2026-07-26 10:45:12Melvin stood alone in the center of the trap, surrounded by twenty armed men, simply looked up at Victor Vance on the balcony, his eyes cold and dark as an abyss.
Twenty heavy tactical shields formed an impenetrable ring around Melvin, locking him inside a tight perimeter of cold steel and crackling voltage.
Chief Fresco took a deliberate step forward, heavy boots thudding against the polished marble floor. A smug, vicious grin stretched across his broad face as he raised the heavy steel handcuffs.
"Hands behind your back, kid," Fresco barked, his voice booming off the glass walls. "You have three seconds before my men force you to the ground."
Up on the second-floor balcony, Vice Director Victor Vance leaned over the gilded railing, resting his chin on his hands. A victorious, gloating sneer lit up his features as he leaned toward Dr. Samuel Reed.
"Look at him, Samuel," Victor whispered, his tone brimming with venomous satisfaction. "He thought curing one girl made him untouchable. Inside these walls, I am the god of Apex Medical Center. By noon, he’ll be locked in a dark cell facing life imprisonment for assault and theft."
Samuel Reed swallowed hard, nodding nervously, though a cold knot of dread remained tied in his stomach.
Down in the center of the ring, Melvin didn't raise his hands. He didn't even drop his leather bag. Instead, he looked past the crackling electric batons, meeting Chief Fresco’s glare with a gaze as dark and calm as an unruffled abyss.
"Chief Fresco," Melvin said softly, his voice carrying a quiet, unnatural resonance that cut through the electrical hum. "Taking orders from a desperate, terrified coward will prove to be the single biggest mistake of your life."
Fresco’s face darkened in an instant. "You arrogant little bastard! Break his knees!"
"Taking him down!" three security guards roared, stepping forward simultaneously with elevated stun batons aimed straight for Melvin’s neck and shoulders.
Before the batons could descend—
CRASH!
A deafening roar of high-horsepower engines shattered the glass entrance facade.
The heavy reinforced glass double doors swung open wildly as three pitch-black, armored luxury SUVs mounted the granite plaza steps, pulling up directly inside the grand lobby itself. The sheer force of their abrupt arrival sent tire smoke swirling across the polished marble.
The three vehicles parked in a tight tactical formation, completely blocking off the lobby exits.
The doors of the front and rear SUVs slammed open in unison. A dozen imposing enforcers dressed in sharp charcoal suits, dark sunglasses, and tactical ear-pieces poured out, moving with terrifying military precision. In less than two seconds, the Syndicate enforcers surrounded the twenty hospital guards from behind, drawing heavy sidearms and raising them directly at the security team's heads.
"Nobody move!" the lead enforcer commanded, his voice cold as liquid nitrogen. "Lower your weapons or die where you stand!"
The twenty hospital guards froze instantly. Their smug expressions melted into pure terror as they found themselves staring down the barrels of high-caliber pistols. The crackling electric batons slipped from trembling fingers, clattering uselessly onto the floor.
Chief Fresco’s face drained of every drop of color. "Wh-What is the meaning of this?!"
The back door of the central SUV opened slowly.
A polished silver-headed cane struck the marble floor with a sharp, echoing CLANG.
Lady Beatrix Sterling stepped out of the vehicle. She wore a tailored crimson coat, her posture straight, her dark eyes radiating a terrifying, autocratic authority that had dominated Sargana Province’s underworld for decades.
Flanking her was her personal chief bodyguard—a towering man built like a fortress, carrying a subtle aura of refined martial training.
Lady Beatrix swept her cold, piercing gaze over the trembling hospital guards, before letting her eyes land squarely on Chief Fresco.
"Fresco," Beatrix’s voice echoed like a thunderclap through the vaulted lobby. "Who gave a dog like you the audacity to point weapons at the honored savior of the Sterling family?"
Chief Fresco’s knees buckled. He stammered frantically, his hands shaking as he lowered his handcuffs. "L-Lady Beatrix! You... you misunderstand! This intern—Melvin—he committed grand theft! He assaulted senior staff! Vice Director Victor Vance personally ordered his arrest!"
"Order?" Beatrix took a single step forward, her silver cane tapping the floor again.
A wave of intense, heavy pressure rippled through the room. "Victor Vance is a spineless worm who couldn't even diagnose my daughter’s condition, let alone issue orders that override the Sterling name!"
Beatrix stopped three feet from Chief Fresco, looking down at the towering security chief as if he were a poisonous insect.
"You dared to call Doctor Melvin a criminal in front of me?" Beatrix asked softly, her tone deathly calm. "Since your mouth speaks nonsense and your hands dare threaten my guest... slap yourself."
Fresco gasped, stumbling back. "Wh-What?!"
"Slap yourself," Beatrix repeated, her eyes narrowing into cold slits. "Right now. Until I tell you to stop."
Two heavy Syndicate enforcers stepped up beside Fresco, their hands resting on their holstered weapons, their expressions grim and unyielding.
Fresco looked around desperately. Not a single hospital guard moved to help him; every staff member in the lobby stood paralyzed in shock. High up on the second floor, Victor Vance had pulled his hands back from the balcony railing, stepping back into the shadows in sheer panic.
Realizing there was no escape, Fresco raised his right hand with a trembling arm.
SLAP!
The sharp crack echoed through the quiet lobby.
"Harder!" Beatrix commanded coldly.
Fresco struck his own face repeatedly, the force turning his cheeks raw and bloody. Tears of pain and deep humiliation leaked from his eyes as he delivered strike after strike to his own jaw in front of dozens of doctors, nurses, and staff who used to fear him.
"Stop!" Beatrix finally said after ten agonizing slaps.
