Underneath the fairy lights that were strung from rooftop-to-rooftop, most businesses within the trading hub of the Adrian Sea had long since posted their closing signs from within their storefronts. But with the constant flow of rowdy sailors and merchants looking to indulge themselves late at night, there were more than a fair share of establishments that kept their doors open for those looking to spend their coin.

And few other brothels in Floré kept their doors more open, than "Heaven's Daybreak".

As part of their security measures, each ground floor entrance was manned by two burly bouncers— all of which were either ex-military, or veteran members of the Adventurers' Guild. Armed with steel maces that they kept clipped to their belt at all times, the bouncers in the back that were posted in behind the brothel— dressed in reinforced leather vests over their black uniforms— remained vigilant— constantly scanning each side of the alleyway.

While it wasn't uncommon to see inexperienced or lost people walking down the alleyway, each and every person who they became alerted to was sized-up by their piercing glares. So when the two of them spotted a three foot hooded figure wearing all black walking down the alleyway, neither man felt immediately threatened by them— especially considering that each of them were more than twice their size.

With the pungent stench of alcohol emanating from them, the two bouncers' guards were lowered that much more: causing them to make the mistake of underestimating the hooded figure— not realizing their fatal error of judgment, as the lone figure suddenly turned toward them, with a silenced pistol shining beneath the city lights.

Field-testing one of her latest inventions on the unsuspecting bouncers, Amerika fired a round each into the two men's heads— spraying the gray-brick wall behind them with their blood and bits of gray matter.

'That's one… One, and one makes two,' Amerika counted silently, in a vain attempt to view the lives of the deceased men as nothing more than just numbers.

Watching their bodies seize up as they folded to the ground in a limp manner, the intoxicated goblin girl sighed bitterly as she approached their soon-to-be corpses.

'What am I doing? What the hell do I think I'm doing here?' Amerika wondered to herself, as she drunkenly crouched down to begin searching their bodies.

'This isn't going to make up for my mistakes— this isn't going to mend what I've ruined… This isn't going to absolve me of my wrongs,' Amerika thought bitterly to herself, even as she used her free hand to pick the key off the first man she killed.

'This won't make the pain go away— nothing will,' Amerika thought to herself while feeling somber, before clumsily stumbling up from her feet to unlock the back door entrance that the bouncers had died trying to protect.

Stepping into a small hallway leading into a large, mostly unstaffed kitchen, Amerika snuck by the workers while their backs were turned towards her— reserving her newly converted .45 ACP rounds, while using her free hand to unsheathe her experimental ballistic knife.

Exiting through the kitchen door, Amerika braced herself as she entered through the main lobby of the brothel— time seemingly slowing down for her, as the two bouncers standing by at the entrance stared at her with bewildered expressions.

"Who the fuck are-?!" One of them tried asking while reaching for his mace, before Amerika fired a round straight through his head.

'That's three.'

Seeing his colleague falling face-first onto the ground, the other bouncer flinched violently, while the prostitutes that had been standing from the top of the upstairs balcony shrieked in terror.

"Fockin' hell…!" Amerika muttered with liquid courage quelling her anxiety, as she quickly dispatched the second bouncer, before he could gather his composure.

'Four! That's four!'

Bearing witness to two murders, the lobby greeter who was standing behind the front desk stared wide-eyed at the men who she'd come to befriend— years of getting know them on a personal level left her in utter shock, until suddenly she was jolted back out of her trace when Amerika leapt up tackled her onto the ground.

Putting her weight on the panicked woman's upper back, the goblin girl pressed the tip of her silencer against the back of the prostitute's head— causing her rapid breath to sharpen, before letting out a wail of agony as the skin along her scalp began to burn from how hot the tip of the semi-automatic pistol was.

'GWAAAH! F-FOCK— S-STOP, STOP IT!'

'Did your kind stop, when they were eating my sister's fingers?!'

'AGHHH!— GOD, STOP! I-I…! I-I didn't f-fockin' d-do that to 'er…!'

