“Get down from there you LITTLE SHITS!”

  Millie screamed at Harry and Elias, who had somehow snuck underneath the barriers in Elsecaller City’s Museum of the Veil to climb onto an ancient Nezha Harbinger drone.

  Harry was currently posing in front of one of the drone’s hulking machine guns, one arm stylishly leaning against the weapon of brutalist design that had no doubt torn through hundreds or thousands of Veilcreatures before it had been decommissioned. Relegated to its final rest, in a museum exhibit, while its companions lay rusting in junk heaps scattered around slum cities.

  Millie watched with a sigh as Elias snapped pictures of Harry as he enthusiastically and fluidly switched poses with such passion and flair that he would have left supermodels envious.

  Numerous small, translucent red circles dotted the front armour plating of the drone, presumably housing the cameras used by the drone’s controllers to sight Veilcreature threats.

  Nezha Corporation had eventually been outclassed by Santa Muerte Defence Industries, with the advent of their Archdemon line of drones. Autonomous monstrosities notorious for tearing Veilcreatures to shreds with their distinctive hail of gleaming red incendiary rounds, leaving nothing but ash and flame in their wake.

  True to their namesake.

  As encouraging as humanity’s technological advancements were, it was easy to forget just why humanity hadn’t yet reclaimed the Lost Territories.

  She remembered her mother telling her stories of how she used to cheer when broadcasts displayed Ghostslayers pushing through territory claimed by Veilcreatures. When the greed of megacorporations reconciled itself with humanity’s goal of reclaiming what was lost, creating fleeting, beautiful displays of hope. Seeing humanity’s air superiority in their sweeping drones and fighters that covered the sky, the ground covered by tanks, mechs and Ghostslayers equipped with various cybernetic specialities and arms.

  All turned to dust.

  The tide turning instantly when a poltergeist possessed humanity’s weapons of war, turning it against them. Humanity’s grand advances, paved in blood split by megacorporations, trivialised in an instant. With such sickening ease, that it reduced the grand raid and collaboration between corps and Ghostslayers into a mockery.

  One of the museum staff members shot her a dirty look, and she tried to convey her remorse with an appropriately apologetic expression, that sought to encapsulate her utter frustration at her little charges’ antics.

  “If you don’t stop this instant, there will be no gaming for you for the next year.”

  Harry and Elias froze, their little faces scrunching up into expressions of pure horror. They scrambled to remove themselves from the exhibit, joining the small mass of milling children around her.

  Works like a fucking charm.

  I should try it on Evantra.

  Elsecaller City’s Museum of the Veil intrigued her just as much as it did the little ones. There were tantalising exhibits about various mysteries and horrors that lurked at the far reaches of their world. She had read books detailing how her ancestors had once complained about their peaceful existence as being boring.

  There had been no other such complaints since the advent of the Veilsurges.

  She shifted from the drone exhibit to join her colleague, who was standing at the space section.

  Brian scratched his chin while looking up at the enormous glowing red orb that hung from the roof, framed by the facsimile of the dark reaches of space around it.

  Mars.

  But there was something different about it that her ancestors wouldn’t quite recognise. It was distinctly less red than it had used to be. The planet’s rusted surface sported distinct patches of green, which betrayed Demeteria Agricorporation’s efforts to terraform the planet.

  True enough, she could see Demeteria’s glowing yellow logo plastered across the side of the exhibit, lazily wrapping around the circumference of the viewing deck right beneath the guardrail.

  “Hey Mills… d’ya think there are any Veilcreatures up in space? I’ve always wondered—”

  Millie stared flatly at Brian while simultaneously tuning out his rambling. He wasn’t known to be the brightest tool in the shed. He was notorious for trying to fill his broken-down station wagon with literal orange juice when he had seen a Himetachi ad suggesting that people “juice up” their cars with advertised mods.

  “Brian, my dude. Look over there, what do you see?”

  Brian followed the path of her finger towards an exhibit bordering Demeteria’s.

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  Huge chunks of stone hung floating, suspended in space. Millie had to admit, it was a cool effect – she wondered how they’d achieved it. The disparate chunks vaguely resembled an immense sphere, hanging beneath the backdrop of a black dome of stars above them.

  “Why do you think they blew up the moon?”

  “Uhhhh… Maybe they thought it was made of cheese? I hear it’s hard to get your hands on these days—”

  Blowing up the moon...

  Or that's what the corpos tell us happened.

  I'm no astrophysicist, but the fact that Earth was spared from the remnants of that explosion, and that the resulting debris drifted to form rings around the planet seem to suggest there's more at play. Especially considering that the tidal forces haven't been affected nearly as much as scientists have projected it would, and that the seasons haven't been thrown out of whack with axial tilt deviation that its destruction would cause.

  Bottom line is... don't believe the corporate propaganda, as the many theories online espouse.

  Not that I think Brian here gives a flying fuck. I don't think he's made it past the cheese hypothesis.

  Millie detached herself from Brian, leaving him to his own devices and fantasies as she tried to get a fix on her little shits.

  Harry and Elias were waving at her anxiously.

  “What now.”

