"Well, that went about as well as it could have," Ögge said with a satisfied smile as he walked back into their office. The moment everyone had entered, the door behind them disappeared completely, leaving no indication that there had ever been an entrance there in the first place. The strange office returned to its usual appearance, with the hidden nature of the room once again concealed from the outside world. For the people inside, however, the operation had been an undeniable success.
"Of course it did," the man who appeared to be the leader of the assassins replied with a confident grin. "Hopefully, this will finally lure the last rats out of their sewer." He clearly believed that the spectacle inside the Senate had accomplished exactly what they wanted it to accomplish. Their goal had never been limited to killing Luke, because the senator was merely one piece of a much larger problem. If the right people panicked after seeing Luke die, they would hopefully reveal themselves while trying to protect their own interests.
"But that was great," another man said, his pride impossible to hide. "I am interested in seeing just how much of us was actually visible on the screen." He sounded almost excited by the thought of reviewing the footage, and Ögge could hardly blame him. The entire performance had looked remarkably impressive from inside the chamber, especially when the assassins had remained hidden while manipulating the situation around them. Even Ögge had to admit that, from a purely dramatic perspective, it had looked really cool.
While the group celebrated their successful mission, the rest of the world was still struggling to understand what had just happened. A diplomat representing the European Union had walked into the United States Capitol, publicly accused the American government of incompetence, and then killed a senator in the middle of the Senate chamber. He had done so in front of cameras broadcasting the event to the world, yet the strangest part was that nobody had stopped him. By the time Ögge walked away, the audience watching the broadcast had been left too shocked to even properly react.
Inside the Senate, Senator Luke was still standing. His body had somehow remained upright despite the three daggers that had pierced him, leaving everyone who noticed him staring in disbelief. One blade had passed through his throat, while the others had struck his body in places that should have immediately brought him down. His legs finally gave out, and Luke began to collapse toward the floor as the unnatural process that had already started inside his body became visible.
Instead of simply hitting the ground, Luke's body began to dissolve into smoke. The transformation was eerily similar to what happened when corrupted creatures were reclaimed by the System, making several people inside the chamber instinctively step backward. Within moments, his entire body had vanished, leaving behind nothing but ten silver coins scattered across the floor. Alongside the coins was a single piece of paper that appeared surprisingly long, its contents still hidden from everyone watching.
For nearly a minute, nobody moved. The Senate chamber had fallen into a stunned silence as everyone tried to process the fact that an elected senator had just disappeared in front of them. Then the silence shattered all at once, and the entire chamber erupted into chaos. Senators began trying to escape the building while journalists rushed toward the paper, convinced that whatever had been left behind had to contain something important.
The guards were equally overwhelmed by the sudden disaster. Many of them were terrified that they were about to lose their jobs because they had failed to protect the people they were supposed to protect. That fear quickly disappeared, however, when some of them discovered what had happened to their fellow guards. Several were found eliminated or otherwise incapacitated in various locations around the chamber, making it painfully obvious that the people who had entered the Senate had neutralized the security detail long before anyone realized they were there.
The remaining guards were almost grateful that they had not tried to be heroes.
Among everyone attempting to escape the disaster, Charles Armstrong ran harder than almost anyone else. He was not pleased with how quickly their entire plan had collapsed, and Luke's death had turned what had once been a carefully controlled political operation into a catastrophe being broadcast to the entire world. His greatest political ally was dead, his involvement had potentially been exposed, and there was nothing he could do to undo what had already happened. Worse still, he knew that he had effectively signed his own death warrant by becoming involved with an ambassador who had been far more confident and dangerous than he had expected.
I need to get out of here, Charles thought as he hurried toward his private office. His breathing became increasingly ragged as he reached the room and immediately locked the door behind him. He did not waste time looking around, because he already knew exactly where he needed to go. Moving toward the hidden section of the office, Charles opened a concealed passage and stepped into the darkness without hesitation.
The passageway was dark, gloomy, and completely different from the polished corridors of the Capitol above. Charles descended a seemingly endless staircase, counting each step as he went deeper beneath the ground. After what felt like an eternity, he finally reached the bottom, having descended at least a thousand steps into the earth. What waited there was not a secret political meeting room or a safe escape route, but something far more horrifying.
Rows upon rows of cells stretched through the underground facility. Terrified women and children were trapped inside them, restrained and unable to escape, while strange magical formations had been carved into the stone surrounding them. Grooves in the floor connected the individual cells to a much larger magic circle, creating a network whose purpose was immediately obvious to anyone who understood the fundamentals of magical formations. The entire facility had clearly been designed for something far darker than ordinary human experimentation.
Charles looked at the people imprisoned there and immediately understood what he needed to do. "I need protection," he whispered to himself, his expression filled with desperation rather than remorse. He did not hesitate before activating the mechanism that would send their life force into the magic circle. To Charles, their lives had no value compared with his own survival, and he was willing to sacrifice anyone if doing so gave him even the smallest chance of escaping.
