### Chapter 99: The Forgotten Abyss
The space at the very center of the garden warped with a sudden, silent distortion. The surrounding air bent like light through thick glass, and in the span of a single heartbeat, the night sky and the scent of superheated flowers vanished entirely.
When their feet touched solid ground again, Silas and Zerav were standing before the yawning maw of a massive, subterranean tunnel that plunged straight into absolute darkness and nothingness.
"Did you really have to warp us here?" Zerav asked, his hand lingering near his hip as he adjusted to the sudden drop in temperature. "We could have easily taken the stone stairs that lead down from the Garden"
"That would have been inefficient and slow," Silas replied flatly, his voice carrying no echo in the tight space. He didn't bother turning his head to look at Zerav; his dark, unblinking gaze remained fixed entirely on the pitch-black void stretching out ahead.
"Plus... we are on a timer," Silas added, taking a deliberate, subtle step into the tunnel.
"Or you're just getting impatient," Zerav muttered under his breath.
Without another word, the two Grands stepped forward into the dark passage, their boots striking the stone floor in a steady, synchronized rhythm as they began their walk toward the depths.
For a long time, neither man spoke. The damp, cool air smelled faintly of stagnant water, decaying mineral deposits, and old dust. The silence hung heavy around them, broken only by the muffled crunch of dirt beneath their heels.
Finally, Zerav voiced the question that had been gnawing at the back of his mind ever since Silas had first unveiled this hidden passage weeks ago.
"Why do you think this place was built in the first place?" Zerav asked, his low voice echoing against the unseen stone walls.
"Isn't it obvious?" Silas murmured, his pace never wavering. "The nobles who occupied this estate long before our time required a discrete escape route in case they were ever attacked or invaded—a absolute final resort to slip away unnoticed into the mountain range. I simply happened to cultivate my garden directly over it."
Zerav cast a sideways glance at the back of Silas's head through the dim light. "You 'simply happened' to... or you knew it was here from the moment you set foot on this land?"
"Think whatever you choose to believe," Silas replied smoothly.
"Even if it was meant to be an escape route," Zerav continued, his eyes scanning the damp stone curvature above them, "this passage clearly doesn't lead to the outer perimeter. It leads to a dead-end . So it couldn't have functioned as an escape tunnel."
"It was *supposed* to be an escape tunnel according to the original architect's blueprint," Silas corrected, his tone chillingly calm. "However, the lord of the house at that time abandoned the construction halfway through."
"Why?" Zerav asked, a subtle frown tugging at his brows.
"It's simple..."
Silas paused in his tracks, bringing his right hand up to rest flat against the damp stone wall.
A quiet, humming vibration rippled through the rock under his palm. Deep within the masonry, ancient channels carved into the walls suddenly flared to life. Small, embedded mana crystals—began to glow with a faint, bioluminescent blue light, the illumination spreading sequentially down the passage like a string of awakening stars.
"A secluded chamber, far from prying eyes and virtually impossible to detect..." Silas whispered, his voice so relaxed and conversational it sent a cold, instinctual shiver straight down the spine. "...proved to be a better hiding place to keep and torture thier slaves for fun."
The darkness retreated instantly, exposing the end of the corridor and the iron-reinforced chamber built into the cavern floor.
Confronted by the sudden blue radiance, the figure in the center of the room stirred.
It was a woman, brutally broken and stripped of all her former stature. Her wrists were bound high above her head by thick, cold-iron mana chains anchored deep into the stone ceiling, forcing her to remain suspended on her knees. Her clothes—once the refined, immaculately tailored attire of a high-ranking noble liaison—were reduced to shredded, blood-soaked rags. Dark, crusted blood stained her collarbones and chest, evidence of prolonged, systematic agony.
Her head hung low toward her chest, her matted hair veiling her face. Her eyes, wide and glassy, stared blankly at the stone floor beneath her, completely devoid of light—the eyes of a soul standing on the absolute precipice of shattered sanity.
"Wake up," Silas said softly.
At the sound of his voice, a violent tremor ran through Mrs. Grey's body. The dull, lifeless look in her pupils flickered as a tiny, desperate spark of awareness returned to her. Slowly, agonizingly, she strained her neck to lift her head, her sunken eyes meeting the cold, blood-red gaze of the Grandmaster standing before her.
The moment her eyes locked onto Silas, she shivered violently, her chains rattling against the iron ceiling mounts in a frantic, metallic rhythm. Yet, she uttered no plea, no scream, and no demand. She simply stared, paralyzed by sheer, terror.
Zerav stepped up beside Silas, his expression remaining perfectly stoic despite the thick, metallic stench of iron and blood that hit his nostrils.
