With a ding, the lift opened, and she stepped out onto the floor where the president of NU and the neuronium were kept. The long corridor ahead was well-lit with fluorescent panels evenly spaced. Shadows danced against the walls, their outlines distorted by moving guards. Every step she made echoed softly, nearly lost beneath the shuffle of armored boots and the faint hum of the air circulation in the building. Guards stood at the wall and in groups, weapons firmly held, eyes alert with precision as they watched her approach. The glint of metal at every angle of their bodies reflected sharply as they changed weight and rechecked their targets.
She had thought to slip past, unnoticed, melting into the shadows; instead, the barest shadow of a smile twisted her lips. There was a time and a place for subtlety, she decided, but this wasn't it. Her disguise melted away without a murmur, revealing her true form. The guards jerked upright, weapons raised and shouting orders. Their voices were hard and loud, reflecting from the polished floor and sterile walls.
She stepped forward with deliberate precision, her hands moving in smooth motions to extend rings on her wrists. Deep purple surfaces unfolded, etched with thick black strips that reflected the light. Known as Arc Basser, the rings activated with a low hum and began condensing and amplifying sound waves in preparation.
Commands for her to surrender were barked by the guards, sharp and insistent, but in a sudden purple glow that blossomed across the devices, twin circular sound waves shot forward with the speed of sound. This was the immediate result: guards being flung backward to collide violently with walls and each other, their guns clattering across the floor; the front wall fractured, with panels splintering and falling in jagged shards. A second wave cleared the remaining resistance, and the corridor fell silent except for settling debris and the faint echo of shattered materials.
Arc Basser drew smoothly into the sheaths in her wrists as she walked. The steps were long and measured, at a pace which scraped her boots along a polished floor. She rapped sharply on the president's door before forcing it open. Blood speckled her right shoulder and hand; she dusted it off without pausing. Inside, guards moved immediately to block the path, guns raised in synchronized formation.
Out of her shoulder came a small, rectangular device opening tiny barrels. A precise volley discharged, neutralizing every guard in an instant. The president froze, wide-eyed, struggling to comprehend what was happening. His voice shook as he asked what she wanted. She punched the floor near the bed, and that motion revealed the safe behind it, its door sliding open as if to greet her.
She tackled him, throwing him onto the sofa with controlled force as he tried to flee. Her left hand opened, and out flew a small disc en circled with a glowing blue ring that will wrap the president, from chest to back, in a thick, staircase-like strip, its central blue glow tracing a clean, geometric line.
"This safe is very sturdy and made from the hardest metal on Earsl. There's no way it can be broken—" he began, but froze as she removed the door effortlessly.
"Wha… it can't be," he stammered.
"Don't get too shocked, Mr. President," she said, taking the glass box of neuronium with practiced precision.
-
Meanwhile, the Mag-51 streaked toward Hanrei's president's private jet. Inside the cabin, the pilots noticed a small, fast-moving dot on the radar. Before they could react, the Mag-51 hovered directly above the jet. Two small panels opened beneath it and released a strip of red, skin-covered nano-particles that attached themselves to the plane's midsection.
The thrusters on the Mag-51 adjusted, tilting downward by roughly forty-five degrees to maintain a stable hover. The nano-particles wrapped around the jet tightly, holding it mid-air with a jolt. Inside the plane, passengers and guards alike crashed into seats and walls as the jet bucked wildly.
The president asked for an explanation, but the pilot's voice was trembling; he said the plane could not move. It was impossible to give it more speed; the plane refused to obey.
The guards escorted him to the rear cabin, which was reinforced for impact. Two of them went inside, the others stayed outside. Several attempts to remove the jet did nothing. Those outside knocked and repeatedly asked the president to step out, but there was no response. When they finally managed to force the doors open, both the inside guards were lying unconscious. When the president retold the story, he still seemed visibly shaken.
A girl in a grey fanged mask, taking a single motion to open a rectangular panel on top of the plane and entering the cabin, had managed to neutralize the guards. She was now demanding the neuronium. When the president resisted, she pointed a black pistol with a deep purple stripe to his head.
He lifted the seat to open a locker beneath it to protect his life and handed the glass box over. She vanished through the panel, replaced it, and sealed it with her small red laser coming from her right hand. The plane remained intact.
The plane began making a slow descent as the guards escorted him outside. Gravity shifted, throwing guards into the air as pilots regained control. On the radar, the red dot representing the Mag-51 vanished.
Eun-ji, piloting the Mag-51, placed the neuronium securely on a rectangular table in the center of the plane. Binding nano-particles withdrew, releasing the jet. She accelerated her craft back toward Noxora. "They will be waiting for me." Nano-particles retracted completely and Mag-51 shot forward with a burst of jet engine, disappearing into the distance.