Chapter 177 The Cruel Truth
Chapter 177 The Cruel Truth
"You really think throwing on some dirty clothes and squeezing out a few tears would fool me?"
Leo stared down at the woman writhing in agony on the floor. Deep within his dark eyes, a flash of sorrow and desolation flickered—carefully hidden, but unmistakable.
The truth was, from the moment Marcel told him Talia had been imprisoned for twenty-five years, Leo had already guessed the ending.
The real Talia was almost certainly long dead.
Monsters like The Evernight Order and the Black Dragon Society didn't keep useless baggage around for a quarter century.
Still, when he'd first heard the name 'Talia'—when he'd learned this girl had been dragged into hell because of her elders' mistakes—Leo couldn't help thinking of Lily. His late best friend Luke's little sister.
Another innocent girl targeted by demons.
He'd hoped—God, how he'd hoped—that just once, the world might deliver a miracle.
That this girl named Talia might be like Lily. That she'd make it to the light at the end of the tunnel.
That at least Marcel's niece could be saved.
But no.
Reality was always cruel.
In this man-eating underworld, miracles didn't exist.
"Reaper! Please, spare me!"
Seeing her cover completely blown, the fake Talia ignored the screaming pain from her shattered arm and crawled toward Leo on her knees, kowtowing frantically as her life depended on it—which it did.
"I was forced into this! I'm just a Black Dragon Society operative following orders! Please don't kill me!"
"When did the real Talia die?" Leo's voice was arctic—a judgment handed down from the depths of hell itself.
"In... in the tenth year of her imprisonment..."
The fake Talia trembled violently, her teeth chattering. "She couldn't take the endless blood draws and the darkness anymore. When the guards weren't watching, she... she bit through her own tongue and bled out..."
"The higher-ups were afraid Marcel would lose it if he found out—that he'd destroy all the Project Genesis data—so... so they had me get plastic surgery to look like Talia. Every year at the same time, I'd call Marcel with a voice modulator to let him know she was 'okay'..."
She suddenly jerked her head up, as if grabbing a lifeline, and shrieked hysterically:
"Reaper! You can't kill me! I have critical intelligence! Top-secret information! Spare my life, and I'll tell you everything!"
Leo lit a cigar, holding it between his fingers, and regarded her with complete indifference. "Talk."
"Project Genesis... It's not just the Fujiwara Group and The Evernight Order!"
The fake Talia's eyes went wide. Fighting for her life, she spilled everything. "It's the Japanese Emperor! The Imperial Family is deeply involved behind the scenes! They're the Black Dragon Society's biggest backer and financier! They want to use gene-fusion technology to achieve immortality—to restore the absolute divine-right rule they had before World War II!"
"If you let me live, I can take you to—"
The deafening gunshot cut her pleading short.
A bullet hole appeared dead center in her forehead.
Her corpse toppled backward, eyes frozen wide in disbelief, and crashed onto the cold, damp floor.
Leo holstered his smoking large-caliber pistol without expression.
"The Japanese Imperial Family?"
Leo exhaled a thick plume of smoke. It curled upward in the dim cell, obscuring his face—cold and godlike in its severity.
"I don't care if it's corporate conglomerates or some so-called Emperor."
"If they're reaching this far, then I'll go to Tokyo myself and burn down their Imperial Palace—along with that worthless Emperor."
He turned and strode out of the hellish prison that had buried countless sins, his boots splashing through the blood on the floor.
Outside, the wind howled and snow fell.
---
Morning. Paris's leaden sky remained overcast, cold rain drizzling down as if trying to wash away the city's sins.
On a private runway at Charles de Gaulle Airport, a jet-black Gulfstream tore through the thick clouds and landed smoothly.
The cabin door opened. A blast of frigid air rushed in.
Leo, draped in a custom black trench coat and a half-smoked cigar clamped between his teeth, descended the stairs with measured steps.
Olivia, who'd been waiting below, immediately stepped forward and draped a dry coat over Leo's shoulders while quietly reporting:
"Boss, the scene at the Belgian monastery has been completely sanitized. Shadow Team's cleaners did a thorough job. All the bodies' wounds and ballistic evidence have been altered. Belgian authorities will only see an extremely brutal turf war between international gangs. Nothing leads back to us."
Leo exhaled a thick cloud of smoke. His dark eyes remained utterly calm. He simply nodded.
"You all head back to the hotel and stand by."
