The room was cold, stone and silence pressed against Eva’s skin as she paced the perimeter. The traitor sat cuffed to the chair, blood caked around his lip, eyes swollen with defiance. She circled him like a hawk."Tell me again why you fed our locations to the Ravens."He spat blood. "You wouldn't understand."Eva leaned in, knife tapping against his throat. "Try me."He hesitated. Then muttered, "Because you're not one of us. You're not even who you think you are."Her hand twitched. "What did you say?"He grinned. "Your mother wasn’t Raven. She was Seraphim. Highborn. You think you were a pawn in their game? You are the damn game."Eva reeled, stepping back. It felt like the floor tilted beneath her.***Meanwhile, Sparrow stormed through the underground corridors of Raven HQ. The Red Seraphim flanked her, faces hardened from years of secrecy and exile. She held her blade close, whispering into her comm."They’re here for the children. Lock down every floor."Over the comms, static

The warehouse on the outskirts of Zurich had been converted into a temporary sanctuary for the children Sparrow had rescued. Eva stood near the window, watching rain pelt the cracked glass. Inside, the air buzzed with the hum of quiet activity—medical staff tending to the injured, agents distributing food, and children huddled in blankets, clinging to fragments of safety.But Eva couldn’t shake the file in her hands. Her mother's name. A lineage that connected her to Raven in ways she hadn't imagined. Bloodlines were binding, but so was the promise she had made—to protect these children. Her fingers trembled, torn between the truth she needed and the duty she bore.A soft knock on the door snapped her out of it.“We’re mobilizing,” said Sparrow, entering with a nod. Her usual icy calm was taut with tension. “The enemy’s not waiting for us to regroup. We just got satellite feed. They're moving in.”Eva slid the file onto the table. “They’re targeting the kids?”Sparrow nodded grimly. “

The first explosion didn’t sound like war.It was too sudden, too sharp—like a building exhaling its last breath. But then came the second, and the ground shook hard enough to crack the pavement beneath fleeing feet.From the 39th floor of the Kingsworth Tower, the view was a hellscape. A column of fire tore through the sky where the old opera house once stood, flames eating through glass and steel as black smoke coiled over the skyline. Sirens wailed in every direction, drowning in the sound of shattering windows and screaming civilians.Jason’s phone was already in his hand when the third blast rolled across the river, swallowing the horizon in red.“Report!” he barked into the comm.Static answered, then Marella’s voice, tight and urgent: “They’ve hit three districts. Transport hubs first, then power substations. They’re cutting the city’s spine before they bleed it out.”Eva appeared in the doorway, hair windswept, eyes wide but steady. “It’s them. The new army—they’re already ins

The rain started as a whisper, a thin mist drifting down over the blackened fields, softening the glow of fires that still burned in the distance. But the quiet didn’t last.Jason and his brother stood only ten paces apart, each one framed by the shattered skeletons of barns and the wreckage of armored transports. Between them, the churned mud was littered with shell casings and the fallen.“You’re alive,” Jason said. The words sounded strange in his own ears—half disbelief, half accusation.His brother smiled without warmth. “Alive because I chose to be. Not because you saved me.”Behind Jason, the Severed Wing shifted uneasily. The Red Seraphim flanked Sparrow, their weapons drawn but not yet raised. On the other side, black-armored soldiers of the Raven Circle formed an unbroken wall behind their commander, the rain streaking silver down their helmets.“This isn’t the place for a reunion,” Sparrow said sharply. “We either fight or move.”Jason didn’t move. “Why are you with them?”

The air between Jason and the mastermind shimmered faintly, the last ripples of energy from the weapon distorting the morning light. Every instinct told Jason to strike, to close the gap and end it—but instincts could be bait, and he knew it.“You’ve come a long way,” the mastermind said, his voice carrying unnaturally in the open air. “And still you know so little about the war you fight.”Jason didn’t answer. He circled slowly, keeping his blade ready.“You think you’re here because you chose this,” the mastermind continued. “But you’re here because I wanted you here. Because this is the moment you’ll understand the truth.”Jason’s jaw tightened. “The truth is you’ve slaughtered thousands, and I’m ending it today.”A smile touched the mastermind’s lips, cold and certain. “Then try.”***They collided with the force of old grudges. Jason’s first strike was fast, aimed at the neck, but the mastermind blocked with a blade that seemed to hum with the same energy as the crystalline weapo