'No, but your kind did. Now then, my little whore: tell our esteemed guest here that the decryption code is, and then— and only then— will the flames of Veronica's vengeance cease to mark your body, as her body was marked.'

"W-Where's the CUNT who owns this shite-hole...?! A-ANSWER ME, GODDAMNIT!" Amerika shouted out as intimidatingly as she could muster— shoving her own reluctance down into the recesses of her mind, while trying to shake away the sudden flashback that made her guilt all the more painful.

Even in her drunken panic, Amerika knew that it would be only a matter of time until the Floré guards would come swarming over to Heaven's Daybreak to investigate the screaming. Unable to get a comprehensive answer from the petrified woman, Amerika's heart was pounding as she looked up toward the front entrance.

"GET ON THE FUCKING GROUND!" One of the bouncers shouted in a thunderous voice, as he and his colleague came rushing toward the anxious goblin with their maces held up at the ready.

Amidst the screaming and loud footsteps that shook the floorboards of the lobby, Amerika saw the two of them slowly down momentarily as she raised her gun— their eyes straying from her firearm's barrel, even as the goblin girl pulled the trigger with her trembling finger.

'Five- no, six— that's six.'

Planting a bullet in each of their craniums, Amerika let out a shaky sigh— a fleeting moment of relief that began falling apart, after noticing that the only ones who were screaming were the women that were cowering behind the rails of the indoor balcony above her.

Fighting the urge to succumb to the horror overtaking her muscles, Amerika forced herself to look down at the woman who she had attempted to interrogate— a loud gasp involuntarily escaping from her agaped lips, as she stumbled back from the body of the lifeless prostitute.

"I-I didn't…! I-I d-didn't-"

'-I-I didn't f-fockin' d-do that to 'er…'

Taking rapid breaths that were leaving the room around her feeling as though it were spinning, Amerika felt her throat drying up as she stared at the small hole in the side of the woman's cranium— blood trickling out onto her make-up caked cheeks, as her glossy eyes remained frozen in terror.

'… Seven. That's seven.'

"-What's going on out h-OH MY GOD?!"

"Arlene…?! A-ARLENE?! T-THAT THING KILLED ARLENE!"

Momentarily snapping out of her state of panicked despair, Amerika spun around toward the sound of the horrified voices. Seeing the looks of the kitchen staff that ranged from complete and utter shock, to tearful anguish, Amerika was too stunned to fight back as the most muscular of the chefs tackled her to the floor.

"Fucking murdering piece of shit…!" Amerika managed to hear being grunted into the back of her ear, as her body froze while being stomach down against the wooden floor— the horror of her living hell playing out before her eyes, as she remembered the terror she felt when she was pinned down against the fallen tree that she was found upon.

"G-Get off me…!" Amerika uttered out in a pleading voice to unmerciful ears, before tears began pouring down from the corners of her widened eyes, the moment the muscular man on top of her got her in a choke hold.

'Gwuah, mmphh! She's tight… She's crying no-'

"-GET THE FOCK OFF ME!" Amerika shrieked in blind rage, before plunging the blade of her ballistic knife into her attacker's forearm— activating the gas canister built within the handle, and sending a high-burst of nitrogen that blew the man's lower arm off into bloody chunks of flesh and bone.

Ignoring the mutilated man's wails of agony, Amerika— in a fit of delirium— spun around to get on her back before grabbing a hold of his neck and plunging her blade into his jugular— causing his body to seize up, before splattering herself with bloody viscus, as the burst of nitrogen caused his neck to swell up before shortly exploding onto her.

Half-aware of what she was doing, the goblin girl rolled herself out from underneath the dying man's disfigured body— letting him bleed on the floor, as she shot the only other male in the head out of a hysterical fear that he was going to sexually assault her.

And as the two female chefs collapsed onto their knees— sobbing unintelligibly to be spared— Amerika could hear clear as day the words of Juliet ringing through her pounding eardrums.

