The ASEAN sphere had always been cloudy and stormy. Storm drains made loud sounds. The multi-colored lights of the city of Neo-Tokyo never ceased to amaze with its bright ads and stylistic choices of signboard. Gaston didn’t like the drizzle of rain. He was not wet when under the rain. His gloved hands released bio-electricity of the color of dark red.

“Janna, let him go.”

Inside this alley where a civilian would not enter. Where even the law-enforcing officers wouldn’t dare to cross. A woman in the same colored black suit and red ties lifted a man easily. Unlike Gaston’s dispassionate face. The woman held a far more serious expression.

“Gaston! I saw this fucker try to drag a kid! Look at the back of his hand.”

A branch of the cult of Sitra Ahra.

“A fucking cultist. You expect me to let him go.”

It was always like this. While she was the fire, Gaston was the cold water that doused her fire. Gaston stood next to her while eyeing the cultist whose lips were curved and raised.

“You will get nothing of me.”

“That is true. You seem to forget that this isn’t an old world friend. And you bear that mark now. A mark that you proudly wear while not knowing that this world hates them.”

Janna growled like a madwoman. Her emotions were unruly for this day. He’d guessed that it was the weather. Wet concrete, the stifled laugh of people getting their drinks, and the bleeping of the arcade.

“Gaston, we aren’t getting anything from this man.”

She glared at him with hostility. Her grip strength was terrifying and Gaston knew very well that there are times where she just doesn’t care. Janna, boiling with rage, increased her grip strength. Gaston hurriedly took hold of her arm and gripped her tightly. She looked at him with a growl and was about to let go when Gaston’s senses made a ring.

His hand quickly held on to a dagger. Catching it between the flat. He flipped the dagger, threw it in the direction where it came from, hitting something fleshy.

Electricity ran on his body and before the shadowy figure could escape. His palm landed on the chest. Gaston pulled his palm, but seeing that the figure didn’t go down. He opted to raise his leg and landed a lock on the blade of the assailant’s shoulder. Leaning his body forward, claws like an eagle, he caught the person, and landed on the man’s back.

Janna walked to him while holding on the other man with her iron grip. She half-squinted at the cultist that Gaston was holding.

“You didn’t kill him?”

“Janna, we are in the east. And the lack of information is troublesome right now so any scraps would do.”

“We’ve hunted fifteen of them for goodness’s sake. I am wet and soggy. And there are no answers to be found!”

“What did you expect from fanatics?”

Gaston pressed his knee on the back of the fanatic.

“You aren’t going to tell, aren’t you? Hmm, do you understand our language? No, you speak English?”

Gaston translated the last part with a machine translator. The cold machine generated translation spoke on the external speakers.

The cultist said nothing. Janna snorted and landed a heavy fist on the fanatic she was carrying. Gaston sighed loudly and produced enough volt on his gloved hand to knock the person out.

“That’s done,” Gaston stood up. He looked at his bracer. There was only a little time left until his bio-energy generator was up. It would be troublesome to be stuck in this rain.

[Bridge, this is Adjutant Gaston Hardy, over.]

[Go ahead, Adjutant.]

[Caught two more black sheeps'.]

[Copy that, the extraction team is coming. Pinging your location to them.]

Gaston turned off his comms.

“Janna, we can get out of this place now.”

“Tsk, let’s go. Let’s get some food first before we head back to the branch. I want to see Ayumi and maybe get her to drink with me. Staying with you all the time is pissing me off.”

“Don’t bother her too much. She’s busy all the time, dealing with the aftermath. She’s probably going to see some shrink now.”

“You have bad luck. Getting caught in a split-realm like that. Still far better than what you saw in the golden gate.”

“I’d be screaming if it was. No, we’d call the Americans, and give the center of Tokyo that’d make Hiroshima and Nagasaki a joke.”

“That’s kind of fucked up for you to say.”

Gaston shrugged. There was an implosion of air above. A split-realm shuttle arrived and marked the road just next to the alley as an extraction spot.

Janna eyed the shuttle. Gaston moved close and wiped her face. Janna raised her chin and glared at him before snorting. Gaston followed her out of the alley. The Babaika Mercs moving inside the alley. Gaston started in the direction of the center of the city, taking in the city.

The sprawl of destruction. The dents on the concrete, broken pavement, and shards of monster bones that were moved made the city to see. The neon lights from the advertisements boards shining on the discarded bones. The blood stains on the side of the road. Cleaning up the leftovers was never an easy process. Some of the larger ones need to be cut apart so they can be moved separately. There are also some of the monsters whose scale and muscles are tougher to crack, needing specialized equipment like a heavy laser to disassemble them into transportable parts.

Buildings that were able to hide underground were mostly fine. Blood does seep in some of these buildings, but they were far easier to clean than the TYPE monsters. Nonetheless the city of Neo-Tokyo and its districts barely changed. Although the danger has been cleared in the main districts. There were still threats that would endanger the local populace.

“Still, guess it’s the workaholic tendencies of these people?” Gaston said under his breath.

Walking the streets and being basked in the lights of the city. Gaston finally found a relatively normal street before heading to the train station heading to Minato-ku. After taking the train, finding a bar, and entering it.

The bar had wooden furnishing and the smell of barbecue lingered in the air. The chef was cooking openly for anyone to see. The counter stools were full of salary men and breakers with droopy shoulders. Gaston took a booth and ate with Janna whose temper finally blew over after finally thinking it over. Sharing a sake which was cheap, but was tasteful enough. It was quite lightweight so it didn’t move them. Not to mention that their resistance was far too strong for a drink like this.

The two ate slowly. Conversing and discussing the details while watching the batches of people entering the establishment. Gaston took notice that the bar was half-populated with foreigners. Some of the chairs were even bigger to accommodate the taller and larger breakers.

Minato-ku has become a melting pot because of the state of the world. Gaston always found it funny that the world was more united compared to before. Though there are still qualms such as the areas and territories where nations are to mine materials.

If it wasn’t for the tectonic plates moving. Land being shifted and moving. Perhaps the world wouldn’t have discovered such minerals. Of course, there are many who have decided to mine deep underwater using the split-realm ships who can take on the intense pressure of the sea by deploying a field that displaces the water. Of course, if the field is negated, destroyed. There was a high chance that the split-realm ship would immediately be crushed by the pressure. They could escape using a quick jump, but most of the time it was advised for split-realm ships to be reinforced before they dive deep.

Gaston nursed his sake before finishing it. He placed the sake glass away and folded his arms. He stared at the clock mounted on the counter before browsing the news. He had to filter out the e-celebrity news before finding journalists who were reporting what they saw. The renaissance of these independent journalists were mainly because they had power. The ability to resist made them bolder when it comes to dealing with what was happening. The journalist’s blog that he was reading belonged to a guy or girl called Hijiri.

There are changes in the shorelines, the blog reads. Such changes are assumed to be the cause of a high influx of ichor that has started to mutate the coastlines of Japan. Recent sightings from local villagers, and visitors of the beaches suggests that there was a forced mutation happening.

The rest of the blog showed images of strangely colored sands and mutated fishes that were caught by the local fisherman. Most of them were gigantic. Some were differently colored than what they should look like. Of course, it could be that these are just another variant of the fishes. But it was far different to be called one.

Not to mention that they have small shards of ichorium on their bodies. The Embeds were particularly focused on this strangeness. Aside from that there were also other articles regarding the Sitra Ahra Cult. Gaston skimmed through the articles but found that there was no conclusive evidence to these articles other than speculation.

“Are you done browsing the net-space?”

“I’m passing a link to you. Read it.”

Gaston sent the link. Janna browsed her AR-headset. After a while her brows meet. She turned off her visualizer and leaned forward.

“These are speculations.”

“I thought so as well. Well, any idiot can tell it is. The problem is that they are tight-lipped. And if anything, what else can we follow other than rumors and speculations?

“Chasing after rumors wouldn’t conveniently allow us to find them.”

“Any bright ideas?”

“We don’t fuck with them.”

Gaston hung his mouth. Janna looked at him with this expression as if she had said something that didn’t make sense.

“I thought about this. But we don’t owe any of these fuckers. Not even the Babaika Lions can tell us to participate in this. The agreement stands that we take care of the problem regarding the belua and the goddamn mining. Tell me, Gaston, why are you bothering doing this?”

“Janna, do you remember that time? Where did everything start falling apart? Remember we were hiding for four days on the third and fourth floor of the Santa Coloma? For some reason that place wasn’t the only one turned into flesh. I recall how awful it was. How You and I were creeping in the streets. While you were keeping watch. Most of the food turned into trash.

“I saw that hell again, Janna. I saw it again in the branch. I can’t let that happen here.”

“Gato,” she said sternly this time. “Three times you’ve entered that fleshy hell.”

“You saved me. If it wasn’t for you I would have died during the first. So I’m asking you to deal with this with me. Can you really let this go? Do you want to see that hell again?”

“I wouldn’t let you go alone. That’s why I am accompanying you, Gato. But if this goes beyond our paygrade, you’ll leave with me. We owe the Babaika Company and the Consortium. But it doesn’t mean shit if we die here.”

“So you’ll follow?”

“Ets la meva mitja taronja, Gato.”

“I know.”

She rubbed her hair and then sighed heavily.

“Fine, it’s better that I’m around to watch your back anyway.”

“Thank you.”

She leaned on her chair. “So we follow the rumors then? Try to find anything until we can find an excuse to say that we ‘did our best’ and then fuck off. I can agree with this, Gato.”

“Not what I wanted, but that will work too.”

“It better be.”

Gaston looked at his palm cracking with dark red electricity. The cultists were not easy prey and the worst part of the bastards were their secrecy.

They were trying to find a needle on a sandy beach.

A needle that if touched would turn into dust.