novelraw Chapter 83: [83]Felix’s Escape, The Emperor’s Secret
Chapter 83: [83]Felix’s Escape, The Emperor’s Secret
Felix choked on his own saliva and coughed up a handful of digital blood. He wiped his mouth but his hands wouldn’t stop shaking.
His face twitched and his eyes glanced up to see Vahn staring back at him expressionlessly. Felix’s eyes immediately paled. He stared up at Vahn with his eyes wide in absolute terror!
He had just watched a supposed Level 1 commoner stand inside a Tier 6 dimensional rift and casually delete an Abyssal Overlord!
The political leverage and the vast wealth of the elite guilds were completely useless right now. Even his advanced armor meant nothing against a man who could rewrite the laws of physics just like that!
"You... you are a monster!" Felix stammered.
He frantically pushed himself backward with his one functional arm. He looked like a cornered beast.
"You think you have won? You think locking down this city makes you untouchable?" Felix yelled.
"Pierce Valerius commands the entire global network! He will bring the full might of the Sovereign Elite down on this pathetic sanctuary!"
Vahn heard Felix’s words but he rolled his eyes and spoke in contempt. "Pierce Valerius is a coward hiding behind a multiplier he didn’t even earn."
Vahn replied evenly and stopped just two feet away.
"He couldn’t beat me when he had an army. He certainly will not beat me now that I possess the Voidpiercer." Vahn looked down at the pathetic man. "Tell me where his primary stronghold is located Felix. Make this fast."
"I will tell you nothing!" Felix shrieked. His voice pitched into absolute hysteria.
The politician reached into the collar of his ruined armor. His trembling fingers closed around a small glowing silver pendant.
It wasn’t an Abyssal artifact. It bore the crest of the corporate elite.
It was a highly illegal and heavily encrypted emergency extraction tool designed exclusively for the Syndicate inner circle!
Sia Vance moved instantly. "Hostile action detected!" she barked.
She raised her secondary short sword and lunged forward to sever Felix’s arm before he could activate the item.
"Hold Sia." Vahn commanded softly and raised a single hand.
The Vanguard froze mid stride. Her military discipline overrode her lethal instincts. She glared at Felix but didn’t take another step.
Aria stepped up beside Vahn. Her eyes narrowed in confusion.
"Vahn what are you doing? He is trying to initiate a spatial jump!"
"If he escapes he will leak our exact defensive parameters to the Alpha!"
"I am fully aware." Vahn smiled faintly. His purple eyes tracked the surge of mana building inside the silver pendant. "Let him run."
Felix didn’t hesitate and crushed the pendant in his fist.
A chaotic tear in space ripped open directly behind the politician. It lacked the precision of Vahn’s Phase Step or the terrifying density of the Duke’s portal.
It was a desperate escape hatch that sucked the surrounding air into a vortex of swirling blue light.
The gravitational pull dragged Felix backward and lifted his body off the marble floor.
But before the portal could swallow him entirely the First Minister locked eyes with Vahn one last time.
The terror in the man’s face was momentarily replaced by a twisted and desperate vindication.
"You think you understand the hierarchy of this universe Architect?!" Felix screamed over the roaring wind of the rift.
"You think the Overlords are the true threat? Pierce is just the beginning!"
"You don’t even know whose throne you are trying to steal!"
Vahn’s expression remained perfectly neutral. However his eyes narrowed slightly at the sudden shift in the man’s tone.
"Enlighten me Felix."
"The Spire was not built for us!" Felix howled as his body went halfway through the portal.
"You think the First Emperor was just a player? You think he was human?!"
"The Emperor was never human! And when he wakes up your little lifeboat will burn!"
With a final deafening crack of displaced air the spatial tear snapped shut.
Felix vanished. He left behind nothing but the faint scent of burnt ozone and a heavy silence.
The silence stretched on from five seconds to ten seconds all the way to fifteen seconds!
"Well." Hana chimed in from the kitchen counter. She casually took a bite out of an apple.
"That was incredibly dramatic. The Emperor was never human? Does every villain in this game take a mandatory class in theatrical monologues before they escape?"
