The High Chaebols Tower rose like a monolith of avarice, its mirrored façade catching the pallid light of a dying sun. Inside, in the cavernous meeting chamber, silence reigned like an executioner's hood. A polished obsidian table stretched endlessly, its surface reflecting the gaunt faces of the assembled titans—twelve sovereigns of shadow, each the architect of ruin.
Their composure, ordinarily carved from marble, was fractured this evening. The news of Samir Faiz Rahmani's death—and the annihilation of five loyal pillars of their dominion—hung in the air like a funeral knell.
Gavriel Elazar, seated at the head, drummed his skeletal fingers against the table's cold surface. His eyes, fathomless and glacial, scanned the assembly before his words slid forth like venom from a serpent's fang.
"Agent-90," he intoned, his gravelled voice a dirge. "He has butchered Samir Faiz Rahmani, along with Anisur Karim, Nafisa Rahman, Shahriar Amin, Tahmid Ahsan, and Adil Hasan. Six pillars of our construct were brought to ash. This time… he has crossed the line."
Maheshvar Rao slammed a gloved fist upon the table, the thunderous crack echoing across the chamber. His jaw trembled with martial rage. "He mocks the edicts we forged! He spits upon our dominion! He must pay the price—in blood."
Yuan Meiling, her hands folded with an elegance that belied the cruelty of her designs, tilted her head, her porcelain face half veiled by the glint of her augmented lenses. "And yet," she murmured in a voice cold as liquid nitrogen, "his defiance fascinates me. A singular operative dismantling empires we spent decades weaving. His audacity may be intolerable… but it cannot be ignored."
Akihiro Takahashi, the cyber-phantom cloaked in violet light from her embedded screens, smirked faintly. "Agreed. Reckless though he is, the man has infiltrated spaces my algorithms deemed impenetrable. Still—" her eyes flashed with surgical precision "—no machine is immune to dismantlement. He will die screaming, pixel by pixel, sinew by sinew."
Diego Cervantes leaned forward, his scarred knuckles gripping a crystal glass of absinthe. His words oozed venom. "You forget Di-Xian. She shields him as her cherished pawn. If her agents continue to strike at us, then they are complicit in this outrage. Her pet assassin is their blade. And blades…" he sneered, baring teeth, "…can be snapped."
Otto Kohlmann, his face carved with Germanic austerity, folded his arms across his chest, his tone clinical. "Enough with theatrics. Samir's elimination was not only a strike against us—it was a message. Our enemies now believe us fallible. If we do not retaliate with surgical brutality, then chaos becomes a precedent." His gaze flicked briefly toward Gavriel. "Stability demands reprisal."
Carlos Andrade, pale and severe, exhaled a breath that seemed to carry chemical fumes. "Stability? No. What we require is theatre. The world must not merely see Agent-90 perish—they must believe him guilty of every atrocity we choose to name. He must become a pariah in the annals of history."
From the far end, Edward Cartwright adjusted his tie, his politician's smile brittle as porcelain. "Precisely. Narrative is the true battlefield. We control every broadcast, every echo of the news cycle. Agent-90's name shall become synonymous with terror."
Philippe Devereux raised his goblet in sombre mockery, his French cadence dripping with irony. "And his master, Di-Xian, painted as the hand that steers him. The world adores villainess to blame."
Arindam Chatterjee, gaunt and serpentine, nodded with a shiver of satisfaction. "Our propaganda machine shall weave a tapestry so dense, even his allies will doubt him. We do not merely crush a man—we erode his legacy."
Giancarlo Bellucci, gesturing broadly with a jeweller's hand heavy with rings, scoffed. "And if whispers arise from the underworld, I shall ensure they whisper our tune. The mafia, the cartels, the syndicates—all will curse his name at our bidding."
At the edge of the table, Ingrid Falk, pale as moonlight, broke her silence with a voice like a reed trembling in the wind. "But if this continues unchecked, we are undone. We have already lost six of our strongest pillars. What are we to do, Gavriel? What if our dominion begins to crumble?" Her hands quivered faintly, betraying cracks in her usual poise.
All eyes shifted to the patriarch at the head.
Gavriel Elazar leaned forward, his thin lips stretching into a chilling smirk, his voice resonant as a cathedral bell. "I was waiting for this moment."
A ripple of unease coursed through the chamber. Diego snarled, "What do you mean, Gavriel?"
His gaze hardened to obsidian. "Agent-90 has sundered too much. We granted him chance after chance to fall in line. Now he shall face the consequence of his insubordination."
Akihiro tilted her head sharply, her synthetic pupils narrowing. "How so?"
Gavriel's answer cut through the silence with surgical cruelty. "We shall bait him."
Diego's eyes narrowed, his lips curling into a sceptical sneer. "And what if Di-Xian intervenes? Or the Continental Bloc shields him? Are you prepared for their reprisal?"
"If Di-Xian—or any pretender—dares to aid him," Gavriel replied coldly, "they shall suffer the same obliteration as he. The line is drawn."
Yuan Meiling leaned in, her voice almost curious. "And whom shall you use as bait?"
The chamber froze. Silence deepened into dread. Then Gavriel's smirk widened into something serpentine. His words slithered across the table like a curse.
"By Song Luoyang—the President of SSCBF. We shall make not only the Bloc, but the world itself, believe that Agent-90 was the hand behind every assassination. And when Luoyang falls, all faith in him and his creed shall rot to dust."
He leaned back in his chair, shadows swallowing the lines of his gaunt face, his voice dropping to a murmur like a priest whispering damnation:
"Song Luoyang—the lion who imagines himself a shepherd. I shall make of him the perfect sacrificial lamb."
The chamber exhaled a collective shiver, and the silence that followed was more terrifying than any outburst.
The President's office within the SSCBF headquarters was cloaked in an unnatural hush, as though the walls themselves had absorbed the gravity of his station. Upon the broad mahogany desk, immaculate yet suffocating with the burden of statecraft, lay a single vase—its stem cradling a fragile bloom of dandelion petals, trembling faintly in the still air, their fragility a cruel contrast to the storm brewing in his mind.
