89 Warehouse

Footsteps tapped onto the ground, releasing clouds of dust that swirled in the musty air. Two scythes scraped the concrete floor, creating the sparks necessary for vision.

Taein flung his sister's body onto a chair in the center.

She looked at him pitiably, but she did not utter a word.

*Click*

With a snap of his fingers, a single light flickered on above Sayako's head.

"Boss, who's this?" A snake-eyed man slithered into the light.

"Some unlucky soul, hehehe~ What tools do we need? I'll get the pliers..." A girl's voice echoed in the shadows, along with clinking metal chains.

Suddenly, a rope fell from the ceiling, binding Sayako's arms and legs to the chair like it had a mind of its own.

"Fucking idiots... Bind her first, so she can't get away..."

Sayako raised her head to the ceiling, but she couldn't make out the appearance of the man above her.

She could sense around a dozen more presences in the shadows, silent and watching.

She let out a sigh.

"Taein, this shouldn't be a public matter." A hint of sharpness tinged her voice.

A few of the shadows tittered. She was in no position to give commands to them.

But then Sayako stood up. The ropes that bound her snapped off as she spread her stance as if they weren't even there.

Her slate gray kimono inched down her shoulders, just low enough for them to make out a dark cloud tattoo above her breast.

The air turned still.

"Dark Cloud Blade-!"

Sayako took her hairpin out, flinging it up into the ceiling.

"Agh!" The man hidden on the ceiling fell down with a yelp.

As the man's figure reached the light, Sayako swung her leg, kicking the man into the far wall.

The shadows' attention was pulled to the crash far away. In that instant of distraction, Sayako had pinned her hair back again, and a knife had miraculously appeared in her right hand.

She raised her left hand. A crackling howl emanated from it, and the hanging light above burst into shards of glass, wreathing the warehouse in darkness.

This was the other reason why she stopped hiding her left arm.

"Brother, I will tell you everything. Don't force me with these extras." After her bout of guilt at the beginning, Sayako had regained a semblance of calm, enough to lay down her bottom line. Don't cross it.

Taein smiled. This was more like his sister.

"Scatter."

In an instant, the vents swarmed with shadows. Sayako let out a breath.

"Now that we're alone..."

"Tell me everything."

The rest of the warehouse's lights flicked on, as there was nothing to hide anymore. Sayako took a glance at her surroundings. A rack of tools and weapons, some clothes, and a couple of replacement scythes for Taein's augmentation. Other than that, it was mostly empty. The man she had kicked into the wall had disappeared.

She turned back to her brother, who was staring at her intently.

"Yes... I suppose I must tell you what happened before you found me." Her brother had found her alone in the hallway, crying over their mother's headless corpse, a bloody knife in her hand.

Although their ages only differed by a year, Taein depended on his mother far more than she did on that fateful day. Any love he felt for his sister died that day.

Sayako looked into his eyes, a sad smirk crossing her face.

"I guess I really do. So, from the beginning... The Kurokumo Clan is a subsidiary of the Thumb."

Taein nodded.

As the story progressed, his eyes slowly widened. His sister told him a story of Capos and Sottocapos, how she naively talked to Kalo on her sixth birthday, how she tried to look mature in front of him by claiming she wished to become a Capo...

After all, the patriarch told her to entertain him.

Kalo smiled at patted her head at those words.

But who knew that behind that smile would be the devil himself?

And who knew that the birthday present for her seventh birthday...

Would be her mother's head.

"And then he whispered... H-He whispered!!"

Happy Birthday.

With a voice so laden with sarcasm that it would forever haunt her memories.

It was all her fault, Kalo's voice told her.

Taein blinked the tears from his eyes as Sayako crashed into his arms. Before, he didn't know the full story. He didn't blame his sister for saying those words to Kalo, that she wished to be a Capo. After all, they both knew how much the patriarch fawned over the Sottocapo.

Maybe the patriarch even ordered her to say those words. And maybe the man knew what would happen next.

Their mother wasn't a well-liked concubine.

Taein wrapped his arms around her. He didn't know what exactly happened next, but when they backed away from each other, their eyes were both wet with emotion.

"Sorry for hitting you." Taein's voice was raspy, but his tears evaporated at an uncanny rate.

"It's fine." Sayako's eyes were dry now too, after only a second passed. Tears would only blur her vision in combat; it was one of the first things that was trained out of her.

"What happened to your arm?"

Before Sayako could say a word, the far warehouse door burst open with a metallic crash. Their gaze shot to the intruder, a white-haired girl-

"A Messenger!" The gold-hooped cloak said it all.

Taein grabbed Sayako's collar, flinging her behind him as the girl's obsidian broadsword slammed into his scythes with a deafening crash, exactly where Sayako's arm used to be.

No words were exchanged. The spare scythes that hung from the wall quivered before they all shot at Yan at once, aiming to eviscerate her from all directions.

"Purification." A scorching heat wave melted the scythes into slag before they could touch her.

In exchange, the girl's right eye combusted into white flames. Soon, the smell of ash tinged the air.

"The Prescript does not concern you, Captain of Hook Office, the Web of Blades."

The Messenger readied her blade once again, her face expressionless.

"Then what the hell do you want with my sister?"

Yan flicked her head toward Sayako's left arm, its grainy surface refracting the warehouse's lights.

