*This chapter contains violence and it might disturb some readers.
During the carnage at the Obsidian Peak when the Celestial Unit departed from SSCBF to encounter the Tier Sinner. Deep within the underworld wing of the Shin-Zhang Corporation, the clandestine council chamber of the SDF shimmered in a dim cerulean glow. The polished obsidian floor mirrored the crimson halo of the holographic projection that bloomed above the central table like an infernal flower. The air was taut—thick with the scent of iron, static, and unspoken dread.
At the apex of the chamber sat Madam Di-Xian, poised in her silken scarlet cheongsam, the high collar framing her pale, commanding face. Her crimson hair cascaded in waves, the hue almost bleeding into the holographic light that flickered across her features. From both sides of her chair, her trusted lieutenants sat in measured silence, their postures disciplined yet restless.
Before them, Alvi stood—expression tranquil yet edged with quiet fury. Adjusting her spectacles and hijab, she pressed her fingers against the projection console. Each keystroke was a dagger in the dark, peeling away encrypted layers of forbidden truth. Fractured glyphs danced across the air—shards of revelation too dangerous to be uttered aloud.
The projection rotated, revealing the sigil of an ancient order: a serpent devouring its own tail, encircled by thirteen golden poppies that shimmered faintly like dying suns. Beneath it, glowing in Zayraniq script, appeared the name that made even the most hardened among them shift in their seats—
𐓢𐓘𐓜𐓞𐓝 𐓑𐓝 𐓩𐓘𐓤𐓪𐓐𐓚
Shimon Ben Yitzhak, founder of the Ark-Templars.
"Established in 1777," Alvi began, her voice as cool and precise as a scalpel. "The Ark-Templars—a society so ancient that its shadow predates the bones of our institutions. They don't seek dominion through war or politics alone… they seek divinity through dominion—to reshape humanity itself into their vision of transcendence."
A long silence followed. The projection turned slowly, casting serpentine shadows upon their faces.
Jun leaned back in his chair, his arms crossed and a sardonic smirk tugging at his lips. "Every secret cult claims to chase enlightenment," he scoffed, his eyes gleaming with curiosity. "But strip away their sermons, and all they want is power. What makes these zealots any different?"
Before anyone could answer, a cold voice cut through the chamber—Agent 90, the scarred veteran standing at the periphery, his features half-lit by the crimson light. The scar along his jawline looked like a fissure carved by time itself. His missing fingers were reminders of past wars.
"Because," he said quietly, "they already have it."
The words froze the air. Even Jun's smirk faltered.
Alvi inclined her head. "He's right," she murmured. "He's seen what they can do."
Madam Di-Xian's crimson eyes glimmered knowingly.
Masud, ever the pragmatist, leaned forward, his voice low and deliberate. "So these Ark-Templars—what are they, exactly? Religious fanatics, or puppeteers behind the curtain?"
Alvi's fingers traced through the hologram, magnifying a cluster of sigils that pulsed like veins. "Both," she replied. "They operate through ritualised science—alchemy fused with quantum manipulation. They believe the human soul can be encoded, copied, and refined. To them, humanity is a prototype—an experiment in need of perfection."
Roy's voice followed, deep and grim. "Then what about Poppies Playtime? The corporation founded by Nikolai Egeus in 1998—the so-called children's entertainment empire. We've traced funds from there to their hidden accounts."
Masud exhaled sharply. "A front for the occult, then. A playground built on sacrifice."
Farhan shrugged, "A Noctum Hollow the city of predators, pedophile and rapist is all connected"
Hella, her tone a mix of disbelief and horror, blurted out, "Wait—you're saying Poppies Playtime was where they sacrificed children?"
Madam Di-Xian's gaze hardened, her crimson hair falling like a veil of blood. "Yes," she said calmly, each syllable laced with venom. "A ritual façade. The laughter of the innocent was their hymn to summon the devil himself."
The younger agents fell silent. Even Hecate, who often carried an air of sardonic indifference, lowered her gaze.