Song Luoyang, the President, sat rigidly in his chair, his posture a sculpture of tension. His fingers pressed against the polished armrests as if he might anchor himself against invisible tides. His eyes—dark pools heavy with unspoken dread—kept wandering to the bloom, as though it alone bore witness to the weight of Gavriel Elazar's threat that still gnawed at the marrow of his soul. The thought of his family, unprotected in the shadow of looming catastrophe, twisted like a dagger in his chest.
A voice, soft yet clear, broke the silence beyond the hydraulic door.
"Mr. President, may I enter?"
He straightened abruptly, clearing his throat to mask the quiver of unease.
"Come in, Chief."
The door hissed open, and Wen-Li stepped through, her long black silk hair rippling gently with the draft of the chamber, catching the sterile light like midnight ribbon. She wore a faint, almost disarming smile—warm enough to soften the edges of the room.
"President," she greeted, her tone equal parts respectful and intimate.
Song's furrowed brow eased slightly, though the heaviness lingered in his gaze. "What is it, Wen-Li?" he asked, his voice carrying the weariness of sleepless nights. His lips twitched in the faintest imitation of humour. "You look as though fortune has favoured you. Has some glad tiding reached your ears?"
Wen-Li gave a quiet shake of her head. "No tidings, Mr. President. I… simply came to see you."
"See me?" His brows arched in surprise, his voice tinged with incredulity. "Why?"
Her expression shifted, the smile dissolving into a more earnest concern. She stepped forward, her footsteps a whisper on the marble. "Because," she said, her eyes glistening with an almost filial worry, "I have seen you fading these days. You are not well, sir. Something weighs upon you, does it not? Has something happened?"
Song waved a hand, almost dismissive, though the gesture trembled. "No… nothing like that. Merely the common strain of work."
"Mr. President," Wen-Li pressed, her tone firm yet tender. "Your words deceive, but your face cannot. It is etched with burdens unspoken. Please—tell me. If there is any way I can help you, let me."
His lips parted, then closed. Silence, heavy and aching, filled the gap.
"President," she continued softly, her voice quivering with the sincerity of a daughter to a father. "You are to me as my own father. Please… let me bear some part of this weight."
"Wen-Li," Song said at last, his voice taut, "it is nothing of grave concern. The pressures of statecraft, the concerns of family—you know how such matters conspire together." He forced a weary shrug, a hollow smile failing to mask his exhaustion.
"I see," she murmured, lowering her gaze. A silence lingered, filled with the unspoken words that neither dared to summon into air.
Song leaned forward, frowning faintly. "Why ask me this now, Wen-Li? Why all of a sudden?"
She took a step back, her black hair flowing like a silken curtain as she turned away. "Because, sir," she whispered, her voice trembling as though caught between warmth and sorrow, "you look… like a man standing upon the edge of a storm, waiting for the thunder to break."
Her hand rested upon the door panel, yet before departing she turned back, her eyes softened with a warmth rare in halls so cold. "Sir, I hope tomorrow will be kind to you."
Her smile—gentle, luminous, unfeigned—lingered for a heartbeat, warming the air like sunlight in winter. It was not the smile of a subordinate, but that of a daughter steadying her father.
For the first time in many days, Song Luoyang felt the faint ache of his heart soften. He returned the smile, a quiet murmur escaping him like a prayer.
"I hope so."
Then she was gone, leaving him alone with the trembling dandelion petals, his heart caught between dread and the fragile comfort of her words.
Meanwhile, in the sanctum of Madam Di-Xian's office, silence reigned with an almost sacramental gravity. The lacquered desk, usually pristine in its arrangement, bore a single anomaly—the crimson lotus, poised delicately within its porcelain vessel. Yet now, its immaculate petals had begun to sag and darken, as though some unseen hand had wrung them of vitality. A slow seep of carmine moisture dribbled down the stem, staining the polished wood beneath like arterial blood.
Di-Xian, seated in her high-backed chair, stilled utterly at the sight. Her porcelain-pale face, usually a mask of inscrutable serenity, betrayed the faintest flicker of alarm. Her fingers, adorned with jade rings, trembled as they reached forward, hovering inches from the dripping bloom, yet never quite daring to touch it.
Her lips parted, her voice scarcely more than a whisper, yet laden with the cadence of prophecy.
"So… the lotus bleeds."
Her eyes narrowed, their obsidian depths shimmering with a sombre lucidity. A bitter smile tugged faintly at the corners of her mouth, though it never reached her eyes. She rose slowly, the silk of her robe trailing across the floor with the hush of a serpent in tall grass.
"This omen is no accident," she murmured to herself, each syllable weighted like a dirge. "The Chaebols move their pieces; the serpent bares its fangs. Blood will not merely stain the petals of flowers, but drown nations."
She paused, her reflection caught in the glass of her cabinet—two Di-Xians gazing back at one another, one flesh and the other spectral, both shadowed by the bleeding lotus between them.
Her hand curled into a fist, the knuckles paling as though carved from marble.
"If they think I shall be cowed by theatre of omens and threats," she whispered, her tone now sharpened like a blade unsheathed, "they mistake me for a woman of trembling faith. Let them come. I shall answer crimson with crimson."
The camera lingered upon her profile, framed against the slowly collapsing lotus, as if to capture the parallelism—the flower bleeding silently upon the desk, and Di-Xian herself, preparing inwardly for the inexorable deluge of blood to come.
However, in the living room, the usual gloom and gravitas of the Crimson Lotus had curiously dissolved into something altogether ridiculous. A neon glow from the colossal television screen painted their faces in shifting hues as Jun, Farhan, Masud, Roy, Hecate, and Hella huddled shoulder-to-shoulder on the long velvet sofa, each clutching a controller with the grim seriousness of surgeons in the middle of an operation.
The room itself was almost absurdly mismatched—heavy drapes of imperial brocade, an antique chandelier above, and in the centre of it all, these hardened agents of espionage shrieking at a racing car video game as though the fate of the world depended on it.
Farhan leaned so far forward his nose nearly touched the screen, his tongue peeking out the corner of his mouth in grotesque concentration. Jun sat bolt upright, his brows furrowed into a thundercloud, thumbs hammering the buttons like machine-gun fire. Masud, in stark contrast, lounged with deceptive laziness, muttering "piece of cake" under his breath, though his eyes betrayed rising panic as his car swerved disastrously into pixelated hay bales.
