Dr. Wagner lounged on the couch, arms folded, watching a horse-girl sprint across the TV screen. His brow twitched. Slowly, he turned his head and shot a side-eye at Vidarath, who was sprawled on another couch with a giant tub of popcorn.
"Vhy…" Wagner drawled, his accent thick as he jabbed a finger at the screen. "Vhy are ve vatching dis? I thought ve agreed to continue der perfectly animated Berserk anime!"
Vidarath just grinned, mouth full of popcorn. "Really? I thought we both wanted to watch Uma Musume!"
"…Fuck you mean oui?" Wagner snapped, sitting up straighter. "I ain't French! And just so you know" he jabbed his chest, "I enjoyed Berserk."
And with that, he settled back down, grumbling, but his eyes stayed on the screen. For a few minutes, the two sat in silence: Vidarath whooping and cheering like a lunatic, Wagner giving the occasional stiff, reluctant fist-pump.
How did it come to this? Well, Vidarath had missed his favorite anime-watching buddy. When he couldn't find them, he remembered his second favorite Dr. Wagner. A quick bribe in the form of a flawless Berserk animation had been enough to reel him in.
"Hey," Wagner said suddenly, eyes still glued to the screen. "I haff to ask… where are your vives?" His glance slid toward the absurdly long row of empty couches.
Vidarath waved dismissively, mouth full of popcorn. "Oh, them? Freelance work. Empress said they were getting rusty."
"Hm. Ja, zat makes sense," Wagner muttered, then stood. "I must excuse myself for… nature's call."
A few minutes later, Wagner was in the bathroom, humming under his breath as he relieved himself. That was when he noticed it a chainsaw roomba idling in the corner, its engine purring menacingly.
He zipped up in a hurry. The machine turned toward him, its LED eyes glowing red.
"Hello, Dr. Wagner," it purred in a disturbingly sweet, feminine voice. "I, too, am deeply disappointed in my husband's choice to watch this anime. We'll be returning shortly to… teach him a lesson." The chainsaw spun once, revving like a warning growl. "We don't want you caught in the crossfire. Please leave."
A chill ran down Wagner's spine. "…Mein Gott." He bolted, striding out of the bathroom without another word.
By the time he reached the front door, Vidarath called after him. "Oi, Wagner! Where're you going? We just hit the good arc!"
"Controlled experiment!" Wagner barked, waving a hand dismissively as he yanked the door open. "Very dangerous, nein time to explain!"
And with that, he was gone, leaving Vidarath alone with his popcorn, a TV full of horse girls, and the ominous whir of chainsaw blades echoing from the hallway.
◇◇◇
Somewhere else a rift tore the sky open and two figures stepped through, silhouettes stitched from shadow and embers. They moved like memory made flesh one with hair wild and singed, the other composed as a blade. Neither announced themselves; their names stayed locked behind eyes that had seen too much.
The wild one lifted her head, inhaled as if drawing the city itself into her lungs. She let out a long, satisfied exhale and, with a grin that didn't reach the whole of her face, breathed, "It's good to be back in Evolto City. Oh, how I missed you need the smell of burning corpses." Her voice danced on the word "need," playful and dangerous all at once.
The other did not smile. She watched the horizon with the stillness of stone, then answered calmly, almost bored: "I disagree, sister." Her tone was flat, an ember under snow. It carried none of the wild one's theatrical hunger and twice the threat.
A Dendrite attendant small, bark-veined, eyes bright with the city's bioluminescent glow was the first to see them properly. His throat bobbed the way it did when he was frightened; his limbs trembled. The sight of those two made something in him snap like dry twig. Oh no, he thought, the thought blooming into panic. They're back. I have to inform the Elders those crazy fuckers are back.
He turned and ran, boots slapping the stone, alarm in every stride. His shout pulled others from their tasks: vendors dropping wares, apprentices freezing mid-incantation, guardians looking up from patrols. A ripple of recognition then dread passed through the crowd. Whispers peeled into a chorus: "No… not them." "Why are they back?" "warn your families!" Fear sharpened into motion.
The two at the rift watched the rising chaos like children watching fireworks. The wild one's laugh bubbled up bright, manic, and entirely unreadable while the silent one's gaze slid over the city and landed, cold and precise, on the distant silhouette of the Central Tower.
◇◇◇
The Central Tower was silent except for the soft rustle of parchment between my fingers. I leaned against my desk, staring down at two files I had not touched in years.
Lyssara Vale.
Agent No. 9.
Her file was a tapestry of chaos scrawled in ink every word carrying the faint smell of smoke as though the crimes themselves had burned their way onto the page.
Arson.
Grand Arson.
Attempted Murder.
Attempted Murder (multiple counts).
Involuntary Manslaughter.
Voluntary Manslaughter.
Destruction of Property.
Pyromania.
Civilian Endangerment (Extreme).
Terrorizing Local Populace.
Instigation of Riots through Fire Displays.
Unauthorized Deployment of Flame Constructs.
The description was short by comparison: "Unpredictable combatant. Flame manipulation tied to emotional state. Dangerous but loyal when controlled. Requires containment and redirection. Unfit for conventional structures best deployed where chaos can be weaponized."
I placed the first file aside and lifted the second.
Sevrina Vale.
Agent No. 8.
