BANG!

  The gunshot tore through the ruined road, echoing against the broken rails suspended above them like the ribs of a dead giant. The bullet screamed toward Alcy's forehead-

  -and in that single breath of a moment, both siblings vanished.

  One darted left. The other right.

  Gone.

  "Wow..." the woman exhaled, her voice edged with something between surprise and thrill. "You're no average kids, are you? Huh?"

  The air shifted.

  Alcy was suddenly there-right in front of her. No warning. No sound. Just presence. His body twisted mid-motion and his knee came flying upward, fast and merciless, aiming straight for her face.

  But she moved.

  Her spine bent backward in a sharp arc, boots grinding against cracked asphalt as she leaned away from the strike. The wind of his knee brushed past her nose by inches.

  Above them, the shattered train tracks loomed. Below, on the devastated road, the fight had only just begun.

  A sharp grin sliced across her face.

  "Not bad, boy!"

  Alcy was still in the air, just about to land-balance not yet his, back wide open. She turned in one smooth motion, arm rising, barrel locking onto him with lethal certainty.

  The trigger began to give.

  And then-

  Lara appeared.

  Right in front of her. Close enough to feel the heat of her breath.

  Shock flashed across the attacker's face, her eyes widening as the shot stalled in her chamber.

  "Eat this!" Lara screamed.

  Fire erupted around her fist, wild and blazing, and she drove it forward with everything she had-straight into the woman's abdomen.

  The impact came like the wrath of a collapsing star.

  Flame met flesh-

  -and the world erupted.

  The explosion tore through the ruined street, rattling the fractured buildings and shaking the broken train tracks above them. The ground quaked beneath their feet. The blast roared outward, violent and unforgiving, its echo rolling far into the distance as if the city itself had cried out.

  If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  Smoke swallowed everything.

  Heat shimmered. Ash drifted.

  And then... it began to clear.

  A silhouette stood at the center of the devastation.

  Unmoved.

  The attacker remained upright, her boots still planted against the shattered asphalt. Ice crawled over her entire body-thick, jagged, glistening. Frost clung to her limbs, layered and unbroken, steam hissing where flame had kissed frozen armor.

  Not a crack.

  Not a single fracture.

  Lara's breath caught in her throat. Her eyes widened, disbelief washing over her as the reality settled in.

  She had taken it head on.

  And it had done nothing.

  Lara snapped back to Alcy's side, swift enough that her retreat left the ghost of herself hanging in the air for a heartbeat. The ground beneath them was broken and blackened, the ruined road trembling under the distant groan of the damaged tracks above.

  Across from them, the female attacker's icebound form began to fracture. Fine cracks spidered over her frozen body, spreading with a sharp, brittle sound until the shell could no longer hold. The ice gave way, collapsing from her frame, and she stood revealed once more-bare of the cold armor that had hidden her, exposed in the wreckage and the dust.

  "Wow. Just... wow. Bravo, you two." She clapped slowly, each strike of her palms echoing against the ruined street below the shattered tracks. Amusement curled her lips as she looked them over. "To think you're both this capable? I'm impressed. Truly."

  Her hands slid over the curves of her own body, possessive, almost mocking. "Such talent," she sighed. "And to be assassinated-what a waste. If I could, I'd steal you both away for myself."

  "Don't get cocky with us! We're just getting started!" Alcy shouted back.

  But in that same instant, Lara collapsed.

  Her body hit the ground hard, breath torn from her. A hole-no bigger than a fist-gaped in her lower left abdomen, dark and horrifyingly still.

  The heat of the battle vanished, replaced by a cold, numbing void in her side. She didn't even feel the pain yet-just the terrifying sensation of her life leaking onto the asphalt

  "Lara-!" The cry ripped from Alcy's throat, raw with terror. He lunged for her, hands reaching, desperate to catch her before she struck the ground.

  Too late.

  The female attacker was already behind him.

  Her right leg lashed out in a brutal, precise kick aimed straight for his abdomen. Alcy barely managed to block, arms screaming under the impact-but the force was overwhelming. It hurled him away, fast and violent, sending him crashing through the air and into the side of a building with bone-jarring force.

  "Hmmm... still," she mused, staring toward the wreckage where Alcy had crashed, "the gaps in your training are obvious."

  "Alcy..." Lara whispered. Her voice barely escaped her lips, thin and trembling against the ruined road.

  "Oh, right. You." The woman's grin widened as she looked down at the blood-soaked girl sprawled on the ground. She raised her gun, the barrel steady as it found Lara's face. "Sorry-Lara, was it? No hard feelings. It's just business."

  Lara's breath hitched. Tears spilled freely as her chest shook, pain and fear overwhelming her. She squeezed her eyes shut, surrendering to what she believed was the end.

  Then-

  Darkness poured down from above.

  The shadowed figure, high over the shattered street and broken tracks, unleashed a suffocating, misty gloom. In an instant, the world vanished beneath a heavy veil of darkness. Nearly fifty meters of the battlefield was swallowed whole, trapped in a murky, unnatural night.

  The darkness didn't just fall; it coiled around the ruins like a living beast, swallowing the screams of the city.

  What-? the attacker thought, her pulse spiking. It's night? No... why does the air feel so heavy-so hard to breathe?

  The Master has arrived! But is he here to save them, or just to finish the 'Contract'?