"It seems our guest here does not particularly enjoy our hospitality," Silas observed, stepping closer to her. "She attempted to kill herself entirely by biting down violently on her own tongue."
Silas tilted his head, observing her swollen, bloodied jaw. "From the looks of things, you must have tried it a few more times after I left earlier today, haven't you, Mrs. Grey?"
Zerav raised his gaze slightly, noticing a slow, rhythmic sound echoing from above.
*Drip.*
*Drip.*
*Drip.*
Single, crystalline droplets of liquid fell continuously from a small, refined conduit carved into the ceiling directly above Mrs. Grey, landing squarely on the crown of her head and trickling down her face.
Noticing Zerav's eyes on the ceiling, Silas offered a soft explanation. "In order to ensure she does not succeed in ending her own life before I extract every last piece of useful intelligence from her mind, I have redirected a refined stream of the garden's fountain water directly onto her. The liquid provides just enough hydration to keep her from dying of thirst, while each drop that strikes her flesh triggers a localized wave of rapid cellular regeneration."
Silas bent down slightly, bringing his face inches away from Mrs. Grey's trembling eyes.
"Except," Silas added, his voice dropping into a sinister whisper, "the healing property only repairs the physical tissue. It does absolutely nothing to negate the lingering pain."
Zerav stared at the tortured woman, then turned his gaze back to Silas, his mind piecing together the timeline. "How were you able to secure her in the first place? I saw her being taken into custody by the Bureau's heavy escort unit with my own eyes. Was that entire transport an illusion you cast?"
"No," Silas replied smoothly, straightening his posture. "What you saw was entirely real. However, during her transport toward the Bureau's regional headquarters, the heavily armed convoy encountered an unexpected, lethal ambush. The entire escort team perished to a man."
Silas paused, a cold, mocking glint flashing in his eyes. "The attack was carried out with such ruthless efficiency that the Bureau's internal investigators believe the assault was launched by Genix loyalists attempting to retrieve her."
Zerav's eyes narrowed slightly. "And when you say 'believed to be Genix'... you mean *you*."
"Precisely," Silas admitted without a shred of hesitation.
Zerav let out a low breath, processing the sheer, multi-layered deception. The entire slaughter of the Bureau's transport squad had been orchestrated by Silas to frame Genix. By making the Bureau believe that Genix had launched a high-risk operation to silence or rescue Mrs. Grey, the Bureau's highest investigative branches would immediately channel all their manpower and resources into hunting down Genix.
Because the Bureau took the murder of an entire specialized squad as an unforgivable declaration of war, they would stop at nothing to eliminate Genix—all while Genix remained completely oblivious as to why the Bureau was suddenly hunting them with such unprecedented ferocity.
Silas had seamlessly pitted two massive, dangerous organizations against each other, turning them into blind weapons that served his own hidden agenda.
"Hmm," Zerav muttered to himself, his eyebrows pulling together. "And yet... no public alerts have been raised. There are no wanted posters, no lockdown notices in the surrounding sectors. Nothing."
"Of course not," Silas explained, stepping back toward the center of the chamber. "An event of that magnitude—an entire Bureau strike team wiped out on open roads—instills absolute panic among the public. The Bureau will do what it has always done best: suppress the incident, bury the evidence, and hunt their enemies in the dark. And since Genix has no idea that Mrs. Grey was taken by a third party, they are now permanently trapped in a war they didn't even realize they started."
Zerav looked at Silas, a dark sense of admiration warring with sheer disgust within his chest. The genius behind the strategy was terrifying. Every move, every death, every piece of information was calculated to produce maximum chaos while keeping Silas completely invisible in the center of the storm.
Yet, as Zerav tried to map out the board in his mind, he felt completely lost. After framing Genix, breaking Lyra's dormant bloodline, binding her life force to an Animus Doll, and keeping Mrs. Grey trapped beneath the estate... what was the ultimate destination? The more Zerav tried to unravel Silas's overarching objective, the further away the truth seemed to drift.
Zerav turned his head to look back down at Mrs. Grey.
Here was a woman who, only weeks ago, had carried herself with immense arrogance, wielding authority and political leverage like a sword. Now, she was reduced to a broken, blood-soaked prisoner in a forgotten subterranean cellar, chained like a feral beast beneath the soil.
Zerav felt no pity for her. She had chosen her path, made her gambles, and lost. But as he stood in the cool blue light of the ancient torture chamber, looking at the man standing beside him, Zerav knew one thing for certain:
He would do whatever it took to ensure he never ended up on the receiving end of Silas's grand scheme.