Dawn New Port
At the quieter residential edge near the water, the shadowy group crouched atop rooftops overlooking the port's security gate.
At this hour, nothing moved. No wagons. No cargo. No workers.
Only two bored Ravendawn guards stood near the gate, chatting lazily to keep themselves awake.
The leader raised his hand.
A signal.
He began chanting a spell.
His body shimmered.
Then vanished.
One by one, the others followed, their forms dissolving into faint distortions in the night air.
They dropped silently from the rooftop.
No sound.
No trace.
They dashed straight past the two guards and slipped through the main gate unnoticed.
Inside the port grounds, they moved carefully.
Even while invisible, they avoided direct lanternlight. Too much illumination risked revealing the subtle warping of air around their bodies. Invisibility was powerful, but it was not perfect.
They also deliberately kept out of sight of the mounted security cameras.
They already knew what those did.
The group circled through the dim parking lot filled with trucks, horse wagons, golf carts, and chariots.
Near the warehouse entrance, they halted.
A lone Ravendawn guard stood watch.
One member received a signal and broke away, slipping behind a parked wagon. Once hidden from view, he dropped his invisibility spell and whispered a new spell toward the guard.
The Ravendawn guard yawned, eyes heavy. It had been a long, lonely shift.
But this time—
The drowsiness hit too hard.
Too fast.
His knees buckled.
He collapsed.
"Zzz…"
With the spell successful, the group moved in.
Two members stayed behind to drag the sleeping guard out of sight and conceal him.
The rest slipped inside.
---
Inside, the warehouse was cavernous and cold.
At its center lay the shipwreck debris.
Beside it, the recovered bodies were arranged in a strange semi-circle. A triangle had been carved inward into the floor—part of a ritual diagram.
Once the leader confirmed there were no cameras inside, he released his invisibility.
The others followed.
"What kind of ritual is this…?" one whispered.
"A forbidden one," another replied quietly. "Reserved only for the greatest dark magician."
A pause.
"Lich."
"You're sure that drunk guard told the truth? About the Lich coming to investigate?"
"Yes. I cross-checked with the port schedule. Lich arrives tomorrow."
"And his soul-memory magic can replay past events…" One of them swallowed. "If he sees what happened here, our client is doomed."
"That's why this is our only chance," the leader said calmly. "Plant the explosives."
"Yes, sir."
Two members stepped forward.
They removed their masks.
Then they stripped without hesitation, standing expressionless as others opened bags filled with explosive scrolls.
The scrolls had to be attached directly to skin to activate.
A suicidal method.
A necessary one.
---
Langley, BICH Headquarters
Inside the operations room, Mo' and Janet observed the warehouse feed through a hidden overhead camera.
From that angle, the bodies on the floor formed a very specific shape. Not abstract. Not random. Suspiciously nostalgic.
A near-perfect Pac-Man formation, about to consume the shipwreck in the middle.
"Seriously, Megan? Pac-Man?" Janet said into her comm.
"What? I'm bored! I've been stuck in this warehouse for five days waiting for them to make a move. Add sleep deprivation and see what shapes 'you' arrange corpses into," Megan's voice crackled back.
Mo' exhaled slowly. "Tell her to move."
Janet nodded. "Megan, the old man says go. Move your team."
---
Dawn New Port
Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.
Without warning, blinding lights detonated across the interior, erasing every shadow advantage the infiltrators had carefully cultivated.
"FREEZE! DROP EVERYTHING!"
"RAISE YOUR HANDS!"
BICH agents poured in from every angle with drilled efficiency. Demons lifted their rifles in perfect synchronization. Ravendawn guards sealed the exits without hesitation.
The shadow group was caught in the worst possible moment—mid-operation. Swords remained sheathed. Bows were still slack. Escape routes vanished in seconds.
Their leader searched desperately for an option.
His gaze snapped toward the two naked suicide bombers. His mouth opened, ready to issue the detonation order—
RATATATATATATATA!
Too late.
Two demon rifles chattered in sharp bursts, shredding both bombers before a single command could be spoken.
"Nuh-uh," a voice said. "Nobody is allowed to go boom anymore."
Megan walked forward with two agents behind her, their gun barrels still smoking.
"Hands up. All of you." Megan shouted.
The shadow group hesitated, calculating odds that no longer existed.
RATATATATA!
One operative dropped instantly. Clean. Final.
"I SAID. HANDS. UP."
They complied.
She marched straight up to their leader and tore the mask off his face in one clean motion.
"Well, well. Alan Ridgewood." She smirked. "What's a fancy restaurant owner doing here? Catering?"
"Tch... You know me?" Alan glared at Megan.
"I like your red-circle place. Very zazzy. No wonder Muricans love it," Megan replied.
"…Thanks, Miss Demon. So the Lich's arrival was just bait?" Alan said.
"Yep. I've been fishing for you," Megan said smugly.
THUD!
She smashed the stock of her weapon across his face, sending him crashing to the floor.
"That's for making me sit in a warehouse for five damn days," Megan said, visibly pleased now.
But the scene made other BICH agents lose focus for half a second.
A mistake.
In that sliver of distraction, one operative lunged toward a corpse draped in scrolls.
RATATATATATATA!
A BICH agent fired at the operative. The shots hit—but not fatally.
"Oh shi—" Megan begun
The operative began chanting.
"GET DOWN!" Megan screamed.
