Anomaly

Chapter 401 – Worship of the true gods [47]

Emily chose to ignore her friend’s inner impulses, at least for now. Deep down, she had nothing against Laura’s inclinations... but that obviously didn’t make things any less uncomfortable for the unwilling “test subject” of her outfit experiments. Still, there were more urgent matters to deal with.

Forcing her mind back to the present, Emily narrowed her eyes, the irritation visible in the tension of her shoulders and the slight furrow of her brows: “What the hell are you two doing here?” she demanded, her voice firm with a trace of barely restrained annoyance: “And why do I get the feeling you have something to do with... this?”

The final word carried weight, accompanied by a vague gesture toward the chaos outside. That’s when her gaze shifted, settling on the man standing next to Eve. He was... strange. Not because of his appearance, but his presence.

While everything around them teetered on the edge of collapse, he remained impeccably composed. His posture was upright yet relaxed, as if he were standing in an elegant waiting room instead of the epicenter of an unexplainable catastrophe.

More than anything, that unsettled Emily: (Great. Another completely calm stranger while some kind of death beam from who-knows-where is out there tearing everything apart...) She held back a sigh, crossing her arms impatiently, though her eyes stayed sharp and alert.

Following Emily’s words, the unknown man spoke next. The refined smile never left his face, not even for a second. It didn’t feel like just an expression, but something ingrained in him, as if it were part of who he was.

Meanwhile, Emily couldn’t shake the uncomfortable sense of familiarity. It was like looking at someone she’d seen before. Something about him... something specific... irritating. Completely irritating.

“Easy now, miss...” he said, his voice smooth and perfectly controlled: “Let’s not rush into picking sides, deciding who’s the hero and who’s the villain... not when there’s a massive beam of destruction outside slowly making its way toward us”

His sharp, attentive eyes flicked briefly toward the towering pillar of light. The smile on his face took on a faintly ironic edge as he mentioned the danger, though it never lost its elegance, only sharpened: “Trust me...” he continued, tilting his head slightly as if sharing a secret: “that thing is going to cause a lot more chaos than it should”

For a brief moment, something changed. It was subtle, almost imperceptible to anyone less observant, but Emily saw it. The gleam in his eyes dimmed, the warmth in his smile faded, and his voice... his voice carried an unexpected weight: “And that...” he finished, now in a strangely serious tone that clashed with everything he had shown so far: “is the last thing I want”

The shift was so natural, so fluid, that it was unsettling. As if he were simply... switching masks. Emily said nothing, but for the first time since he started speaking, she felt genuinely affected. Not by what he said... but by how easily he seemed to change his expressions.

Even so, she kept her gaze slightly narrowed, fixed on the man in front of her. She’d be lying if she said she wasn’t a little tense, not hostility, exactly, but a sharp caution. She had no real proof that what he was saying was true. On the contrary, the way he referred to the so-called “death beam” still echoed in her mind, it felt... disturbing.

Still, Emily chose to set that aside for now. Before jumping to conclusions, she needed to figure out whether those two, clearly eccentric, self-proclaimed followers of anomalies, were trustworthy, or just another problem about to make things worse.

She paused briefly, her body still while her mind raced. An uneasy feeling crept in, like an unresolved déjà vu, making her stomach twist slightly. This... wasn’t the first time. Her eyes slowly drifted to the light tearing through the sky, a brilliant pillar that seemed to defy reality as it stretched endlessly upward.

Her expression shifted into something more tired, more resigned: (Yeah... trusting those two isn’t exactly easy, considering the last time we dealt with someone who “believed in anomalies” it ended with a pillar shooting into the sky) She frowned faintly: (And apparently... with enough power to destroy everything)

Emily let out a quiet sigh, running a hand through her hair absentmindedly, as if trying to shake off the growing weight of the absurd situation: (I really didn’t think my week would end like this)

As Emily drifted into her thoughts, silence followed. Then Eve spoke, her voice cutting through the air with calm, laced with a cold indifference: “It’s true, we had some involvement in that”

Emily didn’t look surprised. In fact, given the timing of their arrival, it would’ve been stranger if they weren’t involved. For a brief moment, her thoughts stirred, connecting dots, forming hypotheses, but she dismissed them with a slight furrow of her brow. Now wasn’t the time. Her eyes returned to Eve, focused, sharp, attentive.