Without another word, she dashed forward.

Taein flung himself forward, intercepting the Messenger's blade with his two remaining scythes.

*CRACK*

The two mechanical blades shattered like glass. Taein coughed blood as his body slammed into the concrete.

"Enough!" Sayako shouted, using the moment Yan was distracted with her brother to unsheath her blade, slicing toward the girl's neck.

Yan tried to flip away, but Sayako's blade caught the Messenger's left cheek. Sayako used the moment of opportunity to slice through Yan's mouth completely, in an instant horizontal sweep.

Blood gushed down Yan's neck as she stood still, still expressionless.

The crimson liquid dripped onto her white cloak, dyeing it ominously.

"Corruption." Despite the garish wound, Yan could still pronounce words with clarity.

An eye grew on her palm. She clenched her fist, wringing out its blood onto the floor.

Before Taein and Sayako could comprehend what happened, the girl removed her hand with a quick twist, tossing it on the floor.

The appendage writhed on the ground before dissolving into rot.

The floor grew mushy and soft as blood vessels seeped into it like roots on a tree. The concrete turned crimson as the smell of blood diffused into the air.

Yan stood back; she didn't have to do anything anymore.

Now that her thoughts have emptied, she held the strength of a true Messenger.

Sayako screamed as threads of flesh bound Taein to the floor. Her own feet sunk into the pulsating ground, microscopic hooks latching onto her skin.

A mouth rose from the floor, biting her left arm off. Before she could react, the flesh tentacle spat the arm across the room into Yan's remaining hand.

This was a Messenger of the Index, matching a Capo in strength.

Instead of raw power, Messengers specialized in a far more mystical strength instead.

Sayako reached to feel her arm stump. With a sigh of relief, she could feel that it wasn't bleeding.

'Might as well just give her what she wants.'

"Prescript: Cut off the left arm of the Dark Cloud Blade. Completed." Yan looked at the limb in her hand, nodding her head.

Her sword disappeared with an azure flash, and the floor reverted to concrete.

Taein and Sayako panted, freed from the flesh monster the Messenger created.

Yan produced a hypodermic needle from her cloak, filled with crimson liquid.

Injecting it into herself allowed her missing hand, mutilated mouth, and vaporized eye to regenerate as if nothing happened.

"Ugh!" Sayako held the stump of her arm as a phantom pain rushed into her body. The arm... The arm! The arm belonged to her!!

"That's my arm!" She gnashed her teeth as her mouth began to froth. Her eyes pulsed with black ooze as a bout of otherworldly insanity took over her mind.

From across the room, Yan frowned as the arm in her hand began to quiver, pulling her forward with a non-negligible force.

What was left of Sayako's left arm raised itself, and the strange pulling force became even stronger.

A crackling whistle pierced the air.

Yan locked her knees, straining to keep the arm in her grip.

Then, the other warehouse door opened.

"Eh, Sayako?" Asher's voice held a bit of confusion, as well as a bit of relief as the boy saw Sayako on the ground, relatively woundless.

Yan disappeared before Asher could glimpse her face properly, allowing Sayako's arm to fly across the room to reattach to her body.

Taein looked at the stranger, his eyes widening as he recognized Asher's face. Connecting the dots, the man shivered.

As soon as the Messenger saw Asher's face, she fled.

'This kid is dangerous... Far more dangerous than I anticipated.' Taein forced himself to look deeper into the boy's innocent looking expression. The boy was only faking innocence to make use of his childish face. Taein was sure of it now.

Thankfully, Asher didn't seem to have any aminosity toward him.

"Guys, what happened? Did you two fight or something?" He glanced around the room.

"No, it was nothing." Sayako gulped, planning her next words carefully. Asher's presence wasn't intimidating at all, which only heightened her wariness. Someone who could hide such sinister aura behind a perfect veil of innocence was someone to watch out for.

Asher tilted his head.

"So, did you guys make up? Clear up the misunderstanding?"

The two of them nodded at the same time.

"That is good." Sophie appeared behind Asher, giving him a vanishing smile as she spoke. "Come, Sayako. My Fixers are awaiting your instruction."

She turned to Taein.

"And the Web of Blades. I hope we have a good cooperation." Sophie stuck out both of her hands, pulling Sayako and Taein to their feet.

...

After Taein and Sayako left, only Sophie and Asher were left in the empty warehouse.

"Asher, I believe they were fighting with some other entity before you arrived." She examined the ash and slag metal on the floor with a watchful eye.

Ever since her immolation an uncountable number of years ago, Sophie had an uncanny affinity for fire. She could tell that nothing on Taein's or Sayako's bodies could produce heat to this extent.

As she explained her reasoning to Asher, he nodded.

"I thought so as well. You can ask Sayako who it was."

"Yes. There's still a bit of day left, are you going to explore around some more?"

Asher glanced out the open warehouse doors. The sky was beginning to turn orange from the sunset.

He hummed noncommittally.

"I found a lead on an Urban Myth. I should be able to finish it by the end of today."

Sophie smiled, clasping the boy's hand in between hers.

They silently relaxed in the stuffy air. It seemed like every moment they were with each other was filled with tranquility.

Perhaps they were still revelling in the novelty of Sophie's new physical form.

"..." Sophie smiled, chiding her thoughts.

"Stay safe."