Sia lowered her sword and was clearly frustrated. "Commander I could have intercepted the extraction."
"By allowing him to flee we have compromised our operational security. The Syndicate will know our exact numbers."
"That was the objective Sia." Vahn replied calmly and turned to face his team.
The brilliant circuits of his Verdant Chronos Sight flared briefly. He analyzed the invisible data trail the escape portal had left behind in the air.
"I didn’t let him escape. I planted a tracker."
"Felix just drew a straight line directly to Pierce Valerius’s hidden bunker. He didn’t secure his safety at all. He just handed me the coordinates to the Syndicate’s core."
Aria let out a soft exasperated sigh. However a deeply fond smile tugged at her lips.
She walked over and lightly rested her hand against his arm. "You are terrifyingly manipulative when you want to be."
"But what about what he said? The First Emperor?"
Vahn’s smile faded. His gaze drifted toward the shattered windows. He looked up at the towering dark silhouette of the Chronos Spire piercing the golden sky.
The First Emperor was a legend in the game’s lore!
He was the entity who had held the absolute unbreakable record for clearing the first fifty floors of the Tower. A record Vahn had just shattered an hour ago.
Every player had assumed the Emperor was simply a beta tester or a mythic player who had mapped the early game.
’But if Felix was telling the truth...’ Vahn thought. If the Emperor was an entity native to the Galactic Arena it changed the math entirely!
"It means the Spire isn’t just a lifeboat." Vahn murmured.
The cold calculating weight of the System Administrator settled firmly over his shoulders.
"It is a prison. And the original warden is still inside."
He turned back to his team. His eyes burned with an unyielding absolute resolve. The time for defensive posturing was over!
"Hana maintain the city’s logistics. Keep the refugees calm." Vahn ordered. His tone was crisp and commanding.
"Sia and Aria prepare your gear."
"We are done waiting for the Syndicate to knock on our door. We are going to follow that data trail and rip Pierce Valerius out of his bunker to secure the Prime Seeds."
Vahn cracked his knuckles. The Mythic power hummed in his veins. "It is time to evict the Alpha."
The heavy silence that had descended upon the Sovereign Bank penthouse finally began to dissipate. It was carried away by the gentle hum of the climate control systems.
First Minister Felix was gone. He had violently torn a hole in the fabric of space time to scurry back to the Syndicate’s hidden bunker.
The faint lingering scent of burnt ozone mixed with the sweet aroma of cherry blossoms radiating from Aria’s restorative magic.
Vahn Ryker stood near the shattered floor to ceiling windows. His deep purple eyes locked onto the glowing red data trail that Felix’s escape had left suspended in the air.
To anyone else it was just an ominous streak of light fading into the smog of the city.
But to the System Administrator it was a perfectly drawn map leading straight to the heart of the enemy’s operations.
"He thinks he escaped." Vahn said softly. A warm human smile broke across his exhausted features.
He turned away from the window and looked at the three women and the tiny dragon girl who comprised his entire world.
"He thinks the Syndicate’s bunker is a fortress. He doesn’t realize he just handed me the administrative keys to their front door."
Hana hummed cheerfully from the kitchen area. She tossed a perfectly ripe system synthesized apple into the air and caught it.
"So we march right over there and kick the door down?"
"I will bring the logistics data pad. I want to personally inventory Pierce Valerius’s tears when you delete his fancy armor."
"Patience Hana." Vahn chuckled. He thoroughly enjoyed her absolute confidence in him.
He rolled his shoulders as the phantom ache of the Mythic tier energy he had channeled slowly subsided.
"Marching on the Alpha’s bunker right now would be a miscalculation."
"Pierce Valerius is a coward but he is a heavily armed coward. If he is attempting to sell Earth’s core data to the Galactic Market he is utilizing the Spire’s foundational architecture to do it."
Sia Vance stepped forward. Her massive kite shield rested comfortably on her arm.
Her silver grey eyes were sharp. She evaluated the tactical parameters of Vahn’s words.
"You mentioned the Prime Seeds Commander. Are these the mechanisms Pierce intends to use to finalize the planetary transfer?"