Hella hesitated before asking softly, "Then, Madam, what connects the High Chaebols to all this?"
Di-Xian crossed her legs, resting her chin on the back of her gloved hand. "The High Chaebols are the architects of illusion," she said. "They manipulate the masses through industry—media, music, entertainment. They mould thought itself. The Ark-Templars supply the ideology; the Chaebols supply the machinery. Together, they weave the cage around the human mind. It is the apotheosis of control."
Masud frowned deeply. "But… Madam, aren't you one of the High Chaebols yourself?"
Her eyes flashed with quiet defiance. "Yes," she said, voice soft yet sharp enough to draw blood. "But I am against them. I joined to tear them down from within. They build laws to mask tyranny, order to disguise rot. I will unmake their empire from its heart."
A heavy silence fell, broken only by the low hum of the hologram.
Di-Xian gestured lightly to Alvi. "Continue."
Alvi nodded and brought up a rotating map. An island appeared—shrouded in darkness, surrounded by storms. Its surface seemed to absorb light itself.
"This," she said, pointing with a gloved finger, "is the Vantablack Isle. Current coordinates place it between the Noctilucent Sea and the Phantom Strait. This is their sanctum—the Ark-Templars' inner sanctum, where ritual and science converge. Satellite imaging cannot penetrate it. Every drone sent there has vanished."
Masud leaned closer, brow furrowed. "Vantablack Isle? That's a private territory. The playground of the elites—where they hunt, trade, and—"
"—and perform their ceremonies," Alvi finished grimly. "It's not a resort. It's a cathedral to their god."
Madam Di-Xian rose from her seat with an elegance that silenced the room. The crimson lotus emblem glowed behind her, its petals unfurling like tongues of flame.
"Agents," she said, her voice resonating through the chamber like a sermon of war, "your mission is clear. Dismantle the Ark-Templars. Burn their Eden and drag their gods into hell itself."
The entire chamber rose in unison.
"Yes, Madam!"
Their voices struck the walls like thunder.
The holographic serpent flickered once—its tail meeting its mouth, devouring itself once more—
a symbol of eternity,
and of damnation yet to come.
Engines howled in the cavernous gloom of the SDF hangar, a mechanical symphony of anticipation and peril. Hydraulic arms hissed as they loaded crates of classified equipment into the belly of the black stealth aircraft, its fuselage glimmering faintly under the emergency crimson lights. The emblem of the crimson lotus shimmered on its flank—an omen of silent vengeance.
Madam Di-Xian stood at the threshold of the hangar, her coat fluttering like a scarlet banner in the downdraft. Her agents assembled before her—each a shadow carved from conviction.
"Remember," she said softly, though her words cut through the roar of engines like a blade. "The moment you set foot on that island, you are trespassers in the court of gods and devils alike. Bring them both to their knees."
They saluted her—no words, only iron resolve.
Within moments, the hangar doors split open, revealing the ink-dark night. The aircraft roared down the runway and lifted into the black heavens, vanishing into the endless oceanic void.
The moon hung low, a wan and spectral watcher above the obsidian sea. Below it, waves clashed and whispered against the cliffs of Vantablack Isle, their foamy fingers clawing at the rocks as if begging to pull the island back into the abyss that had spawned it.
The Isle sprawled like a sleeping leviathan—its cliffs jagged, its forests blackened, and its towers glistening with sin. Palatial manors crowned its heights, their glass façades reflecting the ghostly moonlight like cold eyes watching the world below. It was a place of impossible wealth and quiet horror—where civilisation's puppeteers feasted upon the invisible strings they pulled.
Tonight, however, something had slipped through their defences.
Ghosts had come to hunt the devils.
At the heart of the island, beyond the hedge-labyrinth and the marble courtyards, rose the Owl Sanctum—a temple sculpted from onyx and despair. Its design was a hymn to the macabre: gargoyles with broken halos, arches that resembled screaming mouths, and at its crown, the colossal statue of an owl—its soulless eyes of obsidian wide and all-seeing. Beneath its watchful gaze, torches burned with violet flame, casting ripples of light upon the ceremonial floor.
