Chapter 82 The Bloodline Awakens

Chapter 82 The Bloodline Awakens
The Vance Academy was not a typical Swiss boarding school. It was a huge, fortified architectural wonder, cut into the cold, inhospitable cliffs of the Alps. It was the place where the most highly trained, lethal future lieutenants of the Vance Syndicate were trained.

The very safest fortress on earth was, however, tonight, silently and completely broken through.

With Julian I was in the underground war room of our mountain chateau. My repaired heart beat a cold, pure beat. Ten miles from the academy, we were watching the live tactical feed on the large glass monitors.

"The academy's digital grid simply flickered," Julian growled darkly, his massive hands gripping the edge of the tactical table. The fearsome dictator of the underworld leaned over the screen, his pitch-black eyes narrowing with unyielding paranoia. Avoid the Void Network's sleeper virus?

"No," I whispered perfectly, my icy-blue eyes following the green status lines. No malware; the cameras aren't being hacked; they are being physically and systematically bypassed. Someone is in the perimeter.

Also, our fifteen-year-old son made the same grim decision 10 miles away, deep inside the high-tech, reinforced server room at the Vance Academy.

He didn't panic. He was seated in the ergonomic command chair with his immaculate dark sweater unruffled. His long fingers danced across the encrypted keyboard at supersonic speed.

Our son's voice crackled perfectly over the secure comms with an absolute, terrifying intellect. "I have a ghost on the grid, Papa. He's not using a digital scrambler; he's going completely off the network, using the absolute blind spots of the thermal cameras. It's an old infiltration trick: "He's using an old infiltration tactic, an absolute blind spot of the thermal cameras; he's not using a digital scrambler.

“Do you think you could follow him, my prince?" I asked smoothly.

My son replied, a cold, cruel smile on his lips, "I don't need digital eyes to hunt in the dark." He discarded all the video feeds and weaponized the localized acoustic sensors at the academy. He walks with a heavy, disciplined step under a stealth cloak, plate armor under his cloak; he just broke the roof of the East Wing.

Our son pressed his earpiece to change to a local tactical channel. The target is on the East Wing roof, little queen. He is armed with heavy steel. Intercept and execute.

The blizzard was raging furiously over the snow-covered courtyard below, which was already frozen.

Heavy, reinforced glass doors on the roof of the East Wing violently blew open.

Our daughter went outside in the blinding storm. She wasn't wearing her academy uniform. She wore sleek, custom-made, pitch-black tactical gear, with the heavy Vance signet glinting on her glove. Her pitch-black eyes blazed a feral hellfire, a total reflection of her father's soul.

The ghost was standing 30 feet away, completely covered in the cold snow.

He dressed in heavy dark robes and ancient spiked armor and had a mask of steel with no features on his face. He was a true relic of the old world, a living member of the Sovereign Order, who had been taught the devastating combat techniques of the Praetorian Shadows, which were lost to the world.

Slowly he withdrew a huge, sharp broadsword, heavy steel clanging noisily in the alpine breeze, lethal and sharp.

You are trespassing on Vance Ice," said our daughter in a tone of coldness and world-ending arrogance.

She didn't draw a gun. She bent down and pulled out her thick, dual tactical combat blades.

The Praetorian assassin rushed at him. He swam at a speed that was so fast it was almost silent, and he swung the enormous broadsword at her in a downward arc, severing her in two.

Our daughter didn’t retreat. She, you know, just exploded into motion. 

It was one of those breathtaking, brutal masterpieces of close-quarters blade choreography, like her body kind of remembered some old rhythm. She entirely weaponized the flawless kinetic agility of my Olympic legacy but also the brute physical slaughter vibe of the Ice King, all mashed together like it was meant to be. 

She dropped her hips perfectly, sliding across that freezing slick roof, completely ducking beneath the lethal broadsword like it was nothing, like danger could be negotiated. 

Channeling that explosive rotational velocity of a quadruple jump, she spun violently on her heel, bringing her twin blades down in a hard crash against the assassin’s heavy armor, sparks everywhere, blinding little flashes. 

The assassin staggered back, entirely shocked, like the force of it didn’t belong in a fifteen-year-old girl at all. 

“His favoring his right side, Queen,” our son’s voice echoed calmly in her ear. He said it like he was commenting on the weather, absolute genius, tracking the acoustic micro tremors of the fight from the server room. “Shatter his stance.” 

“Flawless,” she breathed darkly, like the word was a blade of its own. 

The assassin recovered, and then he brought the broadsword down in this massive crushing vertical strike. 

She didn’t block it. Not even a little. She fully redirected his kinetic momentum. She caught the flat of his blade with her crossed twin swords, twisting her wrists with brutal, flawless efficiency, wrenching the heavy weapon off its trajectory. The broadsword smashed into the concrete roof, harmless, just loud. 

In the exact same microsecond, she drove her heavy tactical boot brutally into the side of his right knee. 

A sickening, deafening crack echoed over the howling blizzard. 

The Praetorian assassin roared in agony, his massive frame collapsing onto the freezing roof. 

She didn’t hesitate. She stepped directly over his fallen body, raising her twin combat blades to completely, entirely sever his throat. 

But no, he was a fanatic. With a desperate, feral surge of survival, he reached into his heavy robes and violently hurled a cluster of ancient, blinding flash-powder into her face. 

The magnesium burned with the intensity of a dying star. Our daughter flinched back, her vision totally whited out for exactly two seconds. 

By the time the flash faded and her pitch-black eyes refocused, the roof was entirely empty. The assassin had vaulted over the edge, completely vanishing into the blinding alpine blizzard. 

She lowered her twin blades, chest heaving, the freezing snow settling on her dark hair. She didn’t look defeated, no. She looked absolutely, terrifyingly thrilled, like she’d been waiting. 

She walked over to where the assassin had fallen. On the frost-covered concrete there was this single heavy object he had dropped during the fight. 

She picked it up and held it to the lens of her tactical body camera, transmitting the image directly to the subterranean war room. 

It was an ancient black gold coin. But the symbol wasn’t the closed eye of the Sovereign Order. It was a completely new terrifying insignia, a shattered crown weeping blood. 

In the war room, Julian Vance’s massive hands violently crushed the edges of the tactical table. 

“They survived the Pantheon,” Julian growled darkly, a deeply unhinged lethal hellfire swallowing his pitch-black eyes. “Cassius left a remnant. A new ancient bloodline.” 

I looked at the bloody coin on the monitor, my repaired heart beating with that cold, unyielding power of the Mafia Consort. I didn’t feel fear, not really. I felt that absolute, intoxicating rush of the ultimate hunt. 

“They didn’t come to kill her, Julian,” I whispered flawlessly. “They came to test the heirs; they wanted to see if the new kings bleed.” 

I leaned over the console, pressing the comms link to our children. 

“Return to the chateau, my prince, little queen," I commanded, securely, with this dark, terrifyingly beautiful smile curving my lips. 

“The ancient world wants a second war. And we are going to completely, absolutely slaughter them all over again.”