Chapter: Chapter 70The Ties That Burn.The rain over London was relentless, like the sky itself could sense something dreadful stirring beneath the calm. Inside the deepest wing of Grant Tower’s sub-basement, rows of black servers blinked in rhythmic sequence, the pulse of a ghost no one could trace.Argos had been born.Aria stood at the central command module, her reflection flickering against the glass interface. Her eyes, once sharp with vengeance, were now wired with unrelenting focus.“Status?” she asked.Isabelle’s fingers danced across her keyboard. “Argos is stabilizing. Initial behavioral matrix is holding. And it’s already tracing patterns we missed.”Jerry entered, tossing a small encrypted drive onto the table. “That’s everything we salvaged from the TitanNet breach. Whatever Daniel injected, it’s replicating.”Josh stepped forward, brows furrowed. “Replicating how?”Jerry answered. “It’s not spreading in the system. It’s spreading to people.”Aria turned sharply. “Explain.”“After Daniel'
Last Updated: 2025-08-15
Chapter: Chapter 69Phantom Revival.Seoul’s underground corridors pulsed with dim blue light, weaving between steel pillars and reinforced servers humming with silent power. In the control chamber of the Echo Core Facility, Daniel sat cloaked in shadows. The monitors before him bloomed with maps, code, and a single red sigil, the sigil of the next phase: Project Chimera.He tapped a command. Dozens of screens shifted, blinking alive with facial scans, intercepted voice samples, and AI-simulated behaviors.Daniel’s reflection stared back at him from the glass. Not the same man who had once stood by Aria's side. This version was colder, calculated, a master puppeteer hiding behind Helena’s betrayal.A voice spoke from the darkness.“They think you’re dead.”Helena emerged from the corridor, dressed in black, her eyes as sharp as the scalpels she once wielded.“They believe what they need to,” Daniel said. “That’s what makes them weak.”Helena approached, placing a biometric drive on the console. “Project
Last Updated: 2025-08-15
Chapter: Chapter 68STRATEGY.The storm came without thunder.Back in London, rain traced patterns down the glass walls of Grant Tower. Aria stood before a digital board, surrounded by her inner circle, Jerry, Isabelle, Philip, Helena, and Josh. The tension in the room pulsed like electricity, every breath a loaded silence.“Elira won’t speak,” Helena said, her arms crossed. “She’s been trained for cognitive blocks. Even under sedatives, her mind deflects any attempt to extract Regina’s location.”“Then we shift tactics,” Aria said, turning to Jerry. “What about the clutch?”Jerry placed the sleek silver clutch on the table. “Isabelle decrypted it. It’s not just code, it’s an invitation.”“To what?” Josh asked.Isabelle tapped a holographic panel. A projected screen glowed to life. “A summit. Hosted in Geneva under the name The Human Continuum. The guest list includes every major tech financier, data mogul, and military-tech broker on the fringe.”Philip's brow furrowed. “So Regina’s going public?”“No,”
Last Updated: 2025-08-15
Chapter: Chapter 67Beginning. Zurich’s winter sun passed through the high-rise windows of the tower. Inside a private boardroom on the sixty-first floor, the air sounded with strategy, not business. War.Regina stood by the window, her posture regal, eyes fixed on the sky as snow fell, more like it were a chessboard. Her tailored white coat flared like wings as she turned to face the two figures seated before her.“The world thinks it's safe,” she said softly. “That is always their first mistake.”The woman seated nearest to her, Elira tilted her head. Young, brilliant, and deadly behind her horn-rimmed glasses. “Echidna’s shell is in place. The neural relay will mimic benign communications for another twenty days before it activates. By then, global channels will be ours.”The masked man beside her tapped his finger once on the table. “Do they suspect anything?”Regina smiled. “They’re busy cleaning up the past. Meanwhile, we’re sewing the future beneath their feet.”Behind them, the wall screen fli
Last Updated: 2025-08-15
Chapter: Chapter 66NO I DON'T REGRET.The world outside moved on, unaware of how close it had come to collapse. For Aria, however, the silence that followed felt heavier than the chaos that preceded it.Daniel was gone—locked away under maximum security. Phase Four had been permanently neutralized. Yet victory didn’t bring peace. Not yet.Aria sat in the Grant Global private jet, watching the clouds below as the team returned to London. Across from her, Jerry leaned back with his eyes closed, though she knew he wasn’t sleeping.Isabelle walked in from the rear cabin, a tablet in hand. “The post-operation report is live. All drone nodes are neutralized. No secondary breaches.”Aria nodded slowly, her thoughts still tangled in the confrontation with Daniel. “He would’ve ended everything.”“But he didn’t,” Isabelle said softly, placing the tablet on the table. “Because of you.”Philip entered next, dropping into the seat beside Jerry. “No signs of external retaliation. Creed’s allies have all gone silent.
Last Updated: 2025-08-15
Chapter: Chapter 65 The Tunnels of Istanbul.Istanbul was covered in darkness more in a blanket of gold and shadow. The Bosphorus Strait glistened beneath the moonlight, a quiet witness to the war raging beneath its surface.Beneath the historic skyline, Aria and her team stood in silence before the entrance to an abandoned cistern beneath the city. Once a reservoir, now a decoy. The path to Creed's last stronghold.Jerry adjusted his earpiece and turned to Aria. “Final confirmation. Are you sure about this?”She nodded. “We’ve chased him through data, across oceans. Now he’s cornered. We finish what we started.”Philip tapped the biometric lock on the rusted entry door. It opened with a hiss.As they descended into the underbelly of Istanbul, the air was thick and the earth was damp. Isabelle led the tech operations, her tablet blinking with signal trackers.“He’s here,” she murmured. “Third sector, heat signature’s faint but steady. He’s deep.”They moved as one, Philip ahead with the pulse cannon, J
Last Updated: 2025-08-07