The funeral was being held outside of Wisptown, atop a small hill that contained a graveyard which overlooked the solar and wind farms and continental greenhouses that stretched onwards for miles. The sound of the massive wind turbines in the distance reached them, sending light vibrations reverberating through the ground at a slight staccato with each rotation.
“Millie was a force of nature to be reckoned with. She had a heart that always seemed to find a place for people, loved openly, and wore her wounds proudly,” Adeline Radcliffe said softly into the microphone positioned in front of her. Her husband David stood next to her, a reassuring hand on her shoulder as she gave her speech.
“Unlike her silly parents, drawn to the fantastical, she was always grounded and on the lookout, thinking about how she could make the world around her a better place,” She smiled at the gathering of children in front of her, the kids from Wisptown’s orphanage with tear-stained faces, sitting solemnly in the front row.
“At first, she wanted to become a Ghostslayer, could you believe it?” Adeline chuckled softly at how some of the children seemed to respond with solemn nods. “Then she found her place, with you. All of you brought her so much happiness, and I want you to know that if she were with me today, she would say just the same. She loved all of you very much.”
Carmen bit down a sob as she watched some of the children burst into tears.
Oh Adeline…
You’re doing this for the kids, not for yourself.
“Thank you for being a part of her life. She loved you all very much, and she would want you to live wonderful, happy lives. So, don’t cry too much, ok? You’ll make her sad. The best you can do for her is to live well.”
The children nodded solemnly at Millie’s mother’s words, before some of the orphanage attendants stepped in, ushering them back towards the bus that had brought them out of Wisptown. They filtered down the hill, as the rest of the attendants began rising from where they were seated, approaching Adeline and David with their condolences.
Carmen felt a light tug at her side, and she looked down in surprise at her son. Little Lucas, who stared at her with wide, tearstained brown eyes.
“Mama… why didn’t Evantra come?”
---
Evantra stared at the sewer that had caved in. Beyond it was a tunnel that bordered the sewer system, appearing to lead down into a cavern. Vast cracks spread across the sewer walls in her immediate vicinity.
The wall had either crumbled due to the force of Caliburn’s mining efforts or the Veilcreatures in the caverns seeking a way out of the caverns beneath the sewers. Perhaps it was due to a combination of both. Even now, she could still feel the thumps of Caliburn’s mining efforts reverberate through the ground.
Through the hole in the wall was a familiar dark tear in reality.
The Veilsurge.
Evantra noticed a buzz emanating from a magazine pouch from her vest. She extracted her phone, taking a minute to glance at the call coming through and the name emblazoned across her screen.
Moustache (Trevor Foster)
She declined the call.
Evantra climbed over the rubble of the collapsed sewer wall, climbing into the dark cavern. She holstered her Nagantra and her grip encircled her Liberty Astral M5, her fingernails painfully digging into her palms as she hefted the assault rifle in front of her.
Evantra entered the Veilsurge.
---
Trevor Foster cursed as Evantra failed to pick up the call. Crouched behind a brick wall, he peered past it and watched as another vast rotstag strolled through Wisptown’s streets. The moment he had emerged from the sewers, he had requested backup, but all squads were flooded with creatures.
They were dealing with multiple Veilsurges.
Unfortunately, creatures were pouring through practically all of them, and the force and volunteers were swamped. The only saving grace was that the rotstag was the most dangerous threat that they had to contend with. The rest were rabble – it was the volume that was the problem, but that they could deal with.
“It’s going to be ok,” he whispered to a little girl and her mother who were crouched anxiously beside him, as they evaded the beast walking down the street. He still recalled how all of his rounds were trivialised in the face of its regeneration back in the sewers with Evantra.
Before he could attempt to call her again, his phone buzzed in his hands.
---
[Darkvision]
Evantra activated her skill.
I’m in a different timezone.
Evantra emerged into a luxury shopping mall fallen into disrepair. It had a glass roof which comprised the entirety of its ceiling, which was now shattered in places. High-end luxury stores lined either side of the mall. A single “river” divided the floor of the mall in two, and Evantra supposed that in its heyday, its wealthy clientele could have enjoyed boat rides through its interior.
Rapidly examining her surroundings, she determined that there weren’t any Veilcreatures in the immediate vicinity. She crept forwards in a crouch, careful to avoid stepping onto the glass shards littering the floor around her.
The signs in the mall were in English, but they didn’t give her any further clues as to just where in the Lost Territories she had been teleported to.
Taking a mental snapshot of where the Veiltear was located, Evantra strode forwards.
This place is massive.
She froze, hearing a familiar buzzing noise approaching from a distance away.
Teethlings.
From what Noelle has told me, they don’t have heat vision – just better visual acuity in the darkness.
