Chapter 212: Keep This Hidden

"You two are now officially under my direct banner, which means from this moment forward, you answer exclusively to me and me alone... Your primary duties are to quietly gather high-level intelligence, report back to me immediately upon discovery, and remain on constant standby whenever I issue a summons. Can the two of you execute those orders without fail?"

?"Yes, Master!!" ℴ

?"Yes, absolutely!! I honestly despised my previous criminal line of work anyway!"

?The two surviving underground bosses nodded their heads vigorously, eager to cement their new status.

?"Tomorrow morning, your forces will serve as the secondary line of defense if the monstrous horde manages to breach the inner perimeter of the city. Ensure that civilian casualties in the Third District are kept to an absolute minimum." Asher instructed coldly, before pivoting his head toward the terrified rabble of surviving members huddled outside the shattered gates:

?"As for those rebellious cowards who dared to stand against me—slaughter every last one of them without exception. Seize and consolidate all the resources and assets left behind by the three previous faction bosses. Allocate exactly half of those reclaimed funds to help the homeless of the Third District, and invest the remaining half into rapidly increasing your own organizational strength."

?"....?!"

?The stunned members outside the gate froze in blind panic. Before they could even pivot on their heels to flee into the alleys, the two newly sworn powerful members instantly blurred forward, drawing their weapons with lethal intent.

?"Understood, Master!"

?"Hear that, girls?! Eradicate the entire lot of them!" The female boss, shrieked with bloodthirsty enthusiasm.

?"All forces—attack!!!"

?In a heartbeat, the open courtyard outside the compound dissolved into absolute, chaotic violence as a merciless slaughter swept across the remaining thugs.

?"Master, before you depart... Should we change the name of this territory?" The male boss asked cautiously, bowing his head.

?"There is no need for that. ’No Man’s Land’ remains a fitting title." Asher replied flatly, his senses instantly detected a surge of powerful auras rapidly approaching their sector:

?"Keep this firmly etched in your minds: I am the absolute head of the fifth Ancient Family—the House of Aetheldawn. You must treat every single member of my family with the exact same supreme deference you afford to me. However, absolutely no one outside this inner circle must ever discover that you operate under the Aetheldawn banner. When the appropriate moment arrives, the world will learn the truth; for now, your sole focus is surviving the apocalypse tomorrow."

?Two blank, unadorned tokens materialized out of thin air, hurtling through the breeze. The two bosses caught them instinctively out of the palm-height air:

?"If a catastrophic emergency arises that exceeds your control, channel your internal spirit energy directly into those tokens, and I will instantly perceive the signal." He instructed.

?Before they could utter another syllable, a surge of dark shadows violently surged upward from the asphalt beneath his boots, swallowing his frame whole. The next microsecond, Asher vanished completely from existence as if he had never stood there at all.

?"Yes, Master," They whispered in unison, staring down in quiet awe at the plain, uncarved metal tokens resting in their palms.

__

?[Five Minutes Later.]

?VOOOOM!!

?A massive, armored convoy of vehicles screeched to a halt outside the ruined estate. Marianne vaulted out of the lead transport, fully outfitted in her radiant, Divine-Tier White Armor with her razor-sharp, red-sheathed sword clutched tightly in her right hand.

?"What in the world happened out here?!! Explain this carnage immediately!" She demanded, her voice dripping with hostile killing intent as she swept her eyes across the fresh corpses littering the blood-soaked courtyard.

?"It was merely a localized, minor faction territorial dispute... Nothing of consequence." She walked out smoothly through the iron gates, flanked by her elite female members, making calculated maneuvers to avoid stepping in the pools of fresh blood.

?"Lady Griselda Blanco... What is the precise meaning of this massacre?!" Marianne pointed a gauntleted finger accusingly toward the pile of bodies.

?"I told you, it is nothing serious—just a routine purge between competing factions." Griselda replied coolly, turning her gaze toward the bodies with manufactured indifference.

