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Six months changed everything.
The town still looked the same on the surface—same cracked sidewalks, same school banners flapping in the wind, same forest looming at the edge like it always had. But the people weren't the same. None of them were.
Luna learned that first.
She learned it in the way her heartbeat synced with someone else's now.
Zane Lawson leaned against the hood of his father's black sedan, cigarette unlit between his fingers, eyes sharp and calm in a way that came from growing up around violence. He didn't flinch when Luna's eyes started bleeding again, didn't panic when the air around her vibrated faintly, like pressure before a storm.
"You good?" he asked quietly.
Luna nodded, wiping the blood away. "Yeah. Just… echoes."
That's what she called them now. Not visions. Not hallucinations. Echoes of something vast brushing against her mind. She'd learned how to pull back before it swallowed her. Learned restraint. Learned control.
Zane watched her like she was something fragile and dangerous at the same time. And somehow, with him, Luna felt normal. Or at least less alone.
They'd been together four months.
It wasn't soft. It wasn't loud. It was steady.
Across the city, Siara Halden stood on a rooftop, rain soaking into her jacket, staring down at a military convoy rolling toward the old industrial district.
She didn't feel echoes.
She felt nothing.
The girl who used to sit close to Richard Solace, who used to smile without thinking, was gone. Buried somewhere between blood-soaked trees and an ICU hallway where she'd been told to prepare for the worst.
She didn't grieve anymore.
She didn't hope.
She led.
"Twelve vehicles," Pluto said through the comms. "Standard escort. Experimental division confirmed."
"Copy," Siara replied, voice cold and precise. "Positions stay tight. No hero moves."
Devon stood beside her, jaw clenched. He hadn't healed the same way she had. He still felt everything—too much, sometimes. But he followed her without question now.
Because someone had to step up.
And Siara had.
The group moved under cover of night, slipping past fences and floodlights toward the military facility hidden behind false warehouses and outdated signage. This wasn't the forest anymore. This was official. Concrete. Steel. Men with orders.
Asuka, Tim, Tango, and Pluto split off toward the data wing.
"Five minutes," Asuka muttered. "In and out."
Pluto's drone lifted silently into the air, feeding schematics to Tanya miles away, hunched over screens and radio equipment, tracking something she still couldn't quite lock onto.
Richard's signal was there.
But every time they got close, it vanished.
Devon, Siara, Luna, and Zane moved toward the central yard.
That's when the first gunshot cracked the night.
Then another.
Then the sky lit up.
The Lawson mafia didn't do subtle when they went to war.
Black SUVs crashed through barricades. Armed men flooded the compound, coordinated, ruthless, overwhelming. The army responded in seconds—sirens, gunfire, floodlights snapping on like judgment.
The facility became chaos.
Zane moved like he'd been born into it—issuing commands, covering Luna without hesitation. Devon dragged an injured man to safety while Siara advanced forward, eyes empty, movements sharp and efficient.
She didn't hesitate.
Didn't look back.
Didn't think about Richard.
Luna lifted her hands, silver threading through her dark hair as her power responded to adrenaline and fear. Metal twisted. Guns wrenched from hands. Shockwaves rippled outward, slamming soldiers into concrete. Ripping them in half guts spilling everywhere . Luna shook the battlefield alone
Her eyes burned red.
And then—
The mist rolled in.
Not smoke.
Not gas.
Mist.
Thick, unnatural, swallowing floodlights and gunfire alike. Sound dulled. Shapes blurred. The battlefield vanished into something else entirely.
"Something's wrong," Devon said, gripping his weapon tighter.
Siara felt it then.
A pressure.
A presence.
Not Nekros.
Something closer.
Watching.
Far away, they something eyes those were unmistakble.
The gunfire stopped.
The war froze mid-breath.
And whatever came next didn't belong to any side.
Not anymore.
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