Then, Fresco collapsed onto his knees, blood dripping from his lip, his head hanging low in absolute defeat.
Previous Chapter
Latest Chapter
Chapter 214
The public did not recover its trust that week, yet it stopped sliding. The families who had met Melvin in the small room went home and told their neighbours what they had heard. The anchors kept logging their pulses at the gates, and the cold patches kept walking in the same order.Chen came to the window with the ledger under his arm. He looked out at the car park, at the striped canopies and the folding chairs, and at the volunteers who sat on their positions with their hands folded."It will not come back fully, Doctor. Not in a month, and perhaps not in a year.""No. It will hold, though, Chen. That is the most a broken trust can give us at the start."Evelyn's raw data reached the western hospital by the second bell, and the anchors sent copies of every log down the line to the car park. For the first time since the eastern arc, the volunteers heard the census read aloud in their own voices, and they listened without fear.Lin's frame chirped on the sill beside them. She had bee
Chapter 213
"Why did nobody warn us?" the next family asked. Melvin told them about the census, the rotation, and the four hundred anchors who were learning to read a pulse by hand. He told them what the cold patches had done to the north wing, and what Yan Shou had done to the chamber under the delta.Nobody in the room interrupted him. When he finished, the father nodded slowly and asked for a copy of the map.Ruth Alden's husband came last, and he did not sit down. He held a folded cushion against his chest, the same faded blue cushion his wife had carried to the car park every morning for nine weeks."She brought this every day, Doctor. The chair was hard, and she said she would not sit on bare concrete for anyone." His voice was steady, and his hands were not."Then she should have it back on her position, and the anchors will put it there. Chen, record the cushion against her name.""It is already recorded, Doctor," Chen said quietly, and he wrote a line in the margin.By the afternoon ther
Chapter 212
The councillor wrote the figure on his slate and underlined it twice.Merrow took the stand in a grey suit that hung loose on his frame. He described the afternoon he had stood in a doorway and watched his own hands. The councillors wrote it down without looking up from their slates.Lu was not in the hall. Mo's wardens had kept him at the crater with his plates and his brush, and the high table had not asked for him. Melvin noticed that the seat Lu had been promised stayed empty all morning."Councillor, it is being read aloud by a voice that has already decided how the sentence ends." Merrow's voice cracked only once, on the last word.A murmur ran along the benches. Iris Varga sat at the centre of the high table in her grey federal coat, and she did not write anything down. She waited until the murmur died before she spoke."Doctor Melvin, the council has heard that a man on a slab can be spoken through. Can you show us how it is stopped?""Doss will show you, Councillor, with a pr
Chapter 211
"Sun Wen, do you give your consent? Freely, and in your own voice, with the right to stop whenever Doss says so.""Given," the old carrier said, and he crawled across the gravel on his hands and knees.He reached the litter and laid his palm flat on Merrow's wrist. Merrow's body went rigid under the blankets, and the cords stood out along his neck. The core under Sun Wen's hand gave one deep note that Melvin felt through the stone."Old carrier, you have no right to this vein." The voice hissed through Merrow's throat."I had no right to a thousand years in the dark, Yan Shou. I took them anyway, and I am still holding."Merrow's heart stuttered. Doss's hand flew to his throat, and her lips began to count aloud. Melvin watched the old carrier's palm darken and then brighten against the wrist.The voice fought him for almost a minute. It pushed up through Merrow's chest in short hard waves, and each wave broke against the full core. The blankets slipped from Merrow's shoulders, and his
Chapter 210
Melvin looked at Lin's frame. The sixty-fourth chamber's readings glowed beside the census map, and the thread from the carrier's socket ran up the shaft toward the disc beneath him. He had read that carrier for an hour that afternoon, and he had felt a patience in the slow beat that no living man should have.The council had sealed Yan Ming alive so that his brother could keep a seat on the deputy's bench. Melvin understood now that the bargain had never been fair to both of them. He had spent two days learning the carrier's architecture, and he had begun to think of the sixty-fourth entry as a living man who had been filed away."Doctor, do I stop him?" Doss asked over the line, her voice thin."Not yet. Let him talk, and get me every word. Then tell him I need a reason to bring anyone up out of the stone."Lin's voice cut in from the frame. "The thread is warming, Melvin. The sixty-fourth socket has started reaching for the line again.""Let it reach. It can't pull what it hasn't g
Chapter 209
"So Yan Shou's proxy came through the gate wearing Lu's face. Hui saw the face and let it in, and then someone killed him and wrote a fever over the death," Melvin reasoned."That's the reading, Doctor. I have entered charges against the dead man for the record, as the law requires. The charge is obstruction of a sealed escort, and the defendant is Gate Warden Hui," Chen said, and his voice did not change at all."Enter a second charge against the physician who signed the record, in the same ink.""Already entered, Doctor.""Then keep every entry open for the federal observers, Chen. Varga will want to read every name before she reads a single rule."Outside, the light had turned copper over the crater rim, and the cots along the edge of the stone threw long shadows across the disc. A cold wind came off the far ridges, and the marshals pulled their coats tighter.Lin had not spoken for several minutes. She stood with the frame in one hand and the day's sheet in the other, and she was
You may also like
The Useless Son In Law
Blue white95.2K viewsThe Billionaire Heir
Teddy134.9K viewsThe Legendary Conglomerate
Lord MOH124.7K viewsRevenge Of The Rejected Son-in-law
Teddy157.6K viewsThe Forgotten Heir's Payback
Pe Stone 253 viewsMy Cheating Wife Never Saw My Rise Coming
ayoniboy129 viewsReborn Apex: The City Is My Cage
T. Maryann205 viewsFrom Ex-con To Supreme God Of War
NAYA85 views