Semua Bab THE PRICE FOR HIS NAME : Bab 121 - Bab 130

There were seven official Houses, each one an empire unto itself:House Dominion, led by Chancellor Hilliard Warwick, was the House of politicians. They ruled with influence instead of force—masters of legislation, manipulation, and legacy. If they wanted you gone, you wouldn’t see fists. You’d see polite meetings, closed-door councils, and the slow suffocation of bureaucratic precision.House Valiant, under Lady Grace Kerres, built futures from steel and fire. Entrepreneurs, inventors, strategists—children of tycoons and innovators who didn’t just own businesses, they owned outcomes. Their style was clean, ruthless, and devastatingly effective. People didn't argue with Valiant. They just went bankrupt.House Phantom, shepherded by the elusive Professor Rhys Calloway, was the house of the scholarship elite—the survivors. These students hadn’t inherited power. They earned it. With blades sharpened from hardship, they were the smartest, quickest, and most da

The conference room was suffocatingly quiet when Fiero walked in. The kind of silence that was too heavy, like everyone had collectively taken a breath and held it.Not that he cared.Fiero moved in with his usual lazy confidence, hands stuffed in his pockets, shoulders rolling in a relaxed, almost disinterested way. Each of the House Heads was already seated at the long, polished table. They were older—more seasoned, in their minds—and they all watched him like he was something to be measured.David Huntsman of House Dominion sat with an air of controlled authority, his fingers tapping on the table. George Owens of House Valiant, his face hard as stone, kept his eyes narrowed in suspicion. Anabel Lillington of House Royal looked less than impressed, and Denise Poppins of House Prestige looked annoyed, arms folded tightly. Even Tristan Hope of House Titan was frowning. And then there was Adonis Hale of House Elect—hi

Miriam didn’t need sleep. Not when there was work to do.She sat cross-legged on her desk chair, hoodie pulled over her hair, the only light in the room coming from the faint glow of her laptop screen. The dorm was hushed—Moses’s music played softly through his earbuds across the room, Joy had crashed on the couch with a physics textbook open on her chest, and Samuel was tossing a screwdriver in the air like he wasn’t tired, just waiting.Miriam’s fingers moved with the kind of mechanical precision that came from too many late nights and far too much caffeine. Her gaze didn’t leave the scrolling code for even a second.Thornecrest prided itself on security, but Miriam had long since figured out the truth: security was a comfort blanket for people who didn’t know how to break things. She knew how to break things.The academy’s firewall went down in under five minutes.As her eyes scanned the surveillance logs, she felt a presence

The air was thick with tension.He stood in the doorway, motioning for them to open the door like a shadow carved from steel—black suit pressed, collar sharp, face half-lit under the dorm’s flickering light. A man built from discipline. Danger. The kind of presence that rewrote a room without needing a word. Silence pressed in like fog. The air itself seemed to retreat from him.A low whir of the keypad buzzed beneath Miriam’s fingers as she inputted the code. The lock clicked.No one moved.Xavier Peterson didn’t rush. He lifted both hands slowly—fingers like sculpted bone, movements deliberate—as he unbuttoned his jacket. His shoulders rolled as he stepped through the threshold like he’d done it a thousand times. Like he already owned the place.House Six stood frozen in the narrow hallway, backs straight, eyes unblinking. The hallway light sputtered above them, catching the sharp gleam of steel in Samuel’s hand.

Midterms loomed over Thornecrest Academy like an approaching storm, each day carrying the weight of inevitable judgment. The House Tournaments, the school’s most anticipated event, would follow shortly after, a brutal clash of intellect, skill, and influence. Students were restless, the tension palpable.The prep hall was filled with students buried in textbooks, their hushed voices blending with the furious scratching of pens on paper. House Dominion had taken over the front rows, their members exchanging notes like seasoned politicians sealing deals. House Titan’s athletes, barely concealing their impatience, flipped through study guides with the same intensity they approached their sports. Even the ever-elusive House Phantom had scattered themselves across the room, sharp-eyed and whispering among themselves.Amidst this academic chaos, Miriam sat at one of the tables, her fingers moving swiftly across the screen of her tablet as sh