Roy shouted obscenities at the virtual road, his whole body twisting and jerking with every turn as if he believed sheer kinetic flailing might persuade the car to stay on track. Hella, with hair tied up like a battle standard, snarled every time someone cut her off, her curses rising in pitch like an operatic aria of frustration.
And then there was Hecate—cool, impassive, almost statuesque. She sipped from her glass of cola with the regal calm of a queen presiding over buffoons, her thumbs gliding with preternatural precision across the buttons.
Beside them, Alvi sat on a carved teak chair, perfectly composed, sipping her tea with aristocratic grace. She glanced once at the screen, then back to her cup, murmuring, "Children at play," in a tone both indulgent and faintly pitying.
The final lap arrived. All four agents and two Sinner leaned into the screen as though proximity itself might alter destiny. Jun's knuckles whitened, Farhan screeched, Roy half-stood on the sofa, Masud chewed furiously at the edge of his sleeve, and Hella practically roared like a berserker.
The screen flashed VICTORY in blinding letters.
The name: Hecate.
Her avatar car skidded elegantly across the finish line, performing a gratuitous spin as though mocking the others. She set her controller down with surgical delicacy, her lips curling into the faintest, most infuriating smirk.
The room erupted in chaos.
"You bloody cheated!" Roy hollered, throwing his controller onto the cushions.
"I was in front—IN FRONT!" shrieked Hella, pounding her fist upon the coffee table, rattling the tea set.
Jun buried his face in both hands, groaning like a man betrayed by God Himself.
Masud merely fell backward into the sofa, limbs splayed, muttering, "Unfair… cursed fate… sabotage."
Farhan threw his head back, letting out a dramatic howl worthy of a tragic opera.
Meanwhile, Hecate stretched languidly, her victory radiating smugness incarnate. "Skill," she intoned coolly, "not chance."
Alvi, unbothered, set her teacup down with a soft clink and observed, "It appears, gentlemen, that the goddess of mischief has triumphed. Perhaps you might console yourselves with the noble fact that you were at least spectacularly defeated."
The others groaned in unison, a chorus of despair, while Hecate's smirk lingered like the last insult.
The sky had gone to ink and the rain was a ceaseless percussion, each drop a small admonition against the world. Thunder rumbled like some great leviathan shifting in its sleep as President Song Luoyang's motorcade drew up beneath the shadowed boughs of Zhi-Gong Forest. Beyond the trees the Song Mansion crouched: an edifice of genteel splendour, its pale stone façade smeared with wetness, windows watching like somnolent eyes.
He stepped out, umbrella forgotten, and crossed the gravel with practised economy. The lamps were dark. He told himself, briefly, that the household had retired early; that perhaps Mei and the girls were wrapped in the benign wool of sleep. He took the brass key from his pocket—an old habit, a talisman of order—and eased the front door open.
The foyer answered with a silence so absolute it felt obscene. His briefcase thudded onto the console; the sound was too loud in that hush. He called, softly at first, "Mei?" and then louder, "Mei, I'm home." There was no rustle of petticoats, no answering laugh. Only the breath of the house.
In the master suite the lamp beside the bed was unlit. He crossed to the bedside and sat, all the usual domestic gestures crowding his hands—he smoothed the hair from his wife's brow, murmured about the tedium of meetings, about a trivial joke from the morning—but the words died as his fingertips met skin that had the wrong temperature. His smile faltered; his fingers found the wrist and sought the familiar thrum of a pulse. Nothing answered. The absence was a thing that claimed space; it pressed against his chest like a fist.
He moved with the quick, animal momentum of a man who has been pulled through a sluice. The elder daughter's room was a brief, obscene tableau: the child's body still, a dark stain at the small of her back where a bullet had entered during sleep. For a fraction of an ecclesiastical minute he could not reconcile the sight with language. He dropped to his knees, the sound of rain distant now as if the world had rearranged itself inside him.
He sprinted to the nursery. The door was ajar. He pushed and found, in the dim penumbra, a figure—a silhouette in immaculate black, hat tipped, a gentleman's coat cutting a clean line against the gloom. The figure's face remained hidden in shadow, precisely the kind of blankness that announces disaster. In his hands he held a firearm. The little girl's crib was an overturned ruin; her head had been obliterated in an instant that made the stomach lurch from memory.
Song Luoyang staggered back, grief and fury colliding into a single, volcanic intake of breath. He found his voice as if from a deep well. "Who—who sent you? Gavriel? Is this his design? I obey the accord—why—why have you done this?" His words were jagged, ragged; they scraped the air.
The shadowed man did not immediately reply. He regarded the President with a stillness that made the room feel as though it had frozen in the cold centre of a clock. Finally, his voice came: modulated, courteous, and utterly void of warmth. "President Song Luoyang," he intoned, "you are aware that Samir F. Rahmani and five pillars of the High Chaebols were assassinated."
Song's face drained of colour. He opened his mouth and closed it, as if an answer might be carved from the stone in front of him.
"For their deaths," the man continued, the syllables dropping like currency onto a ledger, "you must pay the price."
"No—no, I didn't—" Song tried, his protest thin and earnest. His hands found at last a chair back to steady himself; the room tilted. "I did not order these murders. I have kept to the statutes. I—"
The assassin's hand moved almost indulgently to the pistol. There was a small, excruciating pause—formal, almost courtly. In that pause Song felt his life dissolve into a succession of ordinary moments: tea at dawn, the press conference last week, his daughter's laugh in the garden—none of them any shield.
The report of the gun was abrupt and horrible, a metallic knell that filled every corner of the mansion. The sound ricocheted off the high ceilings and danced among the gilt frames, an echo that seemed to haunt the very rafters. It was a sound that made the rain outside seem suddenly petty and fragile. President Song Luoyang crumpled like a manuscript scorched at the margins; the house inhaled, held, and then exhaled a silence so total it felt like a closing book.
The man in black did not linger. He stood for a heartbeat, as if to permit the gravity of his deed to settle, then retreated into the corridor's gloom, his silhouette swallowed by the rain-dark night. Behind him, the mansion remained, stage and tomb all at once—its halls thick with the new, immovable sorrow of absence.
