The old Hong Kong syndicates had stood for decades, their roots running deep through the veins of the city's underworld. They had survived colonial governments, economic crashes, and the endless wars of territory and trade. Their leaders were relics in tailored suits—men who measured power through fear, favors, and the flow of contraband through Victoria Harbour. But their empire was a fragile one, built on debts, bloodlines, and nostalgia.
And fragility was something Novaeus understood intimately.
By late February, the Caelum Syndicate had already seeped into Hong Kong like a tide that could not be stopped. First came the quiet infiltration—small businesses bought under false names, transport companies rerouted under "logistics partnerships," and casinos laundering through shell corporations. Then came the force: enhanced operatives disguised as private security, spreading through the city's dark corners like precision instruments of reform.
The streets began to whisper the name Caelum, and those whispers carried unease.
In an unmarked van near the Mong Kok district, a strike team of enhanced operatives sat in silence. Their suits were black and seamless, absorbing the dim light of the street lamps. The armor's synthetic fabric flexed as they moved, a soundless ripple of power contained. Within each helmet, the heads-up display flickered with real-time data fed directly from EIDEN—the neural AI that guided them all.
"Target sectors confirmed. Yau Ma Tei—Triad central. Wan Chai docks—secondary stronghold. Operation commences in sixty seconds,"
said EIDEN's voice through their internal comms.
Atop a skyscraper across the bay, another team waited for signal. The order came not as a shout, but as a flicker on their visors—a silent green pulse.
Then the city erupted.
Explosions tore through the night sky as the Caelum forces breached the docks. Gunfire echoed against the water, tracer rounds streaking between cranes and shipping containers. Smoke rolled through the harbor, curling around the neon lights and throwing the skyline into a violent dance of color. The old syndicates had expected negotiation, a contest of territory and money—but this was surgical annihilation.
Enhanced operatives moved like phantoms through the chaos. Bullets glanced off their armor as if repelled by an unseen force. They dismantled enemy lines with brutal efficiency, the air thick with cordite and blood. One operative vaulted over a barricade, landing with a crunch on the hood of a van. He drove a blade through the windshield, splitting the man inside clean through before vaulting again into cover.
A scream echoed across the dock. Then another. Then silence, broken only by the hum of drones hovering overhead.
The drones were EIDEN's eyes. From hundreds of meters above, they mapped heat signatures, tagged hostile movements, and transmitted feeds directly to Novaeus's private office in Macao.
He watched from behind a wall of holographic projections, his face calm, his hands folded on the desk. The city burned on the glass before him, reduced to colored lights and moving signatures.
Adrian stood to one side, listening as EIDEN's voice narrated the unfolding destruction.
"Sector three secured. Resistance minimal. Estimated enemy casualties: forty-seven confirmed, twelve probable. Caelum losses: none."
Novaeus leaned back in his chair, eyes following the faint blue outline of an escaping convoy.
"EIDEN," he said, his tone measured, "route the convoy's path. I want to know where they think safety still exists."
"Confirmed, my lord. Convoy leads toward North Point. Possible headquarters of the old Red Fang syndicate."
Novaeus's fingers drummed lightly on the table. "Then erase it."
The order was transmitted without pause.
Across the bay, the Caelum strike team rerouted instantly. A missile drone descended from the night sky and locked onto the convoy. The explosion that followed lit up the harbor, a column of fire rising higher than the cranes. Car alarms screamed into the night before the sound was swallowed by the next wave of detonations.
From the window of his office, Novaeus could see the faint orange glow even across the sea. It reflected in his eyes like distant lightning.
Inside the Hong Kong streets, the old guard was fighting a losing war. The Red Fang lieutenants shouted orders through smoke-filled rooms, their men scrambling with outdated weapons, their tattoos slick with sweat. They fired blindly into the dark, unaware that the enemy was already behind them.
An enhanced operative crashed through the wall like a specter, the reinforced armor absorbing the impact with ease. The triad soldier barely had time to scream before a single round tore through his chest, sending blood spattering across the walls.
A second operative grabbed the lieutenant by the collar and slammed him onto a table.
"Your boss sold you," the modulated voice said through the helmet. "Caelum offers employment or extinction."
The man spat blood and cursed in Cantonese. His answer was a blade to the throat.