'Y-You just want to hurt others, b-because you can't STAND to feel like you're the only one suffering in this world!'

'Eight! Eight! Eight! EIGHT!'

Knees buckling, and stomach cramping, Amerika used what motor skills she had left in her drunken, unhinged mind to drag her feet up the brothel's grand staircase— waving her gun and screaming like a feral animal at any prostitute that got too close to her, while mag-dumping her 9mm rounds into the bodies of any man that she came across.

Whether they were a bouncer, a worker, or a patron, no male from that brothel escaped her trauma-motivated killing spree up to the brothel owner's penthouse suite.

Seeing flashes of the time she and Ren had stormed her family's bunker to clear it of the same men who had unforgivably wronged her, Amerika loaded another double-stacked magazine into the bottom of her glock before attempting to open the lavished door that was standing in her way.

When pulling the handle failed her, the highly anxious and intoxicated goblin took the liberty of shooting her way through the reinforced wooden door itself— emptying a magazine into it, and hearing a middle aged woman shrieking far from the otherside of the door, before using her knife to pry open the splintered wood.

Stumbling backwards to create distance between her and the breached bottom panel of the door, Amerika squinted her eyelids as she threw herself through what remained of the damaged construct— ignoring aching pain, as she rolled onto the marble floorboards with her pistol and knife in hand.

Before the goblin girl could scrambled up to her feet, it was then that she heard the same woman who had been shrieking suddenly barking out, "SHOOT IT— SHOOT THAT FUCKER," in a far more vicious tone, compared to how she had sounded moments ago.

Only catching a glimpse of the black-haired woman and her six bouncers taking aim at her with their crossbows, Amerika managed to fire off five shots blindly as her body was pierced with seven bolts— missing the bouncers and the brothel owner, as she flew back from the force of the projectiles alone.

Laying on her side— with her back facing toward her attackers— Amerika began gurgling painfully, as the bolts in her chest began to fill her deflating lungs with her own blood.

'This feeling— this pain; how familiar,' the goblin girl thought to herself, while experiencing an oddly comforting feeling of deja vu, alongside the excruciating agony she was in.

Coughing up blood, Amerika's already distorted vision began to blur, as she struggled to keep focus on the splintered remains of the door that laid strew across the bloodied white-marble floor.

'So… This is then? This is… This is how I die: alone, but… But without fear?' Amerika thought to herself, before feeling her skin getting tingles all over— the revelation in of itself astounding enough to bring a cathartic grin to her crimson lips.

'Without fear… I'm without fear… They can't use that against me now; no one can,' she thought bittersweetly to herself, and couldn't help but to get choked up— even while drowning in her own blood. 'No one can hurt me… Not anymore.'

"Sven. Omar. Go check on… Whatever that thing is— I want to make sure it stays dead," the brothel keeper commanded her men— her domineering confidence returning, as she watched with a vindictive glare as two of her bouncers approached the huddled-up goblin with their crossbows reloaded.

'This wasn't ever about retrieving the Sternengesang— it was never about that... I see that now...' Amerika reassured herself, as she found herself welcoming the thought of death with open arms— ready to embrace her sweet demise, before her hazy mind slowly drifted toward the red-eyed child who she had grown attached to.

'I might not have anything left to live for, but he does— that little red-haired girl's expecting him back, and he's got an older sister who's probably worried sick for him,' Amerika thought soberly to herself— her yellow eyes widening, as a jolt of selflessness surged through her disoriented mind.

'Not yet…! Not yet! NOT YET!'

Gaining her second wind, Amerika violently forced the carbon-dioxide out of her body by coughing hard enough to make her entire punctured lungs feel as though they were on fire.

"GrrruaAHHHHH, AHHHHH!" Letting out a howl of defiance against the hands of Death itself, Amerika rolled over as fast as she could— tanking two bolts into her forehead, and using her ballistic knife to blow the lower leg off of the nearest bouncer, while simultaneously shooting a .45 ACP round directly into the underside of the other man's jaw.

'THIRTY-TWO.'