The rain poured relentlessly, its cataract striking the stone boulevards of Nin-Ran-Gi with the cadence of a dirge. The sky itself seemed to mourn, its veins of lightning tearing across the heavens as if the firmament were rent with grief. In the city's main square, an enormous holoscreen rose like a monolith, flickering to life with the sombre broadcast of a press conference from SSCBF headquarters. The crowd beneath stood drenched and mute, their faces uplifted, each raindrop indistinguishable from their tears.
On the screen, Chief Wen-Li appeared at the podium, her figure taut and composed, though her eyes betrayed an unspoken tremor. Behind her, the chamber was filled with the gravitas of gathered officers, commanders, and dignitaries whose countenances carried the solemnity of catastrophe. Lieutenant Nightingale stood at her side, knuckles whitening as she clutched her beret against her chest, her lips trembling in suppressed sobs.
Lan Qian's hands clenched at the rail before her, her jaw trembling as though words might escape if she dared loosen her mouth. Commander Krieg, his iron posture breaking for the first time in memory, lowered his head, shoulders heaving as though struck by an invisible hammer. D. Abrar Faiyaz, usually loquacious, stood with tears running unchecked down his cheeks, his glasses fogged with the mingling heat of sorrow and the cold air. Nurse Anne Parker covered her face with both palms, her delicate frame convulsing as if her body itself refused to accept such news.
Captain Robert Voryevsky removed his cap and pressed it against his heart, his face crimson, teeth grinding in futile rage. Captain Lingaong Xuein knelt, head bowed in a gesture both martial and personal, while his twin, Captain Lingaong Xuemin, clasped the shoulders of his comrades—Ping Lianhua, Zhai Linyu, Qu Yexun, Yang Shaoyong, and Gu Zhaoyue—his tears falling silently, yet his eyes burning with a promise of vengeance. Feng Shaoyun, normally aloof, now pressed a trembling fist against her lips, as though to dampen a grief that threatened to erupt. Demitin Koğlulanci's hands quivered as he clutched his sword's hilt—not in fury, but as if seeking anchorage. Koizumoto Daishoji bowed his head deeply, shoulders rigid, the posture of a samurai conceding to fate. Tao-Ren collapsed into a chair, muttering prayers in broken syllables. Sakim Massersi stared at the floor with eyes glazed, lips whispering inaudible fragments of remembrance. Louisese Langermans, her face streaked with mascara and rain, wept openly, her sobs puncturing the stillness like fragile glass breaking.
The Chairmen and Chairwomen arrayed behind—Zhang Wei's face paled, his trembling hand clutching at his chest as if the heart itself might falter. Fahad Al-Farsi, once stoic, wept openly, the sound guttural, a desert wind breaking in storm. Elizabeth Carter dabbed at her eyes with a sodden handkerchief, her polished composure dissolved into raw humanity. Selim Kaya shook uncontrollably, the words of lament strangled in his throat. Andreas Karalis pressed his brow against folded hands in prayer. Kim Ji-Soo leaned against Hiroto Nakamura for support, their shoulders shaking with a rhythm of grief. Aarav Sharma's gaze was glassy, his lips moving silently in denial. Rahim Ahmed muttered "we belong to God and indeed we will return to him" beneath his breath, the words breaking in grief-stricken cadence.
Yet it was Wen-Li who stood transfixed, her expression a paradox of stillness and storm. Her eyes brimmed, but no tears fell; her lips twitched, but no cry broke. She looked as though she were balanced upon the blade of a knife—unsure whether to collapse into sorrow like those around her, or remain steel for the sake of her office. In her silence was a grief more terrible than weeping: the shock of a daughter who had lost a father, though he had never been hers.
And amid the solemn assemblage, the High Chaebols' emissaries and their operatives were present as well. Chief Ilse Richter of the secret police stood in stiff, glacial mourning, though her narrowed eyes glittered with calculation behind the sorrow. Captain Elan Mordecha lowered his head, his lips moving in Hebrew prayers, while Captain Shira Malachai pressed her palm to her chest, the gesture both reverent and mechanical. Their operatives, clad in obsidian uniforms, stood like a phalanx of shadows—silent, statuesque, and unreadable.
The scene unfolded as a grotesque mosaic of grief: some wailed, others prayed, others stood paralysed, but all bore the indelible weight of absence. The death of President Song Luoyang and his family hung over the assembly like a funeral pall, the very air heavy with lamentation. And above, lightning cleaved the sky with brutal brilliance, as though Heaven itself bore witness to a crime that no rain could ever cleanse.
The chamber of Madam Di-Xian's sanctum was hushed, a silence so dense it seemed to suffocate the very air. The crimson draperies swayed faintly in the draft, and the incense smoke curled like mournful phantoms, winding around the carved beams overhead. Upon the great obsidian screen, the breaking news of President Song Luoyang's assassination, alongside the annihilation of his family, spilled forth in harrowing detail.
Madam Di-Xian sat upon her high-backed lacquered chair, her figure still as stone, yet her fingers tightened imperceptibly upon the carved armrest. Her eyes, usually twin lanterns of imperious fire, now dimmed, the embers cloaked in an impenetrable veil of grief. Slowly she whispered, almost to herself, her lips trembling as though words were shards of glass:
"Song… loyal as the mountain and gentle as the dandelion breeze… felled like a beast at slaughter. The world grows ever fouler."
Jun, standing nearest to her, pressed his hand against his mouth as if to stifle a cry. His shoulders quivered, his proud martial stance crumbling as his eyes brimmed with tears that glistened but did not fall. Roy turned his gaze away, his jaw clenched so tightly it seemed he might grind his very teeth to powder. His fists curled at his sides, knuckles bone-white, the veins on his forearms pulsing like cords of iron.
Masud lowered his head until his brow touched his clasped hands, a posture of reverence and lamentation. His lips murmured inaudible prayers, yet each syllable shook, like a man attempting to chain a storm within his chest. Farhan, his brow furrowed and eyes red, exhaled heavily, muttering through clenched teeth, "Even innocence in cradle was not spared… what demons dare call themselves men?" His words trembled with a poisonous grief, each syllable heavy with indignation.
