I didn't realize it, but I worked through the night, and I don't feel even a slight hint of sleepiness. Maybe MERTICORE changed me, and I don't need to sleep? That would require further testing, but not right now.

I look at my handiwork and smile. I also giggle maniacally, but that's a minor detail. My shotgun started life as a VEPR semi-automatic magazine-fed shotgun that fired standard 12ga shells. Now I'm not sure what to call it.

Who am I kidding, if anything deserves the name of Super Shotgun then this is it. First of all, I converted the gun into an automatic weapon with a very high fire rate. I also upgraded my handgun in the same manner since I overlooked that aspect. The fire rate alone is closer to a Gatling Gun than a shotgun, but that's only the tip of the iceberg.

The shells are firing a dense rod, made of unknown material that must weigh close to ten kilos, faster than any other rifles. And, as if it wasn't enough, it explodes inside the target. But that's not all, I might also need more of an area-of-effect attack, so I added a script on the gun itself. The fire control selector triggers a script that changes the modified slugs to buckshot. The buckshot is far from normal and also has an impossible density and even higher velocity. Each ball must weigh close to a kilogram.

It will also not surprise anyone that they explode if they penetrate the target, because why the fuck not.

To put it simply, I might have gone a tad overboard.

This gun could- No, it will allow a single person to wipe out entire divisions.

But all this power comes at a price. I barely modified the gun since I had to make it strong enough to endure the new insane pressures caused by the upgraded ammo. The rest went into recoil suppression; it would not be an exaggeration to say that the gun would rip off my shoulder if I didn't take drastic measures to handle the recoil.

In the end, this thing is overkill for regular persons. But I don't know if it will be able to pierce the shield of the wizards, so I also upgraded my AR15 as a safety measure.

If my VEPR is the Super Shotgun, then my AR is the BFG 9000. That thing has a rate of fire so high that it might as well fire a solid beam of bullets, each of them armor piercing. They also greatly expand into the body of the targets, but they don't explode. I had to remove the explosive effects since I wanted this rifle to be more of an anti-armor weapon. The velocity of the projectiles it fires is so high that it makes the International Space Station look slow in comparison. It will also likely rupture the eardrums of everyone else in a ten kilometers radius.

Luckily for me, and everyone else, I fitted a suppressor on the rifle that I heavily upgraded. The gun is almost silent now. I can't do anything about the sonic booms, but the explosions should be at a more manageable level now.

As a side note, I found an old LED lamp in a drawer, so I attached it to my front door after upgrading it. Now, it shines with the fury of a thousand suns and blinks so fast that it will make anyone puke in an instant. It might be useless, but it can't hurt to have.

I take a deep breath as I look at my arsenal. They don't look very different than before the upgrade. Maybe the materials look sturdier, and the guns are slightly heavier. The caliber markings are different, but nobody besides me should be able to see them.

In truth, this all feels inadequate. The mages are capable of wonders beyond my imagination, so what are a few guns against god-like powers? I don't know if I should laugh or cry, but now it's too late to go back. I don't have any Credits to give to the sisters, and I doubt they'll let me go with a slap on the wrist. I don't want to go to a magical prison. That sounds terrible. Granted, I could probably escape with MERTICORE. But I don't want to put my freedom on the line. I hope we will be able to discuss like sane and reasonable adults.

Who am I kidding? It's going to be a mess. I may be overreacting, but everything points toward the worst possible scenario. The sisters tried to assault me as soon as we spoke, and they were not angry at me. Now I stole one of their phones, a bunch of Mana Crystals, and likely put a massive dent in their budget.

I also just realized that they were working with an ominous-sounding organization. That completely slipped my mind, but now I'm one hundred percent fucked. I stole from a rich person who also happens to be working for what I assume is the magical CIA, so what did I expect?

'He fucked up.' Will probably be what's written on my tombstone, if I'm lucky enough to have a body left. Maybe the mages will throw me into an alternate dimension or something, who knows what they will do. I crack open a cold beer and gulp it down, the more I think about my future and the more hopeless it seems to be. It doesn't matter if my guns are powerful. A single spell can probably stop all projectiles without as much as a thought. And that's if they show up. For all I know, there's a ritual going on to teleport a massive magical bomb right into my living room.

Fucking hell, if I survive then I'll need to get my shit together and somehow acquire magical protection for my home.

Of course, it all hinges on my potential survival. Something I'm increasingly not inclined to believe.

...Nicole's PoV...

"It should be around the corner," I say to my sister with a curt voice. She nods and briefly scans the surroundings.

"I can't feel anything. It looks like it hasn't detected us yet," Mary answers while clutching her brand-new staff. It is virtually identical to the first one, albeit more beat-up since it is older.

I nod and clench my fists. It only has been a day since that fateful encounter with that bastard in the lab, and I'm still beyond angry. There are only ten Credits left in both of our bank accounts, and the Agency is closely monitoring our reports. One slip up, however minor it is, and we are out. I already contacted our family, so we should hear back from them soon enough. I know I'm already pushing the boundaries of what I'm allowed to do, but who cares.

Now, this is personal.

That bastard humiliated and robbed us. Mary had nightmares where she relived the slow-fall trap we were stuck into for so long. Seeing your usually hotheaded sister turning into a sobbing mess who is clutching one of the stuffed animals from her childhood is not a fun experience.

