a time.
“It’s Kosedyr. I’ve already taken you there several times.”
The two of them left the cafe from the entrance as both the hostages and the robbers watched. They did not want to die at the hands of Priska and thus let them go. It was so much easier for them to just wait half a minute than to go toe to toe against her.
As they opened the door, three more police cars barreled down the street towards them with a helicopter overhead. They noticed that the two of them were leaving the cafe and they knew that they weren’t the enemy.
Every police officer in the city knew who was a part of the sector stationed there, at the very least just the eight mercenaries and assassins in the group, by memory. They were forced to learn who died and who replaced them because there would occasionally be powerful ones in that group and the police force would have a hard time stopping them. That and the fact that they were paid by and directly worked for the government.
These mercenaries were higher up on the food chain than the police and even some special forces units. Even after they retired, the mercs would sometimes go to work in more powerful positions.
Priska and Ceriena chatted to one another as they crossed the empty street to their right. The cafe was placed on a corner and the police had come from the front.
Suddenly, several more shots rang out and several more bullets hit the police officers. Two of them died, but they were both passengers in the cars. In response to the attack, the helicopter doors opened on either side and two very large guns came out.
The helicopters of 2096 used magical energy to maneuver around in the air and the blades of the helicopters had been taken off. More weaponry had been added and now there were several different types to deal with different situations.
One was for fires, another for emergency situations, another for recon, and three for criminals. Those three carried either missiles, EMPs that had a small blast radius, and energy weapons. The missiles were for heavily armored criminals, EMPs for car chases, and energy weapons for regular situations. This was a regular situation.
EMPs nowadays could affect cars and other vehicles due to the amount of electronics within the cars. If there was a vehicle that did not have electronics, then the police would use their secondary, the AGB, or the anti-gravity bomb.
This current helicopter was filled to the brim with energy weapons whose light pulsed in the shadows of the tall buildings. A moment passed, then the two guns started to fire off light blue rays of magic. While it was an “energy” gun, it actually ran on magical energy with bullets of pure mana which dissipated after a couple hours and caused no ecological harm.
The bullets passed through the windows of the cafe and started to hit the floors of the cafe. Some parts of the window were melting down and were almost a white red color. Every single shot was calculated so that it would not hit the civilians, but there were always some mistakes or things not taken into account.
One of those things was the sleek, black van that came out of the nearby alley and stopped in front of the cafe. Bullets bounced off of it and the two robbers entered the vehicle.
“Come on!!! We’ve got to go!!”
The leader of what used to be three people waved at the other guy to hurry. That person he was talking to was unclipping something.
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
“We can’t have anyone trace us back to this!!”
He threw the cylinder at the car that the female robber was still in. There were small lights on the side of the item that started to flash white. One flashed, then two. Three. Four. Fi-
Explosion! It rocked the whole block and dust flew into the air. What he had thrown was a plasma grenade that had a five second delay on it. However, instead of getting caught up in the dust and dirt, the van had already started to move and both robbers were in.
“Fuck!! You almost killed us!!”
The driver shouted back at them as he reached to the seat to his right. The two robbers had entered the vehicle through its sliding doors so that the passenger seat was empty. In the place of a person, there was a bag full of objects similar to the one the robber had thrown.
He pressed a button and dropped it on the road. It exploded and so did several parked cars. It helped them to escape… for now.
In the meantime, Priska was choosing a second stuffed animal to buy. In her arms was the Black Dragon plush that she had wanted. It was a one of a kind, limited item that was handmade from only Kosedyr. The shopkeeper actually made two of them, one for the customers and one for Priska, since she knew that she was going to buy one.
The cashier called to Priska since she and her friend were the only ones in the store at the moment. He swiftly opened the small gate, exited the checkout area, and moved over to where the two of them were.
“Thinking of getting the Nemean Lion or Eikthyrnir? I’d recommend getting Eikthyrnir, mostly because it is almost sold out.”
Priska looked back at the person and nodded. She placed the lion back on the shelf and walked up to the counter. The cashier, who Ceriena has tried to hit on several times, rung up the items and she paid with her credit card.
Walking out of the store, she pulled the Black Dragon plush from the bag and looked at it. The craftsmanship was amazing and it had many details on it. She hugged it and, after a couple seconds, looked at it again.
