The moment Cindy’s face appeared on the internet, threads started to appear.

While many people were focused on her thighs and the glimpse of her underwear, post from the US started to crop up.

Her name, school, ID and family history was laid bare.

It was like the whole thing was being manipulated by a pair of invisible hands.

Information on Cindy started cropping up and not only that, the people associated with her were implicated as well.

The information on the "gas leak" of her home was dug up and posted.

Mystery channels on youtube started to post shorts on the whole matter while Horror channels started to open their streams and do live reactions on the livestream.

Cindy did not know about it, she did not realize it but back in Japan-

"WHAT THE FUCK?!"

Hana screamed as she watched the warnings on her computer.

Richard had set up a data mining bot that would search up and look for any information related to them.

The job of the bot was to first warn of the data that was being spread and then to ask how to deal with it.

Unfortunately, Richard only prepared for a minor problem like a few acquaintances posting missing persons reports. A few internet sleuths cooking up wild stories and a few short clips of them accidentally getting caught on camera doing crazy shit.

In fact, Hana had already started to deal with the sudden stream that revealed one of Cindy’s pets and even revealed Cindy herself.

What she didn’t expect was that the bot Richard made was unable to control the spread of information.

Moreover, much like how Damien Dixon was framed, Cindy was now being put in the limelight but unlike before, people were not being controlled by mystical means.

Instead, a rapidly growing information campaign was exploding.

The epicenter was somewhere in the US, untraceable- even for Richard’s bots.

Hana didn’t know what to do, she was simply going over the reports and filing them when the computer started to issue warnings.

She made the decision to isolate the stream and prevent information from spreading but it didn’t take a minute before the bot started to issue one warning after another.

Amidst those warnings, one that was directly linked to Japan was overlooked.

Hana was too busy isolating and trying to clear out the problems cropping up over and over again in the US and did not see the bigger problem.

— — — —

"Did you see the post?"

"I think I saw her walking here around this afternoon"

"You can’t fly out to the UK in a couple of hours right?"

"Doppelganger?"

"They say a massacre happened in XXX street... Do you want to check it out?"

A large group of "Toyoko Kids" gathered together and talked about a recent post on a popular forum. It spread rapidly within various groups and it all focused on a mysterious building that did "supernatural work"

"I went there with a friend yesterday! I know that girl! She’s the one who works with that hottie!"

"Yeah! Do you think that cute guy is also a witch- no wizard?"

"A wizard? I think he’s a vampire!"

"A werewolf is also good..."

Wild conversations were happening as the group grew in number and not long after started to move.

A large group of marginalized youth, kids who had nowhere to go and nothing to do-

They all made their way towards a certain address and watching this all happen from a nearby rooftop was a pink haired beauty.

Next to her was a blonde who looked at things with an expression of great interest.

"What did they do this time?", the pink haired beauty, Yuna asked, a sigh escaping her lips as she showed a look of complete exhaustion.

"They went to the UK, their first job as "witch hunters"... doesn’t look to be going well" 𝘧𝓇𝑒𝑒𝑤ℯ𝑏𝓃𝘰𝑣ℯ𝘭.𝘤ℴ𝘮

The blonde woman, Tanya Fowler, the leader of Nova Munda answered. Her tone was carefree as she looked on at the growing crowd.

"It started in the US, my men already traced it, the forums were targeted by bots-"

"From the US?"

"India, China, Pakistan, Africa and Southeast Asia..."

"So, none from the US"

"You think it’s that simple?"

"What? Your men can’t deal with a simple VPN?"

"How about proxies and outsourcing? Your people love doing that right?"

"Oh? Using the race card are you?"

The two women fell into a confrontation but that did not solve any problem and only added more to it.

Already knowing this, Yuna let out a sigh and gave up on pointing fingers as she asked-

"Did you do it?"

But Tanya shook her head and answered with a completely logical response-

"What do I gain from it?"

Nothing... Yuna could only give up on digging into Tanya.

For now, the issue was Richard and his company... no, the whole mystical world.

Moreover-

*RIIIIIIIING*

Yuna’s phone rang and she picked up only to hear a panicked cry from the other end-

"THEY’RE GOING MAD! THE YOKAI- THEY’RE-"

The call cut off, Yuna raised her gaze to look up at the sky.

Japan is changing and the other countries are likely to follow suit. Within a single night, things started to change drastically.

The sun was rising and the people who were apprehensive and worried about visiting a "haunted" or "magical" or "cursed" office building at night found courage in the light of day.

But that was where they were wrong...

Stories talked about the horrors of the night, because fear was most prominent in the shadow of darkness.

The darkness gave off the same air as "the unknown" the instinctive fear all sentient beings had was of that "unknown".

Mystical beings that live on the "knowledge of their existence" used that fear as it allowed the perfect balance to support their existence. They could continue to live on as "fictional beings" in the darkness while still remaining relevant in the minds of the people.

But they weren’t bound to the night like what many tales spun.

They simply adapted to the night, to the darkness... but now-

"It seems the world is going to change..."

Tanya had also received a call and just finished it. She turned to Yuna and let out a sigh-

"Not good, the military is getting involved, the National Guard, DHS and FBI are moving, the CIA is also booted up its anti-magic countermeasures."

"Do they have a way to fight mystical powers?"

"No... but they have a checklist for on field confirmation, permission to shoot on site and a ton of guns"

"... Isn’t that just guessing?"

"When you fight against people who could create zombies and monsters from human corpses while being invincible against firearms- shoot first and ask questions later- becomes less of an issue and more of a necessity"

"How about the FMC?"

"Detained, everyone from the top down are already behind bars"

"..."

"How’s Nova Munda? Salem?"

"They already went underground, unlike FMC, we don’t maintain a direct relationship with the government"

The sudden shift made Yuna freeze for a moment.

Then-

*RIIIIIING*

Both of their phones started to ring and they didn’t want to answer it but...

"This-"

"What the?"

The two only stared blankly at what was displayed on their phones.

It was not a call nor was it a message, instead, their phones had been hacked. The two looked down and saw that even the crowd below were looking at their phones before suddenly looking up towards their direction.

On both Tanya and Yuna’s screens, a similar image to what was being displayed on the screens of the people below could be seen-

[Witches and Mystics AMONG US! Showing proof of the monsters within our midst! Warning! These mystical monsters see us only as cattle! Stop them, before they hide the truth again! Brothers and Sisters! It is time to HUNT THEM DOWN!]

"Since we received it as well... aren’t we technically part of "normal people"?"

Tanya asked but Yuna showed her the image and scrolled down.

"Name, Date, Age, Height, Gender... they have a complete background for everyone"

"Everyone?"

Yuna was able to minimize the image and access her messaging app to show a message sent by one of her people.

It showed the same type of image but this time, the focus was neither Yuna or Tanya but the person who owned the Phone.

"They’re able to trace us?"

"It seems we’ve been too reliant on our mystical abilities... we’ve fallen behind and now-"

*BANG*

"They’re here!"

The door to the rooftop opened and a wave of men and women poured in. They weren’t there to take photos or shake hands...

"Let’s go"

"Yeah"

Unfortunately for them, the people who they thought they caught were mystics and the two women quickly vanished from the place silently.

But the hundreds of cameras pointed their way caught it all.

The Hunt had just begun-