  She strode over to them, and they pointed anxiously towards little Xian Fang, who was standing alone a short distance away. The little girl had tears running from her eyes, and a precious little snot bubble protruding from one of her nostrils.

  She was standing in front of a closed exhibit.

  “Hey Fang Fang. C’mere.”

  Millie walked over along with Harry and Elias enveloping the girl a hug, whispering softly under her breath. She could feel the little girl’s hiccups. Something had clearly upset her but—

  Oh.

  Millie scanned over the closed exhibit that stretched out before her, its entrance blocked off from entry. She held Xian Fang’s hand gently in her hand, as she strode forwards to peer between the wooden boards hastily blocking it off. It was a shoddy, patch-up job, and she could just barely peer between the gaps to peak through.

  That explains it.

  The magical girl exhibit. She must have been eager to see it.

  “I was looking forward to it too, you know?”

  Milile turned as she heard a stranger’s voice to the left of her.

  Wait, I didn’t hear anyone—

  Her breach caught.

  A young woman of Asian descent was standing next to her, with flowing black robes adorned with what looked like gleaming points of light in an immaculate recreation of the night sky, She had long, silky black hair that dropped all the way down to her waist. Her bangs rested just above her eyebrows, and framed gleaming silver eyes angled downwards towards Xian Fang, who had halted in her crying.

  Beautiful, garnet lips angled into a warm smile as the young woman who looked to be about the same age as her crouched, extending one of her hands from within her robe. Flawless, soft skin and a single freckle on her cheekbone shone as the museum’s lighting bounced off her features as she descended into her crouch.

  The young woman handed Xian Fang a little pin.

  “Tsukuyomi-sama.”

  Millie jolted as another voice appeared seemingly out of nowhere. She turned to her side and her heart began to race as she noticed the two men approach.

  The first, looked like less human and more like one of Liberty corporation’s hulking mechs. Or an amalgamation of a golem from a Veilsurge rendered in the image of a mortal man. He had somehow obtained clearance to carry a light machine gun into the museum that looked like it would have been right at home alongside the Harbinger drone’s weapons, lifting it with a practiced ease.

  His eyes were entirely black, devoid of pupils and irises. The only flesh that Millie could glimpse was that which was on his face, the last remnants of his humanity.

  He was more machine, than man.

  The second man was dressed similarly to the beautiful – from what he could tell from her address – Japanese woman who had addressed Xian Fang.

  He had similar flowing black robes. Unlike the woman’s his wasn’t adorned with the glittering stars of the night sky, but something else. The swirls of a painterly rendition of a black hole curled across his right breast, its dark swirls extending throughout his garb, circling lazily in its place. The man had no weapons that she could identify, barring one.

  A katana.

  Sheathed at his back, the blade’s handle had black fabric wrapped around it in an elegant cross-cross pattern. Its sheath seemed to absorb whatever light that touched it, and stood out even against his flowing black robe. Apart from his glowing irises, there wasn’t a single identifiable cybernetic enhancement that she could see. That being said, most of his body was concealed by the robe.

  Millie tried not to topple over as her head swam.

  She recognised the man.

  Touka Tsukuyomi.

  The Japanese Ghostslayer best known for felling a Wisp that befell Osaka.

  The feat granted him the title of [wisp] rank.

  They’re… heirs.

  Tsykuyomi Conglomerate.

  “T-thank you.”

  The woman turned away from Xian Fang, Millie, Harry and Elias, who stared at her in awe.

  “What’s your name?”

  Xian Fang called out to the retreating figures, and Millie paled as the hulking Ghostslayer turned, his dark eyes like the void locking onto Xian Fang. The little girl, bless her brave, suicidal soul, just shifted her weight restlessly from one foot to another as she stared at the girl who had given her the gift.

  “Mi-zu-ki,” the young woman adorably enunciated each syllable, ending in an upwards inflection, before giving Xian Fang a bright wave, and turning back to continue on her way.

  “W-woah,” Harry and Elias breathed in unison, trailing the passage of the woman and the Ghostslayers. Millie was broken out of her stupor as she felt a tug on either side of her jeans as the boys looked up at her.

  “Why aren’t you as cool as she is, Millie? Her eyes were glowing… Then that big guy, let’s look him up! Can we have your phone, pretty please?”

  Millie decided to take a page out of Evantra’s playbook, giving the boys a serene smile of magnanimity.

  “No games for a month.”

  “Wai—”

  Millie the tyrant tuned out the chorus of voices that rose in protest, turning towards the little girl. She extracted a few tissues and cleaned up Xian Fang’s face. Taking a closer look at the pin in her hands, she recognised an artistic rendition of the magical girl Homura Tomoe – the [leviathan slayer].

  “Looks like even corpos can be nerds. She has good taste, doesn’t she Fang Fang.”

  The girl beamed up at her, her worries forgotten. Millie ruffled her hair before casting one final glance towards the shut exhibit dedicated to magical girls and guardians.

  “Shame… Evantra would have liked to have seen it, too.”

  Millie snapped a selfie of the boarded-off exhibition, with her face in the centre of the image.

  “Totally going to rub this in her face. Heh.”

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