25.1

**ACT YoE 4,171/LT March 13, 2070, at 0700**

Corporate Offices of Berkly and Bruce Skiv

Outer Ring of City Center

Northern Downtown Dockspace

Eve had enjoyed watching Crystal work through a silver mirror enchanted to reflect her investment. She didn’t expect this Julio Palacio to last much longer. There were only so many places a mortal could hide from a blood elemental slowly growing in strength. Chrome wouldn’t mean the difference either in her opinion. It was only a matter of time till the revenge play was completed. She considered it a pre-payment with the extra benefit that it would make Crystal motivated.

The entire affair wasn’t something the Silver Witch would do more than watch. After all, it wouldn’t do if her helicopter Patron’s constant meddling choked out the growing Blood Phantom. Eve's plans included Crystal, which were accurate but not dependent upon the blood elemental. From using the Crown, an excellent conceptual piece of tech that seamlessly granted power in the Net, it was child’s play to learn how hard Arasaka had a grip on Noir City.

Corp’s fingers gripped the city tighter than Ebeneezer’s dead-hand claws. Rather than constantly fighting such a valuable potential ally, she decided to go straight to the top. Infiltration or assimilation was more accessible, in Eve’s opinion. She didn’t share her allies' strong emotions, which appeared to blind them to more accessible options. On the other hand, she would be the first to admit that living in the shadow of a corporation your entire life might affect your worldview.

It was depressing that Eve couldn’t just walk into Arasaka Tower and spellbind the Board of Directors. With the advent of mana leaking into this world from her actions, corporations have already started learning and using its various features. Arasaka was ahead of the curve because they had already had a connection, thin as it was, to Nadja’s world. The appearance of mana hadn’t blindsided them. No, they reacted as if the current situation was expected and practically their invention.

Knowing the existence of something was the first step to exploiting it, and the top corps were old hands at that game. Arasaka’s team in the other world had clearly already sent back basic information such as wards, truth-telling, and scrying spells. They weren’t anything close to efficient, but Eve didn’t ignore them. When a global corporation wanted something and was willing to spend, results were a matter of time, not luck.

While no amount of dedicated scrying could pinpoint anyone under her aegis, Eve couldn’t prevent their general location, such as the city they were in, from coming to light. Unless everyone were directly within a few meters of her at all times, if that was the case, there would be no point in having minions!

No, letting others carry out one possible path was a good division of labor. Meanwhile, Eve would have a relaxing vacation involving a less strenuous backup plan. Also, since the plan would involve minimal effort, it was a maximum return, which, in her opinion, mattered only for a solo operation.

Eve smiled gently, discretely banishing the silver scrying mirror. It appeared the mercenaries had arrived. Over the last few hours, she had personally cleared this entire Maelstrom cover business. For a gang that had been recently cleaned to the chrome nuts and bolts, they didn’t appear to be willing to stay down. The idiots had tried hiding in plain sight, never expecting someone who could effortlessly reveal them would pass by. Or perhaps they just didn’t care, either way it was her gain.

Right on time. Eve thought as a group of mercenaries entered the final partner’s room, where she hovered. A form-fitting silver jumpsuit with abyss black highlights, glowing silver eyes, and floating silver hair topped off her current form’s disguise. The entire picture screamed mana-based shenanigans. She had painted the whole basement room in concentric swirling silver runes. To the uninitiated, it would be clear that she was kept ‘contained’ from escape. The sparkling runes and swirling loops looked like nothing so much as an expensive summoning circle to even the most brainless twit. She’d crafted them using examples from the Net, after all.

The lead mercenary raised a hand, pausing the descent of the rest of the group. It was child’s play for Eve’s personal Crown to crack the chatter between employer and mercenary employee.

Eve subtly shifted her clothing between several job occupations when no one saw her raise the creepiness factor. It was pretty amusing as she watched her antics through the body cams. She allowed a faint smirk to cross her face as she continued to hover before, with deliberate amusement, slowly floating upside down as if gravity had reversed. Her head was pointed at the floor, and it was eerie that her hair didn’t fall with gravity’s touch. It was just another screaming symbol that something ‘not right’ was underway.