With that, Leo walked directly toward the black Maybach parked at the edge of the tarmac, opened the door, and climbed into the driver's seat alone.
The engine gave a low growl. The black vehicle sped away from the airport, racing toward the outskirts of Paris.
---
In the cream-colored cottage on the outskirts.
The living room atmosphere was suffocating.
The air reeked of bitter coffee and restless anxiety.
Marcel sat on the couch, hands wringing together violently.
Yuna approached with a cup of warm milk, gently wrapping an arm around her father's trembling shoulders. Her eyes reddened. "Father, don't worry too much. Reaper promised. He'll bring Talia back safely..."
"Yes... He's Reaper..." Marcel muttered as if clinging to a lifeline, but his wildly pounding heart refused to settle.
Twenty-five years of captivity!
He couldn't bear to imagine what his poor niece would look like when rescued—how emaciated, how broken.
Just then, the low rumble of an engine shutting off came from outside.
"He's here!"
Marcel bolted upright from the couch like he'd been shocked, not even bothering with his slippers as he stumbled toward the entryway and threw open the door.
Outside, cold rain drifted on the wind.
Leo stood beneath the portico like a statue, his trench coat soaked through.
Those fathomless eyes no longer held their usual arrogance or violence. Instead, they carried something heavy—something that made the heart ache.
Marcel's hopeful gaze darted past Leo's broad shoulders, desperately searching behind him.
But there was nothing. Just endless cold rain. No one.
"Mr. Ashford..."
The color drained from Marcel's face in an instant. His lips trembled. "Where's Talia... where's my Talia? Is she in the car... is she too hurt to walk? I'll carry her..."
Leo looked at the nearly shattered old man before him. The cigar in his hand flickered.
He didn't sugarcoat it. He didn't use gentle words. In the face of brutal truth, any embellishment would be meaningless.
"Marcel."
Leo's low, gravelly voice cut through the portico, each word a knife to the heart. "Stop looking. The real Talia couldn't take the torture anymore. In the tenth year of her imprisonment, she bit through her own tongue and died."
"No... that's impossible... it can't be!!!"
Marcel collapsed onto the cold floor, a wail tearing from his throat—the death cry of a wounded animal. "They let me hear her voice every year! They said she was alive! They lied to me! AHHHHH!!!"
"That was a female operative they'd surgically altered to look like Talia."
Leo closed his eyes, hiding the sorrow beneath. "They only kept up the charade to control you. To keep you as their obedient dog."
"I hate myself! I'm a coward! I'm worthless!"
Marcel completely broke down. He slammed his head against the floor, pounding his chest with his fists.
"I killed her! If I'd fought back twenty-five years ago—if I hadn't been such a coward—she wouldn't have suffered for ten years in that hellhole! How much pain she must've been in when she bit through her tongue... my Talia!!!"
"Father!"
Yuna threw her arms around Marcel, tears streaming down like a broken dam. "Father, don't do this! This isn't your fault! Those monsters are to blame! They're the ones who deserve to die!"
Watching the father and daughter weep together, Leo's fists slowly clenched inside his coat pockets. His knuckles cracked.
He crouched down slowly, his rough hand resting on Marcel's trembling shoulder.
"Crying won't solve anything."
"Your niece's blood won't be spilled in vain. I promise you—I'll make the entire Black Dragon Society and every member of The Evernight Order pay in the most brutal way possible. They owe a blood debt. I'll collect it. One life at a time."
Hearing Leo's words, a venomous flame of hatred reignited in Marcel's hollow, despairing eyes.
Trembling, he pushed Yuna aside and wiped his tears roughly with his bloodstained sleeve.
"You're right... she can't have died for nothing..."
Marcel staggered to his feet and stumbled up to his second-floor study, opening the safe hidden behind a bookshelf.
When he came back down, he was carrying a heavy black metal briefcase.
"Mr. Ashford."
Marcel solemnly placed the briefcase in Leo's hands. His clouded eyes burned with a do-or-die resolve. "Inside this... is all of Etienne's original experimental data, the Black Dragon Society's global sleeper cell network, and a complete list of every Evernight Order executive involved in Project Genesis. For twenty-five years, I've guarded this with my life. Waiting for today."
Leo accepted the heavy briefcase. His stern face seemed shrouded in a layer of eternal frost.
"Good."
Leo turned and strode into the rain, his voice like a death knell tolling.
"Now, it's time to settle accounts."