Within, the elite of the Ark Templars gathered. Their robes were crimson as coagulated blood, their masks of gold and silver shaped like distorted visages of saints. Their movements were choreographed—elegant, reverent, and profoundly sinister. Each whisper between them carried centuries of corruption, each breath perfumed with arrogance.
A chanting hum filled the sanctum—a sound both melodic and monstrous, like angels weeping in reverse. The scent of incense and burnt myrrh curled through the air, heavy enough to smother the living.
At the altar, a figure in dark sapphire robes stepped forward—the High Priestess. Her mask, a baroque masterpiece of gilded filigree, shimmered with unsettling grace. She raised her arms, the dagger in her hand glinting like liquid starlight.
"The world," she began, her voice sinuous and resonant, "has forgotten its place. The beast believes itself divine. We shall remind it—" she drew the dagger across the air, leaving a glimmering trace, "—that only those who rule the shadows may shape the light."
A ripple of approval murmured through the assembly, like wind sighing through a graveyard.
In the periphery of this masquerade, death wore masks of its own.
Agent-90, his porcelain clown mask cracked and painted with a cruel smile, leaned against a marble pillar. His eyes, a glacial blue, tracked every movement, every gesture. Beneath the mask, his jaw flexed—the predator barely contained.
Near the pillars of ivory flame, Farhan, cloaked in black and wearing a plague doctor mask, observed in utter stillness. The curved beak caught faint glimmers of candlelight as he adjusted his gloves, ready to strike.
Jun, Roy, and Masud drifted through the crowd like whispers in smoke—each blending seamlessly with the congregation. Beneath their robes, the gleam of steel flashed briefly—concealed daggers, microblades, tranquiliser syringes—all blessed instruments of silence.
They exchanged no words. Their mission was already branded into their minds:
Identify. Isolate. Eliminate.
The feast commenced. Goblets of dark wine shimmered like liquid rubies as masked nobles toasted to "purity" and "ascension." Their laughter was muffled by gold masks, their gestures refined yet monstrous.
But amidst their revelry, doom had taken its seat at the table.
As the ceremonial chanting intensified, the High Priestess raised her dagger once more. Before her, a bound figure knelt, wrapped in silken restraints, their mouth sealed shut with threads of molten gold that glinted grotesquely in the firelight. Their tears fell silently, tracing lines down their ashen cheeks.
Above them, the owl statue loomed—its shadow spilling across the marble like a great wing of death.
The Priestess's voice ascended into a near-trance, each syllable vibrating with ancient power. "O Children of the Coil," she intoned, "by blood and silence, by darkness and desire—let the light of mankind be extinguished, and the true dawn arise—"
The congregation joined her in unholy chorus, their movements swaying in synchrony, masks gleaming, hands raised to the infernal effigy.
The air itself seemed to tremble, a symphony of dread and divinity intertwined.
And in that moment—
as the blade descended—
a shadow moved.
Agent-90's hand brushed the hilt at his belt. Jun's eyes flickered beneath his mask. Roy's pulse quickened.
The mission had begun.
The High Priestess raised her hands high, her sapphire sleeves cascading like dark tides as the torches guttered. The air within the sanctum curdled, heavy with a malign pressure that tasted of copper and ash. Her mask gleamed—half angel, half beast—as her voice rang out, vibrating through the marble like the heartbeat of the underworld itself.
"Oh, great harbinger of the veil—bringer of death's breath and the silence between stars!" she cried, her tone swelling into a crescendo of reverence and delirium. "You who dwell beyond the ninth sanctum of existence, where mortals dissolve and gods are reborn—heed the blood we spill and the faith we blaspheme! We call upon thee, O Lady of Shadows, the Demoness of the Unspoken Hour—arise!"
Her words tore through the air like claws across glass. The temperature plummeted. The candles shuddered, their flames bending backward as if recoiling in terror.
