Midnight Prince: Empire of Sin

(AN: So yeah, this is quite embarrassing. I wanted to end the volume on the last chapter but then I was reminded by a reader that, while they were quite satisfying, the last chapter didn't deal with all the aftermath. After all, this is Natasha's volume. So I decided to add a few more chapters for closure. I wanted to name it a side story or interlude but I know some readers always skip those so here it is. So yeah, might as well accept the embarrassment and continue the volume some more and give a proper conclusion.)

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[Monday — 9th December, 2030 — 00:01 AM]

The prior near-catastrophic events had transpired on the night of the 7th and came to their conclusive end at the dawn of the 8th. The days had gone by, the catastrophes were now a thing of the past and… a new day had arrived— the day signifying Natasha's birthday.

She was now officially 22 years old— a day of celebrations indeed.

"Happy Birthday, Young Miss."

Natasha could only show an awkward smile in response to Aleksandra singing her the birthday song while congratulating her with a warm smile on her lips. Even for someone like her, someone way up the food chain, regrowing an entire arm was not easy in the least. 

The arduous task went several times higher in difficulty due to the wound being inflicted by the concept of Gluttony. Anything hit with an attack on the conceptual level was not something easily restorable. You needed to pay a price, sometimes… too steep to reverse the damage.

Taking all those adverse factors into account, it was only inevitable that she was still missing an arm on her body even now. However, it didn't seem to be bothering Aleksandra much as she went about her way in the usual manner. Looking at her, no one could say that she was missing a limb right now. It was truly fascinating.

"I once had to live a few days with no limbs whatsoever during the Second World War… I had been captured by the enemy side and let me tell you now, it was not pretty, by any means. Compared to that experience, that living hell, this is practically nothing, Young Miss."

Remembering the gruesome statements that were documented straight from the mouths of the war veterans, all Natasha could do was accept her words and move on. Even though she was still very uncomfortable seeing her close confidant in that position. In the end, the main crux of the matter was that… there was nothing she could do about it. Hence, she had to endure the discomfort. 

It should have been a moment of pure joy and happiness where laughter and amusement were shared all around but…

… But Natasha was sensible enough to understand that asking for something frivolous like that was most likely impossible for the time being.

L.A. had gone through a great upheaval due to the events of the night prior. In fact, from the reports she had received, there was already a mass exodus that seemed to be in the planning stage right as they spoke. The price of houses all over LA fell tremendously while the prices in the other states rose sharply due to the people gradually scattering to other cities. It seemed that people did not have the wish or consideration to believe in the government anymore.

First a case of a serial killer, then a small scale tsunami almost sweeping through the city, and a massacre in an attraction park, and finally… this event, the culmination of all events with injuries in the hundreds of thousands.

Many small cults were rising and other people were clamoring that the apocalypse was descending upon Earth at breakneck speed. Moreover, with LA as the center, they preached that the City of Angels was being punished first by the hand of God for being a sinful city akin to the historical cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. [1]

It had only been one day but the index of suicide and depression rate seemed about to skyrocket as well. It was at a steep climb up and there was nothing anyone could do anything about it as people were losing their will to live. As though that wasn't enough already, during the chaos, many cases of looting and aggression occurred simultaneously throughout the city, stretching the police force thin, and causing many other smaller problems and criminal activities to spontaneously occur and gradually spur out of control. Law and Order was steadily collapsing and LA was steadily hitting an all time low.

Due to this chain reaction of bad events and since the cause was supernatural, all great forces in LA had been called to the church to discuss a way out of this horrific situation.

All of this was more than just a little sobering and it was hard for Natasha to not feel responsible even if what happened had practically nothing to do with her, but she was the instigator or at least the spark that had caused the whole event. Even though her contribution to the chaos was like a drop of water in a vast ocean… it was still the catalyst, the precursor to all wrong. She had no choice but to feel guilty.

The city wasn't the only thing wrought in chaos. Her own family was in more ways than one, negatively affected by the event.

The first one to be wounded emotionally was Mikhail himself. It seemed like he had learned about the fact that nearly everyone, more or less, had suspicions about him being the traitor.

Natasha had no words to say regarding this matter as she could only imagine how deeply saddened he must have felt due to being doubted by all those he loved and worked so hard for… practically throughout his whole life. To feel worthy.

As cold as Elmira was, since she had been one of the most prevalent voices to bring this theory into practice, she had already spoken regarding the possibility of relinquishing her rights. She deemed that her attachment to their big brother was negatively affecting her mind and that might, in fact, be one of the reasons their family was endangered and had to go through this situation.

Alexei was also with her, trying to cheer her up. But Natasha had to say, Elmira was not wrong about her words. The way she acted as she focused only on Alexei was not much of a problem currently per se, however, in the future, when Alexei became the Alpha of the family, there would be all kinds of problems that might appear because of her obsessive personality.

Her obsession with Alexei was more than a bit unhealthy.

Those three aside, her parents had been in more than ten different meetings lately— be it with different shapeshifter groups or the association and the church.

Everyone heard the howl and saw the giant wolf manifest into the air before catastrophe struck. It wasn't hard to put two and two together. This pretty much put their family in a precarious situation as they had to pay for most of the damages.

Thankfully, the church seemed intent on protecting and giving them some help so the pressure was much less than what they should be bearing in actuality. But well… there wasn't much for her to say about this matter either. They were also indebted to the Hanekawa family and had to pay compensation to them at some point.

In the end, though, the one who was inflicted with the most wounds, emotionally speaking, was none of them.

"Is she still in her room?"

Aleksandra sighed quietly, her expression dropping slightly with the mention of that person.

"Miss Fedora has not left her room since she woke up."

Natasha took a glass of wine and drank it all in one go.

Fedora had been completely traumatized when she realized that everything happened because of Her. Even though she was not the one to blame for this matter.

Truly… things were not looking good for her family.

The only saving grace?

[I am sorry.]

'Do not worry. This is not your fault.'

She came out of this horrific night accompanied by a new family member.

Now all she had to do was to find the timing to tell the family that they now had a fourth daughter.

Sigh~

The bottle of wine had never seemed more attractive than it did now. So drown she did.

Thankfully, just as she was about to fall into a feeling of depression herself, she felt a presence encapsulate her gently, 

"Hey, girly. Seems like you became a little older today."

"Adam!"

There, behind her was Adam in all his splendor. Though he was wearing an eyepatch for some reason. She wondered if it was some new fashion.

"Happy Birthday, Natasha."

Perhaps this birthday would not be too bad after all.

[1]: I think everyone knows Sodom and Gomorrah or at least heard of it. But, in the Bible, those two cities were so bad and filled with sin that God decided to wipe them out. He warned Abraham and the man negotiated with God to not kill the righteous with the Wicked. So God said to Abraham to find 50 righteous people. Abraham negotiated and it went to 10. Angels went on inspection but only found one righteous dude. His name was Lot.n./(-/(-))./.1-.n

Since the quota wasn't filled. The two cities got wiped out by rain of Sulfur and Fire, except for Lot and his two daughters. He had a wife but the wife was dumb and got changed into a pillar of salt.