And all of it was free.
A gift from heaven.
So of course people would take it.
As a result, in less than an hour, the entire scene had been cleaned out completely. Even the blood-soaked ground had been covered by the dust kicked up under countless trampling feet.
...
On the other side of the planet, in Texas, inside a private estate styled like an old royal castle...
J. Jones sat alone in his bedroom, carefully wiping down an exquisite antique in his hands. He had spent hundreds of millions to buy it from overseas.
He loved it deeply, far more than any woman made of flesh and blood.
Outside, the cold wind howled without rest.
But with guards stationed at all four corners of the estate, plus dozens more patrolling constantly throughout the castle, the enormous compound still felt very much alive.
After all, he had made his fortune in energy.
He knew very well that every single day, both openly and in secret, countless people wanted him dead so they could take his place, including members of his own bloodline.
That was why he spent vast sums every year maintaining this private security force.
But as his company kept growing larger, no one had dared tug on his whiskers for years.
"No matter who it is, anyone who stands in the way of the company's growth has to die."
Sitting in his bedroom and watching the company's stock price continue falling minute by minute, a sharp light slowly emerged in the middle-aged man's otherwise murky eyes. As he kept polishing the antique, he murmured the words so softly that only he could hear them.
Their company had clawed its way up through blood.
After all, this was oil and natural gas.
Those things did not sit quietly in the ground waiting for someone to collect them. Countless people and forces had tried to take them.
But every one of those people had died.
And this time...
He believed that bastard would end up the same way.
...
As time passed, the moon gradually disappeared behind thick clouds.
Inside the estate, dozens of fully armed elite mercenaries continued patrolling through the brightly lit halls as if it were broad daylight.
And that was not all.
At every major corner, there was a German Shepherd on guard. The moment one of them caught the scent of a stranger, it would bark a warning and immediately throw itself at the intruder.
Because of that, this estate saw several deaths every couple of years.
But every single one of those cases quietly disappeared.
And in the blind shadows outside the estate, an infiltration team had already moved into position.
One of them pulled out a device.
At once, mosquito-like drones flew out and scattered into the castle through various openings.
Not long after, a complete surveillance layout of the estate appeared on their tactical visors.
Still, the team did not move.
Not until the last mosquito drone entered a luxurious bedroom lined with fine carpets and expensive paintings by famous artists.
And inside that room sat the man they had come for.
"Father, it's getting late. You should get some rest. I'll handle things from here."
A young man who looked strikingly similar to the older one walked in wearing aristocratic evening clothes, then stopped in front of him and spoke softly.
"It's still early."
"This is the greatest crisis our family has ever faced. He is the greatest threat we've ever had. How could I sleep without hearing from our people over there first?"
Hearing his son's words, the older man slowed the movement of his hands for a moment, then resumed polishing the antique.
"Relax, Father. Under your leadership, our family crushed so many old companies and old families to get where we are now."
"AIM is just going to become another trophy in our collection."
"I already have the money prepared. The moment they send back word, we'll move on AIM."
The younger man lifted a crystal glass and opened a bottle of wine worth hundreds of thousands. He poured for both himself and his father.
The two exchanged a smile and drank together.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.
Outside, the wind rose even harder, rattling the windows and doors with a constant shuddering noise.
Then, in the next instant, the lights inside the castle flickered twice and the entire estate dropped into darkness.
Even so, no one inside panicked.
Not even a servant.
Some simply continued what they were doing by moonlight. Most stood where they were and did not move an inch.
A few dozen seconds later, the power came back, and one light after another lit up again.
The entire castle seemed to return to normal.
But in places no one could see, three black-clad figures had already reached the upper levels of the estate.
With knives in hand, they ignored the cameras entirely and killed an entire patrol in one synchronized strike, two targets each, clean and silent.
And on the surveillance feeds in the security room, nothing seemed to happen at all.
After that came stealth, assassination, blades, compact crossbows, every kind of silent killing method was used by the infiltration team with terrifying efficiency.
Almost everyone dropped before they even realized anything was wrong.
The German Shepherds were already dead too, pierced clean through the skull by arrows before they could make a sound.
Not long after, none of the dozens of patrol guards inside the estate were left alive.
"Team A has secured the perimeter."
"Copy. Team B is advancing on the target."
With only that brief exchange, the operation continued.
Meanwhile, inside the bedroom, father and son had been basking in the confidence of coming victory when a subordinate suddenly burst in and startled them.
"B-bad news, sir. Everyone we sent to Africa is dead."
The man had barely made it through the door before the words came flying out.
"What?! That's impossible! I spent a full billion dollars! Top-tier mercenaries, plus multiple local warlord forces, and you're telling me they all died?"
The middle-aged man shot to his feet in disbelief, the antique slipping from his hand and crashing to the floor, though he did not even look down at it.
"Sir... I wish I could say otherwise, but every one of the warlord groups we hired in Africa is gone."
"Even the Stinger mercenary team, the so-called ace unit, was completely wiped out."
"These are the photos our people collected afterward."
The subordinate handed over the images.
"Damn it. What the hell is he?"
The moment he saw the Stinger insignia in the photos, Jones's face turned ugly.
That team had one of the highest completion rates in the world, nearly ninety-five percent, practically absolute.
Anyone accepted into Stinger had already been filtered through elite military units across the globe and survived brutal testing afterward.