The wind began to howl within the enclosed temple, an impossible gale that coiled through the chamber, tearing through robes and scattering parchment like panicked birds. The torches flared violet, then bled into a noxious black fire that consumed the air itself. The marble floor cracked, fine fissures spidering outward, glowing with infernal light.
The High Priestess's robes whipped around her in a storm of shadows. Her voice dropped into a forbidden tongue, the Old Zayraniq, each syllable dripping venom and divinity alike:
"𐓞 𐓛𐓞𐓡𐓓 𐓝𐓒𐓡𐓞𐓜𐓐𐓝𐓒𐓡 𐓧𐓞 𐓘𐓢 𐓤 𐓑𐓘𐓢𐓤 𐓤𐓞 𐓐𐓛𐓛 𐓞 𐓥𐓢 𐓐𐓝𐓓 𐓩𐓞𐓥𐓡 𐓐𐓡𐓡𐓘𐓦𐓐𐓛!"
Phonetically: "Oh Lord Necromancer, who is the greatest threat to our dominion and the harbinger of your return?"
The atmosphere convulsed. The owl statue's eyes ignited with black fire, its stone beak yawning open as smoke poured forth like liquid despair. The shadows writhed, taking form—a shape of feminine horror, formed of ash and embers, her presence suffocating, her laughter the sound of tombs collapsing.
Then came the reply—a guttural voice, neither male nor female, resonant as thunder beneath the ocean:
"𐓧𐓝 𐓛𐓘."
Wen-Li.
The name shivered through the sanctum like a curse.
The flames around the altar coalesced into a ghastly visage, smoke and fire sculpting the unmistakable features of Chief Wen-Li of SSCBF—her cold eyes glaring through the inferno. The demonic fire twisted, her image crackling in and out of focus, half divine, half defiled.
Gasps erupted through the congregation. Some fell to their knees, others covered their masks in trembling awe. The High Priestess herself froze, her gilded mask reflecting the fiery apparition as though it were a mirror of damnation.
"The Enemy has been named!" she cried suddenly, her voice fractured between reverence and hysteria. "The desecrator of fate—the breaker of the unseen covenant—the mortal who dares oppose our ascension! She shall fall before the coming dawn!"
The followers, dozens of them, chanted in unison—an unholy mantra rising like a storm:
"Wen-Li must perish! Wen-Li must perish! Wen-Li must perish!"
Their words echoed through the sanctum, rhythmic and fevered, until it seemed the entire island itself trembled in obedience.
Hidden among the masquerade, the SDF agents exchanged subtle glances beneath their masks.
Agent-90, standing in the half-shadow, felt his jaw tighten. His gloved fist clenched, the leather creaking under the strain. His eyes—pale and electric beneath the cracked porcelain clown mask—burned with something between fury and dread.
"Wen-Li…" he murmured beneath his breath, voice low as a curse.
Beside him, Jun's smirk vanished, replaced by grim calculation. Farhan's eyes narrowed behind his plague mask, and Masud's hands twitched toward the concealed firearm beneath his robe. Roy, ever silent, stepped half a pace forward, the flickering torchlight revealing the trembling of restrained wrath in his posture.
They stood aligned, like statues carved from vengeance—each one realising that this ritual was not just occult pageantry.
It was a declaration of war.
The High Priestess raised her dagger again, her robes snapping like banners in a tempest. "Let her face the judgment of the Ark!" she proclaimed. "Let the false guardian be consumed in the fire she denies! The Necromancer has spoken—our will is divine!"
The congregation thundered in response, a sea of masked zealots bowing to invisible gods, chanting her name like an invocation of death:
"Necromancer! Necromancer! Necromancer!"
The very walls shook with their mania. Above them, the owl statue wept black ichor, its tears burning holes in the marble.
And within the chaos, the five agents readied themselves—for the time to strike had come.
The ceremony ruptured in an instant—an implosion of chaos born from silent intent. One heartbeat, the hall was a cathedral of chanting zealots; the next, it was a maelstrom of murder and gunfire.
