The Imperial Lounge's V.I.P. suite was usually a sanctuary of unmatched luxury, but tonight, it felt like an interrogation room.Harrison Cross stood by the glass balcony, his face darkened by a rare, furious scowl as he stared at his personal terminal. Across from him, Chloe Sinclair sat huddled on a leather sofa, her makeup faintly smudged from the panic of the morning, while Vivienne Sterling sat completely numb in the corner, wearing a plain, unbranded dress she had been forced to buy from a secondary-district market."He threatened your father’s shipping lines?" Harrison’s voice was dangerously low as he turned to face Chloe. "Austin Vance actually said that?""He didn't just say it, Harrison, he had the electronic overrides ready to send!" Chloe snapped, her voice trembling with residual terror. "The entire Grand Martial Pavilion saw him. He wasn't the soft, spineless idiot Vivienne told us he was. His spiritual resonance was completely suffocating. It felt like standing in fron

The air in the Grand Martial Arena turned to liquid fire as Harrison Cross descended. His broadsword, heavy enough to crush an armored transport, cut through the sky with a deafening sonic boom. The compressed Tier-3 spiritual pressure radiating from the steel split the reinforced white-stone floor below, leaving a jagged black trench in its wake.To the thousands of spectators screaming in the stands, Harrison looked like a descending war god. To the high-society reporters leaning over their floating camera lenses, this was the moment the dormant Prime Heir of the Vance Clan would pay for his arrogance.Austin Vance didn't even blink.Standing in the center of the destruction, wrapped only in simple black combat cloth around his knuckles, Austin’s dark eyes reflected the blinding golden light of the blade. In his mind, forty years of combat experience folded time down to a crawl. He saw every flaw in Harrison's form—the reckless tilt of his shoulders, the unstable pulse of the forbid

Time flattened into an agonizing crawl.To the high-society specters remaining in the VIP boxes, the shattering of the reinforced glass dome above sounded like a sudden burst of thunder. But to Austin Vance, the world lost all color, draining into shades of stagnant gray. He saw every jagged shard of glass tumbling lazily through the air, reflecting the frantic terror in his nineteen-year-old sister’s eyes.Olivia was frozen. She didn't even have time to scream as the pitch-black sniper round whistled toward her skull, trailing a dark, corroding plume of Void Poison that melted the air itself.Not again, Austin’s soul howled, forty years of agonizing regret roaring into a primordial frenzy. In my past life, I was too weak to save you! NOT THIS TIME!BOOM!The white granite ring beneath Austin’s feet violently disintegrated as he launched himself into the air. He didn't just jump; he tore through space using a forbidden spatial-stride technique from his past life, leaving a golden soni

Ten thousand atmospheres of pressure slammed down like an invisible mountain. The floor inside the violet barrier disintegrated into dust, the air turning into a dense, shimmering purple broth capable of pulverizing steel armor into scrap metal within seconds.Outside the barrier, Vice-Principal Thaddeus Cole cackled maniacally, his eyes wide and bloodshot. "Feel it, boy! That array was designed to suppress Abyssal Behemoths! Your bones are snapping right now, aren't they?!"Inside the gravimetric cage, Austin Vance stood perfectly upright.His dark combat clothing didn't even wrinkle. The crushing gravity hit his frame and bounced off like rain against diamond. With his soul brought back from forty years of future war, Austin's understanding of spatial pressure made Cole's "ancient" array look like a child playing with toy bricks."Ten thousand atmospheres?" Austin murmured, his voice cutting through the hum of the barrier. "In the Abyssal War, I fought inside a black hole's singular

The remaining mercenaries didn't even have time to scream.As Commander Vane’s blood dried on the shattered stone gate, Austin moved like an invisible blade slicing through moonlight. Golden afterimages blurred across the courtyard. Every strike was precise, absolute, and mercifully quick—a shattered chest plate here, a broken core there. In less than forty seconds, the thirty elite soldiers who had stormed the estate were collapsed across the ruined driveway, completely neutralized.The oppressive pressure choking the courtyard evaporated into the evening air.Austin exhaled slowly, stepping over the smoking debris of a tactical transport as he walked up the grand marble stairs of the primary manor. The heavy oak doors swung open, revealing the Vance Clan personal guards lowering their shields, their eyes wide with unadulterated awe.Standing at the front of the grand hall were his parents.His mother, Katherine Vance, rushed down the steps, her silk robes sweeping behind her as she