At the rate they were approaching, Evantra had no opportunity to get to cover.
Evantra concurrently activated two of her skills, transforming into another ladder.
[Object mimicry]
[Stonerooted]
She watched as the swarm of teethlings lazily buzzed through the air, about a quarter of the size of the one she had encountered in her first Veilsurge.
She watched as the teethlings rounded the corner, and she released her skills with a gasp, feeling the familiar strain on her heart when she activated all three skills concurrently. Picking up the pace, she fell into a steady jog, trailing the teethling swarm, casting furtive glances at the shops around her.
Nothing useful.
Carefully following the path of the teethlings, the path eventually opened up to a huge central area. A section of it appeared to be some sort of food court, with chairs and tables now strewn about the complex.
She quickly understood one of the main dilemmas faced by Ghostslayers that aimed to close Mundane Veilsurges leading to the Lost Territories.
Evantra’s eyes passed over a range of Veilcreatures gathered in the central area. She had taken the initiative to study some of the known Veilcreatures that had been documented, with Noelle having helped her scrounge up whatever reliable information that she could from forums – parsing fact from fiction with her existing knowledge.
Noelle was right… there are a lot of creatures associated with Avalon.
Evantra gritted her teeth, pushing the thought of the girl from her mind. Anger flared up within her, and she took solace in its presence, her grip tightening around the grip of her assault rifle.
Focus.
Her eyes passed over a pair of familiar creatures, their bodies comprised of boulders of stone tied together by some unfamiliar force.
Rock elementals.
Then her eyes fixed on a small group of grazing animals that bore some similarity to the stag of decaying flesh that she had glimpsed before. These creatures had antlers that glowed a harsh, bright blue and had entirely white coats. While the “rotstag” had been unfamiliar to her, possibly a variant, these were within her knowledge.
Mist stags.
The final creature that she glimpsed was one whose form she recognised. Not from any of her night dives, dalliances with the Veil, but in the digital world. Second World.
Curving wood embodied its flowing, elegant form – but this creature was far larger than the one Evantra had last glimpsed. The form that Noelle had taken as her avatar.
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A dryad.
The temptation to burst out of her hiding place and to bury them in bullets threatened to overwhelm her, and Evantra let out a shuddering breath.
Come on. Think. I don’t need to kill all of the creatures in here, only those powering the Veilsurge.
How do I determine—
Wait a minute.
On a whim, Evantra regarded her interface.
Ghostslayer Rank: Ghoul (Level 7)
Active catalyst: Darkstalker (level 1)
- [Razor claws]
- [Darkvision]
- [Clot acceleration]
Reserve catalyst: Ionian Mimic (level 5)
- [Conceal]
- [Object mimicry]
- [Stonerooted]
Rituals:
- [Ritual of consumption]
- [Ritual of Veilsight]
- [Ritual of concealment]
Veilsouls: 20
Evantra activated her [ritual of Veilsight].
Veilsouls remaining: 10
She watched as the environment around her seemed to gain a grey hue, and her eyes widened.
Unlike the Veilcreatures beneath them, the swarm of teethlings hovering in the air had taken on a darker hue, as if there was something… pulsing within them.
---
Having closely observed the teethlings, Evantra realised that they defaulted to a familiar path through the shopping mall. They would halt in the clearing with the other Veilcreatures, before doing a loop around it.
Crouched a short distance away from the Veilsurge, she confirmed that the tear in reality itself had a darker hue when she peered at it under the effect of the [ritual of Veilsight].
Seeing how she couldn’t afford to draw the attention of the other Veilcreatures, she decided to deal with the teethlings on one of their patrols.
Preferably outside the Veilsurge, where she could make a quick exit, which was also a distance away from the congregation of other creatures in the mall, out of earshot.
Hearing the buzzing sound approach, Evantra took position at the edge of a small corridor between two shops, leading to a single storage closet. Her eyes traced the heights of the mall, waiting for her quarry to arrive.
As the small mass of teethlings appeared, Evantra opened fire from behind the wall. Resisting the urge with all she could to hold down the trigger, she sent quick, sharp bursts into the very centre of the mass with her assault rifle, watching as teethlings dropped from the sky into the stagnant river below them, now filled with rainwater and debris.
Evantra lurched around the corner, instantly reloading and activating her skills.
[Object mimicry]
[Stonerooted]
She took her preferred appearance of a ladder and leaned upright against the wall. She watched the remaining mass of teethlings rush by her, having been thinned significantly by the time they had reached her position. They halted on top of the storage door and began to eat their way through it.
While they were stationary, Evantra released her skills, snapping back into motion as she withdrew her Nagantra from her holster and gunned down the remaining teethlings, watching blankly as her bullets carved a bloody path through their bodies, dark grey blood spraying as she completed her massacre of the creatures.
