Is this stupid meeting finally over?
-Nyxia Torrentia, Neon Tempest of the Ultraviolet Rainbow
To Nyxia’s relief, shortly after Oros noted how she’d assumed Hizuki could simply fly the entire van to wherever they were going, the meeting began to wind down. It might not have been as fast as the Neon Tempest would have liked, but things were concluding nonetheless, a fact made abundantly clear when Oros made her way out of the makeshift club room. With the meeting’s organizer having taken her leave, Nyxia saw no further reason to stick around.
“Well, have fun sorting out all those headache-inducing details,” she told the remaining club members as she stretched herself out before strolling over to the window.
“I’m gonna go do something a bit more fun,” she added with a smirk as she slipped through the circular frame and out into the darkening night.
Maybe the others liked the feeling of power and control that came from organizing complex operations and planning intricate strategies, but Nyxia hadn’t become a magical girl to be bored out of her mind mulling over monotonous minutia. No, Norika had been reborn as the Neon Tempest with the sole purpose of cleansing the world of the abominations that murdered her beloved brother, and that was precisely what she intended to do now. Indeed, it was what she would
continue to do for the entire time the rest of the club prepared for their upcoming trip, however long those preparations would take.
…
…
…
The weather was getting colder. In November, it wasn’t common for Hibusa town to get much snow. There were places in Japan at higher elevations that would be getting snow well before Hibusa did. But the northern winds had certainly arrived. If Nyxia wasn’t a magical girl and virtually immune to the natural environment, then the cold air would make her deathly ill or worse. Even on the coldest nights, she’d only need her baby to keep her warm.
It was the dead of night, and all the other detention club girls were elsewhere. Many of them had daytime rituals and needed at least a little bit of sleep to function the following day. Though Nyxia was truly free in that she could hunt for as long as she wanted. Though there was something off. There appeared to be more miseria than normal. Usually by now Nyxia would have them mopped up, but it was like she was only half done. A glaive of green light ripped through five of them on a rooftop. But as soon as they vanished, a few more scurried up and into view.
"You fuckers are persistent tonight, huh?" Nyxia muttered as she fired another blast from her beloved energy cannon.
"That’s fine," she added a moment later as her scowl turned into a psychotic smirk.
"That just means more fun for me!" The Neon Tempest unleashed a peal of sadistic laughter as she swept the Omega Obliterator’s neon-tinged, lightning-wreathed cylinder of annihilation across her myriad foes, while also deploying her pair of hovering octahedron drones for good measure.
"And my little darling here always has room for more, right baby?!" she asked her oversized weapon before giving voice to another burst of unhinged laughter.
But while Nyxia gave into her inner anarchist, she heard an unfamiliar voice call out from the darkness.
"Was zum Teufel?!?" Some grenades flew up from behind the building, which Nyxia’s beam cut into. They detonated, but rather than turning into balls of fire they exploded into bones. Whole bones like ones that once belonged to a man. They bounced harmlessly off of the roof, but a femur did fly pretty close to Nyxia’s head. Once the light and sound died down, the stranger spoke up again.
"Ja." There was some shuffling, but the stranger remained out of view.
"The fuck…?!" Nyxia exclaimed, leaning her head to one side to avoid getting struck by one of the flying bones. Holding her fire for a moment, she called out,
"Whoever the fuck’s down there, ya better get outta the fucking way! Otherwise, it’s not my fault if I vaporize your stupid ass!""Ja?" the voice called out again.
"You zink I vould leave a miseria alive? Maybe if I vas really stupid." She chuckled.
"Nah. I vould do no such thing. Maybe fire your veapon where there are targets to hit?""I’m killing these Miseria, ya fuckin’ moron!" Nyxia snarled as she furiously, yet still cautiously, made her way to the edge of the roof.
"Go find your own!""Zat sounds like a good idea." Without firing her obliterator, Nyxia was able to pick up on the soft pop of a grenade launcher. She heard it several times, and not long afterwards many nearby roofs had one grenade shell bouncing on their roof. It didn’t take them long to detonate and eviscerate the miseria lurking nearby. Though it wasn’t just bones that ripped through the disgusting creatures. Some exploded into horseshoes, candles, clocks, keys, even pages of an old book. All were equally devastating to their intended targets. Another interesting detail was the trajectory of the shells themselves. They weren’t all being fired from the same area. It was as if this magical girl was moving between shots and firing in quick succession. Though if she was moving, she had to be pretty fast because the houses weren’t being shelled in any sort of order.
"Just shoot ze ones you don’t vant me to touch." Nyxia’s jaw clenched and her eye twitched.
"That doesn’t even make any fucking sense!" she shouted, while furiously scanning the streets below in an attempt to catch sight of the mystery grenadier. Though there was nothing to be found.
"Well, whatever…" the Neon Tempest grumbled before opening fire once more.