The first shot cracked like the snapping of divine patience. Masud's silenced pistol hissed through the incense smoke, its bullet carving a crimson bloom through the mask of a gold-robed templar. The man's body spasmed backward, his blood spattering across the marble owl effigy like ink upon holy scripture.
The congregation froze for a fraction—then panic ignited.
"They're here! Intruders!" shrieked one of the lesser priests, only for Roy's blade to find his throat, silencing him mid-syllable. The man collapsed, convulsing, as Roy's expression remained unreadable beneath the half-broken porcelain of his mask—a killer sculpted from composure and apathy alike.
From the shadows near the pillars, Farhan advanced with soldierly precision, his trench coat whipping around him as he fired in rhythmic bursts. Each squeeze of the trigger was deliberate, almost meditative, the recoil synchronising with his breath. A masked noble spun and fell, his silver mask clattering and rolling across the floor like a coin of damnation.
Jun moved like smoke and grin combined—his twin daggers a dance of silver arcs that flashed through torchlight. He pirouetted through the scattering crowd, his movements almost mocking, the hem of his coat twirling with morbid grace. "Your faith won't save you now," he muttered, slashing a templar's wrist clean before plunging a blade beneath his ribs. The scream was swallowed by the chant that had turned to terror.
At the altar, the High Priestess recoiled, her sapphire robes flaring as she backed away, her dagger still slick with sacrificial blood. "Blasphemers!" she shrieked, her voice cracking as the owl statue's burning eyes seemed to weep darkness above her. "You will be unmade by the Necromancer's will!"
Her words barely formed before Agent-90 stepped into the open flame's glow.
The clown mask turned toward her—white porcelain, fissured and smiling eternally. Beneath it, his eyes glowed with the fury of a man long unmoored from mercy. The muzzle flash of his weapon painted the air gold. One shot, two—each mask he aimed at exploded in a blossom of red mist, the elites falling like puppets severed from their strings.
"Gods don't answer cowards," he growled, advancing with a predator's calm. His voice was gravel wrapped in ice.
The High Priestess fled.
Her robes snapped behind her as she dashed through the rear corridors of the sanctum, her slippers slick with the blood of her disciples. Behind her, the temple roared—flames rising, gunfire echoing, the chanting now screams.
"Alvi, I'm pursuing," Agent-90's voice crackled through the comm, low and restrained, yet his every step thundered like judgment.
She ran through the colonnades, past statues that now wept molten stone. The walls pulsed with a strange energy—the island itself seemed to moan, as though it understood what sin had been birthed within it.
"Stop!" Agent-90's voice reverberated through the corridor.
She glanced back—and saw him, emerging from the smoke like an apparition carved from wrath, his long coat torn, his pistol steady. His mask caught the firelight, grinning eternally.
She conjured a small ceremonial dagger, its hilt inscribed with cursed sigils. "You cannot kill me!" she spat, her voice trembling between terror and conviction. "I am the conduit!"
He moved before she could blink—a blur of shadow and precision. The dagger slashed, grazing his arm, but he caught her wrist, twisted—a sickening crack. The weapon fell.
Her scream echoed.
Agent-90 pressed her against the onyx wall, one gloved hand at her throat. His breathing was steady, but his eyes burned—blue flame through the cracks of porcelain. "You called the Necromancer," he hissed. "You showed her face. Why her?"
She choked out laughter—a high, brittle sound. "Because she will destroy you all. She was born under the omen of ruin. She—"
Her words ended with a sharp, clinical click.
A suppressed shot.
The back of her mask fractured. She fell limp, sliding down the wall, leaving behind a smear of red that looked almost ceremonial.
Agent-90 stood still for a moment, the faint wisp of gunpowder curling from his weapon like a ghost exhaling. He looked down at her body—the High Priestess of the Ark Templars—and muttered beneath his breath, almost reverently,
"Consider this your absolution."
Meanwhile, in the sanctum, the rest of the agents finished their grim orchestra.