Alvi, usually poised and measured, sat motionless, her porcelain cup of tea untouched beside her. Her eyes—dark pools of sorrow—stared at nothing, her long lashes wet with tears that finally fell, tracing silver down her cheeks. She whispered faintly, as if speaking to the dead: "President Song… he deserved dawn, not this abyss."
Agent-90, though a mask of stoicism veiled his face, betrayed the fracture within by a single subtle gesture: his gloved hand flexed upon the hilt of his sidearm as though longing for retribution. His jaw twitched, his shadowed eyes narrowing with a pain that refused to yield to tears. He muttered under his breath, "The bastards have written their own requiem."
Hecate, pale as alabaster, sank slowly into a chair, her legs unable to hold her trembling form. She covered her mouth, wide-eyed, her body shaking with muffled sobs that echoed like the wail of a child long suppressed. Hella, her sister, leaned against her shoulder, her hands trembling as she clutched the fabric of her cloak. Her face contorted with grief and fury alike, tears rolling freely, her sobs cracking like thunder across the room.
The agents together formed a tableau of sorrow: some trembling, some rigid, some silent, yet all weighed down by a grief as vast as the sea. The news hung over them like a funeral pall, heavy and suffocating. The silence that followed was broken only by the sound of rain hammering against the roof, as if Heaven itself wept with them.
Madam Di-Xian finally lifted her gaze, her voice hoarse yet laced with solemn ferocity:
"They slaughtered innocence to send a message. But the blood of Song Luoyang and his kin shall not sink quietly into the soil—it shall bloom into vengeance. Crimson Lotus shall not forget… nor forgive."
Chief Ilse Richter approached Wen-Li with the solemnity of a mourner approaching a shrine. Her boots echoed faintly against the marble floor, each step tempered with the weight of condolence. Her face, usually carved from granite discipline, softened into an expression of grave empathy, her eyes shadowed with sorrow.
"I am sorry for the loss of Mr. Luoyang," she murmured, her voice low yet clear, like a hymn sung in a cathedral at dusk. She paused, bowing her head faintly as if in reverence to the departed. "May the heavens forgive him, and cradle his soul in mercy."
Wen-Li, her posture rigid as though she were bracing against an unseen tempest, inclined her head in acknowledgement. Her lips barely parted, her voice hoarse, but she managed to utter:
"Thank you, Richter."
Yet her composure cracked when she glanced aside, her eyes reddened with the silent burn of unshed tears. She whispered almost to herself, her words trembling with disbelief:
"It seems… you're deeply wounded, Ilse. And why would you not be? Yesterday, he was so full of life—his laughter, his worries, his burdens—and now… now he is gone. Snatched away in shadows."
Her gaze lifted, trembling, and fixed upon Richter with unguarded anguish. "Somebody killed him, Richter. Someone with a grudge so venomous they did not spare even his daughters, his wife… his home. Why? Why was his light extinguished in such a cruel instant?"
Her voice broke, and for a moment Wen-Li seemed not the indomitable Chief, but a daughter bereaved, a comrade bereft. Her hands, usually so steady, clenched at her sides until her knuckles gleamed ivory, her chest rising and falling with the tremors of grief.
Richter, steady as an ancient oak, reached out and placed a firm yet gentle hand upon Wen-Li's shoulder. Her grip was neither patronising nor perfunctory, but a silent anchor amidst the storm. Her eyes, grey as winter seas, held Wen-Li's own, and she spoke in a voice tempered with steel yet softened with humanity:
"Chief Wen-Li… grief is the wound of the righteous. It carves into us because we care, because we fight for those bonds others would shatter without thought. Do not see your sorrow as weakness, but as proof of your humanity—and proof that his death shall not be in vain."
Richter gave the faintest of nods, her expression resolute. "I know the darkness of betrayal and the sting of sudden loss. But I tell you now—we will unmask those who orchestrated this atrocity. They will not remain hidden forever in their veil of shadows. Until then, you must hold your sorrow not as a chain, but as a flame. Let it light your path, Wen-Li."
Wen-Li's lips trembled into the faintest, fragile smile, her eyes still brimming but her spirit steadied by Richter's words.
The press hall of the SSCBF headquarters lay steeped in a sombre hush, a cavern of marble and steel suffused with grief. The torrential rain outside rattled against the glass dome above like a mourning drumbeat, nature itself joining in lament. At the dais stood Chief Wen-Li, her black attire severe yet elegant, her long silk hair tied back with meticulous precision. Yet her poise was betrayed by the faint tremor in her hands as she adjusted the microphone, her face pale but her eyes burning with quiet fire.
When she spoke, her voice was low at first—steady, deliberate, every syllable carrying the weight of loss.
"Brothers, sisters… citizens of this fractured world." Her words rang out, clear as the toll of a funeral bell. "We gather not to celebrate power, nor to extol the living, but to mourn a man whose heart beat with unflinching devotion to his people—President Song Luoyang. He was not merely a statesman seated in marble halls. He was a father, a husband, a friend. A man who carried the burdens of office not for privilege, but for duty. He dreamt of a world unmarred by tyranny, where our children might grow unshackled from fear."
Her lips trembled, and for a fleeting moment she bowed her head, composing herself against the tide of grief threatening to break her composure. When she lifted her gaze once more, her voice deepened with righteous indignation.
"Yet that dream has been stolen. Stolen by hands steeped in cruelty, by shadows that lurk and strike without honour. President Luoyang, his wife, his innocent daughters—slain in their home, a sanctuary defiled by the cowardice of assassins. This crime was not merely against one man, nor against one family. It was an assault upon the very ideals of justice, compassion, and sovereignty. It was an attempt to silence hope itself."
The hall stirred, the air heavy with restrained sobs. Nightingale, standing behind her, clutched her sleeve with trembling fingers, her eyes brimming with tears. Commander Krieg stood rigid as a statue, his jaw locked tight, yet his clenched fists betrayed his fury. Across the rows, captains, dignitaries, and soldiers bowed their heads, tears streaking cheeks unashamedly.
Wen-Li raised her hand, her voice swelling with conviction, now like a clarion call.