Paying no mind to the man whose leg she had blown off, Amerika used his body as a shield while he was still attempting to instinctively remain standing up.

With pinpoint accuracy, the berserking goblin blew the brains out of the rest of the brothel keeper's armed forces— racking up a total kill count of thirty-six.

Plunging the knife into the legless bouncer's abdomen, Amerika used the last of her nitrogen canister to messily disembowel him— unfazed, even as his intestines splattered all over her bandages and goggles.

Gasping with every ounce of her confidence fleeting her body, the brothel keeper looked around her sullied penthouse suite— the bitter smell of copper in the air, as a haunting silence following suit, after her last line of defense collapsed onto the floor.

"… Thirty-seven," she heard the hooded figure spoke aloud in her accented voice— sounding very clear-minded, even as she reached up with the bottom of her sleeve to wipe the viscus gore off of her bloodied disguise.

"No… No, n-no— that's not…!" The brothel keeper trailed off in a terrified voice, as she stared in utter shock at the eight bolts that were still stuck inside the three-foot girl's petite body. "T-That's not possible! You should be dead, you hear me?! D-DEAD!"

Rather than acknowledging her hateful attempt at defying her, Amerika reached up methodically to grab a hold of her knife's blade— wiping the bits of muscles and sinew off of it with her glove in one quick motion— before eerily raising the blade up toward the direction of the now petrified woman.

"… Thirty-eight," Amerika spat out articulately— unflinching, even as a thick wad of her own blood vacated her destroyed lungs.

Seeing the seemingly undead goblin girl beginning to storm her way over to her, the brothel owner quickly came to what senses her panicked mind could muster up by trying to load another bolt into her crossbow.

"S-Shit! F-FUCK!" She cursed aloud, after failing to use her trembling fingers to correctly load her only means of defense.

Attempting to buy herself time to run, the brothel keeper threw her large crossbow at the determined goblin girl, who in turn partied it with enough force to break it into pieces.

"No… No! W-Wait, wait, wait— WAIT!" The brothel keeper shouted desperately with her hands held out in front of her— seconds away from beginning to negotiate with Amerika, before getting eight out of her ten fingers severed with one strike.

Horrified at the sight of seeing bleeding stumps in place of where her digits had once been, the brothel keeper didn't utter a single word as she stared wide-eyed at her mutilated hands— her mind refusing to accept her fate, even as Amerika plunge her ballistic blade deep into her abdomen.

"Juliet and I... We didn't deserve the fates we've been given… But yew? Yew deserve every bit of THIS," Amerika grunted out with livid hatred in her voice, as she pulled downward on the handle— flaying open the brothel keeper, and continuing past her midsection, until she cut straight through the older woman's clitoris, where she proceeded to push the blade into her pelvis.

A cacophony of shrieks and cries for help awoke Peter Piper from the dead of night— causing him to spring off of the bedding he had made for himself on his own couch, and groggily stumbled forward into his dimly lit living room.

"What in the world…?!" The befuddled village elder wondered aloud, before instinctively hopping his way over to his bedroom— opening the door open, and blindly reaching over to his dresser to grab a hold of his book of matches.

Striking a match against the wall, Peter used the dying flame to light the tip of the nearest candlestick— lifting it up by its bronze handle, and filling the bedroom in a dim orange glow.

Upon seeing Juliet safely sitting up right from underneath the comfortable covers of his bed, Peter felt a wave of relief washing over him— causing him to let out a sigh, even though the blond little girl was blatantly confused at the audible commotion.

"Mr. Piper?! W-What's going on?! Is… I-Is something wrong outside?" She asked in a tired, yet somewhat alert voice.

Seeing her moving around in her sheets— as if though she were about to get out of bed to investigate the noises for herself— Peter hopped over to her bedside with one paw raised up to usher her back.

"That's just what I intend to find out, kid!" He said reassuringly with a warm smile across his furry face. "But what I need from you is to give me the peace of mind, of knowing you'll be here where it's safe. Think you can do that for me, Juliet?"