Masud knelt by the fallen noble, pressing a detonator to the base of the owl statue. "This place goes to hell," he murmured.
"Where it belongs," Farhan replied, reloading with slow precision.
Jun and Roy moved through the carnage, finishing the wounded—swiftly, mercifully, without hesitation. Their eyes never met; they didn't need to. Their rhythm was the rhythm of men who had long danced with death.
When Agent-90 returned, blood splattered his sleeve, his mask cracked at the jawline.
"Target neutralised," he said flatly. "The head of the serpent's gone."
Madam Di-Xian's voice came through the comms, cold and measured:
"Good. Then burn the body."
The explosions bloomed moments later—great fiery chrysanthemums erupting into the night sky. The Owl Sanctum crumbled, its marble feathers and onyx wings collapsing into a furnace of ruin.
From afar, the island burned—a pyre for a dying god.
And as their aircraft lifted off the cliffs, the five agents watched in silence.
The moonlight caught the cracks in Agent-90's mask, and for a fleeting instant, it almost looked as if the porcelain clown were smiling sadly at its own destruction.
Agent-90's voice, flat as flint, cut through the crackle of radios and the roar of distant fire. "Burn the island," he said simply, each word a measured pebble dropped into the pooling silence. "Leave nothing that can be resurrected."
Masud's jaw tightened; he exchanged a brief, beleaguered look with Farhan—an unvoiced calculus of necessity and conscience. Jun's grin was gone; his face had the sober calm of a man who had watched too many absolutions. Roy's hands clenched and unclenched like someone testing whether he still had a pulse. Farhan, always the barometer, stared at Agent-90 with an inscrutable expression, then a single nod—acceptance by grim arithmetic.
"Very well," Masud murmured, his voice low as gravel, "we raze the sanctum and make sure their names do not fester in any ledger." He flicked his wrist; a compact device slid into his palm—detonators for the statue, charges for the vaults, and incendiaries to swallow timber and tapestry alike. Their motions were practised, economical: boots whispering, gloved fingers mapping the theatre of destruction. The Owl Sanctum became at once a mausoleum and a pyre.
Agent-90 moved through the wreckage like a surgeon through a morgue, efficient, unsparing. He stooped at the High Priestess's body, checked the pulse with the clinical manner of a man who had long ago divorced sentiment, and then stood. "We depart in two minutes," he said. "Ensure every document, every sigil—ash." His blue eyes were as cold as a winter scalpel.
The detonators were placed with the sort of choreography that made the whole act feel inevitable rather than chaotic. Masud whispered a curt incantation of curses under his breath; Jun hummed an off-key nursery rhyme that had become their battle talisman; Roy simply breathed and checked his blade. Farhan's finger hovered over the trigger, then fell. The charges blossomed into controlled carnage—fire kissed marble, torches licked up banners, and the great owl's onyx eyes imploded inward like stars collapsing. Smoke rose in a black, viscous plume that swallowed the moonlight.
They evacuated the sanctum in a tight formation. Agent-90 covered their rear, his silhouette severed and whole in turns by the inferno's strobe. As they reached the cliff's edge, the island behind them became an obscene constellation of orange and ruin, a cathedral collapsing into itself. Agent-90 did not look back for longer than a heartbeat—enough to measure the scale of erasure, too brief for nostalgia.
Madam Di-Xian's voice came crisp and remote through secure channel, laced with a simoom of approval. "Burn it clean," she intoned. "Let the ocean take their secrets. We will take the ash and turn it into leverage." Her tone bespoke strategy rather than triumph; even in victory she calculated consequence. The agents replied in clipped confirmations, and the plane lifted like a sombre gull away from a funeral pyre.
Alvi sat rigid beside the pilot, eyes reflecting flame, mind already concatenating fragments: the High Priestess's invocation, the Zayraniq name that had shivered the air, the necromantic oracle that had singled Wen-Li. Her fingers moved over her console with the rapid grace of someone pruning possibilities. "There's an ecumenical topology to this," she murmured to Jun—her vocabulary oddly lit by the intellectual pall of the night—"the Ark-Templars were not merely political predators; they trafficked in thaumaturgic influence. The invocation of Wen-Li's name is either a prophecy or a provocation." Her eyes glittered, hungry for pattern.
