Carl's warning about Bishop evacuating sent Jacob into immediate crisis response. If Bishop reached Argo with the two artifacts he possessed, Verons would have three of the five pieces—only needing to capture Anna and Jacob's artifacts to complete the set."How long ago did Bishop leave?" Jacob demanded, but Carl had finally lost consciousness as medics rushed him toward emergency surgery.Leo pulled up real-time surveillance feeds, scanning traffic cameras throughout Seron for any sign of Bishop's convoy. "Multiple reports of unusual vehicle movements in the government quarter. Three armored SUVs with heavy security escort departed approximately twenty minutes ago, heading north toward the border."Twenty minutes. That meant Bishop had at least a ten-minute head start, possibly more. But the border crossing was ninety kilometers away over roads that Jacob knew intimately from his years of military operations."Get me every vehicle we have," Jacob ordered. "Fast ones. We intercept tha

The revelation that someone else had possessed artifact four fundamentally changed everything Jacob thought he understood about the conspiracy. This was not just Bishop Nico working with Argo to conquer Seron. This was a deeper plot involving players who had been moving pieces on the board for far longer than fifteen years."Pull every piece of intelligence we have on artifact four," Jacob ordered Leo. "When it was discovered, who found it, what condition it was in—everything."Leo's fingers flew across his keyboard, accessing the captured data from Bishop's servers. "According to these records, the bracer was found during a routine vault inventory conducted eighteen months ago. A junior accountant noticed it during an audit, catalogued it as unknown historical artifact, and brought it to Bishop's attention.""Eighteen months ago," Anna repeated. "That is recent. But the vault itself has existed for decades. The bracer could have been sitting there unnoticed for years.""Or it could h

The war council assembled in what remained of their command center—a reinforced bunker beneath an abandoned factory that had somehow avoided being discovered by Bishop's intelligence network. Thirty people crowded into a space designed for half that number, representing every faction of the resistance Jacob had managed to unite.Captain Chen Wei stood near the tactical maps, her Eastern Defense Force uniform crisp despite days of continuous operations. Beside her was Commander Sarah Chen from the Third Border Regiment, who had arrived overnight with three hundred loyal soldiers after Anna's family connections convinced her the invasion threat was real.Roseline leaned against the far wall, still cleaning blood from her knives after the latest assassination operation. Leo hunched over his computer equipment, monitoring intelligence feeds that grew more alarming by the hour. And scattered throughout the room were the surviving Himulan warriors, each one representing countless hours of t

Verons's ultimatum echoed through the bunker after the broadcast ended. Six hours to surrender Jacob and Anna, or the city would burn. The silence that followed was heavy with implications that everyone understood but no one wanted to voice."We should evacuate you both immediately," Captain Chen Wei said, breaking the tension. "Get you out of Seron before Verons makes good on his threat. Without you here, there is no reason for him to target civilians.""No," Jacob replied flatly. "I am not abandoning Seron's people to save myself. That is exactly what Verons wants—split us from our support base and make resistance collapse."Anna nodded agreement. "Besides, do you really think Verons will stop his assault if we surrender? He wants Seron conquered regardless of whether he captures us. The ultimatum is psychological warfare designed to make people blame us for the invasion."Leo was monitoring social media and communication networks, seeing exactly that effect playing out across the c

mKelvin's public confession shocked everyone in the council chamber into stunned silence. Anna stood frozen, watching guards escort her uncle toward imprisonment while her mind struggled to process what had just happened. The man who had worked to destroy Seron was now voluntarily accepting punishment for his crimes."We should continue," Ben Tate said after several long moments, his voice steady despite having just witnessed his son-in-law's arrest. "The invasion does not pause for family drama."The council dispersed with new urgency, families rushing to contribute resources as promised. Anna found herself suddenly commanding wealth and influence she had never imagined possessing. The Tate family's holdings were substantial, and Kelvin's resignation meant she now controlled them completely.But while Anna worked with legitimate power structures, Roseline was approaching the problem from a completely different angle. Seron's criminal underworld represented a fighting force that most