Ceriena had come out of the store and was busy on her phone. She was updating some of her social media accounts when she heard a loud gunshot.
Slowly, she looked up to see that Priska was bleeding. Her left shoulder had been shot clean through.
“Hey, are you al-”
She stopped. She noticed that Priska had gone rigid. Not because of the pain, but because of what Ceriena saw beyond her shoulder. She took a step back, then four more. She didn’t want to get in her way now.
“Y-you!”
Priska pointed at a black van speeding down the street. Several people were shooting the cops from it and one shot had obliterated the Black Dragon’s head.
She quietly and quickly placed the remainder in the bag and handed it to Ceriena. Tentatively, Ceriena asked her a question.
“You okay?”
Then she felt a burst of bloodlust flood from her friend. She started to transform into her Werewolf form and howled at the midday sun.
“I WILL MURDER THEM!!!”
She started to run at the van. Her speed was unmatched by the police cars as she sped down the road. She was running in the area in between the road and the sidewalk and had to sidestep multiple bikers.
“GET BACK HERE, YOU MOTHERFUCKERS!!!”
Every step plunged into the asphalt and made small indents whenever the tips of her toes touched the ground, since that was where the most pressure was applied. She started to bound on all fours to the point where she was several yards behind the car.
Several bikers that she ran past fell off their bikes due to the wind pressure surrounding her. The air rippled and the wind blew several objects all around. Ceriena watched as several people lost their coffee and sympathized with them mentally; she knew what it was like to lose coffee.
Police officers watched as she bounded down the street and was gradually speeding up. The helicopter above was now going slower than her and she was still going strong. By the time she reached the van, though,they had already passed several streets. They were nearing a large power plant that used magical energy.
The driver of the van stepped on the brakes and he came to a stop. All three people started to leave the van when Priska encountered them. They stood, face to face, with a dark grey werewolf that stood at a height that was much larger than them.
The two robbers stared in fear as they felt this same deady aura before. They had felt it in the cafe when their companion was getting the shit beaten out of her. The driver, however, pulled a pistol.
Shakily, he started to point it at the being and the lead robber saw him.
“If you-”
Too late. It was far too late to save his life as the gun was literally shredded before his eyes along with his hand. Then his left arm came off followed by a sound like a soft ball hitting the floor.
The second robber screamed in fear as he saw the driver’s head roll. He started to run, but he didn’t make it far.
Blood rose from the dead corpse of the driver and formed into a lance. It flew through the air, like a bullet, and pulverized him. He fell to the ground with a hole in his body. Organs spilled out and his heart that was partially destroyed had flopped out.
“Eep!”
The leader of the group turned to look at his two comrades before raising his hand in the air. Priska looked at him as he did so and she started to run towards him. He had been slowly creeping away and was several yards from her.
While she easily closed the gap, he was no longer there when she reached his space. Instead, he hopped upwards and grasped onto a ladder that had fallen from an overhead helicopter. The robbers had actually chosen this spot to enter their final getaway vehicle.
The helicopter moved upwards, out of her range, and the man started to climb the ladder. He only had one bag of money of the two that they divided it up in, but that was still a large amount of cash.
He turned back to see Priska turn into her original form and his eyes widened. He cupped one hand around his mouth and shouted at her.
“Why did you attack us just now?”
“Is it not obvious?! You mangled my stuffed animal!! I’ll murder you one day!”
The man looked at her like she was insane, then scoffed.
“As if you could find m-”
From the inside of her jacket, she pulled out a magnum. She usually had it with her, but due to babysitting duty, she didn’t bring it to the casino. The black and silver gun only had two enchantments, anti-regeneration and dispel magic.
“And that day is today!!!”
She pointed it at him as he tried to climb, but he was too slow. The helicopter pilot had no idea what was going on and kept trying to fly away.
A loud shot rang out, louder than the helicopter and far louder than the sirens of the police cars. The bullet was even faster. Before the robber could react to the sound, he was already shot.
His body froze up for a moment before falling to the ground and turning into paste. The money lay there, some of it soaked in blood. He had fallen about seven stories and now some of his bones were crushed into dust.
