What she read made her pause for a good while. A Joushin?
There were multiple papers within the letter, but the rest were auxiliary details that didn't attack her nearly as strongly as the picture.
'This must be the wrong letter,' she thought. She couldn't possibly be hunting a Joushin—those were what human mages were called. And yet… was it possible for the Spider to make a mistake like this?
She had to make sure. Kinney was too far for her to go after at this point, but the Spider would be where it always was—in its Nest. The kids were sleeping, so there was no better time for her to sneak out.
"Where are you going now, Zora?"
"Li? I thought you were sleeping."
"I was. I'm a light sleeper."
"I have… I have to consult the Spider about this mission."
"I'll come with you. Let me just-"
"No, you won't. I'll tell you about it tomorrow, so go back to sleep."
She saw the angst in his face, the need to be acknowledged, but his presence would only be a hindrance before the Spider. Perhaps because he was young, he couldn't yet understand just how monstrous a being the Spider truly was.
He frowned, but didn't argue, allowing her the space to quickly leave. He was still too weak.
In an instant, she too was gone, lost in between the sandstone canopies of a jungle of concrete and metal.
***
Litost watched his sister leave. Talin was still sleeping, and Mei was just… gone, so it felt like he was truly alone in the world.
There had obviously been times that he had been left alone, sometimes days or weeks on end, but never had it been so apparent to him that he was being left behind.
Zora was Zora, and now Mei found her Tether. Little Talin, the youngest of them, had always been an eccentric genius, whose talents for the arcane had long since been established. His unique ability had allowed him, since youth, to communicate with what the rest of them considered ghosts.
Through continuous investigation, they found that these ghosts were the third of four variants of Shin: Gwishin.
Gwishin were strange, unique in a way that separated them even from Ashin. They did not desire flesh, nor blood, nor magic, no—they were attracted to memories.
So Talin saw ghosts. Then what about him?
What could he do? His strength would be overshadowed in a matter of months, and he would once again be useless.
He was tired. It was late, yes, but his exhaustion came from the futility of his swordplay. Why would he swing ten thousand times, if Zora's single strike carried thrice the weight he could ever hope to achieve?
It was lonely, knowing that his kin were running on air as he alone trudged through mud, incapable of catching up as their backs, once so small, were now distant instead.
'Hmm.'
He noticed blood on his fingers. Recently, he'd been scratching himself bloody, and his arms were latticed with marks. His efforts felt meaningless, but that did not mean he would stop.
Yes, his life was one of hardships, which only meant he had to endure. If ten thousand swings could not bring him to the level of his peers and family, then he would swing his sword twenty thousand times in practice instead.
Clenching his fist, he realized he couldn't sleep. He didn't want to, anyway, because there was blood running down his arms and palms.
He wanted to get a breath of fresh air, but he wasn't Zora, and he wasn't suicidal. Nighttime's Ashin could be dangerous for him, especially if his emotions were running high. Every hunter knew not to fight with their hearts, because they'd be putting it on the line.
So instead of grabbing a sword, he decided to practice with his fists. The room he had been given was large; not large enough for the tip of a sword to cleanly pass under the ceiling, but more than wide enough for martial arts practice.
If even twenty thousand punches would not make him a master, then he would punch thirty thousand times. He would kick forty thousand, just to make sure he could fill the gap between him and his opponent with mastery and understanding in place of raw and unfettered strength.
Quietly, quickly, the boy danced a lonely dance of an eternal struggle; a serenade of hope amidst bleakness, a requiem for his dreams.
***
Zora didn't feel good about returning to the Nest again. It wasn't in her plans, and if possible she wanted to avoid the nighttime Webs for a few days at the very least.
Even coming here in the first place was a risk, considering the bounty that was placed on her head. Though that amount wouldn't move the Spider, not if it meant Zora's death, many of its underlings might not think the same. After all, the one who had planted that ring in her old home was definitely a member of the Nest.
A former and now buried member, most likely. Punishment was strict in the organization, just as much as rewards were hefty.
Still, the whole 'bounty on her head' was strange given the timing—why now? It'd been twenty years since Maria had died, yet the fact that Zora was Maria Denieve's daughter was, for the most part, a secret. She herself made no effort to hide it, but it wasn't well known enough for the question to be prompted in the first place.
So why now? It was frustrating and vexing, leaving questions in place of answers.
At least they had a shelter to hide in, because the Monkey was only the first wave. If snow fell from Eden, it would not be just a single Snowman. They came in waves, and if the first went down then a stronger force would surge in response.
This was precisely why the enmity between the Nest and Eden was a perpetual stalemate: there was an unspoken understanding that attacking the other would be an imminent threat of escalation. Even the Spider feared mutually assured destruction, and the idea of war was something it was not prepared for… yet.
She wished she had Kenji's help right about now. For as unreliable as he was at times, at others he was truly deserving of the title of Special Rank Adjudicator.
Maybe he'd know the truth behind this whole debacle, or at least have some insight that could liberate her.