The reason he targeted the women and children was simple in his mind: they were easier for him to control than adult men. Their fear and desperate pleas did nothing to change his decision. Their cries for mercy and forgiveness simply became another noise that Charles forced himself to ignore as he continued with what he had decided to do. There was nothing he valued more than his own life, which was exactly why he had joined the Void in the first place.
Certainly, Charles had not joined the Void because he believed in some grand moral goal.
Within a short time, the magic circle had been supplied with enough energy to activate. Charles stood before the enormous formation as the carved lines began glowing with an unnatural light, and the air inside the chamber became heavy with mana. The sacrifice had been enough to establish a connection, and an image slowly appeared above the center of the formation. A man materialized within the magical projection, his hands folded in front of him and his expression clearly showing that he was not pleased to see Charles.
"Speak," the man said coldly. "You know that making contact without proper warning can expose everything, so you had better come with good news." His expression remained completely emotionless as he looked down at Charles through the magical communication. "Otherwise, we will simply find new politicians to support, and do not forget that we can take away your power just as easily as we gave it to you."
The contempt in his voice was obvious. He did not appear particularly concerned about Charles's situation, and the frightened politician quickly realized that begging for sympathy would accomplish nothing. Charles swallowed his fear before dropping to his knees in front of the magical projection. "Lord Eight, I have no choice but to contact you," he said desperately. "I need protection."
"Luke has just been brutally murdered on the Senate floor," Charles continued, his voice trembling as he tried to explain everything as quickly as possible. "The plans involving the secret realms have failed, and the System itself has intervened by sending troops." He lowered his head even further as he begged for assistance. "Please help me escape, Lord Eight."
For the first time, the man's expression changed.
"Wait," Lord Eight said, his previous condescending attitude disappearing immediately. "What do you mean the System has stepped in?" His eyes narrowed as he stared at Charles through the magical projection, suddenly taking the situation far more seriously. Before Charles could explain, a powerful wave of mana suddenly swept through the underground chamber.
The magic array reacted to the sudden surge of energy.
The wave passed through the chamber, revealing several figures who had been hidden near the stairwell. Three assassins appeared from their concealment, their presence becoming visible as the magical energy disrupted whatever technique they had been using to remain undetected. They stared at the chamber with expressions of disgust, clearly disturbed by what they had discovered beneath the Capitol. Their original mission had already been serious, but what they had found here had transformed it into something much more personal.
"God, I can't wait to go ham on that list," the three assassins said almost simultaneously. Their voices were filled with anger as they moved forward. Charles barely had time to react before the assassins reached him, and the terrified politician finally realized that the people he had been trying to escape from had followed him all the way underground. The hidden passage that he had believed would save him had instead led him directly into the hands of his enemies.
Charles's expression became one of pure terror as he understood what had happened. He had thought he was playing a game of hide-and-seek, but his opponents had apparently been able to find him regardless of where he ran. There was no political maneuvering left to save him and no powerful ally standing beside him. Within moments, Charles was dead, leaving the underground chamber silent except for the faint hum of the magical array.
"It seems that we need to reevaluate the danger posed by the planetary consciousness of this planet," Lord Eight said calmly. His expression had become considerably more serious after witnessing the assassins appear inside the facility. He clearly understood that the System's direct intervention changed the situation far more than Charles had realized. With those words, Lord Eight reached toward the magical projection and severed the connection.
The moment the communication was cut, the magic array began shutting down.
The women and children who had been trapped within the chamber were left behind as the energy sustaining the formation disappeared. For a brief moment, some of them managed to look toward the assassins, and their expressions carried a faint sense of relief despite everything that had happened. They had been found, and although the rescue had come too late to save them, someone had finally discovered what had been happening beneath the Capitol. Their suffering was finally coming to an end.
"Damn," one of the younger assassins muttered, his voice filled with disgust. He stared at the chamber and clenched his fists, struggling to contain his emotions beneath his mask. "I know it is necessary, but still... fuck this." The words came out quietly, but the anger behind them was obvious.
"Yes," an older assassin replied grimly. He looked around the underground facility with an expression that had lost all traces of amusement. "But as bad as this is, the more of those rats we can catch, the better." He turned toward one of the doors deeper inside the facility, a door that looked considerably more sinister than the others. "Because look at this."
The assassin opened the door.
Beyond it was a pit roughly five meters wide, although its true depth could not be determined from the entrance. The entire pit was filled almost to the rim with bones of different sizes, piled together in a silent monument to the countless people who had disappeared into the underground facility. Even the assassins, who had already seen more than enough horrors during their work, were visibly shaken by the sight. For a moment, nobody said anything.
"Let's document and report everything down here," one of the assassins finally said. His voice was grim despite the fact that his face remained hidden behind his mask. Tears were streaming down both sides of his face, however, betraying the emotions he was struggling to suppress. He wiped at them without success before looking back toward the pit. "Whatever happened here, this was not human."