The police had already surrounded them, but there had been a barrier around the ladder and helicopter that didn’t allow regular bullets to hit. With the use of her gun, she was able to kill the man and stopped them from completing their heist.
Several officers shrunk back in fear as she looked at them. Then she looked at the bag of cash that had fallen to the ground.
“Can I get some compensation for this?”
She gestured to the mess behind her. She placed her magnum back into her jacket and started to get out her phone.
“Freeze!”
Some officers forgot the eight mercenaries in their city.
Priska looked up with eyes that froze the person in place due to how scary it was. He shakily cocked his gun that was pointing at her and fired off several shots.
However, those shots passed right through her. Since she was holding onto her phone, it also became ethereal and she could still touch and use it.
She looked back at the officer whose gun was taken away and glared. She slowly reached back into her jacket when the officer closest to her bowed.
“I am terribly sorry for my junior’s actions. Please, spare him! He is ignorant!”
Everything seemed to freeze as the police awaited her next move. They couldn’t actually charge her for murder because she had a license to kill. It was an ID that she had in her wallet that said she could kill those opposing herself.
Of course, for such IDs, there were proper procedures, even if they were weak. One rule was that if the user kills five or more people intentionally within the span of one month, they will be placed in prison. So far, she had a record of only killing three innocent people intentionally in her entire career as a mercenary. The previous record was only killing seven in one year, but she beat it with three in two years.
Actually, one of her coworkers had one of the worst reputations, with forty eight innocent deaths in one year. That person was Hiak, the close range gun wielder. He was also known as the partially insane one.
For most people, many of the kills were accidental and done with guns. The courts ruled them as intentional kills and decided that they were counted as innocent deaths. It was mainly the victims’ families who protested for this as the bodies were… quite decimated.
Priska was a close combat expert and focused mainly on the enemy and usually didn’t involve civilians in fights. Of course, there were those like Hiak who liked to kill those who got in their way. In fact, Hiak was one fifth of the reason why that law was instituted.
Even with all the bad reputation, Priska was friends with him because they both liked guns and blood. However, Priska liked blood for different reasons, mainly because it gave Vampires more life energy to live and they were also attracted to it. Even so, they were on friendly terms, but she never once went outside of the office with him.
At the present moment, the officer who fired at her was being crushed by the body of five officers who did not want to die. The officer in front of her was still bowing and was sweating bullets.
“Fine. Just make sure it doesn’t happen again. If it does… that’ll be my fourth innocent.”
Every officer gulped as she spoke. Then, once realizing that, if this doesn’t happen again, it was all fine and good, they all chuckled as if they escaped death.
While Priska was known as the Heavy Brawler, she still used the guns from her arsenal. All those who’ve seen it felt both awe and fear as they even saw weapons only sold on the black market.
Along with guns, she also had some explosives and melee weapons, but was still looking for a suitable trench knife. If someone had to give a ratio of weapons to other in her office, it would be one to one, but what most don’t know is that she has two more places where she stored weapons.
She bought a chest that could fit twenty items and only responds to the owner where she placed fifteen items so far. The other area was a fake wall in her closet where she placed only her most favorite guns.
If someone included all that, it would be more like four to one. However, only Priska knew about the other two places. Not even Beta IV knew about it, even when she brought in a chest small enough to fit under her desk or when she hired some guys to make a fake wall and install it. Although, she had her suspicions about the last one.
Priska started to walk away. Well, not really away from, but more like through the police. She stepped through the police cars and officers. Some felt weirded out while others tried to get out of her way, but ended up knocking themselves out with the cars.
On her way out, Priska was already texting Ceriena to pick her up. She wasn’t sure if they would, but she would like a nice, fat check sitting on her desk by the end of the day.
After a moment, she received a message from Ceriena.
It took her a moment to fully comprehend what she was saying because Priska only used some shortened words to text, like “plz” or “thx”. Ceriena was someone fluent in texting and social media while Priska was more… illiterate in those ways.
She could not find a more suitable answer than “yes” as she had no excuses. This time she ran after some guys to kill them. Before, she had climbed a building to take out some snipers. Another time, she got lost from the group in a mall and they found her in a toy shop looking at all the stuffed animals.
“Does that mean moment?”