Eve cut into the screaming back and forth on the Net as she waved congenially while upside down before speaking, her voice smooth as liquid silver. “Would you mind freeing me?” Witch’s Dust let the air shimmer around her as she playfully twirled a lock of her silver hair.

The mercenary leader stared before a mechanical voice stated, “No.”

Eve drifted closer to the circle's boundary, her head still inches above the ground. The mercenaries tensed but didn’t fire. As expected, no corporation would resist something as enticing as information. Anti-gravity without tech? Magic.

“Here’s the thing,” Eve continued, her voice still a melodic hum that teased the ears. “Unless you can provide me a valid Contract to stay, I’ll be forced to depart. There isn’t much energy left keeping me here in this tiny fragment after all.”

The mercenary leader, a broad-shouldered man with augmented optics glinting red, glanced at his team, then back at Eve. His tactical instincts screamed at him to be wary, but the greedy corporate voice in his ear urged caution and curiosity. The voice of a handler piped through their shared channel, a low whisper like a serpent’s hiss.

“Explain.” The same mechanical voice echoed dispassionately.

Eve’s smirk widened slightly at the audible tension. They were practically foaming at the mouth to learn what they didn’t yet know. She extended a hand, and the silver runes beneath her pulse with a cold, metallic light.

“See?” she purred, her fingers trailing along the circle's boundary as a field of force flashed into silver luminescence, her hands tracing invisible circular walls. “This lovely circle is designed to keep me here for a while, but it was never meant to last.” She drifted forward again, shy of crossing the shimmering barrier, her silver eyes catching the light like a cat in the dark. “So, tell me, who do I have the pleasure of meeting? I can taste the greed on the other end of whoever you are talking to. It’s delicious.”

The leader gritted his teeth. “You can call me Red-eye. Who—or what—are you?”

“Straight to the point. I like that.” Eve’s voice was honeyed with amusement. “Let’s just say I’m a traveler from a place your bosses are very interested in. And you… you’re standing in the way of my next appointment.”

Another merc, a more petite woman with a cybernetic jaw, stepped forward, weapon half-raised. “You said you wanted us to free you. Why not just leave if you’re so powerful?” Her tone was skeptical, contrasting sharply with her leader’s hesitant diplomacy.

Eve tilted her head, still floating upside down. “Where’s the profit in that? Travel is expensive. Leaving with empty hands is a bad sign for all parties involved.” She sighed theatrically as if bored. “Besides, it’s only polite to attempt negotiations. It’s not like I’m one of the Fae.”

The mercs exchanged nervous glances, Red-eye’s optics flickering as he subvocalized a message to the handler. Eve could feel the ripple of a decision being made—corporate greed and fear warring for dominance.

The handler’s voice returned, strained with urgency, Eve’s tap into their comms allowing clear flow. “Stall her. Find out what you can. We’re sending in a specialist.”

Eve’s smile turned sharp, a glint of teeth like polished silver. “Oh, are we playing for time now?” She twirled another lock of her hair, the strands shimmering like liquid mercury between her fingers. “Very well. I suppose I can provide a small sample.”

She extended her other hand, and the air crackled with Witch’s Dust, forming tiny motes of silver that floated lazily around her. Each mote carried a fragment of mana, harmless but deeply disconcerting to anyone who knew what they were looking at. She could hear the scientists on the other end gibbering at the handler to hire her for whatever price she wanted. It was a rather significant ego boost, in Eve’s opinion.

“I could tell you about where I’m from,” she mused, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “A place where the rules of your world start to… break down. Reality unravels like a ball of cheap string, and only the individual power allows for standing outside Existence.”

The woman with the cyber jaw shifted uneasily. “Magic,” she muttered, almost to herself. “This is like that mana stuff they’ve been talking about.”

Red-eye shot her a glare. “Silence.”

Eve chuckled, the sound echoing through the room with a melodic lilt. “Oh, she’s not wrong. You’re standing at the precipice of something wonderful and terrifying, and your employers barely understand half of it. I cannot describe in the limited words of your human language how lucky these metal meals were. If they summoned something else, the fragment you live on would be a light snack.”

