Rain fell in sheets that swallowed the city whole. It drummed on rusted rooftops and ran through the cracks of forgotten alleys, washing the filth but never the sins of New Avalon. The night smelled of iron and rot—of old blood and old dreams.Beneath the dripping bridge of Iron Alley, a boy crouched beside a dumpster, shivering. His name was Lucien Kane, ten years old, and invisible.He’d been invisible since the day the world forgot his parents existed—two addicts who overdosed and left him a broken lighter and a debt to hunger. The orphanage spat him out when he stole bread. The streets took him in.Now, the streets were his family. And like any family, they beat him, starved him, and whispered lies to him between the cracks of thunder.Lucien’s thin fingers rummaged through garbage bags, pulling out a soggy bun that smelled of vinegar and decay. He wiped it on his sleeve and bit down anyway. The rainwater slid down his face like tears he didn’t have the luxury to shed.Across the

The Marino mansion wasn’t built—it was forged.Iron gates like prison bars, marble steps that echoed of power, and walls lined with portraits of sinners who’d learned to live as kings.Lucien Vale stood at the bottom of those steps in a rain-soaked coat, staring up at the world he’d vowed to conquer. He was no longer the boy in the gutter. Not yet the godfather either.Something in between—something dangerous.The guards eyed him with quiet contempt. One searched him for weapons; another for weakness.They found neither.Inside, the air was perfumed with wealth and fear.Evelyn Marino waited at a long table of black glass, sipping wine the color of fresh blood. Around her sat men with cold eyes and heavier pockets—the Marino Council. Each controlled a piece of the city: docks, markets, drugs, gambling, and silence.“Gentlemen,” Evelyn said, “this is the boy who burned Warehouse 19.”Laughter rippled through the room.Lucien didn’t flinch.A bald man with gold rings on every finger sne

The storm broke over Aramore like judgment.Thunder rolled through the skyline, drowning out the cries of the city’s underbelly. Rain hammered the glass walls of the Marino tower, each drop a drumbeat for the end of an era.Inside, Evelyn Marino stood before her council—pale, poised, and trembling beneath her mask of control. The once-loyal lieutenants who used to bow now traded glances across the table, uncertain where their allegiance truly lay.And in the corner, half-shrouded in shadow, sat Lucien Vale.The wolf she’d raised.The man who had rewritten the rules of the game.I. The Fracture“Half our shipments are rerouted,” barked DeVane, one of Evelyn’s old guards. “The docks answer to someone else. Our suppliers—gone overnight.”“Not gone,” Lucien said quietly. “Redirected.”All eyes turned toward him.He leaned forward, calm, every word measured like a blade being drawn.“The House of Glass controls distribution now. Efficiently. Without leaks. You should thank me.”Evelyn’s kn

I. The EvolutionEmpires rot when they stop evolving.Lucien Vale knew this better than anyone. Aramore had fallen silent under his rule — a city so orderly, it had forgotten how to breathe. He stood on the roof of the Citadel one night, watching the neon glow fade into dawn, and realized something chilling:Fear had an expiration date.He could feel it — the pulse of defiance buried deep in the city’s veins, waiting for courage to return. So he did what the old kings never dared to do.He reinvented himself.II. The Digital ThroneLucien understood that the next battlefield wasn’t the streets — it was the network.He gathered coders, data brokers, and AI engineers — outcasts from every corner of the world. Together they built Project Umbra, a digital organism designed to observe everything. Cameras, transactions, messages — all feeding into one neural core.It began as surveillance.It evolved into prophecy.Umbra didn’t just track crime. It predicted it — mapped fear like weather, f

The city never slept — it just changed masks.By dawn, the rain had stopped, but the air still carried the scent of fire and betrayal. Smoke drifted from the old distillery where Leon had burned the evidence, curling up into the bruised sky like a warning to the gods.Word moved faster than bullets in this town.By the time the first rays of light hit the waterfront, whispers had already found their way into the alleys, into the mouths of hustlers, dealers, and drifters.“They say Leon killed his own men.”“They say he drank their blood.”“They say he made a pact with something darker.”No one knew what was true. No one dared to ask.At the East Docks, a figure named Marta the Fence listened to the gossip while counting her cash. She’d seen empires rise and crumble before breakfast, but there was something different this time. The fear wasn’t normal. It wasn’t human. It had weight — like smoke in the lungs.She flicked her cigarette, watching the ash spiral away. “From gutter to godfa