The hunters’ stride was feverish, bordering on a desperate impatience. Greedy thoughts of a prize Gold-eye, a wounded target, and a future of rapid promotion filled their minds to the brim.

  Then, they skidded to a halt.

  Standing at the edge of the forest was a slender figure draped in bck. She wore funerary attire of absolute obsidian, her face obscured by a veil made of shifting shadows. This veil didn't just hide her features; it formed a fine, microscopic filtration net around her nose and mouth. Since the ambush at the border, Ana refused to allow herself to fall for the same trick of garlic powder twice.

  Beneath the veil, a pair of golden eyes burned with a piercing intensity.

  “Stop, humans! Turn back if you want to live; I won't warn you a second time.”

  her voice drifted into the hunters’ ears like a cold wind. It was as clear as a silver bell, yet the sheer pressure behind it caused the lead hunter—the one who had first injected the serum—to take a half-step back.

  Air froze for a heartbeat. The hunters exchanged gnces. Their fear was real, but the numbers fshing in their minds—bounty, prestige, merit—were more real. Someone licked their parched lips.

  “...She’s bluffing,” a voice whispered from the back.

  The first injected hunter said nothing. He stared at the golden gaze beneath the shadow veil. Something was wrong. The serum was working; his vision was enhanced, the contrast dialed up, the world dismantled into a "trackable map." But the girl before him stood like a void that refused to be locked onto. Her scent was severed. Her heartbeat was swallowed. Even the weight she left on the ground had been "erased."

  “She isn't an ordinary vampire,” he finally managed.

  The Captain’s jaw tightened. “Then she’s worth even more.” He raised an auto-injector. Thrust. Inject.

  A low growl vibrated in the Captain’s throat. “A warning?” He bared his teeth, revealing the jagged, uneven fangs—the malformed byproduct of the forced serum catalyst. “I’ll give you a warning once I’ve taken your head back in a box!”

  He smmed his foot into the earth. BOOM! Bolstered by the explosive force of the serum, his speed was staggering. To an ordinary human, he would have appeared to teleport.

  But to Ana’s eyes, the movement was nauseating. Too much force. Too crude. He had no understanding of the harmony between air and gravity.

  The man swung a heavy fist toward Ana’s face, the force of the punch creating a shrill whistle. Ana stood her ground. Her bck skirt twirled lightly with her movement, yet the hem wasn't lifted by the wind. Her steps remained restrained and formal. Two dark shadows spread soundlessly from her lower back.

  They didn't spread outward like wings for flight. Instead, they extended upward and backward along her spine, like structures that had always existed but were usually folded away into the constraints of etiquette. The shadows yered beneath the fabric, forming a blurred but certain silhouette.

  It was less an unfolding and more a "cdding." It was a living night that slid and overpped along the curve of her dress. The shadows writhed beneath the cloth without breaking the silhouette—instead making her figure appear more upright, more "contained."

  These were not wings meant for the sky. They were guardian wings designed to ensure nothing could draw near. Instead of meeting force with force, they swallowed, deflected, and robbed the impact of its direction like water.

  Ana’s expression remained unchanged. She simply tilted her body, letting the shadows fold back beneath her hem once the attack passed, as if nothing had happened.

  “—!?” The man felt like he had punched a thick, viscous swamp. His proud strength was easily guided away by the shadows. His center of gravity shattered, and he stumbled forward in a pathetic sprawl, nearly face-pnting in the dirt.

  “There she is! Fire!” The squad members behind him leveled their specialized automatic weapons, spraying a deluge of silver-pted bullets. Bang-bang-bang-bang! The gunfire shattered the forest’s peace.

  Ana’s form blurred. She didn't retreat; she swept directly toward the fnk of the woods.

  “Lights! Don't let her reach the dark!” the Captain roared. Two soldiers snapped on high-intensity portable UV mps. Fsh!

  A blinding white gre illuminated the trees. The trunks turned a sickly pale, and shadows were forcibly elongated like monsters from a childhood nightmare.

  But Ana was prepared. She kept her speed perfectly synchronized with the edge of the light beams. Along her path, she left behind several solidified walls of bck shadow. Though these shadows dissipated slowly under the UV exposure, they successfully blocked all direct light for the crucial seconds she needed.

  “Where is she?! She was just there—” One soldier frantically swept his mp, only to feel a sudden chill down his spine. A cold, fair, slender hand rested gently on the back of his neck.

  “Are you looking for me?”

  “—Ergh!” Before he could pull the trigger, a dry snap echoed from his cervical vertebrae.

  Ana shoved the corpse into the other mp-bearer, using the weight of the body to topple the light source. She gave a slight curtsy-like bend of her knees and vanished into the darkness once more.