Eve paused briefly before continuing, as if choosing her words with minimal care, not out of consideration, but precision: “... While it’s true we had a hand in this, it wasn’t our intention to cause... this much collateral damage...”

She slowly shook her head, almost imperceptibly. Her expression remained unchanged, neutral, distant. Even so, Emily caught something subtle in her tone: a faint trace of displeasure, nearly buried under layers of indifference, but present enough not to go unnoticed.

“Yeah, whatever...” Laura muttered, inserting herself back into the conversation with an impatient sigh, rolling her eyes dramatically. She crossed her arms for a moment, as if trying to organize her thoughts, before continuing: “For now, let’s just forget whatever part you played in this damn death ray... at least for the moment. And let’s focus on how to stop that thing before the “death” part of the name I gave it turns out to be accurate, alright?”

Emily let out a quiet grunt at Laura’s words, her eyes narrowing instinctively as she evaluated the two in front of her. Trusting them like this, out of nowhere, was out of the question, every instinct she had screamed against it. Still... Laura had a point. As always, annoyingly logical.

That thought made her sigh, her gaze drifting away for a brief second as she sorted out her priorities. Regardless of who was involved or how far this situation had spiraled out of control, something much bigger was at stake now. For better or worse, Emily decided to set it aside, at least temporarily.

She slowly uncrossed her arms, the subtle motion marking her decision. Of course, that didn’t mean she had forgotten. Her eyes returned to the two of them, colder now, more calculating. She still intended to question them later... and this time, she wouldn’t let a single answer slip through.

“Laura’s right” Emily muttered, the agreement coming out more like a breath than actual words. Her eyes drifted toward the glow outside, a pillar of light tearing through the sky: “Let’s focus on what matters” she continued, her voice firmer now, though a subtle tension weighed on every syllable: “The [Angel of Death] is out there trying to contain... whatever the hell that is” Emily paused briefly, watching the shimmering pillar that seemed to have appeared out of nowhere, distorting the air around it: “And if we haven’t heard anything yet, then it’s safe to assume it’s not going smoothly for her”

Straightening her posture, Emily looked between Eve and the unknown man. Her fingers slowly curled, as if trying to contain the growing unease: “So tell me” Emily said, her tone lower but laced with urgency: “how do we stop this?”

The silence that followed was heavy, not the comfortable kind, but the kind that presses against your ears and makes your pulse quicken. And from the way Eve briefly looked away, and the unreadable expression on the man beside her... it became clear their answer was far from what Emily wanted to hear.

“Now that it’s started, there’s no stopping it” the unknown man replied, someone whose name Emily still didn’t know. He paused briefly, his eyes drifting away for a moment: “Our goal was for this to be on a smaller scale, less... lethal” His voice lost some of its firmness for a second, but quickly recovered: “As it stands now, it’ll probably reach the entire city”

His expression shifted. His features hardened, taking on a rigidity that looked almost carved from stone. He appeared coldly confident, almost aristocratic, the posture of someone used to dealing with catastrophic consequences, but beneath that, tension still lingered. He lifted his chin slightly, eyes fixed on something distant.

“We don’t know how much power is in this...” he continued, quieter now, as if admitting it was a risk in itself: “But there’s a real, albeit remote, possibility that it could be enough to cover the entire world”

Emily groaned inwardly at the man’s words. A flood of curses echoed in her mind, insulting not only those responsible but their entire bloodlines, as if that could even slightly ease the frustration building in her chest. Her fingers twitched faintly at her sides, and she had to resist the urge to roll her eyes right then and there.

Honestly, Emily began to wonder if she was being punished for something. Why, exactly, couldn’t she have a single normal week? Was it too much to ask to just walk through a mall, browse some stores, maybe buy something useless, without some absurd anomaly popping out of nowhere trying to destroy the world, open dimensional portals, or, of course, threaten the very fabric of reality?

She let out a nearly imperceptible sigh, running a hand through her hair as if trying to brush away the stress along with a few loose strands. Seriously... was it really too much to ask for this not to happen for at least one week?

Faced with the real weight behind the man’s words, the thought surfaced again, more bitter now, more exhausted, echoing in her mind like something inevitable: (Damn... I really hate this job sometimes)