Agnes pulls herself up from the table, looking down at herself. She raises her arms, gazing over the closely woven patterns with slight awe.

“It’s certainly the most complicated enchanted tattoo I’ve ever seen.”

She taps her foot on the ground, releasing shimmering silver mana into the air before her where it coalesces into a full-body mirror.

“Woah!” A quiet exclamation leaves her mouth as she stares at the weaving patterns wrapping her muscles, turning and admiring their spread across her back as well.

Emily nods in agreement with a small, proud smile. The tattoo is a blend of pale blue, green, and silver, spreading down from Agnes’ nape to cover almost all of her skin, accentuating her well-defined muscles.

“It looks great,” Agnes says with a satisfied smile, turning to face Emily. “Now, let’s test it!”

She puts her clothes back on before leading Emily into another room attached to her living space. The room is a miniature version of the training hall they use for lessons, with a packed dirt floor and weapons hanging from the walls.

“How do I use it? It’s not permanently active, right?” Agnes asks, standing in the centre of the space, facing Emily.

“First, activate steel body, unless you want a nasty shock, then simply inject a bit of mana into the activation rune at the top of your neck,” Emily says, eagerly awaiting the test herself.

Agnes reaches a hand up to touch the back of her neck as a silver glow envelopes her.

“Here?” she says and the tattoos come alive, lighting up with a vibrant glow and sending crackling lightning across her skin.

The patterns seem to shift with the lightning, playing tricks on Emily’s eyes as she watches Agnes raising her arms to observe the effect.

“This feels weird,” Agnes mutters, staring at her hands.

“Does it hurt at all?”

“No. It feels like a faint buzzing in all of my muscles at once.”

“Perfect. I tuned it as close as I could to your resistance with steel body active, so the discomfort should fade as you get used to it. It will drain about half as much mana as a second circle boosting spell, so you should be able to keep it up for a while. Just, be careful not to activate it without another spell to increase your lightning resistance. I did make sure it wouldn’t be strong enough to disable you if you do, but it’ll hurt like a bitch and definitely mess you up mid fight.”

Agnes nods at her advice, flexing her fingers before crouching and feeling the difference in her legs.

“Got it. Now for the fun bit. How fast does it make me?”

Agnes’ eye flicks briefly towards Emily, and Emily’s lips part into a smug grin as she realises what Agnes is about to try.

Sorry. But even with this spell you’re...

Agnes springs up from her crouch, spinning around and whipping her leg towards Emily’s chest. Emily’s arm snaps up to catch her ankle, stopping the attack dead in its tracks as her feet slide back a few centimetres.

“Still slower than me!” she finishes her thought out loud, ignoring the stinging ache in her hand from catching Agnes’ metallic foot.

Ignoring her taunt, Agnes pulls her leg back and proceeds to throw attack after attack at Emily, who smoothly dodges or counters every blow at high speed. After a few minutes, Agnes stops and deactivates her tattoo and spell.

“I should be happy that you’ve given me such an effective speed increase, but I’m honestly slightly annoyed I’m still slower than you. What the hell are you? You didn’t even use magic!”

“Haha. Well, let’s just say my breathing technique does something similar to your tattoo naturally. Perks of being a lightning mage.” She avoids answering the question honestly, skirting around it with a well-practised excuse.

“Tsk,” Agnes clicks her tongue, but her grin shows the lack of malice behind it. “How much do I owe you then?”

“Not much, only about six hundred points.”

Agnes nods and holds out her hand for Emily’s crest. She transfers a thousand points, but cuts Emily off before she can object, walking past her and tapping her on the shoulder.

“I would have had to pay at least triple to a lightning engraver for that quality of work, if I could find one. If you have a complaint, spend the extra points on your expedition prep and come back safe. It would be a shame to lose a good sparring partner.”

Emily smiles and follows her out.

“Fine. I can always use more explosives.”

***

A few days later, Emily settles in her room for the morning, her weapons spread across the workbench before her.

“Hmmm. I need more grenades. I can take loads now I can fill my belt with them. The same with bullets,” she mumbles, glancing at her two new firearms.

The first, the Whisper, is a long, sleek black and white bolt-action rifle. The main body is delicately machined from a black iron alloy, appearing more grey than black in a few places, and it’s lined with carefully inlaid veins of white iron, with a dense swirling pattern wrapping the barrel. The adjustable telescopic scope above is a work of art, crafted from metal and glass, allowing Emily to target enemies from as close as ten metres to as far as thousands. It has several small dials around it to flick between internal lenses and adjust their positions at will.