---
Taking a deep breath in, Carmen drew her son closer to her.
“You’re wondering why Evantra didn’t come to the funeral?”
“Mmhm.”
For a moment, they sat together in silence, watching as relatives and friends of the Radcliffes walked up to Adeline and David to pay their condolences.
“Lucas… people grieve in different ways. Do you know why we have funerals?”
Lucas frowned and seemed to struggle to grasp Carmen’s question.
“Funerals aren’t for the one that passed, Lucas. They’re for the ones that remain. Tell me, how does it feel when you cry?”
“I… don’t like crying.”
Carmen smiled with understanding.
“Think what it is you don’t like, is being sad. When you cry, does it make you feel better at all?”
“Mmhm.”
Carmen squeezed her son’s forearm.
“You asked me why Evantra didn’t come? Why was that?”
“She didn’t seem sad. I didn’t see her cry. Millie was her friend.”
---
Evantra watched as the rotstag emerged out of the Veilsurge back into the luxury mall. It’s clouded, white eyes locked onto her.
Did it track me into the Veilsurge?
Damn.
This is it, huh?
The beast let out a wail as it charged towards her. Every fibre in her body was telling her to run further down the corridor of the mall, but she had learned in her encounter with it in the sewers that the creature was capable of easily outpacing her. Without the sharp corners that cut off its line of sight, the creature was free to summon its miasma to tear through her skin if it unleashed a ranged attack.
There wasn’t any way she could easily break their line of sight to activate [object mimicry].
So, she waited.
For the beast to come to her.
Evantra lurched sideways at the last second, watching as the stag barrelled past her, her gambit successful.
Now I can make for the Veil—
Evantra narrowly leapt to the side and dodged as it sent another ball of miasma hurtling towards her, warned by the sound that it had emitted. Before she could run, she watched the stag reorient itself with a speed that surprised her.
It charged again.
She waited once more, and this time, she saw the beast slow, as if trying to bait her into a lunge, before rapidly increasing its speed once more. Evantra leapt to the side, correctly timing her leap.
It learns quickly; it almost got me.
The ball of miasma slammed into her arm.
Evantra screamed as she felt her clothes and skin beneath being rapidly eaten away, consumed by the creature’s corrosive miasma. It felt like her skin was aflame, and she could see her exposed skin bubble into blood.
With shaking hands, she rapidly undid the Velcro on the magazine pouch containing her stims and jammed it into the arm that had taken the brunt of the hit.
The miasma overpowered it.
The beast charged, and Evantra brought up her weapon, trying desperately to steady her breathing as she aimed for its eyes. If hitting its teeth had disrupted it, perhaps going for another more vulnerable area would throw it off, giving her enough time to hide, then to slip away.
The only problem was that her arm wasn’t entirely healed. Her shots fired wide, spattering into the line of shops behind her, causing whatever glass panels adorning the shopfronts that remained intact to shatter.
She lunged again, but this time, the rot stag anticipated her movements and adjusted its trajectory, its antlers hooking into her abdomen and sending her hurtling across the mall floor.
She slammed into the ground, her vision going white as her body came aflame with pain.
---
“Right now Lucas, Evantra doesn’t have the tears to cry,” Carmen whispered to her son, as she lightly stroked his head. She saw thunderclouds gathering in the distance, far above them, signalling the advent of another ectostorm.
“I don’t understand mama.”
Carmen's smile was drawn as she slowly rose to her feet, guiding Lucas up while she stood.
“When her mama and papa died, she didn’t cry either.”
“She isn’t sad?
“Oh no, mijo. That’s not it at all. Listen,” she dropped to her knee, pushing a lock of her son’s hair out of the way of his eyes.
“Evantra is more sad about losing Millie than most of us here. If it’s even possible to compare the pain and grief that one experiences with another’s. She misses her desperately. It’s the reason she isn’t here.”
Lucas’ brow furrowed as he frowned in confusion
---
Evantra rolled onto her back as the skin of her abdomen which had been gorged by the creature’s antlers devolved into a bubbling mess of blood and flesh.
With her one good hand and the last vestiges of her consciousness, she reached for the final stims in her magazine pouch. Every single movement burned, and she tried not to glance at the site of impact on her abdomen, which was bubbling just like her hand was.
She watched through blurry eyes as the stag slowly approached her, its eyes locked onto hers.
Ah.
Her fingers touched shattered glass inside her magazine pouch.
She had landed on the stims, breaking them with the impact of her fall.
---
Carmen and Lucas paused as the line of people queuing up to express their sympathies to the Radcliffes paused. Carmen whispered down towards Lucas.
“Evantra doesn’t cry because she isn’t sad, Lucas. It’s because she doesn’t think she deserves the relief that it brings.”