Not responding to his request, the blond six-year old looked down below the height of the village elder's large bed— showing concern in her blue eyes, as she stared worryingly into his beady black gaze. "But… What if you get hurt…? What if… W-What if someone wants to hurt you…?"

Wincing not for himself— but upon recalling some of what Juliet had gone through in her earlier childhood— Peter forced himself to remain smiling for her sake, before telling her, "If that's the case, then I'll high-tail it back inside— I'll take you away from where the danger is. No one… N-No one's going to hurt you— not on my watch, kid!"

Although visibly reluctant with letting the two-foot tall rabbit face whatever was making the village hysterical, the sincerity in his voice and his eyes was enough for Juliet.

"Okay, just… Be very careful, okay Mr. Piper?" Juliet asked, while tightening her fingers along the edge of the blanket— her gaze lowering, as she muttered sorrowfully, "I… I don't think I can stand losing anyone else."

Feeling nothing but sympathy for the six year-old, Peter let out a saddened sigh as he reached up on his tippy-toes, so as to gently pat Juliet's blanket-covered leg. "… I'll be back before you know it, kiddo," Peter said softly, before hopping his way out of his bedroom— putting on his denim jacket from his coat rack, before bracing the crisp, cold early morning weather.

With the amount of contingency plans he had devised with the other harefolk, Peter already knew better than to assume that there were any invaders— for if that were the case, than the village would have been silent as a ghost, given that the fallback plan in such a scenario was to always evacuate into woods of the Valley Rose Foothills.

No; what awaited the village elder was far worse than he could have imagined.

Sitting hunched over in the center of the village— with blankets thrown underneath and over her, in a desperate effort by the villagers to keep her colorless body warm— was none other than the goblin girl who he had taken guardianship of Juliet from.

Looking around at the frantic crowd who were all trying to keep the makeshift fire beside Amerika ablaze— some of which were attempting to offer her first-aid and something warm to drink, all of which the deathly still goblin seemed unresponsive of, even as Peter quickly hopped his way over to her.

Jaw agape and his spine chilled with how badly wounded she appeared, Peter shook himself out of his shock before asking Amerika in a flabbergasted voice, "W-What bloody happened to you…?!"

Instead of explaining what led up to her having eight bolts sticking out of her body— two of which were lodged in her head, like devil horns— Amerika looked up at the village elder with her blood-stained goggles— speaking in a raspy voice, as she said to him, "I… I think part of me… P-Part me thought that I… That I went to Heaven's Daybreak… T-To… Die…"

"… But… I see now… I see now that… That I went there… To take back wot was mine... My soul," Amerika finished, before pausing as she wearily shifted her head in the direction of her overstuffed duffel bag. "I have… N-No one… No one else that I… That I could turn to… F-Forgive me, but… I… I need you to… T-To do something for m-me… S-Something v-very, v-very important… P… Please…"

Not one to turn a blind eye to someone in need— especially when it was obvious to him that she wouldn't be leaving that spot alive, in the state that she was in— Peter let out a solemn breath, and knelt down beside her before responding with, "Name it."

Lending the goblin girl his long rabbit-ear, Peter heeded every word that Amerika spoke— subconsciously reaching up to take her icy-cold, gloved-hands into his paws, and gently squeezing them to provide her with some level of comfort, and warmth.

"There's… Nine-hundred platinum coins… In my bag… I took them from… From the people who… Who h-hurt Juliet…"

"I… I have three… Three letters… They need to be sent out… One… Is to the Adventurers' Guild… Use t-ten percent of the money t-to… To offer a reward…"

"One letter… It's for Bethany Heim— Heim Family Farm, n-near Maggoire Village… M-Make sure she receives f-forty percent of the coins…"

"K-Keep ten-percent for R… Ren… Ren Ashta— a-and make sure… Make sure someone's there in Floré to… To give it to him, and… And the rest of me belongings— everythin' that's in that bag, is his," Amerika stated with everything she had left in her practically lifeless body— grabbing a hold as tightly as she could onto Peter's paws, as she leaned forward and stared desperately at him through her goggles.