The back of the rifle has a sturdy metal stock with several wind crystals embedded along the side to power the acceleration and silencing spells woven along the body and barrel. The top holds a comfortable leather cheek rest in line with the scope.

On the side of the gun, just above where her thumb would rest when firing, is a small switch. It can be flipped between the three firing modes of the gun: safe, where the trigger won’t move anything inside no matter how much it’s pulled; silent, the normal firing mode where only the sound dampening array is activated; full, the power hungry mode with the acceleration array active as well.

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Underneath the gun, sitting just in front of the trigger assembly, is the pride of Emily’s innovation within the last few months, a magazine. Unlike the cylinder fed clockwork rifles of the military, the magazine can hold bullets in a more compact, quick to reload form. The bullets held within are hefty, being slightly bigger than one of Emily’s fingers with the cartridge included, and weighing almost triple that of one of her handgun bullets.

¯¯¯¯¯

[Whisper {Gen.1}]

[Rank:] E

[Stats:] +4 Dex, +3 Agil

[Description:] A sleek enchanted rifle designed for long-range silent shooting.

[Effect:] Fires silent bullets over great distance.

_____

The second gun is a new pistol, the Spitter. Similar to the Whisper, it’s mostly black with small grey accents. But, unlike the Whisper, there is only a single wind crystal embedded into the trigger guard. The grip houses a magazine in the bottom, and the firing selector switch on the side also flips between three modes: safe, single-fire, and three-round burst.

The wind crystal is only used for the burst mode to chamber rounds rapidly without wasting any power from the shot itself. However, to balance this, the end of the barrel has a threaded end, and next to the gun is a stumpy black cylinder of metal with a sound dampening spell carved into it, and the requisite wind crystal for power, for Emily to attach at will.

¯¯¯¯¯

[Spitter {Gen.1}]

[Rank:] E

[Stats:] +3 Dex, +4 Agil

[Description:] A pistol designed for rapid fire.

[Effect:] Fires low calibre bullets in single fire or three-round bursts.

_____

“Maybe I should pay a visit to the black market again to stock up on gunpowder,” Emily mutters with a malicious grin. “Time to claim some debts.”

She stands up and taps the Whisper, sending it into her storage space, before she straps the Claws back into place and drops the Spitter into a thigh holster, with several magazines attached around it for good measure.

***

Emily catches a train out into the city, descending to the lower levels and stepping out into the mist filled streets. She pulls down the hood of her crestless robes, obscuring her face. Ignoring the shifty figures lingering in the side alleys, Emily marches on through the winding streets before ducking out of the way into a narrow gap between two towering metal buildings.

She walks past an open shop front selling cheap skewers of indiscernible meat, checking The Clock and noting the time as she approaches a heavy metal door set into the building beside it.

I hope the password Ed gave me isn’t a trap. I liked Machineworks. I’d hate to find out he was in on this.

She slams her fist into the door.

Four fast taps.

A three-second pause.

Two beats.

Half a second pause.

Two beats.

A two-second pause.

Three fast taps.

A few moments later, a peep-door slides open.

“The black oak’s roots spread far and wide,” a squeaky, high pitched voice says on the other side.

“The shade of its branches can’t hide the rot within,” Emily answers.

A short burst of clicking and grinding later, the heavy door swings open. She steps in, casting a sideways glance towards the guard, noting the undrawn gun at his hip.

No reaction yet. Hopefully that means that’s the normal password.

She continues down the stairs without a word, heading towards the underground haven of trade. Stepping out of the narrow stairwell, Emily turns and heads straight for the arms dealer she dealt with before. She remains on high alert, observing everyone around her and looking for anyone conspicuous who may be helping The Crystal Skull keep track of her, but finds nothing.

So far so good.

She pushes open the door to the small weapons shop and steps in, once again being hit by a strong stench of smoke and booze.

“You know. It’s a wonder you’re able to cover the smell of gunpowder so well,” Emily calls to the shop owner slumped over the counter.

He grunts and drags himself up, glaring at her.

“What do you want?” he asks gruffly.

“Nothing much. I just want you to answer a few questions,” she responds while flipping her hood down.

“Why would I-“ the shop owner starts, before freezing as he recognises Emily, the colour draining from his face.

That doesn’t look like the face of someone who was warning me about danger.