Carmen smiled a sad smile down at her son.
“Because she thinks she’s failed Millie, and she can’t bear to face her.”
---
Evantra smeared her hand into what remained of her broken stims. She screamed in pain as the corrosion wreaked havoc across her abdomen and arm. Hands coated with the remains of the stim intermingling with slivers of glass, she dragged them across her burning abdomen, being eaten away by the creature’s decay in a vain attempt to halt it.
[Clot acceleration]
It didn’t work.
She attempted to climb to her feet, but fell back down, her bloody hands slipping on the floor beneath her. She collapsed to the ground as the decay began to bore further into her flesh, muscle and sinew.
This is it, huh?
I’m sorry Mills.
I was a horrible friend.
I’m so sorry I wasn’t there for you when you needed me.
I wish… I had told you about what happened. About awakening as the world’s final magical girl.
At least that way, I would have been able to see you laugh at the thought of it.
I wish…
I had told you how much you meant to me.
Evantra closed her eyes as tears ran down her cheeks, born not from her sorrow, but from her pure physiological reaction to the decay tearing through the skin across her body.
I don’t deserve to weep for you.
She felt warm. The ends of her lips curled upwards.
The world’s final magical girl.
I’m a failure.
Still… I feel warm, here at the end.
Maybe I have fewer regrets than I thought.
Evantra opened her eyes and stared as she watched flames flicker on the ground in front of her, at the feet of the rot stag. The beast that had slowly been encroaching towards her had paused, its head turning to look in another direction.
Through her fuzzy hearing, she heard someone shouting in the near distance, interspersed with the bark of semi-automatic gunfire. Craning her head as her vision went in and out of focus, Evantra fixed her gaze on a figure racing towards her.
She heard glass shatter next to her, and she felt a familiar sensation of liquid wash over her.
It’s pointless.
Stims won’t work.
It’s too far gone.
“EVANTRA!”
“DO WHAT YOU DID WITH THE NANOTECH!”
Evantra blinked tears from her eyes as she turned her head towards the approaching figure.
Noelle Laurent.
The girl narrowly ducked a ball of miasma that passed right over her head, which had been poised to slam directly into her face. With her eyes clear of tears, she watched as Noelle reached into a sling bag at her side and withdrew a Molotov cocktail, which she lit and threw towards the rotstag.
She watched as the stag danced backwards as it shattered across the ground before it.
Then she watched as Noelle reached into her bag once again, throwing another object towards her.
Glass shattered, and Evantra felt liquid spray onto her.
“DO IT!”
[Clot acceleration]
Evantra’s eyes widened as she felt the burning across her body and arm—
Cease.
Unlike when she had previously attempted to stem the advent of the corrosion, [clot acceleration] amplified the healing effect of whatever Noelle had thrown at her. She felt her skin begin to repair, the pain disappearing as it counteracted the effect of the rot stag’s decay.
She rose to her feet.
The stag, seeming to realise the threat that the Noelle posed, wound itself up like a spring, preparing to surge through the flames at its own expense, to gorge the girl. Even a small miasma projectile would melt through Noelle’s skull with ease, and the girl’s mere presence next to the beast was an existential threat to her.
Evantra lunged forwards, activating [razor sharp] and driving her elongated nails into the rot stag’s eye. Immediately, the decay from the beast began to eat away at her nails and parts of her skin in contact with the beast, but it was counteracted with whatever healing liquid that Noelle had showered her with, which was still working its magic in concert with [clot acceleration].
The rot stag let out a wail as it attempted to tear itself free from Evantra’s grip, still intent on goring the other girl that posed a threat to it.
“THROW THEM NOW!”
“No, but—”
“DO IT!”
Evantra hugged the beast’s neck to herself, heedless of the decay that the contact against her skin was invoking, setting her skin aflame with pain.
[Clot acceleration]
Being healed.
Decaying.
Being healed.
Decaying.
Over, and over, and over, and over.
Then she was set aflame.
Evantra used her weight to pull the rot stag’s head towards her, as the Molotov cocktail thrown by Noelle impacted on the other side of its body.
Flames poured over them both, and Evantra began to burn from both the decay and the flames.
“MORE!”
More Molotovs shattered across the beast’s hide, and she screamed as her skin was set aflame from decay and flame alike.
Until eventually, they slumped to the floor together.
---
All was still and silent until Noelle watched the figure rise from the flickering flames consuming the body of the creature.
By all logic, she should have been dead.
Instead, she left the corpse of the rotstag, a [draugr] class creature behind, as the melted and corroded skin across her body began restitching itself before Noelle’s very eyes.
Noelle watched as Evantra Wraithmarked walked free of the flames.
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