#dpxdcinspired

Technically, she stayed home long enough to make sure the town wouldn’t collapse without her. Realistically? She was waiting for her Monster Fancier Permit to become legally valid.

Because Mira had one mission:

Find a supernatural cryptid in a cape and climb him like a cursed tree.

Her target? Night Whisper — Gloam’s silent phantom, the one the locals whispered about like a ghost story with good hair. Moves like smoke, appears out of nowhere, vanishes into shadows.

Mira took one look at him in blurry news footage and said, “Oh yeah. That one. That’s the creature I’m ruining my life for.”

She was so sure the whole Shadow Wing Clan were monsters in human cosplay. Eldritch beings pretending to be vigilantes. Urban legends with better jawlines than expected.

Mira wanted one. Badly.

And when Night Whisper dropped out of a rooftop shadow the first night she arrived, silent and close enough that she could feel the chill off his armor?

Mira smiled up at him like she’d just won the lottery.

Night Whisper: “…You followed me.” Mira: “No, no. I hunted you. Big difference.” Night Whisper: “…Why?” Mira: “Let’s just say I have… interests.”

He didn’t step back. And she definitely didn’t.

Eli needed cash. Badly.

Yeah, Blight City was cheap enough that even villains could afford lofts, but rent still existed, and Eli was not winning that fight. Being a former teen vigilante accidentally promoted to minor interdimensional royalty did nothing for a college application, either. No scholarship, no safe dorm, and after one “mysterious explosion incident,” zero roommates willing to handle his corpse-like sleeping habits.

Legit jobs were rare, and Eli promised his sister he’d avoid anything shady—or anything that sounded shady. (She had a sixth sense for disappointment.)

The Ghost Treasury? Off-limits. Try converting supernatural dragon-hoard currency into regular money without landing on a watchlist. Not happening.

So he was camped out in a half-functioning coffee shop with terrible pastries, doom-scrolling job sites and praying he wouldn't cave and call him.

Then he spotted it:

Wanted: Engineer. No degree required. Tools provided. Must sign NDA. Must tolerate free-spirited “visionary creators.”

And the paycheck? Enough zeros to make him inhale his burnt espresso.

Better yet, the listing said the work could lead to more “creative commissions.” No red flags. No laws broken (probably). Nothing that would summon his sister’s judgement glare of doom.

Perfect.

Eli applied instantly.