Jun snorted softly, but the sound had no mockery in it. "Prophecy or provocation—either way, it burns hot in the wrong hands." He glanced at Agent-90, whose profile was a geometry of wounds and purpose beneath the cracked porcelain. "And our Chief has been named in their rites. That is not a scrap of paper you leave for history."
Roy, who had not spoken since they'd put flames to stone, finally said something that was less a comment than an oath. "If they invoked her, they aimed to set a compass needle in motion. We've put the needle in our pocket. We must not let it point anyone to tragedy." His voice was hoarse and precise.
When they touched down at the clandestine airstrip beneath Shin-Zhang, Madam Di-Xian was waiting like a queen at the antechamber of war—imperturbable, immaculate, ribbons of rain clinging to her shoulders like medals. She surveyed them as if they were chess pieces returned from a gambit. "Report," she said, an invitation and a command rolled into a syllable.
Agent-90 stepped forward and delivered the summation with the austere cadence of a professional executioner. "High Priestess neutralised. Congregation dispersed or terminated. Temple destroyed. No survivors of consequence. Invocation attempted: Wen-Li named by the necromancer. We burned the sanctum to eliminate the archive and the locus." He folded the words into the room like a sealed envelope.
Madam Di-Xian's face remained an oblique mask; only the smallest imperceptible lift at one corner of her mouth betrayed satisfaction. "Efficient," she observed. "I prefer tidy chaos." Her fingers tapped the desk—a staccato metronome. Then she fixed Alvi with a look that was part commission, part curiosity. "What of the necromancer's oracle? Can you map its provenance?"
Alvi's hands danced across her tablet; the data cascaded and congealed into hypotheses. "The ritual language is archaic but traceable. The sigils are not local; they braid motifs from several occultic lineages—Zayraniq, Vantablack, even motifs we saw in the Ark-Templar manifestos. Whoever taught them this language is not a dilettante. This was orchestrated by someone who understands ritual praxis as well as geopolitics." Her cadence sharpened. "Wen-Li being named is deliberate. It was either bait to draw you or a reckoning aimed at her."
Madam Di-Xian considered for a breath. "Then we must not let the vultures pick the corpse. Keep this within our circle for now. We have made enemies tonight, and some of them are very patient." Her gloved hand rested on the dandelion emblem at her desk—a small emblem suddenly seeming both tender and dangerous.
Agent-90's eyes shifted briefly to the emblem, then back to the firelight caught in the hangar's wet floor. "The Ark-Templars will not be the last to meddle with the necromantic arts," he observed, voice flat. "This is a contagion; treat it as such."
Madam Di-Xian inclined her head. "Agreed. We quarantine, we investigate, and we retaliate if required. But remember—our retaliation must be surgical. The world still suspects us; let it suspect a thousand things, but never our hand."
As the agents dispersed—wounded, weary, and oddly exhilarated—Alvi lingered at the window and watched the smoke curl on the horizon where Vantablack Isle smouldered. Her reflection was a ghost in the glass; behind that ghost, the city pulsed with its usual indifference. She whispered, almost to herself, "Wen-Li named in blood and liturgy. A portent, or a ploy. Either way, the chessboard has shifted."
Agent-90 paused beside her, the two of them silhouettes against the dying glow. He spoke with the dry humour of a man who had made peace with bleakness: "Then let us be the players who do not lose our heads to superstition."
Alvi offered him a faint, knowing smile—wary, conspiratorial. "And if the world thinks you are the butcher, we shall make it bleed for the truth."
He did not answer, only watched the embers die. In the silence that followed, the aircraft's engines hummed like a distant heart; the night closed around them, heavy with ash and the strange, metallic tang of consequences yet to be paid.
