The elevator groaned as it carried them upward through layers of steel and stone, away from the Winter Citadel’s core. Julius kept one arm around Aurelia, steadying her frail frame as the world moved beneath their feet. Her breathing was slow, steady—but her eyes remained distant, locked somewhere between recognition and disbelief.She hadn’t said his name. In fact, she hadn't called him anything at all.The woman who once roared at a council to protect her child now stared at him like he was a shadow.Julius studied her features in the dim light of the lift—every line, every scar carved by decades of isolation. Her eyes still held that ferocity, but there was something fractured behind them now, something that hadn’t been there in the archive videos.The elevator clanked to a stop.They moved into a narrow corridor cut through rock, leading to an extraction point near the north ridge. Outside, the storm howled against the stone, but here it was still, cold, silent. They paused beneat

The convoy left before dawn had a chance to over the horizon.Armored jeeps, camouflage-plated drones, and three silent aerial skiffs glided over the snowbanks like phantoms. Inside the lead vehicle, Julius sat beside Miley, strapped into the seat with his gaze fixed on the icy horizon. His jaw was set, his pulse steady… Aurelia sat in the vehicle behind, dressed in full field gear. Her face was thinner than it once was, but her eyes carried the same thunder Julius remembered from the video testimonies. She hadn’t spoken much this morning, saving her strength for what was coming.Today, they weren’t hunting shadows.They were bringing down the final citadel of Winter Lily: Facility Helix. The sealed subterranean cloning facility hidden beneath a hydroelectric dam, which was still heavily guarded. This was the root of the operation : the beginning, and the end. And today, they were going to end it when fire.---The assault began with a complete blackout of the sky.Drones deployed

Kenneth stood frozen, his mouth open in a grimace that wasn’t quite a smile or a snarl. His hand still held the crystal wine glass, but his fingers trembled just enough to betray him. The liquid inside terminated trembled with the thought that every eye at the Beldham manor steps had turned on them. A string quartet faltered inside, and the hush that fell was damning.But the Duke of Beldham wasn’t done.He stepped forward slowly, hands clasped behind his back, the polished boots of a statesman echoing against the marble. “Kenneth Colton. You were invited as a courtesy—an olive branch between old families. Instead, you spat on it like a brat.”Laughter flickered through the crowd… nervous, muffled, but unmistakable. Kenneth flushed red to the ears.“And you,” David turned to Quella, his voice like velvet over steel.“You married into a legacy name, and mistook it for your husband's character. You divorced a great man, and thought you had found someone better… but it will take Kenneth

The ballroom turned into absolute chaos all around them. The glassware rattled as windows burst inward, bullets slicing through silk curtains as high screams echoed in the air, heels skidded across marble, and the scent of wine mixed with panic and fear.Julius moved on instinct, grabbing Miley’s arm and diving behind the bar just before another hail of bullets ripped into the crowd. Glass bottles exploded above their heads, raining shards of glass and the red wine down like confetti at a funeral.“Are you hurt?”He asked, crouched over her protectively.“No,” Miley whispered, ducking as another round thudded into the wall above them. “But someone’s going to be if this keeps up.”The air was thick with smoke and terror. Across the room, guests cowered under tables or ducked behind flower arrangements that had once been centerpieces of celebration. Guards scrambled to secure the exits, but they were too late. The enemy was already inside.Just then, amechanical voice echoed through

The first thing Julius registered was pain, not the sharp, immediate kind, but the slow, grinding ache of restraint. His limbs were numb, suspended above cold ground by metallic bindings that hissed faintly with hydraulic tension. The room was dim, pulsing with low blue lights, sterile and humming with hidden machines. He couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. Even his eyes fluttered as if underwater.A voice cut through the haze, clinical, male, cold.“Subject 17’s neural activity has stabilized at 82%. Begin Reawakening Protocol calibration.”Another voice replied with sterile precision. “DNA mesh has been extracted. Cross-referencing sample compatibility with Cryo Batch: Theta-Zero through Theta-Nine.”Julius tried to lift his head, to speak, to rage—but his body disobeyed. He was a mind trapped in meat and metal. A caged ghost.“I told you.”The male voice said, approaching the suspended frame, “Lily’s Fang was always the key. His physiology’s regenerative matrix outperformed all prior