"T-The rest of it, it goes to J-Juliet," She whispered in a hoarse, barely coherent voice— tugging away at the village elder's heartstrings. "Please… S-She… She deserves a… A comfortable life…"

"... You have my word… I'll see to it that gets done," Peter said with saddened resolve in his voice— squeezing Amerika's fingers tightly back, and letting out a horrified gasp the moment he felt her grip go immediately limp. "B-But…! Y-You can't go just yet, okay Miss Amerika?! Y… You've got one last obligation to fill— y-you hear me?!"

If Amerika had the breath in her, she would have laughed at how persistently optimistic the village elder was— the two-foot rabbit keeping his warm demeanor, even as every other villager around him was either sobbing or solemnly silent.

"I… I don't know if… If she'd want to-"

"-Shhh… Save it for her, mate— not for me," Peter interrupted with a sad chuckle, and waited anxiously for the goblin girl to nod at him— his heart sinking in his chest, after realizing then that she had been breathing the entire time since he laid eyes on her. "I'll… I'll be back."

Unable to even nod, Amerika's head hung limply in front of her— the warmth of the fire next to her doing nothing to keep the icy chill from her covered face, as she sat still for what felt like the villagers to be an eternity.

Beginning to feel herself slip into a peaceful sleep, Amerika's heavy eyelids barely moved at all, the moment she heard none other than the familiar soft, angelic voice of Juliet speaking quietly to her, "M-Miss A-Amerika…?!"

With much effort, the goblin girl darted her pupils upward towards where the mortified little girl stood directly in front of her— her ridged lips curling into a soft smile, as she muttered out, "M-My mask, love… T… Take it off… I… I want to yew… T… To see me— one… L-Last time…"

Already choked up and shedding tears profusely down her cheeks, Juliet was soon comforted by the two-foot rabbit, who reached up to lay a paw on her hip— nodding at her, so as to encourage her.

"O… O-Okay…" Juliet squeaked back, and did her best to keep what composure she had left, as she took a step forward to carefully use her trembling fingers to remove Amerika's blood-soaked bandages.

Whimpering with her lips quivering, Juliet felt her knees buckling at her heart aching the moment she saw Amerika's glossy eyes gazing up at her— tears streaming down her blood-soaked cheeks, as the goblin girl gazed apologetically at the six year-old child.

"I… I'm… S… S-Sorry," Amerika uttered out in a voice that was just below a whisper. "Those… Those words— those awful, awful words… I… I was talkin' 'bout me, love… N-Not yew— t-they were n… N-Never 'bout yew…"

Although the thought never occurred to her up until that point, hearing that revelation not only made their unpleasant interaction all the more clearer for Juliet, but it made the six year-old feel that much more sympathetic for her.

"Why…?! W-Why would you say those awful things about yourself…?!"

"Cause I… I see… See myself in yew… See w-wot I used to be— couldn't stand to… To think 'bout yew… E-Ending up… Like… M… M-Me," Amerika continued to explain, with each word coming out of her bloodied lips taking more effort to articulate than the last. "This world… It's cruel… Unforgivin'… Unfair…"

"... B-But not all of it, though… Not while it still has… A-Angels like y-yew, it's not," Amerika croaked out— her vision fading away, as the impending darkness severed her body's ability to sense the world around her.

Unable to convey her raw emotions into words, Juliet reached out with her small arms to scoop Amerika's limp body— embracing her cold body tightly to her, and resting her chin on her collar. Sobbing loudly, the heartbroken six-year old held Amerika as tightly as she wished she could have done with her mother— breaking the village elder, who finally broke down into tears.

"The pain…? It's…? It's finally... Gone..." Amerika whispered softly into Juliet's ear, before finally closing her weary eyelids one last time— having no fear, or bitter hatred resonating in heart, but instead felt what she had once considered impossible.

In her final moments, she felt love.