Chapter 3:
"Paris, huh..." Magnus muttered under his breath, eyes fixed on the glowing glass walls of Charles de Gaulle Airport. "It's been a while."
He stood still for a moment, watching crowds pass: businessmen wheeling briefcases, tourists fumbling maps, lovers parting ways. Life moved around him like a flowing river, but his thoughts ran deep beneath the surface, cold and dark as the Seine at midnight.
Paris was beautiful. But beauty often hid rot.
Magnus walked forward, his steps unhurried, hands in the pockets of his tailored coat. But then he paused. His name was written boldly on a whiteboard held by a man in a black suit.
Magnus Reinhart.
The man looked average: dark hair, neatly parted, sunglasses despite being indoors. His expression unreadable. A blank wall with a smile painted on it.
Magnus approached him without a word.
"Allow me to carry your bag, sir," the man said politely, lifting a gloved hand.
Magnus handed it over without resistance, but his mind sharpened like a blade pulled from its sheath. He hadn't told anyone he was coming. The Reinharts had deliberately left this mission to him alone. No backup. No interference.
So who had sent this man?
"Right this way, sir," the stranger said, turning on his heel.
Magnus followed, observing with a predator's eye. The man walked too smoothly. His posture was stiff, proud, military-grade. His footsteps were near silent. He didn't look back even once.
Definitely an assassin, Magnus concluded. But not elite. His movements lacked Atticus's weight. His discipline felt... trained, not lived. Like a dog that had learned tricks, not a wolf that had learned to hunt.
Uncle Atticus had taught Magnus how to kill and vanish before he turned thirteen. Recognizing assassins was second nature by now. It was in the way they held their shoulders, the way their eyes moved without moving, the way they breathed through their noses to stay quiet.
The man opened the back door of a sleek black Mercedes-Benz, the kind that whispered class and danger. Magnus studied it. Everything told a story, from the tire brand to the sheen of the polish.
Old habits kicked in. His mafia days weren't just gunfire and politics. They were car snatching, smuggling, stash hiding. Every car was a potential vault or a death trap.
This one? Clean.
He nodded subtly and stepped inside. The man placed the bag in the trunk and took the driver's seat.
"Where are we heading?" Magnus asked, his gaze out the window.
"To your hotel, sir," the man replied, tone flat and professional.
Magnus didn't respond. He leaned back, closed his eyes, and let the hum of the road carry his thoughts. In silence, he calculated possibilities, enemies, alliances. The tension in his shoulders never left. It was an old friend now, a weight he had carried so long he forgot what it felt like to set it down.
Hours later, the car slowed.
He opened his eyes.
They were parked before a towering, glass-and-gold hotel. Modern. Expensive. Definitely not random. The kind of place where rich men hid their sins behind marble and velvet.
"We've arrived, sir," the man said, stepping out to open the door.
Magnus emerged, adjusting his coat. His eyes scanned the building instinctively: security cams, blind spots, exits. All logged. His grandfather had taught him this. Titus had made him stand in front of buildings for hours, memorizing every detail, every weakness. "A building is a body," the old man had said. "Learn its bones. Then you can break them."
Inside, crystal chandeliers gleamed overhead and velvet-lined furniture filled the lobby. Workers moved about politely. A bellboy took the car keys. The man who had escorted Magnus handed his bag to another porter, then followed him toward the front desk.
But Magnus stopped in the middle of the hotel hallway.
And smiled.
To the average eye, this was just a luxury hotel.
But Magnus? He saw everything.
The receptionist was too alert. Her fingers hovered over the keyboard like a pianist waiting for the conductor's cue. That waiter walked like a trained combatant, his tray perfectly balanced because his core was iron. One of the cleaning ladies had a military stance beneath her humble smile, her knees slightly bent, ready to spring.
Assassins.
Dozens.
And a few mafia agents, sprinkled in like salt on a wound.
So... this wasn't family who sent him here.
This was something else.
This was war.
The man returned with a room key and silently led him to the elevator, then down a hall. He unlocked the door and stepped aside.
Magnus entered, slowly.
The room was vast: marble floors, high ceilings, and sheer windows with a view of the city. A queen-sized bed. A large flatscreen. A bathroom to the side.
But no cameras.
No bugs.
No eyes.
Perfect.
He dropped his bag beside the bed and shut the door behind him. Then he began his ritual.
First, he swept the room for any hidden lenses. Nothing.
Then he unzipped the bag.
At the top: clothes. Ordinary. Bland. The kind of thing a businessman would wear to a meeting he didn't care about.
But hidden within?
Thirty sharpened throwing knives.
Two polished daggers.
Two disassembled pistols.
Silencers.
Ammo wrapped in socks.
Smoke pellets hidden in a rolled-up tie.
He laid them out in precise rows like a painter prepping his brushes. Each blade caught the light and threw it back, sharp and hungry. Each bullet was a promise. He ran his thumb along the edge of a knife, feeling the bite of the metal, and something in his chest loosened. These were his friends. These never lied. These never betrayed.
Then, from the inner pocket of his suit, he drew out something more... personal.
A half-smiling, half-sad mask, two-toned. One side blood red. The other, storm gray.
He stared at it for a long moment.
His fingers traced the edge where red met gray, the seam like a scar across a face that wasn't there. He remembered the night he had made it, sitting alone in a safehouse at sixteen, his hands shaking from the cold and the fear and the thing he had just done. He had carved it from leather stolen from a dead man's coat. He had painted it with blood and ash. It was ugly. It was beautiful. It was him.
"Looks like you'll be getting to work sooner than expected," he whispered.
This mask was no mere disguise. It was his identity on the battlefield. His armor. His shadow. The part of him that didn't feel pain, didn't feel doubt, didn't feel the weight of every life he had taken. When he wore it, he wasn't Magnus Reinhart, the boy who watched his parents burn. He was something else. Something colder. Something that could finish what others started.
He placed it carefully beside the weapons and looked toward the window, where the city lights of Paris shimmered like stars waiting to fall. Each light was a life. Each light was a lie. And somewhere in that glow, someone was waiting for him. Someone had set this trap. Someone thought they could cage a Reinhart.
Alone in a foreign city. Surrounded. Outnumbered.
But not outplayed.
Because Magnus Reinhart didn't start wars.
He finished them. And this one...
He had it in the bag