  “Dammit! She’s in the trees!”

  The Captain’s movements were crude, but his senses were indeed sharpened. He caught the faint vibration of Ana’s feet on a branch. Using his powerful legs, he leaped into the canopy like a rabid hound, his tactical knife frantically shredding the surrounding foliage. “Come out! You little rat!” he roared, swinging his fists. The serum’s strength allowed him to snap branches the thickness of a bowl, but every strike hit nothing but air.

  Ana stood in the shadows of the higher branches, looking down at him with icy disdain. She watched his muscles twitch from the strain of power they weren't built to carry. She watched his reactions, dulled by sensory overload.

  This is the "evolution" humanity seeks?

  Compared to a soul as pure as J’s, these half-baked monsters who abandoned their human dignity for selfish greed disgusted her.

  “My sister was once pushed to the brink by trash like you...” Ana slowly raised her hand. “The thought of it makes me feel... that I should chop you into much smaller pieces.”

  In the darkness, the ripples of shadow began to expand. Several hunters who had already injected the serum suddenly found the shadows beneath their feet moving. They weren't shifting; they had become traps. Sharp shadow-spikes erupted silently from the ground, skewering their feet and knees with surgical precision.

  “Aaaaagh!” Screams erupted across the clearing.

  “Quiet,” Ana said, nding gracefully before the Captain.

  The man realized with horror that the shadows dispersed by the UV lights were regrouping at his feet, locking around his ankles like iron shackles. “Impossible! In the light, you should be—”

  “—You sves to greed have never witnessed the true power of a vampire.” Ana walked closer, the shadow-bde in her hand reflecting an ominous, deathly silence under the moon.

  She struck. No fshy maneuvers, only the precision of a surgeon. The Captain’s right arm was severed cleanly. He let out an inhuman wail, trying to retreat, only to be yanked back by the shadow chains.

  “And another thing...” Ana’s form was suddenly pressed against his chest. Her movement was no longer light; it carried a crushing sense of weight. “This punch is on behalf of my sister, returned to people like you.”

  She retracted her bde and clenched her fist. It was a move learned from the Blood Memory, one Saliya had used before: Short Power, the Inch Punch.

  THUD.

  A muffled boom echoed as the man’s chest caved in. His serum-reinforced ribs were as fragile as paper under the strike. The man was sent flying like a puppet with broken strings, smashing through a UV mp and finally ceasing his twitching amidst a shower of electrical sparks.

  “If you aren't dead, feel free to enjoy the sensation of respiratory failure for a while.” Ana stood still, lightly brushing the dust from her skirt.

  Her golden eyes swept over the remaining humans. They immediately opened fire. Before the silver bullets arrived, Ana’s figure vanished like a shadow struck by light.

  The first hunter to fall didn't even understand what had happened. In his vision, a golden gaze flickered before him. In the next second—the world was only "Bck." Not blindness, but isotion. He opened his mouth to scream, but found his voice swallowed by something. When his throat was cut, there was no pain. Only a deyed understanding: I should not have come here.

  Blood spattered against a tree trunk.

  The second hunter pulled the trigger. The bullets tore through the air where Ana had stood a second before. She was already gone. Her figure appeared behind the third man, the shadow-bde on her fingers falling at an angle precise enough for dissection.

  “Scatter!” the Vice-Captain roared.

  Too te. The serum made them faster, but it also made them—noisier. Heartbeats, the rush of blood, the noise of nerves... all were amplified to an unbearable degree. And Ana heard every bit of it. She didn't chase. She simply appeared at the exact moment someone made a mistake.

  When someone turned. When someone hesitated. In that split second when someone thought they were safe.

  One. Then another.

  Her movements held no emotion. No anger. No satisfaction. She was simply, calmly reducing their numbers. Until the Vice-Captain finally realized: they weren't hunting. They were waiting to be sughtered.

  “Retrea—”

  He never finished the word. Ana finally appeared directly in front of him. Those golden eyes pierced through the gloom. It wasn't an intimidation. It wasn't a decration. It was an almost merciful confirmation.

  You should have listened to my warning.

  In the next heartbeat, the night closed in.

  When the forest fell silent again, only slumped figures and the lingering scent of blood remained on the ground. Ana stood still, tilting her head slightly. She felt it—the violent, disordered osciltion coming from the direction of the gas station.

  “...Sister.”

  She turned and walked in the opposite direction. She deliberately made her footsteps heavy. She intentionally left a trail. She would lead away whatever remained alive and capable of tracking.

  Meanwhile, back at the derelict gas station...

  The single step Saliya had taken forward finally made Lenka... move.