"But hear me: Hope does not perish with one man's fall. Hope is a flame carried in the hearts of the living, and today—though drenched in mourning—we pledge that this flame shall not be extinguished. We will not yield to fear, nor to the architects of this atrocity. To those who believe their wealth, their shadows, their networks can hide them: hear my words. We shall find you. We shall unmask you. And we shall see justice delivered—not for vengeance, but for the preservation of humanity itself."
The silence that followed was profound, a silence not of apathy but of awe. Then, as if moved by a singular heartbeat, the assembly rose to their feet. Some applauded through their tears, others pressed fists to their chests in solemn salute. Nurse Anne Parker wept openly, her hands clasped in prayer; Feng Shaoyun bowed low, tears glistening like rain upon her cheeks. Even the hardened officers of the Secret Police, Richter and her operatives, bowed their heads in solemn assent.
Wen-Li, though her throat burned with grief, stood tall, her figure illuminated beneath the great screen's light like a sentinel carved from sorrow and defiance. In that moment, she was not merely a chief—she was the voice of the bereaved, the custodian of hope, and the vanguard against the encroaching dark.
Chairman Zhang Wei rose with deliberate gravity, the rain's percussion outside dimming as every eye turned to him. He straightened his shoulders, smoothed the lapel of his coat as if arranging the very air, and then spoke; his voice was crisp, edged with cold resolve.
"We mourn the loss of President Song Luoyang — a stalwart defender of justice and a beacon of hope for our fracturing world," Zhang intoned, each syllable struck like a tolling bell. "Tragically, he and his family were taken in a brazen act of barbarity. The perpetrator has been identified as the rogue operative known as Agent-90."
A hush, taut as a drawn wire, fell across the hall; umbrellas trembled, journalists' pens stalled mid-scratch. Wen-Li's face betrayed nothing at first save a tightening about the jaw, but Nightingale's fingers flexed, Lan Qian's breath hitched, and Commander Krieg's posture became a coiled promise of reprisal. The great screen behind Zhang resolved to a stark portrait: Agent-90 — a man in black, spectacles catching a pale, surgical light, those ice-blue eyes like chips of glacier.
A reporter, throat raw with the need for clarity, called out, "Sir — can you demonstrate how you reached this conclusion? Who is Agent-90, and what proof binds him to these crimes?" Zhang's gaze swept the room, pausing on each face as if to measure consequence.
"With irrefutable evidence supplied by the SCP and corroborated by SSCBF inquiries," he replied, voice steady as a metronome, "Agent-90 is linked to the deaths of seventy-three Sinners and one hundred and seven outlaws, and to the recent assassination of Samir F. Rahmani and five senior members of High Chaebols. His dossier is not legend — it is ledger." He tapped the lectern; the screen flared with names, dates, stills and telemetry, the tableau clinical and inexorable. "This is not conjecture but compilation: forensic timestamps, intercepted comms, and eyewitness overlays. We have a net, and the sinews lead to him."
Across the dais, Wen-Li's expression shifted: sorrow melted into something sterner, brows knitting into an armour of concentration. Nightingale's eyes glinted — not with accusation so much as alarm — and Lan Qian's fingers hovered over a console, already scheming cross-checks. Among the rank and file, there were murmurs — some edged with disbelief, others with righteous fervour.
Zhang leaned forward, his words now a summons. "Let it be known: SSCBF and the SCP are unified in purpose. Agent-90 is a threat to order and to countless innocents. We shall marshal every resource to bring him to account, and we will not be hindered by sympathy for the man behind the moniker. Justice — not vengeance — will be our compass."
The assembly reacted as one organism: a ripple of assent, a few harsh exhalations, a clutching of sleeves. Wen-Li remained stone-still for a heartbeat, then inclined her head once — a curt, professional acknowledgement — but her eyes were two flint sparks; whether they burned toward retribution or toward protection, no one could say. The hall's mood vacillated between mournful and martial, like a world standing at the edge of a precipice that had suddenly become a battlement.
At the pinnacle of the High Chaebols Tower, Gavriel Elazar rose from his seat with the slow deliberation of a monarch inspecting his dominion. The metropolis sprawled beneath him in a lattice of neon veins and steel sinew, the stormlight reflecting off glass spires like molten quicksilver. His reflection merged with the city's shimmer on the windowpane, half-man, half-shadow.
The shrill chime of his encrypted line broke the silence. Gavriel's long fingers coiled around the receiver with a reptilian grace.
"How is it going?" he asked, his tone a silken thread wound tight with menace.
A voice, faint with distance yet brimming with assurance, answered: "It's going well according to plan, sir."
Gavriel's lips bent into a crescent smirk, his aquiline features hardening like chiselled marble. "Good. We have framed him, and soon the world will stand united against him, along with the sanctimonious guardians of SSCBF. Slowly, inexorably, we shall hollow their foundations — erode their credence, dismantle their alliances, and make of their righteousness a noose about their own necks." With a languid flick of his hand, he ended the call, the click of the receiver echoing like a judge's gavel.
Alone once more, he pressed his palms behind his back, leaning closer to the window, eyes aglow with predatory satisfaction. Below, the city mourned President Song Luoyang, their grief echoing through black umbrellas and candlelit vigils. Gavriel's voice dropped to a murmur, almost a benediction to himself:
"Cry, you masses… drench your streets with lamentations. For in your tears, I find mortar for my empire. Every elegy to your fallen leader is but another stone set upon Agent-90's pyre. Soon, your faith in saviours will die — and when hope withers, power alone shall endure."
A faint smile, thin and venomous, ghosted across his face as thunder rolled beyond the tower, the metropolis trembling under both storm and scheme alike.
He allowed a thin, satisfied smile to curl at the corner of his mouth and, to no one but the storm, murmured: "Let them wail — every elegy is mortar for my edifice of power. I will unweave their faith stitch by stitch, turn their saviours into scapegoats, and watch the citadel of their certainties collapse into the very dust that once begot it. When hope is exhausted, dominion remains."
The Black Castle lay drowned in its own twilight, the obsidian walls catching only a sliver of moonlight that crept through the high lancet windows. The chamber was hushed, a silence so dense it seemed to press upon the lungs. At the dais, Lady Sin reclined upon her throne carved of jetstone, her face obscured in the half-light save for the faint crimson shimmer of her eyes — eyes that glimmered like embers beneath a dying hearth.