Her file was different cleaner, more precise. The opening line read like a blade: "Cold operative. Shadowflame specialist. Displays remarkable efficiency in eliminating high-value targets. Known for silence in and out of battle."
Abilities listed in tight script:
Shadowflame Manipulation.
Psychological Suppression (emotion dampening).
Silent Movement and Precision Execution.
Command of Small-Scale Shadow Constructs.
But the page where the crimes list should have been… was blank. Not missing, not torn out blank, as though no one dared to write what she had done. My own note in the margin caught my eye: "Record sealed under personal authority. Do not disclose."
I remembered why.
Of the two, Sevrina was the more dangerous not for the havoc she wreaked, but for the quiet devotion she carried. I had seen it in her eyes during briefings, in the way her gaze lingered a second too long, in the precision of her movements whenever I entered the room. Her attachment to me was no secret not to herself, not to her sister, not even to me.
Some called it loyalty. Others obsession. I called it… a complication.
I set both papers down, letting them rest on the polished wood. Outside, Evolto City still hummed like a great machine, unaware that the Vales had returned. To most, their names were curses whispered in alleyways, old nightmares resurfacing. To me, they were tools volatile, fractured, and sharp.
And now… they had walked back into my city.
◇◇◇
A few days passed. I grew close to Ryn's family Ryn Halvorsen, and his daughter Mira. Mira, impossibly eager and sharp-eyed, slid into a role that was both wrong and right: my student, my little-sister figure. She clung to the idea that the man who beat the simulation was…acceptable company. I let her. Watching her study footwork like a tiny, furious tutor scratched at something I hadn't felt in a long time.
Ryn's wife General Elara Halvorsen was a sight. Holy shit. Seven foot two, by my estimate. Two feet taller than Ryn. She moved like a mountain that could smile and crush you before breakfast. We nearly got thrown out of the arena after our sparring match. She fought with a trained brutality I respected: precise, vicious. I stuck to the blade like habit no Endowal, just iron and stance. She fought dirty: dagger toss, pocket sand in my eyes, the whole variety show. I should have been furious. Instead I smiled when I shouldn't have. Mira cheered like a lunatic afterward. Congratulations, Ryn your family breeds monsters and generals.
That night I slept thinking of the academy, of class lists and delicate politics. A thousand years and school still felt novel. I closed my eyes and fell into a deep sleep.
I opened in the same ruined room, but it had been tidied the couch righted, books set upright. The darkness beyond the window remained an accusation.
The geode floated before me. Its pale yellow crystals trembled, voice forming and failing. Before it could speak, a hand closed around it from behind my hand, only half me. The other half was what I'd been when I tore the Pyre Sabyr apart: shadow and hunger, teeth and claws. It looked at me with pure, hot contempt.
"This is what I have become," it spat, the mouth mine and not mine. "A god playing mortal. Pitiful. You should've been hunting those damn Evolto agents regaining our power. Instead you play nurse to fresh meat. You let this…thing…live in your head instead of absorbing it."
The geode quivered like a bird with a broken wing. Golden chains thin, shimmering snapped from the walls and wrapped the half of me that held it. The vision forced that other-me to his knees; invisible hands yanked the shadow's wrists back until muscle strained.
"Why do we do this? Why must we kill them?" I asked the question I'd avoided, the one that made my voice smaller than it should be.
He laughed. A low sound that tasted of soot and old iron. "Years ago, parasites escaped from their home reality onto the land before it was called Evolto. We ate them. Then Zalthorion came he led the crusade against us. He hunted us to near extinction. Who fed those parasites when we were driven out? Who built over our graves? We burrowed and hid, and they burned the burrows and slaughtered us. They chained us, locked us in sarcophagi, and left us to be forgotten. Now we are free, last of our kind. Should we not repay the violence done to us? Why be content with crumbs when we can reclaim everything with the same brutality we were shown?"
The speech was raw grief lacquered with rage. The old hunger twitched familiar as a muscle remembering its use.
But another part of me the part that watched Mira practice footwork, that sat in a library and tasted books like promises answered differently. "We don't have to become them," I said, steadier than I felt. "Retaliation will eat us whole. If we tear down cities and slaughter kings the way they slaughtered us, we become exactly what we despise. They took things from us. Yes. We were caged. But brute force is one path. There are other tools here: knowledge, influence, the Academy itself."
His laugh cracked. "Tools? You've been soft."
"Soft lets me live," I said. "Soft lets me see who bites first. Soft lets me learn how they build chains and where those chains can be broken. I will hunt Zalthorion and his agents. I will rip them apart. But not like a starving animal. I will be surgical. I will gain what I need here alliances, research, and then I will take our revenge on terms that make sense."
The chains around the geode tightened. The crystal's light guttered. The half-shadow's eyes burned with fury, and then disturbingly with calculation. "You've become too foolish, too pathetic," it hissed. "Enjoy your little moment. These chains will fail, and when they do I will consume you and everything with you."
The geode whimpered something small and bright. The vision dissolved; the library, the chains, the two halves folded back into one. I woke in Ryn's guest room with Mira's slippers by the doorway and the morning sun cutting a dagger through the curtain.
I sat up, fingers flexing. The world felt the same and nothing felt the same at all. School was tomorrow. The thousand-year-old part of me had decided to play human for now.
(Hello everybody I must apologise for how long it took me to publish this chapter some things have happened and I am sorry but I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter)