“…”

  “Silence won’t help me understand, Black Man. Don’t you think doing something for everyone’s sake is wonderful? Everyone for everyone, one for one… If we all pursue our desires, let the smoldering kindling within us blaze, it’ll come full circle and fulfill everyone’s desires. So, please, Black Man… hand that girl over to me, won’t you?”

  Sweat dripped from Danan’s forehead, trailing down his cheek to the corner of his mouth. Licking the droplet with his tongue, he aimed the shotgun at Aeshma as she approached step by step. “Stay back!” he shouted, pulling the trigger.

  Gunshots layered over one another in the pleasure district. A sniper’s bullet deflected Danan’s shotgun, sending scattershot in an unintended direction, piercing the neck and left eye of a man and woman who leaped to shield Aeshma. Blood sprayed from their wounds, splattering the asphalt. The fallen pair writhed, laughing maniacally as if pain itself were pleasure.

  “One down, then another… Does it feel good? The scattershot tearing flesh, the heat of blood making you feel alive? How wonderful…” Aeshma murmured.

  “Then let me make you feel even better.” She drew a derringer from her ample chest, firing into the writhing man’s limbs. Each shot released a capsule embedded in the bullet, bursting to mix liquid narcotics into his blood, tainting his spinal fluid. The drugged fluid demanded pleasure from his brain, neurons and cells erupting with dopamine in a frenzied rush.

  Like a fish flung onto land… Bleeding out, the man’s body convulsed, his unfocused eyes begging for more wounds. A woman, drooling enviously, clawed at her crushed left eye, devouring the pleasure of agony. The ultimate embodiment of masochism—Aeshma’s madness and destructive pleasure shattered people effortlessly, consuming lives like dust.

  To accept this scene would be the end—humanity’s end, life’s end. Joining the ghosts swarming the warped, radiant star in the abyss, the broken humans clinging to Aeshma, the lotus blooming in the gutter, seeking biological oblivion. What a horrific, sinister sight.

  To say Danan felt no fear would be a lie. Aeshma terrified him, unperturbed by her atrocities. This beauty, who saw her own organization’s members as mere tools for satisfying desires, was a demon stirring the cauldron of hell. Something wearing human skin. No… To her, individuals were individuals, and collectives were collectives. Thus, individuals acted for themselves, and everyone acted for everyone—fulfilling desires.

  It was like a mandala. A warped mandala of desire swirling around Aeshma. Regardless of hierarchy, the people and environment surrounding her embodied the pleasure district—the Crucible of Carnal Desire itself. Yet, even as the Empress of Debauchery, Aeshma could never attain the one being she desired. Her desire was unfulfillable because the one she sought was madness incarnate.

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  “Stop spewing pretty words, whore,” Danan spat.

  “What’s that?”

  “You’ll never, ever fulfill your desires. I guarantee it, Aeshma, leader of the Crucible. Damocles doesn’t want you. The one he wants… is me.”

  For a fleeting moment, Aeshma’s eyes burned with rage, hatred tingeing her pale pink lips. A subtle shift imperceptible to those with drug-fried brains and no judgment. Danan didn’t miss it. Shrugging, he tossed the shotgun to the ground and laughed quietly.

  “Want me to spell out what’s inside you, whore? Burning with desire, yet finding nothing, not even a single answer. Hilarious, isn’t it, you piece of trash? That’s why you crave someone honest with themselves—Damocles. But don’t worry, scum. He doesn’t want you, not even a fingertip’s worth. Poor little empty doll.”

  “…Could you,” Aeshma said, “shut up?”

  Her derringer fired, a shrill metallic clang echoing. Just in time—anticipating her shot, Danan deflected the bullet with his mechanical arm’s armor.

  As expected, her obsession and warped affection were utterly abnormal. Behind her predatory words lay a fragile ego, hidden in painless flesh, invisible to the eye. But Damocles, the reckless blade, gave sensation to her numbness, drawing out pain and exposing emotion.

  Yet… Cutting down waves of attacking Crucible members, Danan bit his lip. He lacked the means to kill Aeshma. Referencing Damocles worked once, but it wouldn’t again. He was still in a critical situation.

  “…Tefira,” he called.

  “Yes!” she replied.

  “Undo the hack on Damocles’ system.”

  “B-But that’ll—”

  “Use every card we have. It’s the best move against Aeshma.”

  Playing the trump card, wielding a double-edged sword. Issuing the command through his neural link, Danan glanced at the steel giant charging from the alley’s depths, dodging a bullet that grazed his cheek by a hair’s breadth.

  “Danaaan… Finally ready to play with me?” Damocles taunted.

  “…”

  “Don’t ignore me, DANAN!”

  Drenched in blood, guts, and flesh, Damocles grinned grotesquely, crushing Crucible members with wild abandon as he closed in. Drawing Helles and activating his bio-fused metal, Danan parried the electromagnetic claw, catching Aeshma’s ecstatic expression in his peripheral vision.

  “Oh, Damocles… Man of recklessness, you came for me?” she cooed.

  “Get out of my way, you Crucible shitbucket! You’re interrupting me and Danan again!” Damocles roared.

  “Both of you, kill each other and leave me out of it,” Danan snapped.

  Dodging Damocles’ attacks while carrying Tefira, Danan fled. Damocles sowed death to kill him, and Aeshma stood between them, craving the giant’s steel heat. A chaotic dance of three. For Danan, this was the best strategy—a fragile shield to protect himself and the girl.

  Find the next move. Keep devising ways to survive! The claw’s heat, chain Gatling bullets piercing his side, blood and guts splattering his armor, his footing slipping. Breathing heavily, Danan clicked his tongue, spotting a shadow blending into the crowd.

  Fighting like a fool, walking a tightrope with his life, and now more enemies appeared. What were those shadows? Why were they approaching? One vanished from sight, reappearing to cling to Damocles’ armor and explode. As if on cue, more shadows launched suicidal attacks, raining blood and guts.

  “Come,” a shadow said, grabbing Danan’s shoulder—a figure cloaked in a distinctly different darkness.

  “Who are you?” Danan demanded.

  “No time for chatter. Come. More fighting outweighs any gain. We’re forced to act for you, even abandoning their debts. Orders from your client—got it?”

  “The Parade—”

  “Shh.” The shadow pressed a finger to its lips, urging silence, and darted through the chaos.

  Reinforcements from the Parade of the Dead? With no time to hesitate, Danan ran after the shadow.