The Stellan night was ablaze with dazzling neon and brilliant lights.
Inside a VIP private room at the Elysium Club, several young men of noble status were gathered for drinks.
Dressed in designer clothes with a prominent logo on his chest, the slick and overly groomed Shaun Adler had his arm around Serena Sherwood. He lazily teased, "That sister of yours is too ignorant. Don't worry, Serena, I'll teach her a lesson for you."
Shaun came from the wealthy Adler Family. He possessed an innate, insufferable arrogance, and his tone carried a coldness fitting of his status. Four years Serena's senior, he had grown up alongside her; they were childhood sweethearts. Their families were of equal standing, and the public naturally assumed they were a couple. They had both signed with the Grant Family's Elysian World entertainment company, playing up their rich-kid personas. Fans hailed them as the golden couple of high society, and many avidly shipped the "Shaurena" pairing. Shaun, in particular, was thriving in the entertainment industry and was already a massive pop star with a huge following.
Serena's eyes flickered as she snuggled closer into Shaun's embrace. She huffed coquettishly. "Milo, my sister just came from the countryside. It's her first time seeing the prosperity of Stellan. She's just blinded by this glamorous world, which is why she's acting a little greedy."
Shaun's smile was playful. "There's no great crime in a girl being a bit vain."
Serena pursed her lips, a calculating gleam flashing in her eyes. "When you meet her, Milo, please help me talk some sense into her. An inexperienced girl suddenly entering a wealthy family can easily stray down the wrong path. As her older sister, I can't bear to watch her ruin herself."
A man sitting on the adjacent sofa turned his head and let out a low chuckle, his expression unreadable. He had ordinary features and a lean build, looking refined and composed in his light-colored casual wear. He was shuffling a deck of cards with dazzling speed, giving him a somewhat mysterious aura in the dim lighting.
"Young Master Kendrick, give it a try," a few nearby rich kids urged, playing along.
With a slight flick of his fingers, the man sent the cards flying toward a target one by one. The sharp corners of the playing cards pierced the board like razor-sharp blades. Thunderous applause erupted across the room as the rich kids took turns showering him with flattery.
"Young Master Kendrick's card skills are absolutely incredible! You couldn't find a second person in all of Stellan who can do that."
"Of course. Our Young Master Kendrick is exceptionally gifted—"
"Why even compare him to Stellan? Young Master Kendrick is from Valerium! I bet none of the wealthy heirs in all of Valerium possess his skills."
Xavier Kendrick paused his shuffling. He held up a single card, aiming it right at the head of the rich kid who had just spoken. Leaning back and carelessly stretching out his long legs clad in black trousers, he warned, "If you don't know how to speak properly, shut your mouth. Don't go looking for trouble."
The rich kid froze. It wasn't until someone nudged his shoulder that he snapped back to reality. He quickly offered an apologetic smile. "Young Master Kendrick, I've had a bit too much to drink and had a slip of the tongue. Please don't take offense."
Exuding a cold, oppressive aura, Xavier casually bent a leg and looked up with a sneer. "Get out, all of you. Don't let me see you next time." A ruthless, dark gleam flashed in the depths of his eyes—so profound and icy that it sent shivers down their spines.
The rich kids exchanged dismayed glances, filled with regret. Their attempts at flattery had entirely backfired. They hastily apologized and left the private room in disgrace.
"What's wrong, Zane? Why the explosive temper?" Shaun looked up at him, asking with keen interest.
"Never mind me. You're a big star who isn't out filming, but instead you're here plotting to trouble a little girl. Don't you have too much free time on your hands?" Xavier teased, raising an eyebrow at the man sitting in the corner. "Donovan, you've been dead silent all night. Are you missing your goddess? The moment the third miss of the Sherwood Family returned, she made the second miss cry out of anger. I wonder if the eldest miss will be affected."
As he spoke, a cold smile was hidden in his eyes, making him seem incredibly shrewd and impossible to read.