By the time the smoke cleared, the old syndicates had no leaders left who could stand. Some fled to Macau seeking sanctuary, unaware that Caelum already owned half the ports there. Others vanished into the mainland, leaving behind burned dens and broken hierarchies.
Hours later, as dawn approached, EIDEN's voice returned to Novaeus.
"Operation status: full territorial control achieved. The old Hong Kong syndicates have been neutralized. Sub-factions absorbed or eradicated. Resistance negligible. Adrian's teams are moving to secure financial and logistical assets."
Novaeus closed the feed and stood. The silence of his office was deafening after the chaos he had just witnessed. Outside, the sun was only a suggestion, a pale smear across the horizon. He turned toward the harbor view, watching the morning mist roll across the water.
War, he thought, had never been about noise. It was about control—about who dictated the silence afterward.
Adrian entered moments later, his uniform marked with dust and gunpowder residue from the field. He stood straight, eyes cold, the look of a man who had seen the night's work through to its end.
"Report," said Novaeus, without turning.
"Hong Kong's underworld is under our control, sir," Adrian replied. "Primary syndicates have been dissolved. Key figures—eliminated. We've placed our own men in the transport and gambling sectors. The police are… cooperating. Some out of fear, others out of profit."
Novaeus nodded once, his reflection faint against the glass. "And the casualties?"
"Minimal on our side," Adrian said. "The enhanced units performed beyond expectation. The Red Fang syndicate is gone. The Dragon Court scattered. We now control the docks, the night markets, and the southern trade routes. Local news will label it a gang war between smaller outfits. We'll release a statement through Ascension's public channels to support the stability narrative."
A faint smile tugged at the corner of Novaeus's mouth. "Good. Make it sound humanitarian. Tell them we're sponsoring reconstruction efforts. That should buy silence from the bureaucrats."
"Yes, sir."
Novaeus turned then, his expression unreadable, eyes distant and calculating. "Begin integrating Hong Kong into the network. Hospitals, casinos, tech fronts—everything. I want seamless transition. Keep the flow of cash quiet but constant. And make sure EIDEN seeds new surveillance infrastructure. Every camera, every drone, every server must report back here."
Adrian nodded. "Understood. We'll have the grid online within the week."
There was a pause. The hum of the servers filled the room, a mechanical heartbeat echoing through the walls.
Then Novaeus spoke again, softly. "Tell Marco to prepare expansion protocols. We'll rest for a month, digest the gains. After that… we move north."
Adrian saluted, then hesitated before leaving. "Sir… if I may?"
Novaeus looked up.
"This victory—it was too clean. No leaks, no retaliation, no interference. Do you think the other players are simply watching?"
Novaeus smiled faintly, the kind of smile that didn't reach the eyes. "Of course they're watching. But that's the point, Adrian. Let them see. Fear works best when it's broadcast."
Adrian gave a curt nod and left the room.
When the door closed, Novaeus sat back in his chair and exhaled. The cityscape before him was alive with lights again, the scars of the night's war already buried beneath the hum of commerce and routine. Hong Kong was his now—every street, every shadow, every coin that changed hands.
EIDEN's voice broke the quiet once more.
"All systems synchronized. Operational stability: ninety-eight percent. Incoming transmissions from local affiliates awaiting authorization."
"Filter them," Novaeus said. "Prioritize financial channels. I don't need reports of gratitude; I need numbers."
"Understood."
The holograms shifted, streams of data cascading in front of him—income projections, casualty charts, loyalty indexes. Each one was clean, precise, efficient.
It was the beauty of domination made mathematical.
Outside, the first sunlight spilled across the water, catching the blackened edges of the destroyed docks. From afar, it looked almost peaceful.
And so, in the silence that followed the conquest, the city of Hong Kong fell completely under Caelum's dominion—its syndicates absorbed, its economy redirected, its future rewritten.
When Adrian returned hours later with the finalized report, he placed it quietly on Novaeus's desk.
"Sir," he said. "Operation completed. Hong Kong is ours."
Novaeus nodded once, not looking up from the screen before him. "File it. Begin reconstruction."
He paused, his eyes narrowing just slightly as he looked toward the horizon.
"Let's see," he murmured, "how long it takes for the world to notice."