He spoke to herself quietly as she read. She was walking down the road and knew that Ceriena was coming to pick her up. All the members of the sector had linked phone accounts and they could each find the GPS location of one another.
Back when Priska left, Ceriena waited until Priska had vanished from her line of sight and then started to move to the parking lot where her hot pink sports car was parked. Outfitted with many different gadgets and technologies, she was able to bring it almost everywhere, roads, water, gun fights, but not the sky. Technology had come far enough where cars could fly, but they were far too dangerous to be called safe.
It was a few minutes later that Ceriena picked up Priska from the sidewalk. Priska was sitting on a bench holding her shoulder. She slowly got up and made her way to the car.
Once she entered, Ceriena tried to comfort her because, by that point, Priska was sniffling due to the loss of the Black Dragon plush.
It was truly a sad event. There was only one other in the world, but it had been bought a week ago. Even if she wanted it, she didn’t have a license to steal, only spies had such rights and only for the benefit of the government.
“You okay? Here, let’s go get that wound treated first, then we can go back to the shop, alright?”
Priska nodded in silence, like a child who had just lost their toy. She started to take off her jacket and rolled up her left sleeve to look at the bullet wound.
There was a hole all the way through and you could even see some bone. It had penetrated in an area that was a few inches above the heart. However, if it had hit her in the heart, she would still be alive as one would need to destroy both her brain and heart at the same time and they were far thicker and more protected than any Human’s.
Genetic traits passed down by both Daemos and Gusion allowed her to live much longer in what would be a fatal position. However, she did not have the immortality of Gusion nor the immediate regeneration of Daemos. Instead, she had a set lifespan, although no one knew what age she would reach, and she healed in a longer amount of time.
Although, sometimes it was observed that some traits were shown later on in life. Some people were found to be immortal so long as they had magic and others developed some new skills or physical traits.
For Priska, she had only discovered her blood magic three years ago, one year before she started working as a merc. It was actually a somewhat stupid reason why she knew. She had ended up smashing her face into an electric pole, being too busy on her phone, and got a bloody nose. She really didn't want to get blood on the shirt she wore at the time and willed the blood to move away from her shirt.
At the time, it freaked her out and she took a step back causing the blood to fall onto the ground. Since then, she was able to hone her power and control it into the still-not-so-perfect power it was today.
Instead of going to the hospital, they went to the 4th floor of their office, the Medical Center where the members got treated for injuries and such. There was a professional medical staff on that floor who were able to do basically anything from surgery to taking care of sicknesses.
When they entered the ground floor, the security guard looked up from his tablet at Ceriena hauling up a much larger Priska whose injury had already started to heal, bit by bit. He was used to this common occurrence and pressed a button under his desk.
As soon as he pressed it, the two of them could hear the sounds of rolling wheels followed by numerous footsteps. From a side door, four nurses ran up to her with a gurney and they placed her carefully onto it.
After strapping her in, they rushed to the elevator and placed a key in the slot under the buttons. The medical staff all had keys that made the elevator prioritize the level it was used on and it automatically went to the medical floor once they went inside.
Since Priska’s condition was not fatal, but more like a small cut to a Human, they staff had an abundant amount of time to get her to the floor. Even so, they rushed to one of the medical rooms once the elevator door opened and they immediately started to heal her wound.
First, they used alcohol to clean and disinfect the hole. Then they cast healing magic and cleaned it up afterwards. Then, since there was a cut and blood coming out, they wrapped it in gauze and had her drink some kind of liquid with medical properties.
It had been only ten minutes when they finished and Priska was let out of the room. Most medical facilities around the world were only a bit worse than the one in their office. While they had healing magic and things like that, they did not have the healing tonics that increased the natural healing of someone.
Ceriena found Priska staring up at the ceiling of the first floor and sighing. While the plush was not very expensive, it was more of a habit to buy two plushies every paycheck, if there was enough money.
Priska looked at Ceriena and got up. The two of them drove to the shop as Ceriena consoled Priska. Of course, being someone who shouldn’t mope around all day, she started to think of a new plush to buy.
When they got out of the car, they started to walk when Priska overheard someone next to them.