Zoyah knelt first, her silver-white hair spilling like liquid mercury across her shoulders, her clenched fists betraying the tremor she fought to suppress. Beside her, Adela's lips pursed into a line of brittle restraint, her posture statuesque, though her eyes betrayed the ache of disbelief. Bai-Yu's features softened in a rare moment of melancholy, her usual poise eroded by a grief she dared not voice.
Joker, in contrast, gave a hollow laugh — too sharp, too shrill — a grotesque mask for the unease gnawing at him. Ravok's broad shoulders shook as he exhaled heavily, like a beast caged, fury simmering beneath his grief. Rahu's dark gaze flickered with a smouldering intensity, a silent oath written in the shadow of his brow.
Lady Sin, however, did not stir immediately. She raised one gloved hand, fingers brushing over the black rose she held — its petals newly wilted, as though echoing the world's mourning. When she spoke, her voice was glacial, steady, yet threaded with a subterranean sorrow.
"So, the world's sentinel has fallen," she intoned, each word uncoiling like smoke in the gloom. "Song Luoyang — a man of frailties, yes, yet a bastion nonetheless. And now his name is carved upon the stone of martyrs."
Her words drew their gazes upwards, each sinner reacting in their own muted cadence — Zoyah biting her lip until it bled, Bai-Yu lowering her eyes to hide their glassy sheen, Ravok clenching his jaw so tight it echoed like stone grinding on stone.
"Remember this night," Lady Sin continued, her tone tightening like a noose. "For the towers of justice have cracked, and from their ruins will rise either tyranny… or reckoning."
And in the silence that followed, their grief and anger braided together, a tapestry woven from mourning and menace, each soul caught between the weight of despair and the whisper of vengeance.
The office of Chief Wen-Li was cloaked in a dim amber glow, the lamps along the lacquered walls casting long shadows across the maps and dossiers strewn upon her desk. The storm outside rattled faintly against the reinforced glass, a murmuring accompaniment to the gathering tension within.
Commander Krieg, his broad frame bristling with indignation, broke the silence first. His voice, guttural and edged with scorn, reverberated through the chamber.
"So, the culprit is Agent-90! How convenient, is it not? That every string of chaos—Samir F. Rahmani's demise, the slaughter of the five pillars of the High Chaebols—falls so neatly at his feet. And lo, the SCP arrives with their declaration, as if the tale were pre-scripted."
Feng Shaoyun leaned forward, her dark eyes narrowing, her voice sharp yet tremulous with suspicion.
"If this is true, then why in heaven's name have they not caught him? If he is this beast they speak of, why is he yet unshackled?"
Robert, who had stood with arms folded across his chest, shifted his weight and spoke with a soldier's gravity.
"You both, Xuemin and Feng, speak from indignation, but listen—this man, this Agent-90, is not merely a mercenary with bloodied hands. He is a ghost inside the machine, one who dismantles systems, devours codes, and hacks the sinews of our strongest defences. Catching him is akin to seizing smoke."
At that, all eyes turned to Lingaong Xuein. She remained still for a moment, her gaze fixed upon the rain-lashed window, then exhaled softly and replied in a voice calm yet laden with weight.
"Perhaps Robert speaks true. I have studied the traces of his work. Firewalls torn asunder like parchment, encrypted data reduced to carrion for his mind. He is a man stitched not merely from flesh, but from enigmas. To cage him would be to net the wind itself."
Her words hung heavy, their cadence lingering like incense smoke.
But Wen-Li, who until then had sat in stillness, her hands folded upon her desk, lifted her gaze. The light caught her eyes, gleaming not with certainty but with a brooding unease.
"And yet," she murmured, her voice low but resolute, "the question still lingers in my mind."
A silence, funereal and expectant, cloaked the room. Even the rain outside seemed to hush.
"What is it, Chief?" Nightingale asked gently, her brows furrowed with concern, her hands twitching faintly as though yearning to reach out.
Wen-Li did not answer immediately. Instead, she rose from her chair, the wooden legs scraping faintly against the floor like the whisper of a blade drawn. Her expression bore a rare fissure of sorrow and fire intermingled, her jaw tightening as if to quell the tremor within.
She turned to the door, her silken hair rippling like a raven's wing.
"I will go out for a moment," she declared, her tone steady though her eyes betrayed a tempest. "Nightingale—see to the headquarters in my stead."
Nightingale straightened, almost stepping forward, her lips parting. "Where are you going, Chief?" Commander Krieg pressed, his deep voice thick with apprehension.
"To find some resolve," she replied, her back to them, her words falling like flint upon stone. She did not turn, nor did she linger. The hydraulic door sighed open, and she passed into the corridor beyond, her silhouette swallowed by the pale light.
The chamber remained hushed in her absence. Robert exhaled, his stern visage cracking into a furrow of unease. Xuemin lowered his eyes, brow knitted in thought, while Feng Shaoyun clenched her fists upon her knees. Commander Krieg muttered beneath his breath, "She carries too much upon herself."
Nightingale stood motionless, her gaze locked upon the door that had closed behind her Chief, her lips trembling with words unspoken. The silence that followed was heavier than steel, binding them all in the knowledge that something unspoken—something far darker—was yet unfurling.
The sky above Zhaoxian hung heavy like a tarnished mirror, glinting faintly with the cold gleam of surveillance drones drifting across the layers of digital haze. The neon arteries of the city pulsed below, alive with electricity, whispers, and the ceaseless hum of augmentation.
Through this cacophony of chrome and phantom light, Chief Wen-Li cut her path astride a sleek obsidian motorcycle—the Arashi Vektor-V8, its form as much predator as machine. The vehicle snarled beneath her, its engines resonating with a low metallic growl, like a beast of iron longing to be unleashed. Augmented fins along its frame flexed with each turn, scattering droplets of rain into sprays of liquid silver that shimmered under the holographic billboards.
