Liam felt his heart skip as soon as he heard the gunshots and immediately, he dashed towards the table in the room and picked up his car keys rushing towards the warehouse with Jack closely behind him. However, just as they arrived, everything was still as if there was not an attack here moments ago. Silence fell over the warehouse, broken only by heavy breathing and the sizzle of a burning fuse on a demolished generator.“Everyone okay?” Liam called out as soon as he walked inside the warehouse.“I’m good,” Evelyn replied.“Mara too,” Darius added, shaken but unharmed.Jack nodded, checking his weapon. “That wasn’t a raid. It was a warning.”“Or a test,” Liam said darkly. “To see how ready we really are.”He looked around at the team—bruised, bloodied, but still standing. Then down at the device still in his hand. Victor’s message pulsed again, like a heartbeat.“He’s closer than you think.” causing Liam’s eyes to narrow.The warehouse was quiet now, too quiet. Only the occasional f

The atmosphere in the corridors of the base had changed. Liam moved silently through the main hallway, his eyes catching the flickers of red scanner lights, the whirring of automatic doors, the dull hum of the enhancement chamber far down the line. Evelyn’s words still pressed on him, but so was the weight of what he had to do.Darius had done the procedure on a few more volunteers from the Tribunal, and as Liam passed them, their faces were blank. Their eyes filled with chemical fire, but they also blank. One woman flinched as he passed, her arm twitching involuntarily like her muscles were trying to remember something human.Liam stopped right in front of her. Before now, she was a medic with warm eyes and a shy smile. Now her eyes were empty and dull. He didn’t even remember her name.He turned away, his heart sinking deeper than he’d admit to anyone. Each footstep he took weighed more than the last, and every face he passed was a reminder that the line had already been crossed—and

The air was thick with smoke and dust, filled with the remains of Peter’s fortress. The battle was over, or at least that’s what Liam thought. He leaned against a crumbled wall, blood streaked across his face, his body aching from the fight. Around him, the enhanced soldiers stood quiet, still catching their breath. For a brief moment, there was silence, peace. Or something like it. Then Darius stepped forward.Liam looked up and immediately felt something was wrong. Darius didn’t look like himself anymore. His eyes glowed with a strange, dark light. His skin was pale, almost gray, and thin black veins crawled across his arms like vines. Liam could see it clearly now, the power of the Ogini rippled off him in waves, thick and heavy. It had fully taken control of Darius.But Darius wasn’t acting possessed. He didn’t move like someone under control. He moved like a man who had finally found his purpose.“You feel it, don’t you?” Darius asked, voice deeper than before. “The power. It’s r

After Mia left the safe house, she wandered along the edge of the city, her steps slow and heavy with emotion. The night was quiet, but her mind was loud—full of questions, hurt, and the echo of Liam’s cold words. She pulled her coat tighter as the breeze swept through the empty streets. She glanced at her watch and it was just a few minutes past ten. The streetlights flickered above her, casting long shadows on the cracked sidewalks.She didn’t know where she was going. She just needed to be anywhere but the safe house. Anywhere away from Liam’s distant stare and the feeling that she no longer belonged. She eventually came to a stop near an abandoned train station and with a slow soft exhale, she sat on a bench, the wood damp beneath her, and exhaled.“You don’t look like you belong here,” a voice said.Mia flinched, frightened and turned. A man had taken the seat beside her. He was dressed in dark clothes, hood half pulled over his head. His face was calm, his smile polite, but some

Mia sat in the corner of the cold basement, now awake, her wrists bound, her head heavy. The walls around her pulsed with a faint red glow, like veins carrying something unnatural. Darius paced slowly in front of her, his face calm, and eyes fixed heavily on her. That eerie glow from the Ogini still lived inside him, and it was getting stronger.“You look tired,” he said with a soft smile, crouching in front of her. “This place drains you, doesn’t it?”She didn’t answer. Her eyes locked on him, full of fear but also something else, confusion and anger.Darius tilted his head, amused. “I don’t blame you for not trusting me. I wouldn’t trust me either. But I’m not your enemy, Mia. I’m just the one finally telling you the truth.”“Liam will come for me,” she said quietly, but her eyes carried the fire of a strong resolve.“I know,” Darius said with a grin. “That’s the plan.”He stood up and waved his hand. The room around them shimmered, and suddenly the walls fell away. Mia gasped as vi