“...And it was mental!! Apparently, the guy on the ladder was shot! I didn’t even make any money off of that heist!! Fucking bullshit.”
Priska stopped in her tracks and spun on her heels. Grabbing the guy by the collar, she spun him to face her. The guy was surprised when he was grabbed and tried to squirm out of her grasp.
However, the moment she growled with an inhuman noise, he stopped moving. He started to whimper and sweat dribbled down his forehead.
He dropped the phone he was talking on and the call immediately hung up. The phone cracked on the sidewalk as Priska’s grip grew tighter.
“Were you the asshole who drove that helicopter?!”
The man’s face paled as he realized that she knew what he was involved in before. He had only recently parked the helicopter and was now waiting for someone to transport him.
“N-no.”
He drew up his hands defensively and tried his best to look Priska in the eyes, but was clearly having trouble doing so. Ceriena watched this scene with zero knowledge of what they were talking about.
Priska’s blood red eyes seemed to glimmer just a little with a tinge of purple aura. This was a trait she received from Gusion, Know Truth. It allowed her to see if someone was telling a truth or lie, but nothing more. It favored yes or no questions and hated anything else.
However, unlike active skills, this was active at all times and her eyes only radiated purple when someone lied to her face, not via text or such. Luckily, this person said “no” while the real answer was “yes”.
She shoved him against the side of the nearest building and from his hip came an audible crack. He writhed in pain and tears started to flow from his eyes. It was quite painful.
“You lied. Who were you talking to?”
“N-no one!”
She knew he was lying, but now had to try and find their name. It was obviously someone working in the shadows. She heard several robberies all around the city similar to this one where they had two kinds of escape vehicles and similar guns.
Her conclusion? It must be another criminal organization. She knew of three within the city, twenty in the state, but the three in New York City only dealt in drugs, human trafficking, and weapon dealing, not robberies for cash.
“Who is your boss?!”
“I-I…”
He was trying to form words, but they wouldn’t come out. Instead, foam did and his eyes rolled back. Then, his limbs went slack and his head lolled to the side.
Priska clicked her tongue and threw him in a nearby alley. He was already dead. It was remotely used cyanide which, nowadays, ignored the properties of magic and could only be removed if someone took out the tooth with the cyanide inside.
The unmoving corpse seemed to sail gracefully through the air, only coming to a stop when hitting a brick wall and landing perfectly in a black dumpster. Several bags could be heard being popped and a foot was still sticking out.
“... Fucker.”
She mumbled under her breath. Not only did she not find the organization, but now didn’t have any leads whatsoever. Whoever was doing this had power, money, and manpower.
“So… who was that?”
Priska whirled around to see Ceriena. She was completely relaxed as she turned off her phone. While Priska was interrogating him, Ceriena was updating her social media platform by saying, “Going to get plushies with friend!!”
“One of the guys who was in league with the dude who shot my Black Dragon.”
She could barely contain her anger and was growling through her teeth.
“And your shoulder.”
“Yeah, but what’s more important? A body part or a stuffed animal? It’s obviously the plush, right?”
“Unless you don’t have a healing factor…”
She said it in such a quiet voice, that she could have thought it in her mind and it still wouldn’t have made a difference.
“Anyway, let’s go get you that… Ekiterner?”
“Eikthyrnir.”
Priska corrected her. Ceriena’s knowledge of myths was only bound to the Odyssey and several passages of Jason and the Argonauts. Priska’s surpassed about 70% of the known world in Earth mythology alone.
“Sure. Let’s go get that.”
When Priska had ran at the opponents about an hour ago, Ceriena walked back into the store to explain what happened. The cashier apologized as the second Black Dragon had already been sold and Priska said it was no problem, while holding in her anger the entire time.
“Anyways, I’m here to buy Eikthyrnir. As you saw…”
She gestured to the decapitated Black Dragon.
“... It died. A truly unfortunate accident where all persons involved must pay with their LIVES!! Ahem.”
She accidentally let slip the voice of wrath within her and tried to cover it up by clearing her throat. While Ceriena was used to it, for the most part, the cashier was able to deal with it. He too knew the tragedies of when stuffed animals are shot with bullets…
He shook off the memories of her younger brother shooting her kitten plush.