Yuan Meiling sat at her desk like a conductor before an unseen orchestra, fingers steepled, a porcelain cup of tea gone cold at her elbow; the glass façade of the High Chaebols Tower framed the city below in a lattice of lights, each one a tiny dominion to be catalogued and construed. Her expression was the epitome of cultivated calm — an equanimity so polished it could have been lacquer — until the hurried footfalls on marble announced an interruption.
The door burst open and Katarina Sten, breath barely tempered, skidded in on the balls of her feet; data-readouts still shimmered across her pupils as if the screens had burned their statistics into her retina. "Sir—" she began, then stopped, the habitual deference cracking into urgency. Her voice was thin with alarm. "Ma'am — the Vantablack Isle has been reduced to ash. The Ark-Templars' sanctum is no more."
Yuan's eyelids flicked once, a micro-expression as economical as a diplomatic coup. The porcelain cup paused midway to her lips; the steam hovered like a suspended verdict. "Burned to dust?" she asked, voice cool as a scalpel. Her tone betrayed nothing, yet every syllable was an incision. She rose, not with haste but with the deliberate grace of someone who adjudicates consequence rather than panic. Her hands folded behind her back like the clasp of a vice.
Katarina swallowed and nodded, words tumbling after one another as if afraid of being slowed. "Yes. Satellite spectrography shows sustained conflagration; signatures consistent with incendiary charges and ritual accelerants. And — we have a more pressing datum. The necromantic invocation named Wen-Li directly. Our cross-correlation flags Chief Wen-Li as the greatest emergent variable in our threat matrix."
At the name, Yuan's face altered in a manner almost imperceptible — an incision in marble becoming a fissure. Her smile, when it returned, was a merciless, very small thing. "How quaint," she said, and the word hung like a perfumed guillotine. In the reflection of the tower glass her eyes glinted, hard and fast as obsidian. "Lady Di-Xian," she murmured, tasting the syllables like a strategist tasting wine, "has indeed transgressed our canons."
She turned, every movement economical, and the office seemed to contract around her authority. "Send an adjudicator to Madam Di-Xian at once," she ordered, each phrase clipped and punctilious, the command stripped of theatre. "A stern warning. Make it bureaucratic, make it inexorable — let the message read: the High Chaebols will not tolerate unilateral conflagrations." "As for Wen-Li you and Eitan have a task to do
Katarina's shoulders eased fractionally, and she nodded, fingers already dancing on an impossibly thin tablet. "Yes, Ma'am. I will dispatch Camille Marchand with a formal remit."
Yuan's gaze returned to the city below, then snapped back like a predator refocusing on its quarry. "And as for Wen-Li," she continued, voice now a quiet engine room of cunning, "you and Eitan have another task. Trace every vector that links her to the Ark-Templars, catalogue her alliances, and prepare the dossiers. If she is the fulcrum the necromancer named, we will not merely counterpunch — we will reroute the narrative. Find leverage, fabricate the pretext, and when the hour comes, we will set the world's lamp to illuminate the scapegoat we prefer."
Katarina hesitated, the analyst's prudence chiselling at the edges of the order. "And if Di-Xian objects, Ma'am?"
Yuan's smile was now all teeth and no warmth. She turned fully, the citylight etching her silhouette in argent lines. "Then adjudicate her, Katarina. Send a reprimand clothed as clemency. Make the reprimand precise and public enough to be humiliating, private enough to be emasculating. As for Wen-Li — you and Eitan will choreograph a revelation. Let the world's outrage coagulate around a chosen spine."
Katarina swallowed, nodded again, and left like a comet after its warning flare. When the door closed, Yuan stood alone for a long moment, palms resting lightly on the glossy table as if feeling the hum of the building's power through the lacquer. She murmured to herself, the whisper more a vow than idle thought: "Fly high, and wings make easy targets. Cut a feather and the bird forgets its song." Then she fixed her face into the mask of conviviality she wore for shareholders' breakfasts and press galleries, and returned to her tea — cold, precise, and utterly resolved.