My stomach sank a little. I wanted to argue—to say something clever or brave—but the words just stuck in my throat.
Damian leaned closer, his voice low, like he didn't want the others to hear.
"This is what you wanted, right?" he said. "Proof monsters are real? Proof the world's bigger than the stuff you write about?"
His green eyes pinned me, "well, here it is. Monsters don't wait for permission to kill. And neither can we."
Yeah, that shut me up.
The hologram flickered—those red dots blinking like heartbeats across the city map. One pulsed brighter over the docks. Akel. The city Ryu had just walked into.
The commander's tone dropped. "Prep your gear. Forty-eight hours. Code Seven moves on Akel. Once you do… there's no turning back."
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Two nights later, the sky above Akel looked bruised.
Dark clouds pressed low over jagged rooftops, lightning veined behind the smog. The air stank of smoke and something worse—like burnt rubber and copper. Even inside the dropship, I could taste it, metallic on my tongue.
Jade sat across from me, silent, arms crossed, twin blades strapped neat against her back.
Damian leaned forward, elbows on his knees, eyes locked on the flickering monitor showing the city grid.
Me? I was trying not to throw up from my nerves or the turbulence—could've gone either way.
The commander's voice crackled through the comms. "Operation Ghost Net is a go. Ryu's already embedded in Akel. Your mission is confirmation and extraction. Minimal engagement."
"Uh, quick question," I said before my brain could stop me. "How do we *not engage* in a place full of monster dealers?"
Jade didn't even glance up. "Simple. Don't get caught like Ryu."
Damian smirked faintly. "She's not wrong. This is recon. If you want to live, stay behind me."
I was about to shoot back something smart when the red light in the cabin started flashing. The hatch hissed open, and rain came slicing in—cold, heavy, merciless.
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Akel wasn't like the capital. It was smaller, meaner—built from rust and regret.
We moved fast, hoods up, the rain turning everything into static.
Every alley felt like it was watching us.
Ryu's voice finally broke through the static in our comms, rough and distorted. "Sector Twelve. Docks. Shipment moving now. Be quick."
Hearing him alive again should've been reassuring. It wasn't.
We cut through backstreets, moving under the cover of flickering lights.
Jade was a phantom—slipping between shadows like they made room for her. Damian moved with mechanical precision, steps deliberate, scanning corners before we reached them.
And me? I was the guy trying not to slip on wet metal stairs and pretend I wasn't terrified.
When we reached the overlook, Jade crouched first, motioning for silence. Below us—trucks lined up under busted floodlights, men in long coats shouting orders. Crates everywhere, sealed in black tarp.
I leaned closer, squinting through the rain. "Drug deal?" I whispered.
Damian didn't answer right away. His gaze had gone distant, sharp. "Not drugs. Look closer."
I did—and wished I hadn't.
One of the crates moved.
The lid trembled, metal creaking. Then came a low growl, deep enough to crawl under my skin.
At first I thought it was thunder. Then claws tore through the tarp, black and wet, dragging across the crate's edge with a screech that made my teeth ache.
Jade's hand went to her blades. Her voice was quiet but certain. "They're transporting them."
My throat was dry. "Transporting… monsters?"
"No," Damian said. "Weapons."
As if on cue, one of the men below lifted a hand. Shadow spilled from his palm—thick and slow, like ink in water—sliding into the crate. The growling rose, twisted, turned into screams.
I didn't even realize I'd taken a step back.
The commander's voice burst in through the comms, calm but sharp: "Eyes only. Do not engage. Repeat, do not—"
Static. Dead.
The crate exploded.
Boom!
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The rain hit harder the closer we crawled to the edge. The crates didn't just break—they burst open, spilling shadows that crawled and pulsed like living tar.
When the first clawed hand punched through steel, my lungs forgot their job.
And yet… some part of me—some twisted, reckless part—felt alive?
This wasn't a blurry photo or a theory on my wall. This was real. Proof. Monsters, teeth, blood—the kind of story nobody believed until it killed them.
And for one insane second, all I could think was: *This is it. This is what I was chasing.*
School? Gone. Dead weight. I could vanish tomorrow and no one would blink. But here—here I mattered.
'Focus, idiot,' I told myself, dragging my thoughts back.
Jade leaned forward, gaze never breaking. Damian flexed his fingers once, that faint shimmer of gravity energy humming at his wrist. They were steady. Professionals.
I was… still figuring out which way was "forward."
The tarp below shredded apart, and the air went thick.
One of the creatures—if you could call it that—burst out, dragging the handler screaming. Too many eyes. Too many teeth. Too fucking wrong.
"Shit," Damian muttered.
Jade's blades were already in her hands.
And me? I gripped the railing tight, the rain dripping down my face. "Guess class is officially out," I whispered.
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The dock went to hell fast.
Crates burst open, shadows spilling like ink across concrete. One monster—big, spined, twitching—threw a man straight into a wall. He didn't get up. Didn't even twitch.
Jade dropped from the ledge, landing in a crouch. Her blades flashed, silver cutting through darkness like light made sharp. Damian followed, steady as gravity itself, crushing two beasts under an invisible energy before they even touched him.
I wasn't just watching this time.
Ryu had tossed me something before the mission—a metal rod, plain, ugly. "Focus with it," he'd said, grin sharp as lightning. "If you're not useless, it'll answer you."
It hadn't answered before. But right now, in the rain and chaos, it felt… different. Heavy. Humming under my skin like it was alive.
And then the worst thing possible happened. One of the monsters turned its gaze on me.
Its eyes glowed red—too red.
I swallowed hard, my whole body locking up. 'Move, Ken. Move or you're dead.'
It lunged.
Instinct kicked in. I swung the rod with both hands—no aim, no plan, just panic.
And the damn thing lit up.
A pulse of energy ripped through it, jagged and white-blue, like lightning but rawer, I think. It hit the creature square in the shoulder and threw it back into a container.
The air smelled like ozone and burnt oil.
My arms buzzed, skin tingling, every nerve screaming. But I was grinning. Like an idiot.
Because that had actually worked.
"Ken!" Jade's voice snapped through the rain. She darted past me, twin blades slashing clean through another creature's torso. "Stay sharp. Don't get cocky."
"Noted!" I yelled back, still catching my breath.
The dock lit up again as Ryu's energy flared somewhere deeper in the chaos, a blinding streak of lightning carving through the night.
And in that flash, I finally saw it—his face. That calm, grinning mask replaced by something wild. Unrestrained.
He wasn't fighting to win. He was enjoying it.
Every swing, every kill—he moved like a storm that wanted to break everything in its path.
For the first time since joining Code Seven, I realized something terrifying.
The monsters weren't the only thing we had to be afraid of.