The air inside the warehouse remained thick and heavy, the dim light above flickering restlessly, casting trembling shadows across the cracked walls and layers of dust. The conversation had reached its most crucial point, and in Jim's deep, unreadable eyes, a glimmer of greed and anticipation shimmered, impossible to conceal.
"You're certain," Alia asked quietly, her tone steady but edged with disbelief, "that what you want… is Marcellus's blood?"
"Of course." Jim's reply came almost instantly, his voice cold and precise. "With his blood, I can locate the handle he once threw away. For me, that won't be difficult."
Alia narrowed her eyes slightly, her mind racing.
"Marcellus's blood…" she murmured, her tone deliberately hesitant. "That means not only getting close to him, but striking when he's completely off guard. That's not an easy task."
She paused for a breath, then said softly, "Let me think about it."
A cold, amused smile tugged at the corner of Jim's lips. "What's wrong? Getting sentimental?"
"Of course not." Alia lifted her gaze, her voice calm yet firm, though inwardly she was weighing the cost—the risk, the timing, and the unseen consequences. "It's just… complicated. But I'll find a way."
For a moment, silence filled the space between them. Then Jim's tone shifted, carrying a strange, almost playful warmth that didn't reach his eyes.
"You know," he said, "you're an interesting woman. I can't shake the feeling that we've met before. A strange sense of familiarity—almost like déjà vu."
He smiled faintly as he spoke, but the smile was wrong, carrying something sharp and dangerous beneath its surface. "I only hope that when all of this is over, we won't end up as enemies. Who knows—under my guidance, you might carve out a kingdom of your own."
Alia's pulse tightened for a beat. That sense of familiarity—she had felt it too. There was something in his gaze, in the way he spoke, that reached into a part of her memory she wished had stayed buried. It was as if, in some forgotten dream, he had once been both her teacher and her tormentor.
But she showed no hint of unease. She merely sighed inwardly. Yes, there was a kind of fate between them—but it was the kind that had already burned itself out in another life. In this one, they were bound to stand on opposite sides of the battlefield.
"We'll see when the time comes," she replied with a faint smile. Her tone was light, almost casual, but there was a distance in her words—cool, detached, deliberate. "I don't like to assume anything before success is certain."
Jim studied her for a few seconds, as if trying to gauge how much she meant it. Then he lifted a hand in a casual gesture of farewell, his smirk returning. "Clever people never make promises too easily."
Their eyes met for one brief moment—two calm, guarded smiles masking the quiet hostility beneath. The flickering light above caught that fleeting harmony before darkness reclaimed it.
After a few more words of polite pretense, Alia turned to leave. Her silhouette stretched long and thin under the trembling warehouse light, the cold wind brushing through her hair as she stepped toward the door.
When she finally emerged from the shadows, she drew a deep breath. Jim's final words echoed in her chest like a needle pressed against the heart—"a sense of déjà vu." It unsettled her, but at the same time, it strengthened her resolve.
No matter what bound them before, no matter what strange echoes lingered from another life—
this time, she swore to herself, she would never again become a pawn in his game.