She couldn't help but sigh, breaking the silence that permeated the Webs. Some of the shadows looked towards her, and she felt their vision, but their interest waned as they slithered through the night.
Most of them were barely even troublesome, but there was just such a large number of Ashin swimming through darkness that they nearly covered all of the bioluminescence.
A swarm of gluttony and desire. A reflection of herself.
They passed like a constant whisper, the only sound aside from the occasional scream, which was quickly either silenced or muffled by the night. And then it was quiet again.
The quietness was always unnerving. During the day, while not exactly loud, the Webs were at least vibrant with signs of life. But even vagrants were few and far between, hidden in dumpsters or makeshift shelters lying in forsaken alleyways. The gray had gone from one of life, like the hide of a spirited beast, to the stiff gray of forgotten things.
Even the Nest was no exception to this dampened hue. Once again, the building was empty. There was a heartbeat in the observatory that was calling to her, expecting her arrival, and knowing she had entered the building the moment her foot crossed the door.
Yes, the Nest was like a forgotten thing, one that withstood the night with the power of a single and undying flame that refused to forget the unspoken crimes of the world above.
The Spider's heartbeat had always been angry, ever since the moment she met it. But there was comfort in this sound, a routine formed from the sharpening of its knife that it aimed at Eden.
As if in a trance, she followed the heart-song to its source, retracing familiar steps. It was like she was sleepwalking, where her body was so familiar with the motions that she didn't even feel like she was conscious.
From stepping over the black spider painting in the entrance, to riding an elevator she still felt nervous about, there was learned familiarity. It all happened in the blink of an eye. She thought she heard a whisper, but it left her ears right before she could understand what it said.
In just a few moments, she was once again face to face with the Spider's puppet, watching its soulless button eyes as it tirelessly worked on a never-ending stack of papers. Papers, papers, papers—Tesson, Spider, Sherman, all of them. She'd never write a day in her life if she could avoid it.
"Do you need something, Zora?"
It spoke first. She swallowed and presented her problem.
"Did you give me the wrong hunting order? This mission says 'Joushin'."
"That's correct."
"I'm not killing a human."
"That's fair."
"Is there any other mission? Or a different hunting order?"
"No."
"Then—"
"Ah, Zora."
The scarecrow had stopped writing.
"It seems I forgot to tell you. As the payout for this mission, there are an additional three Mirrorblade Shards."
"!!!"
"Aren't you close to completing the Mirrorblade?"
"I'm… not close yet."
"Ah. A shame. So you won't be taking this mission?"
"Who's the Shard broker?"
"A man named Kenji Runaan. Surely you've heard of him?"
"I have."
"Then you are assured of the quality of the broker?"
It was confusing. Kenji had straight up given her shards in the past, not needing to take roundabout methods like through mutual acquaintances like the Spider. What was so special about Rey Caido that even Kenji wanted him dead?
But she couldn't refuse the opportunity to inch closer to her goal—at least not outright.
Zora looked to the Nest's leader with grim determination.
"Spider– if I am to kill a man, tell me why he must die."
"You wish to know if he has hurt people?"
"I am your monster hunter, not your assassin. Why have you made a monster of this man?"
"I could ask you, as you do not know him, why make a man of a monster? Is there no such thing as an innocent beast? Why make the differentiation now, when you've fed yourself with carcasses of your making, nearly your whole life? You are my hunter. Be it man or beast, it makes no difference to me– and you delude yourself by thinking it makes a difference to you."
As she swallowed her bile and thought up a retort, she couldn't– in her lifetime there had been many an Ashin whose visage was too close to human, and yet they were cut down all the same for the plight of their birth.
Before she could come up with something to say, the Spider continued:
"Do you still think yourself to be good, merely because your targets weren't 'human'? What a strange distinction– you yourself aren't human, not fully. Why do you still hold humans in such high regard? What is it about humanity that you so cherish, when they deny it from you? Don't you know what you are?"
What was humanity to a prisoner of the world itself? To a hostage of the underworld? The Spider had known since the day Zora walked in this room, that she wasn't human. Yet it had accepted her, trained her, taught her; it had been her family. A sketchy, untrustworthy family, but one that had always been behind her nevertheless—if not to have her back, then at least to watch her fall.
Alas, a broken family was still a lifeline of dependence, and a witness to her fall meant it was at least consequential. If no one saw her as she keeled over, was she not like a tree felled with no one to hear? Did she ever exist without an observer?
"The world itself is trying to keep you down. So what else must you do but tear it down?"
The puppet's soulless button eyes pierced her heart and soul. To it, Ashin and Joushin meant very little, as its true enemy was of the world above. It stared at her, and burning indignation took hold of her heart.
She had avoided killing because of what it might mean for her specifically, but for freedom? It was lofty, trying to overhaul a world without sacrificing a principle or two. Kinney's advice rang in her ears over and over, trying to convince her that the step she was about to take was wrong.
Yes, it likely was. But hadn't she tried everything else? She'd never be clean enough to ascend like a human would. So wouldn't it at least be fitting for her to rise as an Ashin?
"Kill for me, Zora. It shall set you free."