2026-06-22 02:30:04Adam Swift's POV
The entire bar had fallen silent. The smell of blood lingered heavily in the air. Bodies lay scattered across the floor. Broken tables and shattered glass surrounded us.
Moments ago, this place had been filled with arrogance and laughter. Now it was filled with fear. I stood in the center of it all.
My gaze remained fixed on General Otti.
The once-powerful man was no longer standing. He was kneeling. Trembling. Bleeding. Afraid. The same man who had terrorized countless innocent people now looked like a cornered animal. His remaining hand pressed against the floor as he struggled to breathe. His eyes were filled with terror.
"Who... who are you?" he asked weakly.
I took another step toward him. The sound of my shoes echoed through the silent hall.
Tap. Tap. Tap. Every step made him shrink further.
I stopped directly in front of him. For a few moments, neither of us spoke. Then I crouched down. Close enough for him to see my face clearly.
"Look at me."
His eyes slowly lifted. The moment our gazes met, his body trembled. I could see him searching his memory. Trying to understand why I had come. Trying to remember where he had seen me before.
Unfortunately for him, ten years had passed. Age had weakened his memory.
But mine remained crystal clear. Because I had relived that night every day. Every single day.
"Do you remember me?" I asked quietly.
Otti swallowed hard.
"No."
His answer didn't surprise me. People like him rarely remembered their victims. To them, it had been just another job. Just another night. But to me… It had been the night my entire world ended. I smiled coldly.
"No?"
I grabbed his collar and pulled him closer.
"Think carefully." His face paled.
"I don't know you."
I stared directly into his eyes.
"Ten years ago." His expression flickered. I continued. "A dark road." His breathing became uneven. "A convoy surrounded by armed men."
Sweat appeared on his forehead. "Two frightened boys sitting in the back seat of a vehicle."
His eyes widened. The memories were finally returning. I saw it happen. The realization. The recognition. The fear. His lips began trembling.
"N-No..."
I nodded slowly. "Now you remember."
The color drained completely from his face. "You..."
His voice shook. "It was you."
I smiled. "Yes."
The room remained silent. Everyone was listening. Everyone was watching.
"The older boy survived.”
Otti looked as though he had seen a ghost. "Impossible."
"Is it?" I leaned closer. "You remember the first shot that night?"
His body stiffened. I could see the answer in his eyes. He remembered. Of course he did. Because he had fired it.
"You were the first man to pull the trigger."
Otti immediately shook his head.
"No." His voice cracked. "No, please."
I stood up. His panic intensified. "I was only following orders!" His words echoed through the hall. "I didn't have a choice!"
I laughed. The sound sent chills through everyone present.
"No choice?" I repeated. "You had a choice."
Otti shook uncontrollably. "Please."
His knees scraped against the floor as he crawled toward me. "I was ordered to do it."
"I don't care." "Jackson Carter gave the command!"
"I know.”
Tears filled his eyes. "I was just a soldier."
I stared down at him. A soldier? No. Soldiers protected people. Men like Otti destroyed them.
"You hunted children." His body froze. "You hunted my father." I tightened my grip around my sword. "You deserve no mercy."
For the first time in his life, General Otti truly understood fear. Not political fear.
Not financial fear. Death. Raw. Absolute.
Death.
He bowed his head. "Please spare me."
I looked at him without emotion. Ten years ago, my father had begged him to stop. Ten years ago, my little brother had cried for his life. Ten years ago, nobody showed mercy.
Why should I? My sword slowly rose.
Otti's eyes widened. "No!"
The blade flashed through the air. A silver streak. Then silence.
For a brief second, nobody moved. Nobody breathed.
Then General Otti's body collapsed. His head rolled across the floor. The chapter of his life had ended. And one of my family's debts had finally been repaid. I lowered my sword. The room remained frozen. No one dared speak. No one dared move. The fear in their eyes was understandable.
They had just witnessed the fall of one of Quinzerland's most feared men. I cleaned the blood from my blade.
Then I turned around. As far as I was concerned, General Otti no longer existed.
My business here is finished.
"Thank you." A soft voice stopped me.
I looked over my shoulder. Wilson Carter had risen to his feet. His wife stood beside him. Their daughter remained close to them. All three looked emotional.
Wilson lowered his head respectfully. "You saved us.”
His wife nodded. "If you hadn't arrived..."
Her voice broke. She couldn't finish the sentence.
I simply nodded. "You are safe now."
The family exchanged glances. Relief flooded their faces. For the first time that evening, they could finally breathe. I turned to leave.
Then Wilson's wife suddenly spoke again.
"Wait."m
I paused. Something in her expression had changed. She stared at me carefully. Almost as if she were studying my face. Her brows slowly furrowed. "Have we met before?"
My heart skipped for a moment. She looked familiar too. Very familiar. Then I remembered. The old neighborhood. The children playing outside. Summer afternoons. Laughter.
And a little girl who used to run around with me and Taylor. Wilson's daughter.
Back then, she had been only a child.
Now she is a grown woman.
I quickly pushed the memories aside. "You're mistaken."
She shook her head. "No."
Her gaze remained fixed on me. "You look familiar."
I offered a calm smile. "I don't think we've met.”
She seemed unconvinced. Then she asked,
"What is your name?"
The room grew quiet again.
For a brief moment, I considered lying.
Instead, I gave her the truth. "My name is Swift."
The woman's eyes widened.
"So that's why."
She looked shocked.
"The family I knew also carried that surname."
I said nothing.
There was no reason to continue the conversation. The past belonged in the past. The future was all that mattered now.
Outside the bar, the sound of engines filled the night.
Several black military vehicles arrived. The doors opened. Dax stepped out. He immediately approached me.
"Boss."