“Certainly. Oh, I mean “Certainly” to buying Eikthyrnir, not the lives part. I mean, you could if you wanted to.”
“Ah, I already killed five who’ve done it. Just need to find the boss and kick the crap outta him until he vomits his organs out.”
She smiled creepily as, in harmony, Ceriena and the cashier shuddered. Her smile, while still captivating, seemed cruel and sadistic. However, all she really was thinking about was revenge as she was neither a torturer nor a S or M.
“Anyways, I’m gonna go get you that plush now…”
The cashier quickly scurried away to retrieve the stuffed animal.
“Why do you care so much ab- Nevermind.”
She was about to ask the taboo question and sensed bloodlust rising from her body. No one, not even her manager liked her bloodlust. It caused too many people to piss their pants and several people also froze in their chairs causing them to not work. Just another racial trait from a Vampire, Banshee, and a Duke of Hell.
By the time the cashier got the stuffed animal, Priska had mostly calmed down. She was still a bit emotional, but her mood had become brighter.
Even with the mood being better, there was silence throughout the checkout procedure. One could even hear the talkin outside the store as no music, talking, or any other sounds were heard.
“So, what now?”
“I’m gonna look on the database to try and get some more data. Can’t have these guys killing any more plushies.”
“Alright. I’ll drive you back to the office, but I’m going home once you get out of the car.”
They walked to the car in the parking lot and entered her car once again. They could walk, but both of them were quite tired already from all the things that happened earlier in the day. It wasn’t just physical fatigue, but mental as well.
In a matter of minutes, Ceriena drove to the front of the office and Priska got out. Ceriena called out behind her as she started to roll up the window.
“Good luck! Don’t stay too late.”
Priska waved and entered the building. The guard, still on his tablet, glanced towards her and then returned to whatever it was he was doing. He really only cared to do his job to the point that someone would call him “mediocre” at his job.
Priska nodded as a greeting, but he ignored it. Used to this gesture, she continued onwards to the elevator. She needed to find a pattern between the heists.
The elevator stopped at floor 2, the break and eatery area. The door opened and in came Beta IV. She was the Human manager of Priska who now had a cup of coffee in her hand.
Sniffing the air discreetly, Priska could smell the scent of chocolate around her and the bitter scent of black coffee. Beta IV had eaten a chocolate muffin several minutes ago.
“Priska! How’s your arm?”
She opened up her arms to greet her, but then retracted her arms when her coffee almost spilled. She then took a sip while Priska answered as she stretched her previously damaged arm.
“It’s fine now, but what I’m trying to do now is find a specific group.”
“What kind? The ones who deal in drugs?”
“No, it seems like there is a person controlling the money heists behind the scenes.”
“Like the ones who you killed earlier?”
“Exactly.”
She took another sip of coffee and the elevator dinged and the doors opened. The two of them stepped out and made their way towards their offices.
“I can ask some of the FBI people that I have connections with. I’m sure they can send over something.”
“Thanks.”
They were about to go separate ways when Priska wheeled around and grabbed hold of Beta IV’s shoulder.
“You… you won’t bring any of your children here, right?”
“Huh? On Bring-Your-Child-To-Work day? That’s a great idea! I should do that!”
They both entered their own offices and Priska slid into her seat. She face palmed as she looked up at the white ceiling.
“Motherfucker.”
She mumbled. She felt like she just triggered some sort of disaster or something akin to it.
Peeking through her fingers, she looked at an envelope on her desk. Tentatively, she took the envelope and slowly opened it. She carefully tore the tape off and pulled out the paper within.
It turned out that it was two papers, a note and a check. Reading aloud, she realized it came from the police.
“Hello Ms. Huld,
We thank you for helping us to capture the criminals, even if just the bodies, and have decided to make some good on our promise. Included in this envelope is a check for $5,000. We have also decided to give you a badge for helping the police, although we will give it to you in private.
Sincerely,
NYPD.”
She frowned. She didn’t think that 19 years of age was enough to call someone “Ms” nor was she comfortable with them calling her by her last name. Setting aside the mixed emotions and the note, she looked at the check.
Indeed, it was a real check. Five thousand dollars for killing four plebs who defied her. That was easy money right there.