"If the stupid bitch gets vaporized, it’s her own fuckin’ fault!"And so the hunt pressed on. Miseria were getting vaporized left and right. If not by a death beam, then by whatever ordinance the other girl was using. Sometimes there were some close calls. A laser would burn through a miseria moments before a grenade got it, other times it would be Nyxia’s beam that caught a grenade, and the fragmentation would take out all the miseria in the area before she could hit even one.
Eventually, the town became quiet. The end of Nyxia’s obliterator smoked, but there were no other targets to shoot. The last grenade to explode had thrown goat horns everywhere, and one of the more rounded ones rolled towards Nyxia before falling on its side a few feet from her position.
The Neon Tempest eyed the horn as it rolled to a stop. After taking a moment to glare at this latest incongruous object to cross her path, she took a step forward and crushed it under the high heel of her boot.
"Just what I need…" she muttered.
"Another annoying dumbass getting in my way…"The powdery remains of the horn were scattered to the wind. They glimmered under the moon light before finally dispersing enough to where they couldn’t be seen. For a time, it was just Nyxia and the wind. But she wasn’t fortunate enough for it to remain so quiet.
"Zat vas the last of zem." The stranger’s voice was near, possibly right over the other side of the roof.
"You’re rather good at hunting miseria, ja? Not many can keep pace vith me." "And just who the hell are you?" Nyxia inquired, her tone clearly conveying her vexation.
"Ya don’t sound like anyone I know, so ya must be new in town," she added.
"Were there not enough Miseria to kill where ya came from?""Something like zat." Came the stranger’s voice from the other side of the roof.
"I heard zere was a school that vas obliterated. It sounded like a good hunting ground. I also had been curious about a demon of Hibusa town and her dark harem. I had heard zey were weak, but that does not seem to be za case with you. You kill as well as I do." Nyxia’s eye twitched when she heard the word "harem", but she chose to ignore it.
"Thanks. I’d like to think I’m the strongest magical girl around here," she said instead.
"Aside from that demon you mentioned…" the Neon Tempest added with a scowl.
"So, if you’re as strong as you say, mind showing yourself?" the tealette inquired, putting a hand on her hip.
"Or are you shy, too?""You vant to see me? Hmmm." She hummed, though her voice came from yet another direction.
"Or maybe you vant to shoot me? Vould a smart person show zemselves now?" Nyxia’s eyes were drawn to some light. In the darkness of the night, she could make out a halo. It was white, but a red neon glow. Slowly it rose, and slowly the scalp of the mysterious magical girl rose into view. Her hair looked pink under the glow of her halo. Then her body turned into a blur as she shot into the air and landed on the roof. While the landing was hard, both the girl and the roof were fine. Though some chain links bounced away from her landing spot. Finally, Nyxia could look upon the person she had been talking to.
There was no doubt she was a magical girl, but her halo was the only angelic thing about her. Two ribbons tied off her twin tails, which draped down her leather trench coat. Said trenchcoat was too small for her, and was held around her waist by a tactical ammo belt. A partial leotard struggled to cover her body modestly, and employed the help of several leather straps to keep everything in place. If it wasn’t covered in tactical equipment or leather, it was covered in netting or pantyhose. Her lace up boots went half way up her thighs and had an elevated heel, though there was no arch in the shoe. Among her numerous pouches and ammo sleeves were a few choice accessories. She wore a chain around her neck and a gothic cross necklace. She had a few piercings under her eye, and may have had more that Nyxia couldn’t see. In either hand was a grenade launcher with chains wrapped around the barrels. Each one was latched onto the launchers and terminated in goat skull charms. They were both aimed into the air.
"Guten Abend. Zey call me Home Vecker."
"I got a banner before Finn did. Vunderbar!"— Home WreckerWhile this was Nyxia’s first time seeing
Home Wrecker, it appeared to be her first time seeing Nyxia as well. Her eyes moved over Nyxia carefully, clearly trying to get a read on the girl. Though most of her time was spent looking at the giant gun Nyxia was holding.
"That makes a little more sense." Her eyes rested on the business end of the weapon.
"Does it have a name?" "The Omega Obliterator," Nyxia replied, while taking in the appearance of the other girl. Although she probably wasn’t a GEM, the odds of her being a member of Ashbringer’s little group were considerably higher. As such, the Neon Tempest resolved to not let her guard down.
"Whadaya call yours?" she inquired, pointing at Home Wrecker’s pair of grenade launchers.
She looked to either side, and turned the guns over in her hand.
"Sköll and Hati." The wind wasn’t too bad right now. It was blowing, but it wasn’t so noisy that they needed to shout to hear each other. Wrecker’s trench coat flapped by her legs.
"Now zat ze miseria are gone, vat shal ve do, hmmm?" She tipped her head.
"You’re not ready to go to bed either, ja?"Nyxia smirked.
"When I kill all the fuckers in one place, I just go to another and hunt down some more," she replied.
"Seeing as how you’re not from around here, I guess I can let ya tag along, as long as ya promise not to be a nuisance," the Neon Tempest added.
