“Get the fuck out of here, you bitch. This is no place for a girl like you. Your battlefield is on beds.”

“First of all, I would gladly do battle with someone on bed. It’s always fun to sleep with someone who wants to kill you. Trust me. I’m telling from experience.” Katie did her typical ramble before suddenly changing her tone. “However, I prefer to stay here for a while, so...no thanks.”

“I ain’t asking, bitch.”

“Well then.” Katie’s right hand suddenly moved, and the next second a dagger landed between the man’s legs. “It’s actually not as bad as it may seem.” She casually commented, licking her lips.

The man was confused as of what happened for a brief second before feeling the pain in his crotch. A scream came out of his lips, but the voice was instantly cut off when Katie reached out, grabbed onto the dagger, pulled it out, and ran it across the man’s throat.

As the man’s body hit the ground, Katie casually licked the tip of the dagger before sitting back down.

Boss glanced at Katie again. This time he had a little more confidence.

The fighting paused for a second before continuing, but no one challenged Katie. None of the guns for hire actually used guns because if they did, things would get out of control. A gunfight might kill half the mercenaries before the real enemy even gets here. All of these men used melee.

Truth to be told, Katie was slightly disappointed, but she did take a particular interest in seeing the fight go all around her.

One of the man carrying a machine gun on his back knocked a seated man out in one swift punch.

Another woman expertly dislocated a seated man’s shoulder, causing him to fall off the chair and groan in pain. The woman smirked and kicked the man aside, taking his seat.

But what really made Katie’s heart beat was a girl with red hair. A man made a jump on the redhead, but all the girl did was flicker her finger, and the man collapsed out of seemingly no reason at all.

In his seat, Boss suddenly smiled. The more powerful, and mysterious, these men and women were, the safer he would be.

His smile disappeared when Mr. Hunter heard something from his walkie talkie, walked up to him, and whispered something into his ears.

“Boss, we lost contact with the perimeter guards.”

Boss frowned. “All of them? Including the snipers?” He put two snipers at the entrance.

“Yes sir, I suspect there might be multiple hostiles. There’s no way one man took care of all the boys out there before they can call for help.”

“Recall all of our men to this location. We can’t afford to let them be picked off one by one.” Previously Boss deployed his men all around the entire mansion so the enemy couldn’t sneak in, but it turned out the enemy had no intention of using the element of surprise. If they were pushing through with brute force, Boss needed to move his men to one place as well. Thankfully, he knew the enemy would be after him. All he needed to do is pile as many guns around himself as possible.

As Mr. Hunter went to deliver the order, Boss stood up. At the seats, the fighting was pretty much done. At least ten men were on the ground. The twenty left were seated. The overall number of mercenaries dropped, but the average quality grew.

“You know the deal. Keep me alive until tomorrow, and I will make sure you get your check.”

“With all due respect, we are taking a risk just by being here.” The man with the machine gun said impatiently. “According to the tradition of our line of work, you should pay us half the money before the job happens and pay us the rest, along with the bonus, after we do the job.”

It was a reasonable tradition. The mercenaries were risking their lives by taking part in this mission. If they fought and bled and took some wounds and the man they were hired to protect still died, do they just return empty-handed? This way the mercenaries were both inspired to get the job done and wouldn’t be in a tough spot if the mission failed.

There was an entire class of economy behind this line of work. Of course, extremely rarely, the mercenaries might just take the money and run or fail the job on purpose, but if that happens the employer could contact the officials of ShadowNet and put a bounty on that mercenary or simply tell the entire website what he did, thus shutting down their future. No one would hire a mercenary who has had a history of betrayals.

“Very well.” Boss nodded at one of his lieutenants, who started typing on his computer. In half a minute, all of the mercenaries received buzzes in their phones that suggested the transactions were completed.

With the money in place, it was time to get the job done.

Suddenly, gunshots rang out from outside the building. The mercenaries frowned and stood up. Mr. Hunter walked back in.

“Boss, there are multiple hostiles outside the house. They have engaged our guards. Sir...”

“What?”

“I think you’re right. They’re not human.”

Before the Boss could say anything, something slammed on the metal security door and formed a human-sized hole on the door. The guns for hire frowned. Whoever tossed the man must be insanely strong.

But it was too late to back out now. Plus, none of the mercenaries were afraid of taking some risk. If they did, they wouldn’t have chosen this line of work.

“Let’s waste them.” The machine gun carrying guy stood up and readied his weapon and pointed it at the door. Rather than waiting for the mysterious attackers to take care of the guards outside and then engage the mercenaries, the wisest thing to do would be to go out, team up with the remaining guards, and gun down the enemies with superior firepower.

Boss nodded, and the mercenaries got ready. Katie reached to her side and took out two Glocks.

The gang member closest to the door typed a password into the controller, and the door was opened. As soon as that happened, the mercenaries poured out. The machine gun guy was the first. Katie was the second.

The battle outside has evolved into something extremely unconventional. Gang members, criminals and killers, pulled the trigger like their lives depended on it. Somehow Katie saw a scent of fear on the faces of these fearless executioners. Their automatic weapons rang out and formed a music of death, but the death of whom remained to be a question.