BOOOOOOOOM!
The explosion ripped through the warehouse. Megan slammed into the concrete, ears ringing, vision vibrating.
Ratatatata! Ratatatata!
Gunfire tore through smoke and dust.
As her sight steadied, the warehouse had already dissolved into chaos. BICH agents collided with shadow operatives armed with short swords and wrist-mounted crossbows. Steel flashed at close range. Bolts snapped through the air.
Near the exit—Alan Ridgewood was running.
"He's getting away!" Megan said
"Megan, you idiot! Stop him! We need him alive!" Janet barked through the comm.
Megan pushed herself up and bolted outside.
---
Outside, Alan and one companion had already commandeered a chariot and were racing toward the gate. Megan and a Ravendawn guard gave chase on foot, but the distance widened with every second.
She scanned the area, calculating options—and spotted a golf cart nearby, keys still hanging from the ignition.
Meanwhile, Alan's chariot thundered toward the exit gate. Two guards moved to block it. Alan's companion calmly raised a customized wrist-crossbow and fired twice. Both guards dropped.
The horses crashed through the wooden barrier and burst into the city streets.
"Sir, are we fleeing Dawn?" the operative asked.
"Yes," Alan hissed. "But first we return to the Red Circle."
He tightened his grip on the reins.
"We can't leave any evidence behind."
---
Dawn City
Night settles quietly over the suburbs of Dawn City. Every house is dark, its residents already deep in sleep. Only the distant barks of dogs, the yowling of cats, the clatter of hooves—
—and the very loud, very illegal roar of engines tearing through the streets.
TACATAC—TACATAC—TACATAC—
"YAH! YAH! YAH!"
Alan Ridgewood yells as he snaps the reins, urging his horse-drawn chariot forward with the frantic energy equivalent of a man shifting gears in a high-speed car chase.
VROOOOM—
A golf cart rockets up a steep road behind him.
"KYA! KYA! KYA!"
A poor Ravendawn guard clings to Megan's golf cart, screaming for his life—it's his first time in anything with wheels and an engine.
"CALM DOWN, WILL YOU!?"
"Y-YES, MA'AM! I'LL TRY!"
Megan's cart skids around corners, stubbornly tailing the runaway chariot. Both vehicles drift wildly through the empty streets. At a blistering 50 km/h, the medium-speed chase barrels out of the suburbs and into downtown.
Megan is gaining. The gap between them shrinks.
Realizing danger closing in, Alan snatches several magic scrolls from his pocket. He chants under his breath—short, sharp, efficient—and hurls them behind him.
The parchments ignite midair, They burst into two mounted skeleton knights.
One skeleton raises its sword toward the golf cart.
Megan jerks the steering wheel aside, narrowly dodging the slash, then swings it back and slams into the skeletal horse, knocking it off balance before it begins its pursuit again.
"Uh, ma'am," the guard shouts over the chaos, "can't you tell them not to attack us? Since they're demons?"
"Well, can you tell pirates not to rob you? Since they're human?"
"…Fair point."
The guard steadies himself on the cart's edge, drawing his sword to clash with the undead knight now beside him.
CLANK—CLANK—CLANK.
As he fights on the left, another skeleton approaches from Megan's side, sword poised to take her head. She draws her P30L in one smooth motion.
BANG BANG BANG BANG—BANG BANG BANG.
Four shots straight to the knight's core, three into the horse's. Both collapse instantly into a pile of lifeless bone.
On the other side, the guard deflects a downward strike and uses the opening to sever the undead horse's neck. Knight and steed crash to the cobblestones.
"Hey," Megan says, impressed. "You're not bad."
"Thank you, ma'am!"
With her mighty fourteen-horsepower engine, Megan pushes the golf cart to its mechanical ceiling, the motor whining in protest as she steadily claws the distance back from the fleeing chariot. It is less a pursuit vehicle and more a strongly opinionated lawn appliance—but it is committed.
The shadowy operatives riding beside Alan twists around, calm despite the velocity, and raises a wrist-mounted crossbow. He fires.
CLINK—
The Ravendawn guard knocks the bolt aside with clean precision.
The assassin registers it instantly—the guard is a high-level swordman. A second bolt would only waste time. So he makes the practical decision.
He leaps.
He abandons the chariot mid-speed and crashes onto the golf cart, offering his own body as a delay tactic.
The sudden weight shift wrecks the cart's balance.
Megan loses control.
The golf cart plows straight into a peddler's stall, splintering wood, launching baskets and loose goods into the street.
The chariot vanishes around the corner.
On the pavement, steel collides in close quarters.
CLANK CLANK CLANK.
"Ma'am!" the guard shouts between strikes, locked blade-to-blade with the operatives. "Go! I'll hold him off!"
Megan slams the cart into reverse. The battered vehicle shudders, then lurches free from the wreckage. She pivots and accelerates alone.
"Control, I lost visual. Please advise," she says into her comm, voice steady despite the smoke and debris trailing behind her.
---
Langley, BICH Headquarters
On the main monitor, a drone feed tracks Alan Ridgewood's chariot as it skids to a halt in front of Red Circle. Alan jumps down before the horses fully settle and rushes inside without hesitation.
"He's entering Red Circle," Janet reports.
"Copy," Megan responds.
"Alert our agents and Ravendawn forces," Mo' orders. "Block every exit."
"Yes, sir."