The city didn't celebrate Victor Kane's death.
It exhaled.
Smoke drifted through broken streets where his banners once hung. Screens replayed the same headline on a loop—SYNDICATE KINGPIN DEAD—but no one smiled. Empires didn't die. They molted.
Emma stood on a rooftop overlooking the ruins, rain sliding off her jacket, blood dried into the seams. The night wind tugged at her hair like it wanted her gone.
Victor was dead.
So why did her chest still feel like a locked room with no air?
She closed her eyes—and saw the bridge again. Fog. Gunfire. Liam falling. Her hands slick with his blood.
Emma turned away from the edge.
Below, Syndicate safehouses burned. Rival factions moved in fast, devouring territory like starving animals. Power was currency now, and everyone was broke and desperate.
Her phone vibrated once.
A single encrypted ping.
She ignored it.
Footsteps sounded behind her—light, careful.
"Emma."
James.
She didn't turn. "You shouldn't be here."
He rolled closer in his chair, rain beading on the metal frame. "Neither should you."
Silence stretched between them, filled with sirens and distant explosions.
"Victor's gone," James said. "The police think it's over."
Emma finally faced him. "It's not."
James studied her—really studied her—and his jaw tightened. She looked thinner. Sharper. Like a blade that had been overused.
"Sam's safe," he said gently. "Transferred schools. New name. New city."
Good, Emma thought. One less shadow to chase him.
"And you?" James asked.
Emma glanced at the city one last time.
"I can't stay."
James didn't argue. That hurt more than if he had.
He handed her a flash drive. "We intercepted chatter before Victor died. Something bigger is moving. They're calling it… The Veil."
Emma's fingers tightened around the drive.
"Seven leaders," James continued. "No names. No faces. Governments answer to them and don't even know it."
Emma slipped the drive into her pocket. "Then they'll learn."
James hesitated. "They're asking about you."
She met his eyes. Calm. Steady.
"Let them."
Thunder cracked overhead.
Emma stepped back, then vaulted from the rooftop—vanishing into the rain before James could say goodbye.
---
ELSEWHERE — UNKNOWN LOCATION
Seven silhouettes sat around a circular table of glass and light.
Screens hovered in the air, displaying footage of Emma—fighting, bleeding, surviving.
"She killed Kane," one voice said.
"Correction," another replied. "She ended him."
A woman's voice cut through the chamber, smooth and cold.
"Bring her in."
A new image appeared: a white-clad assassin sharpening twin blades.
NYX KUROHANA.
"Break her first," the woman ordered. "Then we decide whether she dies… or joins us."
---
FINAL SCENE
Emma walked alone through an abandoned train station, footsteps echoing like gunshots.
Her phone vibrated again.
This time, she answered.
A distorted voice whispered:
> "You don't belong to the shadows anymore, Emma Hellsing.
The shadows belong to you."
The line went dead.
Emma stopped walking.
Slowly, she smiled.
"Then they should be afraid."