I glanced toward the convoy. Everything was prepared. Everything was ready. General Otti was gone. Now only one person mattered. Jackson Carter. The mastermind.
The man who had stolen everything. The man responsible for my father's death.
The man responsible for my brother's death.
The man who believed he had won. A cold smile appeared on my face. "Let's go."
Dax nodded. "Where to, Boss?"
I looked toward the city skyline. My eyes darkened. It was time. Time to remind a certain bastard that the Swift family still existed.
"Let's go visit that bastard."
Dax smiled. "Yes, General."
The convoy engines roared to life. And somewhere in Quinzerland…
Jackson Carter had no idea that death was already coming for him.
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Chapter 70: The Empty Throne
Adam Swift Pov The customs house stood undefended by the time Adam's company reached it, and the wrongness of that emptiness put every soldier on edge before they'd even breached the front doors."Formation," Adam ordered anyway, refusing to let instinct override procedure. "Sweep it room by room. Assume nothing."They found resistance on the second floor—a dozen guards, clearly left behind rather than evacuated with the rest of Carter's inner circle, fighting with the desperate ferocity of men who understood they'd been abandoned. Adam cut through the first two before they'd finished raising their weapons, and the fight that followed was fast and brutal, soldiers pressing the advantage of numbers against an enemy that had none.A guard swung a heavy blade from a stairwell landing, and Adam ducked beneath it, driving his own weapon up through the gap in the man's guard. Two more tried to hold a doorway at the end of the corridor, and Reyes led the charge that broke through it, ending
Chapter 69: Clash of Legends
Adam Swift Pov The impact of their fists meeting cracked like a breaking beam, and Adam felt the shock of it travel up through his arm into his shoulder, numbing everything below the elbow. Thorne staggered back half a step—the first ground he'd given all fight—and Adam pressed the opening before the man could recover, driving two fast strikes into his ribs before retreating out of counter range."There it is," Thorne said, working his jaw, something like genuine pleasure entering his voice. "Wondered when you'd stop dancing."He came again, faster now, and Adam met the exchange with everything speed could still offer him. They traded blows across the ruined square in a rhythm too fast for the watching soldiers to fully track—strike, deflect, counter, retreat—each exchange costing both fighters more than the last. Adam caught a glancing hit across his temple that sent the world sideways for a half-second, recovered on pure instinct, and answered with a strike that opened a fresh cut
Chapter 68: The King's Trump Card
Adam Swift Pov The attack came without warning three days later, striking not the districts still smoldering from the war's earlier waves, but the fortified command post Voss had established at the old cathedral square—the crown's last major stronghold south of the river.Adam arrived to chaos already in full swing. The square's outer barricade had been shattered, crown soldiers scattered in retreat, and at the center of it all stood a single figure, unarmored, moving through a cluster of the garrison's finest commanders like they were nothing more than an inconvenience.Adam had seen a great many dangerous fighters in the past month. He had never seen anything like this."That's Marcus Thorne," a wounded soldier gasped, dragging himself toward Adam's position. "Commander—that's Marcus Thorne. He died at Ravensbrook eight years ago. Everyone said he died at Ravensbrook."Adam watched the figure catch Commander Aldis Grey's blade on a bare forearm, twist it free with contemptuous ease
Chapter 67: Emperor's Wrath
Adam Swift Pov The report reached Adam within hours of leaving the compound's ruins—a secondary holding site, further intelligence pulled from the ledgers his soldiers had recovered, listing a warehouse near the eastern docks under heavy guard for reasons the documents didn't explain. Adam didn't wait for confirmation before moving. He'd learned, this past month, exactly what unexplained heavy guard usually meant.He reached the warehouse alone, having sent Reyes and the recovering soldiers back to reinforce the garrison, and found the truth waiting behind its locked doors within minutes of scaling the perimeter wall.Through a gap in the warehouse's high windows, he saw them—dozens of civilians, chained along the building's central support beams, positioned deliberately between the guards' firing lines and the warehouse's main entrance. Human shields, arranged with the same cold, calculated precision Adam had come to recognize in everything wearing that unmarked crest.Fifty guards,
Chapter 66: The Siege
Ethan Hayes Pov The first shot shattered the study window before Ethan had even registered the sound of engines outside."Down!" He grabbed William by the collar and hauled him behind the heavy oak desk as a second volley tore through the room, splintering the bookshelves, sending papers and glass raining across the floor."Ethan, the front gate—" William's voice was tight, urgent, but steady."I hear it." Gunfire, sustained and heavy, rolling up from the estate's main approach. Ethan risked a glance over the desk's edge and saw torchlight and muzzle flashes strung across the front lawn in numbers that told him this wasn't a probing attack. This was a full assault. "Stay behind me. Do not go for a weapon.""I've fought before, boy—""Not tonight." Ethan was already moving toward the study door, blade drawn. "Tonight you survive."The main hall was chaos by the time he reached it. Two estate guards lay dead near the shattered front doors, a third dragging himself backward with a wound
Chapter 65: Fortress Zero
Adam Swift Pov Dax survived the night, and by morning the intelligence Adam had been chasing since the shooter's mark finally arrived—smuggled out by one of Voss's deepest contacts, confirming a location Adam had suspected but never dared believe would actually exist: a fortified compound on the capital's northern edge, built into the ruins of an old textile complex, marked on every official record as abandoned for over a decade."Satellite tower disguised as a grain silo," Voss said, spreading the intelligence across the war room table. "Underground levels, at least three by our informant's count. This isn't a hideout, Swift. This is a command center.""Then we take it.""With what? Half our garrison is still holding the eastern districts against whatever's left of the Black Battalion."Adam studied the map. "Then we take it with what's left."They struck an hour before dawn, forty soldiers moving in dead silence through the industrial ruins surrounding the compound's perimeter. Ada
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dax is as obedient like wtf