On the other end were twelve or so figures. All of them were in black cloaks. Their skin was covered, but Katie wasn’t disappointed because these attackers were obviously not normal. The speed they moved with was impossible for ordinary human beings, no matter how trained they were. For instance, Katie saw one of the attackers literally dodging a couple of bullets from a gang member and then proceeding to break his neck.

The guns for hire immediately realized this wasn’t their typical everyday mission. “Fall back and focus fire!” The machine gun guy ordered as his gun started blasting. The rapid firing weapon forced the attackers to move around and dodge, pushing them back. The rest of the mercenaries joined the fight as well as they started opening fire.

They were joined by the guards that survived the previous onslaught.

Katie pulled the trigger like crazy. The recoil repeatedly blasted on her arms, but she didn’t give a damn. Whatever ache or bruise the recoil caused merely made her more excited. However, Katie questioned the effectiveness of her weapons as she saw a cloaked figure getting shot in the chest, only to keep moving around as nothing happened.

The mercenaries continued shooting, and the cloaked figures started to lose some ground. Katie frowned as she reloaded. These attackers have lost the element of surprise. They might have some supernatural powers, but as Katie has learned from her experience, superpower didn’t mean bulletproof. There was no way these attackers could possibly hold against this much firepower. If she was in their position...ok she might just charge and get shot repeatedly..but if it was someone logical in their position, they might pull back, regroup, and strike another time. Even someone like Boss couldn’t be surrounded by an army every second of what was left of his life.

A part of her wanted these vampires to turn and run. Shooting them in the face, as fun as it was, was not as interesting as getting to know better and gradually hurt them and be hurt by them.

What happened next made her smile.

One of the vampires stumbled as he was shot in the chest, but he didn’t collapse. Instead, he went back to standing almost immediately and launched himself at the gang member that shot him. The large guard backed off while firing, but the vampire was faster as it jumped onto the guard and ripped him apart. The six feet tall gang member didn’t stand a chance against the smaller cloaked figure. As he died, his killer dug his teeth into the man’s neck briefly before pulling them out. Blood was spilled. A satisfied look appeared on his cloak covered face.

The machine gun-wielding man was really good. A cloaked figure charged at him, but the man saw the vampire almost instantly and turned his weapon around. The automatic weapon spat fire and ripped the cloaked figure apart.

Blood covered the floor. Katie rose her eyebrows. These figures might be able to take a few bullets, but they couldn’t stay alive either when their bodies were in pieces.

Using the moment of distraction, a vampire jumped onto Katie. His arms swung across Katie’s neck, and the girl felt a stinging pain on her skin. For a moment she couldn’t breathe. The vampire on Katie smirked in bloodthirst as she smelled the sweet taste of blood in the air. The girl below him was surely dead, and she was ready to move on to someone else.

And then Katie reached out and grabbed onto the vampire’s neck. The vampire struggled, to no avail. Katie pushed her pistol onto the vampire’s mouth and pulled the trigger.

Bang. The vampire collapsed with a bloody hole at the back of his head. At this close of a distance, the bullet went all the way through easily.

Katie glanced at the blood on the tip of her pistol.

“Impressive.” Behind her, a fellow mercenary, the woman who Katie suspected had telekinesis power, commented. She walked closer to Katie. A vampire launched himself at the woman, only to get knocked back to where he was by an invisible force. “Name’s Lauren.”

“Katie. What’s up?” Katie asked as she kicked another vampire in the chest and concluded with three more bullets. The vampire screamed and turned and ran away. Katie didn’t bother finishing the job. Thankfully, Lauren was a more qualified mercenary as she emptied a clip into the vampire’s back.

“Something’s off,” Lauren commented. “I don’t know who these attackers are, but they aren’t invincible. We’re already pushing them back.”

“Yeah.”

“Then why are they still attacking? They don’t stand a chance. I guess you can say their commander is unwise, but...” But that wasn’t something they could lean on.

What happened next answered her doubts.

Suddenly, a surge of crimson energy exploded from the center of the defender lines and swept through almost all the mercenaries and guards, including Lauren and Katie. As soon as the human bodies made contact with the energy wave, they collapsed.

Streams of red energy were sucked out of human bodies and condensed into rivers of red. In contrast, the victims grew paler and paler by the seconds. Just five seconds later, most of the mercenaries and guards collapsed. Their life was drained.

The gunfire came to a halt, but the vampires didn’t. They ravaged through the mercenaries like they were made of paper.

The machine gun-wielding man could no longer raise his weapon. Seeing the situation, he drew his sidearm and tried to put up a last stand, but two vampires ripped him to pieces. The man killed multiple vampires previously, and now he paid the price.

The stream of red energy flowed into the body of one of the mercenaries. Katie realized the man’s face has turned incredibly pale. The energy intake obviously satisfied the man. Two vampires ran to the man and lowered their head obediently.

A quick-thinking guard, still on his knees, raised his rifle at the man and pulled the trigger multiple times. The man smirked and suddenly disappeared. The next second he appeared he was already in front of the guard.

Snap.

He broke the man’s neck and casually dropped the body onto the ground.

“Well,” Katie coughed. She had to admit she was taken by surprise, not that she was complaining. “can someone tell me what the fuck just happened?”