Every one of them could hit a target like a one-man assault team.
And now...
They were all gone.
"What about the others? If our side failed, then what about their methods? Son, call them right now. Tell them they have to intercept him before he gets back onto American soil."
"Even if they have to use local armed groups and surface-to-air missiles, they have to stop him."
Hearing the report, the older man turned urgently to his son.
"O-okay. Right away."
The son, already rattled by the news, quickly pulled out his phone and began trying to send messages.
But after several went out, nothing came back.
"No... no signal!"
Only then did he fully realize that even his satellite phone had gone dead. His pupils shrank, and he showed the screen to his father with a trembling hand.
"Something's wrong!"
The moment J. Jones saw it, and recalled that all of their people in Africa had already been wiped out, his expression changed.
But before he could finish reacting, the door exploded inward.
A fully armed team stormed into the room and instantly trained their weapons on the two men.
The subordinate who had brought in the report did not even have time to react. One of the operators moved in through the broken door and slit his throat in a single smooth motion.
Blood splashed across the priceless carpet and even sprayed onto the walls.
"Heh. You were sent by Killian, weren't you?"
After seeing what happened to his man, the older Jones forced himself to stay calm. He sat down and laughed at himself.
But unlike his father, the son was completely panicked.
He quickly looked around, realized the exits had already been sealed off by the team, and identified the only possible chance left to him.
The window.
Gritting his teeth, he sprinted toward it.
One of the operators moved instantly, trying to stop him, but still missed by a fraction. The young man threw himself out, landed along the outer edge of the castle, and started scrambling away using the architecture as handholds.
He told himself that no matter how they had gotten into his bedroom, as long as he could make it to the main entrance and buy a little time, the estate guards would get there.
And once that happened, he would be safe.
The team did not seem particularly concerned.
They simply cuffed J. Jones's hands and dragged him out.
Meanwhile, outside, the younger man kept climbing and leaping, moving with a level of agility he had never shown before. He used every jutting edge and every possible grip point, dropping lower and lower until he was still more than two meters off the ground.
At that point, he bit down and jumped.
But the skills he had been taught from childhood kicked in. Just before landing, he stretched out his arms, rounded his body, and rolled across the ground to absorb the impact.
Even so, it hurt.
Still, he did not stop. He got up immediately and started running for the front.
Then, suddenly, he froze.
Something was wrong.
He smelled blood.
A lot of it.
To create a smell that strong, there had to be a tremendous amount of it spilled.
And he knew that smell well.
Born into wealth, he had already tasted every kind of indulgence before he was even sixteen. Later, bored of ordinary pleasures, he invested in a private hunting island.
Once a year, one hundred human "prey" would be released there for wealthy men like him to hunt for sport.
And it was there that he discovered just how intoxicating the smell of blood could be.
Eventually he was no longer satisfied with the hunt itself.
He had begun to enjoy torture and slaughter.
The thrill of it made him feel almost godlike, as if he held other people's fates in his hands.
He had grown thoroughly used to that cruel scent.
But now, for the first time, that same smell no longer excited him.
Instead, something deep in his bones trembled.
Only now did he realize that hunter and prey could exchange places.
So he forced himself forward, every nerve shaking, and slowly stepped out from the shadows.
What he saw confirmed his fear.
Bodies were everywhere.
Even the large guard dogs he had once taken such pride in lay still and lifeless on the ground.
At that moment, his fear of the strike team deepened even further. He simply could not imagine what sort of force could break through the estate's defenses so easily.
They had round-the-clock surveillance. Real-time monitoring. And yet there had been no warning, no reaction, nothing.
He cursed the incompetence of whoever had been watching the feeds.
As he got closer to the exit, he found a handgun on one of the fallen guards.
A quiet click sounded as he checked it, chambered a round, and made sure the weapon was ready.
That helped.
A little.
To him, the path to the exit, normally something he could cover in a minute, now felt endless.
And when he finally reached the last corner, he forced himself to look around it.
Then he stopped cold.
Something enormous blocked his way.
A massive shadow.
And from it came the thick smell of blood.
His scalp went numb. His body locked in place. Every muscle began shaking uncontrollably.
He could tell at a glance that what stood before him was no ordinary man.
He was already over six feet tall, and yet he could not even meet the thing's chest with his own eye line.
Slowly, trembling, he raised his head.
And saw a pale, bald giant staring down at him with expressionless eyes.
He did not know what the creature was.
But he understood the meaning in its gaze.
If he moved the wrong way, he would die.
Clack.
The handgun slipped from his hand and hit the ground.
At that, the Tyrant's eyes showed a glimmer of almost playful satisfaction.
Then it seized him and carried him toward the open courtyard outside the estate.
There, he saw his father again.
Under normal circumstances, meeting like this in such a familiar place should have brought comfort.
Instead, both men only felt despair.
They exchanged one look, then both lowered their heads.
At that moment, the thundering sound of rotor blades filled the air.
Both men looked up with a burst of hope.
But what descended overhead was a transport helicopter painted with the AIM logo.
And the two of them were hauled inside without ceremony.
...
At the same time, in New York, at Alex's seaside mansion...
Bang.
With that final gunshot, no one remained alive inside the villa except the target himself.
Only then did the leader of the strike team remove his mask, revealing the familiar face beneath.
Adam.
(End of Chapter)
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