The man called out, Vincent Thorne, was dressed in a sharp, perfectly tailored suit. His side profile featured distinct, sharp angles, and his thin lips were pressed into a tight line—the very picture of an elite corporate CEO.
"No matter who returns to the Sherwood Family, it has nothing to do with Rosalind," he replied with a placid expression, holding a hexagonal glass and taking a sip of his brandy on the rocks.
At that moment, a waiter opened the door, wheeling in a cart to serve fresh alcohol and fruit platters.
Through the open door of the private room, Vincent caught sight of a young, slender figure. Out in the hallway, a girl with waist-length hair wore a baseball cap, the dim, soft lighting tracing her exquisite profile. As she walked past, she seemed to carry a radiant luminescence, leaving behind a fleeting moment of stunning beauty.
The glass paused at his lips. Vincent's fingers pressed slightly harder, rubbing against the rim twice. As the light shifted, the depths of the man's eyes turned as pitch-black as thick ink.
Meanwhile, inside the club manager's office.
The slightly plump middle-aged manager kept wringing his hands. A layer of greasy sweat broke out on his face as he stared nervously at the young girl sitting before him.
"Miss Iris, I have no idea what's going on with these security cameras. A massive issue popped up out of nowhere," he said. The manager was so overwhelmed by this mess that he had practically torn out handfuls of his own hair.
The massive issue was that the surveillance footage seemed genuinely paranormal. He had nearly hired a Daoist to perform an exorcism!
Three days ago, a rich kid had come in to celebrate his birthday. The group of six had ordered a case of fruit wine, along with a bottle of imported liquor worth two hundred thousand. Yet, when it came time to settle the bill, the rich kid played dirty, loudly protesting that they had never ordered such an expensive bottle.
When the floor supervisor and the shot girl argued with him, the rich kid and his crew brutally beat them up and proceeded to smash the expensive equipment in the private room. The rich kid even arrogantly threatened that if he wasn't compensated two million for mental and reputational damage, he would use his family's influence to shut the club down for good!
The club manager wasn't a pushover, however. Anyone capable of running a top-tier luxury club in Stellan naturally had some formidable backing. He had sent someone to pull the security footage from that night, fully intending to slap the evidence right in the rich kid's face.
Instead, it was his own face that got slapped!
The security tapes held absolutely no record to prove that the rich kid had ordered the two-hundred-thousand-dollar bottle. On screen, the supervisor had never retrieved the liquor, nor had the shot girl ever delivered it to their room. Throughout the entire night's footage, there was not a single trace of the imported liquor. Two of the rich kid's friends had left halfway through the night, but the cameras didn't show them taking the empty bottle with them, either.
That two-hundred-thousand-dollar bottle of liquor had simply vanished into thin air!
Iris Dalton stared at the surveillance feed on the computer monitor, slowly twirling a lock of her hair, deep in thought.
This wasn't paranormal activity; it was hacking.
"Sigh. We spent a fortune hiring several hackers, all absolute top-tier experts, but they insisted there's nothing wrong with the footage," the manager said, wiping away sweat. His tone was thick with anxiety. He knew perfectly well that the rich kid was playing tricks, yet he couldn't find a single shred of proof.
"And that young master of the Yates Family, Ethan Ellison—he called again yesterday, refusing to let the matter go. It's truly a tough pill to swallow; it's suffocating," the manager grumbled, clenching his fists.
"Don't worry. It's just a minor issue." Iris simply took a seat and began typing rapidly on the keyboard. Strings of scrolling code instantly filled the screen.
"This is an AI deception. They have some skill." A flicker of interest crossed her otherwise impassive face. The surveillance footage had been entirely overwritten and replaced by AI, which was why the evidence had disappeared out of thin air.
Iris's eyes shifted as she released a pulse of spiritual power.
An overwhelming presence instantly blanketed a five-hundred-meter radius. Not even a mosquito in the nearby park could escape her notice. Following the network cables into the virtual space, her spiritual power rapidly read the residual image fragments lingering in the cloud.
Iris narrowed her eyes.
She could clearly see the truth of what happened that night.