"Hey. Primordial Witch of Greed. Vert. Mammon. Whatever your name is."
A pause. The hum of the machinery. The pulse of the green-white light.
"I know you're awake," Neila continued. "I know you can hear me. And I know you want to get out of here as much as I want to stop my father."
Another pause. Then a sound, soft, barely audible, like the whisper of wind through dead leaves.
"Yessss."
Hoshimi's blood ran cold. The voice came from everywhere and nowhere, from the cylinder and the machinery and the air itself. It was ancient and young, feminine and genderless, almost human.
"I want," the voice continued, "to be freeee."
Neila's voice was steady, but Hoshimi could hear the strain beneath it. "I can free you. I can break the machine that's keeping you here. But I need something in return."
"What do you offerrr?"
"A Witch's Oath. You help us escape. Give me a little bit of your power and solve my mana deficiency. And in exchange, I'll set you free from your battery thing."
The silence that followed was deeper than mere absence of sound. It was a void, a negation, a space where something was being weighed by a mind that had existed for millennia.
"Accccepted," the voice breathed. "The contract isss formed."
The air split.
The pressure that had been building since the goddess opened her eyes erupted outward in a wave of pure, concentrated mana.
It swept through the chamber like a tidal wave, washing over Hoshimi, over Neila, over the guards, over the Patriarch, over everything.
Hoshimi felt it pass through him. Siphoning. Draining.
The guards' mana reserves, already depleted from the chase, vanished. The guards froze.
Their bodies simply stopped moving, their weapons falling from suddenly numb fingers, their eyes going wide behind their visors.
One of them tried to speak, but no sound came out, his throat was paralyzed, his lungs refusing to draw breath.
Hoshimi felt it too, a pull, a drain, something reaching into the well of his mana and drawing it out in great, hungry gulps. His invisibility shattered. His blade dimmed. The strength that the sword had been feeding him flickered and nearly died.
"What's happening?" he gasped.
"She's feeding," Neila said. Her voice was strained, her face pale. "She's taking their mana. All of it."
"If they collapsed, how come you haven't too? Don't you have a mana deficiency?"
"Surprise."
"I added a little something into the Oath."
The guards were collapsing now, their bodies hitting the concrete floor with dull, heavy thuds. Their mana signatures flickered, died. The thermal goggles went dark, their power sources drained along with everything else.
And the Primordial Goddess of Greed began to laugh.
It was a terrible sound, ancient and young, joyful and hungry, the laughter of something that had been imprisoned for far too long and had finally, finally been given a taste of freedom.
The cylinder's glass cracked, fissures spreading across its surface like spiderwebs, and the green-white light that bled through them was brighter now, purer, the color of spring.
"Yessss," she hissed. "More. Give me more."
Hoshimi's hand found his gun. His mana was draining but his abyssal well didn't seem to disappear any time soon, the weapon didn't need mana, just a steady hand and a clear target. The guards were down, their bodies motionless on the concrete floor, but they were still alive. Barely.
His hand found the grip of his sidearm. The guards were down, but not dead.
They would recover.
They would get back up. Unless he made sure they didn't.
He aimed carefully. Center mass. Quick. Efficient. One shot. Two. Three.
The gunshots echoed through the chamber like thunder.
The guards stopped moving.
Neila was still standing before the goddess, her hand pressed against the glass of the containment unit. Vert's eyes were still open, still watching, still glowing with that faint, ancient light.
Vert's voice was stronger now, the years of disuse falling away with each word. "You offered me freedom. I accepted. The terms are fulfilled." She paused. "Release me."
Neila began working on the containment unit's controls, she took Hoshimi's blade and drove it into the control panel, through the circuits and wiring, through the locks and failsafes that had kept the goddess imprisoned.
The panel sparked, smoked, died.
The cables retracted. The tubes disconnected. The goddess fell.
Neila caught her before she hit the ground.
Vert stared into her eyes.
"Your mana deficiency, I wasn't able to permanently solve it."
"I thought you were a Goddess."
"I am, but I'm not omniscient or omnipresent." She swallowed. "And your deficiency seems to be a special case, your mana is so potent that it's inherently blocking your reincarnation from entering your body. And in turn, it inhibits you from using your mana to your full potential."
"That's news to me." Neila turned to Hoshimi.
"Let's take her."
"That's what you called me here for anyways."
Hoshimi grabbed her arm, pulling her toward the maintenance tunnel.
They ran. Through the tunnel. Up the stairwell.
Past the loading dock and the guards who were still unconscious from the goddess's mana drain. Into the gray afternoon light. Into the city.
They didn't stop running until the warehouse district was far behind them, until the alarms were distant memories, until the only sound was their own ragged breathing and the faint, steady pulse of the goddess's heart against Neila's chest.
They stopped in an alley, hidden from view, surrounded by dumpsters and cardboard boxes and the accumulated grime of years.
Neila set Vert down gently, propping her against the brick wall. The goddess's eyes were still open, still watching, still glowing with that faint, ancient light.
Neila leaned against the wall, her chest heaving, her face pale.
"Dude, I'm gonna die. My throat is burning from all of that running."
"Anyways." Neila's voice was sharp, cutting through his thoughts. "What the hell was that back there?"
"Which part?"
"The part where you tried to surrender and leave me to die."
"You're right. Let's talk about the Witch's Oath you made with a mythological entity. What were the terms?"
Neila's eyes narrowed. "Are you sure that this is an appropriate place to be discussing the security of my father's facility?"
"Yes."
"Fine." She crossed her arms, her blue eyes meeting his with that familiar, sharp intensity. "The terms were simple. She helps us escape. She helps us stop my father. In exchange, I let her go."
"That wasn't all, was it?"
"I asked her for a bit of her power and for her to solve my mana deficiency as well." Neila glanced at Vert. "And as you can tell, that clearly didn't last long."
"And you think you can trust her?"
"I wrote it in the contract that I'd let her go free from the chains, I didn't specify to let her go free forever." Her voice was flat.
"And the second problem, if the Vice knows—she will definitely know—after all of that commotion we caused, we could get a punishment from the government for trying to mess with the order of the families. Or even worse, get labeled as rogues who went against the government."
"At least we survived." Neila stared at the Goddess sitting down on the floor.
"Excuse me, but unlike you I actually care if I get labeled as a rogue. Because of your carelessness, I'm being dragged into this."
"Hmm."
Hoshimi's eyes narrowed.
"We're so fucked. I already had a target on my back, this is going to make it so much worse."
"Don't worry too much." Neila smiled. "We have a bargaining chip."