The motes of Witch’s Dust began to swirl faster, forming a delicate spiral between them.

Eve sighed a mock disappointed sound. “Looks like our time is up.” She clapped her hands, and the silver runes around her flared bright enough to make the mercenaries wince. “I was hoping you’d come to your senses, but oh well. I guess I’ll be seeing you…later, perhaps. If you want to call me again, follow the instructions on the card.”

With silent finesse, the runes shattered like glass, and Eve’s form flickered, dissolving into a cloud of shimmering silver dust that phased out in a flicker. The mercs scrambled back, weapons raised, but there was nothing to shoot at.

A shining silver card written in flowing cursive script was on the ground in the exact center of the ritual circle.

Red-eye picked up the card at his handler’s behest before departing hurriedly.

Michiko Sanderson watched with clinical eyes at the mercenary Red-eye’s body camera footage displayed in her optics. Her company, Danger Gal, had quietly funded the mercenaries on the side, receiving the footage before the main corporate headquarters in return. “What do you think, Kei?”

“Lethal,” Kei said, his infamous lack of starting conversational rhetoric, which was a somewhat mixed blessing. His analysis of combat, though, was second to none. Even her infamous contact, Uncle Morgan, would give way to Kei’s experienced eyes.

That was why a brief shock flashed through Michiko’s teal eyes. A rating of ‘Lethal’ meant that Kei didn’t think he would survive a combat encounter in one piece. At the worst, he’d only be able to shield himself from death but be left in scattered fragments of expensive chrome. This little slip of a woman is equal in his mind to that shit-tier annoyance, Adam?

“Explain,” Michiko finally verbalized. She wanted to know what her bodyguard saw in the silver woman. On a side note, she also wanted to know who the ‘demon’ went to for such exceptionally fantastic bio-models.

Kei’s gaze lingered on the frozen frame of the footage. The silver woman—if one could even call her that—stood on a battlefield littered with broken drones and shattered combat androids, her figure almost serene amidst the carnage. Her unnatural glistening silver skin didn’t seem like any standard chrome plating or next-gen bio-alloy. It moved fluidly, more akin to liquid mercury, reflecting the neon lights of the attacking enemies in a mesmerizing cascade. It was as if she was a living amalgamation of metal and flesh.

He connected the imagery he had been watching with the copy from the mercenary body cams. “She’s the Silver Sword without a doubt. Younger, less blade, more mischief, but the same, no question. This is footage from the Blackwall and the office footage.”

“Fluid response patterns. No telegraphing of intent,” Kei said as he continued, his voice devoid of awe but tinged with something Michiko couldn’t quite place—perhaps a rare hint of professional respect. He zoomed in on the footage, enhancing a segment where the woman effortlessly dodged a plasma blade by mere centimeters. “In combat, she reads inputs at a rate beyond the tactical threshold. Almost predictive. It could be pre-cog mods, but her movements... it’s not just reaction speed. It’s instinctual.”

Michiko leaned back on the couch, steepling her fingers, her teal optics narrowing as they absorbed the details Kei was presenting. “Instinct? You don’t believe it’s purely augmentations?”

Kei shook his head, a slight tilt that conveyed more than words ever could. He tapped his temple. “No standard neural ware. There is no indicator of any obvious cyberpsychosis triggers. This isn’t chrome madness or a rogue net-runner. It’s something else. Something from beyond the Wall.”

He played the footage again, slowing it to a frame-by-frame analysis. The silver woman moved like a phantom, her body bending impossibly, avoiding gunfire and strikes with fluid, almost preternatural grace as she disassembled the rogue AIs with inhuman ability. But it wasn’t just speed. Her attacks were surgical. There was no wasted motion, no hesitation. Each strike was lethal with the exact amount of force required.

“You think she’s like Adam?” Michiko’s voice carried a weight of disbelief. Comparing anyone to Adam Smasher was tantamount to saying they were a walking apocalypse, given their human-shaped form.

“Worse,” Kei replied, his tone flat. “Adam’s a brute, a force of nature, but he’s predictable. Overwhelming strength and a god-complex. This one,” he pointed at the woman’s image frozen mid-strike, her silver hair flaring like molten metal as her blade flashed in ethereal radiation, “this one thinks.”

