*****Upon hearing his father’s question, Nico, whose entire being was screaming, “Please let me sleep,” managed a sluggish nod.Then, with his body feeling like it was made of concrete, he moved toward his father, each step heavier than the last.His steps were heavy, his movements sluggish and drained, as though the air around him had turned dense… until at last, he slumped into the chair opposite the old man with a muffled groan.Earlier that day, after the old man had dismissed the meeting, everyone else in the mansion had gone straight to bed… his wife, his children, and even the maids had vanished into the quiet of their rooms.But Nico? He hadn’t been so fortunate.Barely two hours into what might have been his first real sleep in more than a day, one of his father’s servants came pounding on his door with the urgency of a burning house, announcing that the patriarch wanted him to get ready and come immediately.Since then, he hadn’t had a single moment to breathe, let a

***** At this moment, Nico sat frozen like a statue, his mouth slightly open, and his brain buffering. Then, slowly, his eyes widened in disbelief, realization dawning on him like the sunrise after a long storm. In the following second, his lips trembled, and before he could stop himself, he blurted, “That’s… that’s so… so fucking smart!” The words slipped out of his mouth before he knew it. But in the next second… a second that felt horrifying, Nico panicked, slapping both hands over his mouth as he realized the language he had used before his father. His face even became pale as he awaited the inevitable scolding. But instead, his father did the unthinkable. He laughed. A deep, rich, and genuine laugh… rare and startling enough to make Nico blink in disbelief. “Hahaha!” The old man actually threw his head back, amusement echoing across the study like thunder rolling over calm waters.

*****Still inside the Oriens patriarch’s study…The air was so heavy at this moment that it could have been mistaken for smoke; a heavy, thick, and suffocating silence wrapped itself around the room, pressing down on both men like a storm cloud ready to burst.Neither Nico nor his father spoke, and neither even breathed loudly. Instead, they simply stared at the cell phone lying on the desk as though it were a venomous thing.The insider’s words kept repeating in their minds, echoing endlessly like a bell tolling in a tomb.In fact, for several drawn-out seconds… perhaps minutes, the world itself seemed to stall. Then suddenly…“You… did you just say that little witch has caved under pressure?” Nico’s voice tore through the silence like a whip crack.His face twitched with disbelief, his breath came faster, and his eyes sparkled alive with a strange mix of hope and excitement.The old man turned his head sharply toward him, his gaze unreadable.But he didn’t speak. Instead,

*****The old man’s roar was so loud, so sudden, and so unexpected that Nico couldn’t help but flinch so violently that his chair creaked.“My… my fault?” he stammered, his voice trembling and his eyes wide.“Yes, your fault!” the old man thundered, slamming his palm against the desk so hard that the pens and teacups rattled. “I ordered you to take care of that piece of filth! I gave you the money, the resources, and everything you asked for… and yet that wretch is still breathing and swaggering about!”The words hit Nico like a whip. In the following second, his throat went dry, his heart hammering so loudly in his chest that he swore the old man could hear it.For a split second, he didn’t even understand. Instead, his thoughts scrambled, spinning wildly as he tried to piece together who his father meant… until an image flashed before his mind.That face… that detached, self-assured, and infuriatingly calm face.Xavier.The realization struck him like a lightning bolt, and i

*****And seeing his son like this, the old man could only exhale sharply, glaring at him with the expression of a man questioning every life decision that led to this moment.His fingers clenched, and for a brief second, he looked genuinely tempted to bash his own head against the wall, incredibly frustrated.Finally, he massaged his temples, muttering under his breath before exhaling hard. “Forget it. Explaining things to you is like teaching a cat to swim.”Nico blinked in wounded silence.The old man continued, this time calmer… but only just. “Since we don’t know what they’re plotting and can’t afford to sit around waiting for it to unfold, we have no choice but to revise our plan.”“We strike first, and we strike fast. Otherwise, we risk losing our one real chance to destroy them right to the very grass.” His voice turned icy. “If we can’t have it, then no one can. That’s the rule.”The moment the old man finished uttering this… an eerie, terrifying, vicious, and ruthless