?"If Guild Leader Marianne finds the sight of these corpses offensive to her refined sensibilities, I can easily dispose of them." Griselda casually snapped her fingers. Instantly, roaring geysers of white-hot flames erupted from the cobblestones, completely consuming the bodies. Within seconds, every corpse was reduced to fine grey ash, leaving behind not even a fragment of bone.

?".....?!"

?Marianne raised an eyebrow in cautious skepticism. While she herself was an elite SSS-Rank Warrior, Griselda was a notoriously volatile SSS-Rank Attack Mage specializing in fire; engaging in an all-out, destructive turf war with her right now was strategically idiotic—especially when an apocalyptic army of monsters was already marching toward their doorstep.

?"Why the sudden, unprovoked hostility, Guild Leader? You and the high-tier guilds have never once given a single damn about what happens down here in the lawless slums, so why crawl out of your pristine sanctuary today?" Griselda challenged, a sharp, critical frown deepening across her face as she thought inwardly:

?’My Master is willingly distributing millions in capital to uplift the wretched and homeless of this district, while arrogant hypocrites like you simply ignored our existence for decades... and now you dare march in here demanding answers?’

?Marianne narrowed her eyes, letting out a long, weary exhale of breath: "We came here because our perimeter sensors picked up a massive, highly irregular spike of dark energy... An intense, corrupted demonic aura."

?"That would simply be the former Blood Guild Leader finally losing his remaining sanity and triggering a demonic backlash before we put him down." The male boss chimed in smoothly, stepping up beside Griselda.

?Marianne snapped her sharp gaze toward the man:

?’Huh? Two rival regional underbosses standing side-by-side in active cooperation?! Rumor always held that the lords loathed each other’s guts, which was precisely why No Man’s Land was permanently fractured into five distinct, warring sectors... Something deeply abnormal is unfolding here.’ Marianne thought to herself, recalling the intelligence report she had skimmed earlier that afternoon:

?’Did the Blood Guild finally push things too far with their power experiments and manage to provoke a joint coalition between these two rival factions?’ She let out a silent mental sigh:

?’Regardless, pursuing this further right now is a logistical dead-end; we simply lack the time, especially when our relationship with them has always hovered around armed neutrality... What an unbearable headache.’

?She spun sharply on her heel:

?’I don’t have a single second to waste playing detective out here—the city walls must be reinforced before dawn... As for these two opportunists.’ She threw a cold glance over her shoulder:

?"Very well. I will accept your explanation, but I expect absolute quiet from this sector moving forward. The entire city is on the precipice of an apocalyptic siege; we cannot afford any internal turf wars or factional conflict whatsoever. Do you clearly understand the gravity of that order?"

?"But of course, Guild Leader Marianne." The two underground lords replied smoothly, hiding identical, knowing smirks behind polite bows.

?Marianne stared at them piercingly for a few lingering seconds, moved her heel, climbed back into her transport vehicle with her members, and ordered the convoy to speed away into the gathering dusk.

?"Phew... Thank the heavens she bought that excuse; I honestly didn’t have the strength to face her in a fight." Griselda muttered, exhaling a massive sigh of relief as the dust settled.

?"Marianne only holds a superficial advantage due to her high-tier divine gear, and abilities; trying to fight her would have been suicidal." The male boss nodded in agreement, lifting his chin to stare up at the darkening, starless sky:

?"Now then... We should probably sit down and calculate how we intend to divide all these newly acquired territories and assets. Between the Blood Guild’s vaults and our own expansion, we are rich."

?"Yes, you make a valid point." She agreed with a sharp grin.

__

?Several miles away, suspended invisibly high in mid-air above the neon-lit sprawl of the Third District, Asher stood silently on the wind currents, observing the scene below:

?"Brawling and scheming among themselves, completely oblivious to the fact that they all answer to my command." He murmured quietly. Asher shifted his golden gaze in the direction of Marianne retreating convoy:

?"While integrating our newly seized assets under the family name would certainly accelerate the public reputation, it also inevitably paints a massive, glowing target on our backs... It functions precisely as a double-edged sword. For the foreseeable future, I will keep this network strictly classified, cultivating them into my own private, hidden shadow army." He concluded. ℓ.

?{DING!!}

"Huh?"