Chapter 260: Breaking In

Johnathan let the silence hold for a moment before he spoke again.

"We believed the great devil was dead." His voice was cold and measured, carrying easily through the still hall. "But it seems the heavens haven't forgotten their people. The devil was left alive so that we may exact our revenge personally." He paused, letting that land. "And now that chance is here."

The screen behind him changed.

The licensing photo of Adam disappeared, replaced by something far more detailed. Aerial imagery. Ground-level shots. Structural layouts. Every angle of Eden's manor estate laid out in a clean sequence, sourced directly from a field agent who had been doing their job quietly while the family kept its head down.

"This was gathered by one of our agents on the ground," Johnathan said. "We have full details on how to strike. Their weak points. Their defence system and how to breach it." He reached into his coat and drew out a white totem. It was shaped like an angel, carved with precise and deliberate craft, unmistakably powerful even from a distance. "And with this we will slay the great devil."

He raised it above his head.

"The Faraday family will receive retribution."

The hall erupted.

Back at Eden's manor, a fly drifted lazily across Adam's line of sight. He tracked it for half a second, then killed it with a clean slap, dusted off his hand, and turned his attention back to Abigail and Dickson.

They had laid everything out for him, the full picture of what the Faradays had been doing since going underground. Robbing Kelvin businesses. Sabotaging supply lines, picking them apart from the shadows one operation at a time. It was the kind of harassment designed to drain resources without ever offering a clean target to fight back against.

Adam had already worked out the solution before they finished talking.

"We set a trap," he said. "Pick one of your businesses something valuable enough that they won't be able to ignore it. When they move on it, we catch them. After that, leave the interrogation to me."

Abigail's expression shifted. The tension she had been carrying since she arrived softened just slightly, and she reached out and took his hand with both of hers. "Thank you," she said, and she meant it fully. "Your help will go a long way for the Kelvins."

She wasn't just being polite. Adam could see it in the way she carried herself, the genuine relief of someone who had just handed a problem to a person she was certain could actually solve it. With someone at Adam's level involved, someone the Kelvin elders themselves couldn't measure up to, the Faradays were already running out of road.

Adam nodded.

Then he felt it.

A death glare sharp and concentrated, cutting through the ambient energy of the garden like a blade. It wasn't aimed at him. It was aimed directly at Abigail's hand, still resting on his. It lasted only a moment before it vanished completely, pulled back before it could be noticed. Abigail hadn't felt a thing.

Adam had only caught it because of how attuned his death affinity had become. He tracked it back to its source without moving his head, his eyes shifting just slightly toward the main building.

A figure stood near the window.

Remedy?

Remedy hadn't stopped at the window on purpose.

She had simply been passing through, moving from one part of the manor to another, when her eyes caught the scene outside in the garden. Abigail's hands wrapped around Adam's. The easy closeness of it. And for just a moment, barely a fraction of a breath, something sharp moved through her chest.

It was gone almost instantly. She was already walking again before it fully registered.

But Remedy had lived countless lifetimes. She knew better than most what a single moment actually contained. For someone with her history, that brief flash of jealousy wasn't a small thing; it carried the full weight of real intent behind it, compressed into a split second. That was exactly what Adam had picked up on through his death affinity. Not a sustained feeling. Just one honest, unguarded moment.

In reality, Remedy wasn't threatened by Abigail. Not in any direction, not in looks, not in money, not in power, not in influence. The feeling had come and gone like a reflex, nothing more.

Outside, Abigail felt offended for some strange reason. She frowned slightly, then shook it off, filing it away as her imagination playing tricks on her. She turned her attention back to Adam.

"Since we have a plan in place, we'll move on it tomorrow," Adam said, keeping his tone easy. "For tonight, let me show you both to your rooms."

Abigail blinked. "Adam, no. We don't want to impose on you."

Adam smiled. "Honestly? I'm not even sure how many rooms this building has. You staying over barely registers as an inconvenience."

Abigail looked at Dickson. Dickson looked back at her with an expression that very clearly said he had no objections whatsoever. She let out a short breath and nodded.

"Alright. Thank you."

The two of them fell into step behind Adam as he turned and led them back through the garden entrance and into the manor, the door closing quietly behind them as the night settled over the grounds outside.

****

The night outside the manor gates was still.

No wind. No movement. Nothing that would catch the eye of anyone passing by. But the air itself was behaving strangely, bending at the edges, refracting the dim light in thin, almost invisible seams that a person would have to be specifically looking for to notice.

Johnathan and his operatives moved in complete silence, their camouflage armaments active and holding, each of them reduced to nothing more than a slight distortion against the dark. They had planned this carefully. Entry points mapped. Security system weaknesses identified. The estate layout memorised from the field agent's intel down to the last detail.

Johnathan reached the gate and stopped. He activated the silent communication channel running through the group's shared technique and let his voice carry through it without making a sound.

We have arrived at the great devil's domain. Tonight, the heavens will celebrate our victory.

The group held position. Johnathan raised a hand and began running through the first step of the breach sequence in his head, timing the approach against what he knew about the security rotation.

Then a voice came from directly behind them.

"What are you doing?"

Every invisible body went rigid at once. Johnathan stopped breathing. He held perfectly still, clinging to the hope that it was coincidence, that whoever had spoken was talking to someone else.

A blade of wind cut through the air.

Clean and precise. The head of the operative standing to Johnathan's left separated from his shoulders and hit the ground before the body had even registered it was falling. The distortion of the camouflage flickered wildly around the collapsing corpse as it dropped.

Adam stood a few feet back from the group, hands in his pockets, dressed like he had simply stepped outside for some air. His expression was completely relaxed.

"So," he said again. "What are you doing here?"

Adam had been mid-cultivation when he felt it.

A thread of killing intent, faint but directed, pressing against the outer edge of the manor's atmosphere. He had set his session aside without rushing, walked downstairs, stepped outside, and found exactly what his senses had flagged a group of people who thought invisible meant undetectable. The wind blade had been a simple correction.

Now he studied the group as their camouflage dropped.

Something about the souls in front of him felt familiar. He had encountered that particular signature before, he was certain of it. His eyes moved to the man at the centre of the group, the one radiating the strongest presence, the one who was clearly in charge. The familiarity was strongest there.

Johnathan deactivated his armament. His men followed. He straightened up and fixed Adam with a stare that was burning with compressed rage, his jaw set, his hands balled at his sides.

"I am Johnathan Faraday," he said, his voice shaking slightly under the weight of everything behind it. "And I have come for vengeance. For the glory of heav—"

"You're the Faradays."

Johnathan stopped. His mouth stayed open for a half-second, the rest of his prepared speech sitting undelivered. The interruption had been so flat and casual that it took him a moment to process it as an interruption at all. His eyes narrowed. He reached into his coat and closed his hand around the white totem, the weapon he had promised his people would end this tonight.

He never got it clear of his coat.

A wall of death intent slammed into him, dropping onto him like a physical weight. Johnathan's hand froze. His body refused the next command he gave it. His legs locked in place.

Adam's expression shifted. The relaxed look was still there, but something underneath it had changed. A cold edge moved into his eyes, and the corner of his mouth pulled into something that wasn't quite a smile.

"You just made my job a hundred times easier."

Johnathan's eyes went wide. The realisation hit him a half-second before the wind did.

Wind blades spread outward from Adam in a single, clean motion and Johnathan Faraday's head left his shoulders before he could draw another breath. The body dropped. The white totem hit the ground beside it, rolling to a stop in the dirt.

The rest of the Faraday operatives stood frozen, staring at what remained of their leader.