"Speaking of, I guess you’re here on some kinda school trip or family vacation, huh?""Nein. My parents are parasites." She practically spat the words.
"I come near here ven I visit my grandfather. Thought I might take a detour and come zis way." Even though Home Wrecker wasn’t the one who suggested they fight more miseria, she had picked a direction to go hunting for them.
"I came here from ze east. ve von’t find any miseria that way." With a shake of her guns, the revolving cylinders swung out of the grenade launchers. She swiped them across her ammo belts in a single flourish and swung them back shut again.
"I vould have thought a coven of dark girls would hunt together. Do you not?""We’re not a ‘coven’," Nyxia corrected as she followed after the foreign-sounding girl.
"We’re a club, and sometimes we do hunt as a group. But I also like hunting alone, without anyone getting in the way," she added, putting particular emphasis on the last few words.
"Sucks about your parents," the Neon Tempest said after a few moments of silence.
"Mine are pretty shitty, too.""Parents should look after zeir children, ja? Not ze other vay around." Her hands tightened around Sköll and Hati, but she eased up before her fingers curled around the trigger.
"My parents never took care of me. Ven I was small, zey would feed me coffee for breakfast. I could never keep it down." "My parents openly hate the fact I was ever born," Nyxia replied.
"If they both died in a fire I wouldn’t give a single fuck." That wasn’t entirely true, of course. If both of her parents died, it would cause no small number of unpleasant complications for her, and even with as awful as her mother and father might be, she knew her
other relatives were even
worse… "Anyway, uh, I’ve never actually had coffee before," the Neon Tempest revealed in an attempt to slightly change the subject.
"Is it really that bad?""It is not something you feed a growing child." Wrecker eyed Nyxia. There was anger in her eyes, but it wasn’t clear if it was from reliving old memories or that Nyxia didn’t understand how bad coffee was for a child.
"It’s an acquired taste, has no nutritional value, and is only consumed for a dose of caffeine. Some mix cream and sugar into it to make it palatable, but zat never helped me." While they hopped between rooftops, something caught the grenadier’s eye. She looked over the side of the roof at a fast food chain. It was still open, and wasn’t too busy at this hour.
"A moment." She hopped off the edge of the roof. Nyxia didn’t even have time to wonder how long she’d be gone before she hopped back up on the roof again. Only this time Hati was chained to her hip and she was holding a disposable coffee cup. There was an insignia of some mythical twin tailed creature with a vaguely feminine appearance on the side, and the cup’s heat escaped a small opening and turned into steam in the cold air.
"Here, coffee." She held it out for Nyxia to take.
"At least it smells good."Taking the offered cup, Nyxia gave it a sniff.
"You’re right," she agreed with a look of surprise.
"That is rather pleasant." Slowly bringing the cup to her mouth, the Neon Tempest took a small sip. Her face contorted into a scowl as she swallowed the liquid.
"Fucking disgusting…" she declared after a moment.
"And people actually like drinking this shit?" she inquired, holding up the cup, before tossing it into the air and vaporizing it with a quick blast of teal energy.
Home Wrecker watched the beverage and its container vanish from existence.
"It can be an addiction for some, if you can believe it." She loosened Hati and lifted her second grenade launcher up against her shoulder.
"Caffeine makes it addictive. No different zan tobacco in cigarettes or alcohol in beer." She hesitated before adding.
"Sugar makes zings addictive too. But at least zey taste good." Home Wrecker chuckled.
"I might be addicted to killing miseria.""And what’s so bad about that?" Nyxia asked with a smirk.
"The less of those fucking things in the world, the better. Plus, killing them is so fucking fun.""It’s bad because ve both vant to kill zem." She squinted her eyes and looked off in the distance.
"But if zat isn’t a problem anymore…" Home Wrecker’s next jump caused her to fall between two buildings. The miseria at the edge of town were hiding among the trees, but scattered when a grenade detonated and threw lit candles everywhere.
"Well, there’re plenty to go around," Nyxia replied, before leaping to a higher vantage point and using the provided illumination to fire a crackling cylinder of incandescent annihilation at a cluster of Miseria lurking just beyond the nearby wood line.
"Wanna have a race to see who kills the most?" the Neon Tempest inquired, her sadistic grin widening.
"Ja! Let ze slaughter commence!" And so the night pressed on, with flashes of teal lightning and the thunderous explosion of entropic projectiles.
As much as Nyxia had initially despised the strange interloper, she was forced to concede that she was beginning to feel a sense of camaraderie with Home Wrecker. The two of them shared several similarities, not the least of which being how much they enjoyed killing Miseria, and as the Neon Tempest had begun to discover during her outings with Roche, doing so with a competent and equally enthusiastic partner was almost as fun as slaughtering them solo.
Taking aim at a particularly gruesome Miseria, Nyxia was just about to open fire when it burst apart amidst a hail of random objects, causing her to grind her teeth in frustration.
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