Setting that aside, she opened up her laptop that was stationed to the right of several files with a cup of water on top. To the right of the laptop were the unfinished bills that she needed to pay by the 30th. However, it was only the 7th of September.
Unlike work laptops that were mainly made for offices and such, this was a gaming laptop with some of the best modifications on the market. Although, she mainly played card games or strategy based games.
She double tapped a shortcut on the screen and looked into the camera of her laptop. Then, after the facial recognition, she had to speak in a regular voice with a specific catchphrase the user set up already.
“Ahem. ‘Nine Tails are really fluffy.’”
The laptop dinged and she was now in the database. All she had to do now was select all the related crimes and pull up searches on people who they might be. Then she could go after the people in question and threaten them.
As she started the search, she heard a loud booming that sounded more like someone breaking concrete instead of running. After a few steps, a large man appeared in the doorway.
He had tanned skin and square glasses. On both sides of his head, he had a pair of horns that was red and curved to the front. He wore a formal suit and tie. The suit was black, but the tie was white with a design of a diagonal red line through it.
“Hey! Someone just told me that you didn’t complete that mission a couple days ago! What the f-“
“I did. The casino, right?”
“You did? Then why did…”
Oryan’s lecture was interrupted when the glass of water fell onto the laptop. Priska watched in horror as it started to drip water.
Priska started to try and snatch it from the air before it fell completely, but a paper flew to the left and the water fell even faster than anticipated, slipping on the piece of paper.
Too late. The water spilled onto the disk drive that was open. The water entered the computer and it short-circuited. The screen went from on to off as smoke started to rise.
The fire alarms detected the smoke and the sprinklers went off. Since they were more focused nowadays, the sprinkler managed to only drench her, the laptop, and her bills. She covered the paycheck with her jacket.
Sparks flew as Priska groaned. While the laptop was normally waterproof, when it had things open, it wasn’t so effective.
“Who put the fucking glass there?! And who opened my disk drive?! That… so help me that the God of Death doesn’t help me murder you…”
She was furious. She thought about taking out a grenade and throwing it in the middle of the building, but decided against it.
She turned in her chair to face one of her other seven co-workers. It was partially his fault that the water spilled as the cup fell due to the shaking of him stomping towards her.
They were not on the best of terms, but neither on the worst. They only recognized one another’s achievements and, occasionally, Oryan would criticize her for not doing something.
“Now, where can I find some files?”
Oryan rested a hand on the back of his neck and sighed. After a moment of eager anticipation from Priska, he slowly started to speak.
He was the only person in the eight person sector who was devoted to being a bodyguard as there rest were either mercenaries or assassins.
Using barrier magic, he could block bullets and blades and his reaction and cast time was even more extraordinary. It was almost impossible to get anything by him… unless he wasn’t in the area.
His wisdom was great as Balrogs were very intelligent and logical strategists. However, he was only half Balrog and half Human. He was thirteen years her senior and was amazing at his job. Not only that, but he was already learning security tactics when Priska was just a child. A Balrog’s lifespan was near limitless, even a half Balrog retained this trait. This was proven in Limbo where several Humans had ended up and it ended with Human and Devil/Demon hybrids.
The points in time where Humans accidentally slipped through worlds and landed in Limbo were few in numbers, but it was enough to inform the Limbo natives about the hybrids. There were times where random people were sent there via a Satan summoning ritual, where Satan killed them all and dragged the person to Limbo, and also some battlefields dragged Humans to both Limbo and the Underworld due to the amount of blood and sacrifices all around.
At present, Oryan was thoughtfully touching his chin and was trying to find an adequate answer.
“I believe that the FBI or the NYPD may have some… try the police first. They are much closer. Oh, but don’t do anything to them. If you do, I swear to…”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it. Don’t be a Hiak. Now, can you do something about this water?”
She glanced up at the spray of water only to find that some of it got in her eyes. She started to rub them out of her eyes when she saw, from the corner of her blurry vision, Oryan leaving. She was awful at any electronic equipment other than cars, computers, or other video or game related material.
Sighing, she turned to look out the window behind her. The sprinklers stopped as Oryan flipped a switch on a wall and typed in a code. Placing both her elbows on her knees, her chin rested on her hands as she looked out at the grey city.