I grit my teeth. I'll avenge my sister!

Quite frankly, it's a miracle that we got out of that trap. I somehow grabbed a corner of a nearby desk, and I managed to pull myself out of this cursed area. But Mary wasn't so lucky, and I had to pelt her with random items to send her flying away from the trapped zone.

She was inconsolable. I have never seen her crying so much. She has been a nervous wreck; she still has random fits of despair as she recalls what we went through. My little sister thinks she's hiding it well, but I can see her trembling and holding back tears.

"Come on," I say to her to cheer her up. "We just have to complete this assignment, and we'll be good for the day."

As if taking all our money wasn't enough, our supervisor thought it would be a good idea to demote us. We are stuck working with small infractions instead of investigating critical events.

"What was the assignment again?" Mary asks as she consolidates her Veil. She has been very self-conscious since that incident, and she always monitors her Veil to the point of obsessiveness. That's another mental scar that I will pay back tenfold.

"Nothing much, apparently a random house in this Regular suburb turned into a miniature sun for a millisecond, and we detected very faint traces of Mana," I answer. Honestly, I hope it's just a minor infraction. We'll just write up a fine to whoever did this, and we'll be on our way.

But my instincts tell me that the world is hellbent on fucking me over. There should be no mages in this particular neighborhood, so I hope it's not a Regular who discovered the magic world. The sheer amount of paperwork I'll have to file is enough to make me light-headed. That's not counting all the training and explanation I'll have to supervise, so the Regular becomes a good citizen of the magical world.

Fuck me. I hope it was a fluke. Maybe we'll be lucky, and he just did it on accident so we can wipe his memory. But if it was on purpose and not the first time they dabbled in the occult then-

I want to rip out my hair. It's beyond frustrating!

"It's here," I say as we have the home in our line of sight. It doesn't stand out since it's the standard cheap suburban home. Nothing indicates that Mana-related events took place here. When a Regular stumbles into the magic world, there are usually traces of destruction from uncontrolled spells around the area.

Good. Maybe we are not too late, and we can just wipe the memory of whoever is responsible for that mess. With any luck, it was only their first spell, so there could still be time.

I snap my fingers and scan the area for anything related to magic. Luckily there are no hits, so we've got that going for us. It's not fun when a fledgling mage thinks it's a good idea to put wards everywhere. It usually makes our job harder than it has to be. That also means that I'm right in my assumption, and this guy lucked into creating a spell.

That's easy. We all did those kinds of operations while we were recruits, so I know what will happen. A refreshed smile appears on my face as we casually stroll towards the house in question. Mary is looking at everything, afraid that someone will just walk through her Veil.

Her trauma is deeper than I first thought. It will take a lot of time to heal that wound. I recall the smirking face of the bastard who turned my sister into such a mess, just thinking about it makes me want to punch everything around me.

But our revenge will come soon enough. Nobody messes with the Farsight family and comes out unscathed. I run another scan, and nothing seems out of the ordinary. Mary is leading the way. We approach-

She yelps in surprise as she falls on her back. Or rather, she will fall on her back because her fall has slowed to an extreme.

I recognize that pattern! Fury engulfs me as I shout and rushes toward my sister to free her. We found the home of that bastard; we will get our revenge sooner than I expected! However, a sudden strobe of blinding light brings me to my knees. The light flickers so fast that it makes me dizzy. My headache grows stronger until I can't hold it in anymore, and I puke on the sidewalk. I look up, and Mary is not spared as a stream of her half-digested breakfast slowly arcs above her face.

"Fucking hell!" I mutter as I try to prop myself up, but fail to do so. I puke again, or at least my body tries to. But there's nothing left in my stomach.

Why did we have to fall into the same fucking trap again! And that puke spell is just adding insult to injury! This bastard is not taking us seriously. I'll show him what our power can do!

I close my eyes; it slightly dims the light but not enough to completely block it out. At least I don't feel like puking now. I grit my teeth as I activate a basic shield spell and modify its color to turn it into a wall of pure black. It blocks out the light, and I feel better after a second or two.

That's when I realize that Mary is still trapped, and she must be struggling to escape her inevitable fate of being covered in her vomit. I take a deep breath and grab her before pulling my sister towards me. I feel like I'm moving my arm in thick jelly, but then the pressure gives out, and Mary falls on top of me.

"N-Nicole, t-that's," Mary mumbles while tears stream down her face.

"Yes, don't worry. I'm here. Everything will be fine." I hug Mary as tightly as I can and take a deep breath. "I will handle that bastard for the two of us."

Is what I'm about to do against regulations? Yes, but I don't care about that anymore. If the Agency wants to fire me, then I'll gladly let them! I don't need those idiots anyway! I shout as Mana gathers around my hands. It stings a little, like a shock of static electricity, but it tells me that the Mana in my hands has reached critical mass.

My will permeates the magical energy and gives it the properties of fire. I want an everlasting flame that will destroy everything in its path, something that will cook that bastard alive!

A primal roar comes out of my mouth as two balls of orange plasma fly towards the door of the house.

I will have my revenge, and I don't care if I have to burn down the entire city!