“Fantastic.” Michiko’s voice was dry with irony. “The perfect soldier, then. Why can’t we get normal cases with normal assets and easy paydays.”

Kei hesitated an uncharacteristic pause that made Michiko raise an eyebrow. “The Hato faction has never had Mr. Saburo’s faith,” he said.

Michiko felt her synthetic heartbeat spike, an odd reaction she hadn’t experienced in years. It was almost nostalgic—fear. “What do you mean?” she asked, though she knew the answer.

“The Law of Blood,” Kei said quietly. “There is nothing on file from the spare DNA left behind in the air. No samples. No existence. She may be one of his newest assets.”

Michiko’s grip on the armrest of her couch tightened involuntarily. Uncle Morgan’s influence was everywhere, but the Law of Blood was a shadow that loomed over even the most fortified corporate towers. It was whispered about in hushed circles, a legacy that predated chrome and neural augments, rooted in the oldest kind of power—magic. Her grandfather would sell his soul for access to something like that. Entire slush fund accounts in the black ops section of Arasaka were allegedly funding searches on it. Because with magic came the age-old promise that accompanied it in tales and stories.

Immortality.

Something her grandfather valued above family, far, far, far above family.

“The Blood Network, could that old relic have finally become a member?” Michiko muttered under her breath. The words tasted like iron on her tongue. She’d heard rumors—whispers of beings who could traverse the digital and physical realms with equal ease—just like the recently rumored Phantom, connected not through hardware but through something ancient and terrifying. Something that pre-dated the cyber world of today. Something whispered as the real reason the Fourth Corporate War ended.

“You’re telling me she’s something from the New World, an Elemental like the one that crushed Arasaka resources?” Michiko’s voice was sharper now, tinged with irritation masking her unease.

“Possibly, but not the same. The one who obliterated the storm elementals was aligned clearly with blood. They are without a doubt part of the Blood Network.” Kei corrected. He enhanced the footage one last time, zooming in on the woman’s eyes as she turned towards the camera, almost as if she knew she was being watched. Her irises were a deep, swirling silver, like a pool of molten bright metal set in a human pair of eyes.

“Silver elemental,” he said. “Far superior in power if her work outside the Blackwall is anything to go by.”

Michiko’s composure faltered, her perfectly controlled mask cracking ever so slightly. “Elementals are a myth. A ghost story for net-runners who cross the wrong streams.”

Kei gave her a rare, thin smile. “Then I suppose we’re living in a ghost story. Because right before she vanished out of that demonic Maelstrom ritual circle, there was a massive data surge on the Net in that area.”

The screen went black as the footage cut out abruptly. A chill settled in the room, the kind that even the most advanced climate control systems couldn’t dispel.

“What do you want to do?” Kei asked, his tone as neutral as ever.

Michiko leaned back, exhaling slowly. Her mind raced, considering the implications. This was a warning. It was also an opportunity. Her right hand picked up a card filled with calligraphy script. It was an invitation to a world the corporation had been struggling to access, delivered on a platter with clear intent.

“Double the surveillance on our assets. Pull back any unnecessary ops from the Red Zone. And...” she paused, a rare look of genuine uncertainty crossing her features. “Prepare laboratory room eight.”

Kei nodded and turned to leave but paused at the door, glancing back at Michiko. “You know what happens if we push this too far, right?”

Michiko smirked, the familiar steel returning to her gaze. “When have I ever played it safe, Kei? Even as a child, I could see Uncle Yorinobu’s hatred.”

He gave a slight nod. “Fair point. Just remember—ghost stories don’t end well for the ones who try to play hero.”

The door slid shut behind him, leaving Michiko alone in the silence. She moved from the couch to stare at the bright view of Noir City nightlights outside her penthouse, her thoughts already ten steps ahead, calculating and recalculating the odds.

An entity from outside the Blackwall. Something with so much power that even elite assets would pale in comparison. Michiko couldn’t let something like that walk around without attempting to make a deal. The temptation was just too much.