“Good! You recognise me. That will make this easy.”

Emily sees with crystal clarity as the man’s shoulders shift ever so slightly, his right hand, hidden behind the counter, reaching for something. She bursts forwards, closing the distance before the man can react. With a light spring of her ankles, her legs clear the counter and she slides over to plant a Claw into the man’s shoulder, knocking him off his chair and pinning him to the ground with her knee pressed against his chest.

“Argh!” he cries out in pain, reaching up to push Emily off with his uninjured arm.

Emily simply catches his hand before he can touch her, holding it still as she looks for what he was reaching for. She sees a double barrel shotgun sitting on a hidden shelf.

“Now that’s not clever. I just wanted to ask you some questions, but you’re making this look a lot worse for yourself,” Emily says as she looks back down at the man below her. “Now, are you going to satisfy my curiosity? Or do I need to find other ways to persuade you?”

She twists the blade in his shoulder for effect, watching as his face contorts in pain.

“Ahhhh! I’ll tell you whatever you want. Just fucking stop!” he spits out through gritted teeth.

“Why did you send me to The Crystal Skull?”

“They paid me! A woman came in a few hours after you left the first time you were here and gave me three gold to tell you about their tent.”

Emily nods, having expected as much.

“I see. And what do you actually know about The Crystal Skull?”

“Nothing.”

Emily tightens her grip on the man’s hand, sending a shock of pain through his arm.

“AHHH! FUCK! I DON’T KNOW ANYTHING!” he screams as something cracks.

Emily loosens her grip slightly, and he pants out in relief.

“You expect me to believe that? If you know nothing, why did you look so horrified to see me again?”

“Look, I only know some rumours. Some of my drinking buddies have mentioned that they sometimes go asking around about people, and those people always disappear! That’s all I know. I swear!”

Useless.

“See, you did know something!” Emily says with a smile, pulling her Claw out of the man’s shoulder and drawing it quickly across his throat.

She drops his hand and stands up, retracting the Claw and turning away from his panicked, choking form. She jumps back over the counter, leaving the shop owner to suffer in a pool of his own blood.

“I can’t believe I’m only worth three gold,” Emily mutters as she flips her hood back up and steps out of the shop.

She takes in her surroundings while walking away, checking for people watching or following her as she moves towards The Crystal Skull’s tent. A minute after leaving the weapons dealer, Emily notices a pair of eyes focused on her. She turns a few corners and, sure enough, a cloaked figure follows.

Hello there, stalker. Did the guard recognise me after all? Or were they watching the arms dealer in case I came back? Either way, there are clearly several people here working with that bitch.

She arrives at the small white tent and pushes her way in through the front flap, ignoring her pursuer for now to see how they react. The sweet scent of inhibition incense hits her nose immediately, but is burnt away by the machina coursing through Emily’s body before it can do anything.

“Hello there. How can I help you?” the same deceptively gentle-looking woman from last time asks, fixing Emily with her piercing emerald gaze.

“Can you answer some questions for me?” Emily asks, keeping her hood lowered over her face.

“Well it depends on what you want to know, honey. How about you take off your hood and ask away?”

Emily flips her hood off, watching surprise and amusement run across the woman’s face.

“Well hello again, cutie. It’s not often someone escapes me, and none of them were dumb enough to return. Did your escape give you the confidence to come back?”

Emily smirks at the taunting question. Before she can respond though, she feels movement behind her and notices the woman’s gaze shaking slightly.

Trying to sneak up on a space mage? Bad idea.

“It did! And - I’m dying to know - did you think I’d simply tuck my tail and run?”

Emily pulls out the Spitter and points it backwards over her shoulder, activating her sound-deadening earrings before squeezing the trigger. A bullet tears out of the barrel, ripping a hole through the head of the man approaching behind her. A loud bang fills the tent, and the man’s body slumps to the floor at the same time as the bullet’s casing.

“Because that’s not really my style.”

The woman’s eyes open wide in shock.

“Now, would you like to tell me who else here works for you?”

Instead of answering, the woman grits her teeth, her smile morphing into a fierce glare. Before Emily can enjoy the look of anger on her enemy’s face, the woman’s eyes roll into the back of her head and she slumps over the counter.

Shit.

Emily approaches the woman and pokes her with a Claw, getting no reaction. She reaches out and pushes her hand through the woman’s thick, wavy hair to press her fingers to her neck. There isn’t a single beat of life left.

Really? I hadn’t even started!