Her posture was taut, armour-black coat whipping against the air, her eyes hidden beneath a visor that painted the road ahead with crimson overlays of threat-detection. Yet beneath her cold exterior, her chest was a storm of discordant rhythm—an ache of grief for Song Luoyang, a simmering anger at the fabrications that bound Agent-90 in chains of blame, and a relentless, gnawing suspicion that her world was tipping into a precipice of lies.
The maglev lines above glowed like veins of cobalt lightning, while Chrome Riders darted past her in shrieking waves of neon. Neuro-Cabs scuttled along the streets on arachnid legs, their passengers half-submerged in synaptic trance, their faces eerily still. Wen-Li ignored them, pressing her throttle; the Vektor roared forward, carving through the arterial roads where beggars with twitching prosthetics muttered prayers to gods of silicon and circuitry.
Her reflection flickered in the neuro-link panels of the hive-stacks she passed: a lone rider, a silhouette of determination framed by the grotesque splendour of Zhaoxian. She could almost hear the Neurodome's spectral whispers above, its living lattice of data pulsing in time with the city's heart, as though mocking her resolve.
Crossing beneath the twin shadows of the Augur Spires—those great twisted towers of flesh and machine—she felt an uncanny tightening in her gut. The city seemed alive, its breath laced with deceit, its veins choked with secrets. She whispered beneath her breath, as though to steel herself against the weight of it all:
"Resolve, Wen-Li… find resolve, even if in the maw of machines."
The Shin-Zhang Corporation's headquarters loomed ahead, a monolithic fortress of polished chrome and bioluminescent circuitry, its façade rippling faintly as if the very building possessed lungs. Wen-Li slowed her motorcycle, the Vektor hissing steam like a beast cooling after the hunt. She swung her leg over with graceful precision, her boots striking the slick ground with an echo of defiance.
For a moment she stood there, helmet still masking her face, staring up at the living edifice where Madam Di-Xian awaited. Her hands flexed against her gloves, as though bracing for more than conversation—for an entanglement of power, grief, and revelation.
With a slow exhale, she removed her visor, her black silk hair dampened by the neon drizzle, and her eyes gleamed—not broken, not yielding, but sharpened to a blade's edge. Then, without hesitation, she strode towards the yawning gates of Shin-Zhang, as though she were walking into the heart of a labyrinth that hungered to consume her.
–––
The Shin-Zhang Corporation loomed like a cathedral of chrome and silence, its halls alive with the hum of circuitry that coursed through its semi-organic walls. The air tasted faintly metallic, as though the building itself inhaled and exhaled.
Within Madam Di-Xian's office—an elegant sanctum of lacquered obsidian, silken drapes embroidered with lotus motifs, and faintly glowing calligraphy etched into glass—Agent Jun approached with a bow. His expression carried that rare gravity reserved for matters beyond protocol.
"Madam," Jun intoned, his voice low and deliberate, "the Chief has arrived. She seeks audience with you."
Madam Di-Xian, seated behind her desk of black jade veined with threads of gold, did not immediately respond. She lifted her gaze from a crimson lotus resting in a crystal vial—a flower so still it appeared carved from bloodstone. Finally, her voice emerged, silken yet commanding:
"Let her in."
The hydraulic doors parted with a sigh, and Chief Wen-Li stepped inside. Her gait was precise, each footfall measured like the ticking of a blade poised above a throat. Her expression betrayed nothing but composure, though her storm-dark eyes burned with restrained fire.
Madam Di-Xian's lips curved faintly, not into a smile, but into an acknowledgment of the tempest that had just entered her sanctum.
"Wen-Li," she said with composed courtesy, "how may I be of service?"
The Chief did not bow, nor did she offer pleasantries. Her voice cut the air like tempered steel:
"Where is Ninety?"
Di-Xian's reply came as calm as the surface of a black lake.
"Ninety is not here."
Wen-Li's eyes narrowed, her fists flexing at her sides. A rare crack of thunder seemed to echo her tone as she hissed through clenched teeth:
"Not here… or hidden by you? This reeks of orchestration. If he stands accused, perhaps the shadow behind him is you."
The agents in the room stiffened, their eyes darting toward Di-Xian, but the woman herself remained unflinching. She leaned forward slightly, her gaze steady, voice low and deliberate:
"Chief Wen-Li, you of all should know better than to embrace the first narrative cast before your eyes. Illusion is the favoured weapon of the powerful. Look deeper—look beneath the veil. The hand that kills rarely owns the blade."
Wen-Li's jaw tightened, her tone sharpening into a threat, her anger a barely bridled flame:
"If I find that this foul charade—the President's death, the framing of Ninety, the stain on this world—is birthed from you, Madam… I will not spare you, nor the roots of your Crimson Lotus. I will rip them from the soil."
Di-Xian tilted her head, her eyes narrowing, a faint glimmer of amusement curving her lips.
"You will do what?" she asked softly, a challenge veiled in velvet.
Wen-Li met her gaze without flinching, her words resounding with oath-like clarity:
"I will bring down your castle of shadows stone by stone, and I will see your empire of whispers turned to dust."
She turned on her heel, her coat flaring like a blade cutting air. Her footsteps struck the polished floor with unwavering cadence as she strode towards the exit. But before she could cross the threshold, Madam Di-Xian's voice lilted through the chamber—a voice that was both warning and prophecy.
"Be careful, Chief Wen-Li," she said, her tone carrying the weight of unseen depths. "You know not the shadows you consort with. They are not allies—they are carrion crows. They feast upon reputations, upon legacies. It is they who orchestrated Luoyang's death. And it is they who will rend your name and your institution into ruin."
Wen-Li froze for half a heartbeat, her shoulders taut. Without turning, she replied in a voice that was both steady and pained:
"If that is true, Madam, then I will see those shadows burned by daylight. Even if I stand alone."
And with that, she left, her figure dissolving into the sterile glow of the corridor beyond.
Silence reclaimed the chamber, broken only by the faint pulse of the crimson lotus on Di-Xian's desk. She gazed at it, her expression unreadable, and whispered to herself, her words laden with metaphor:
"Petals of the dandelion drift where the wind wills… fragile, aimless. Yet when scattered, they root in foreign soil and bloom anew. Wen-Li—you are that dandelion. Beautiful, fleeting… and doomed to be torn apart by the storm you chase."