The two of them came to a brief halt, the night air thick around them.

  Archer gnced at Adrian, a faint hesitation in his posture.

  "Should we go through his office window?"

  Adrian's eyes followed the direction Archer suggested. His tone was measured, calm, leaving no room for doubt.

  "Now, if we do that," he said, "he will have more chances to spot us. And once he notices… the arm will be raised."

  He shifted slightly, scanning the shadowed walls and rooflines.

  "We are going through the window down the hall, the one facing his office door. From there, we will walk in through the front door."

  His words carried authority, and yet they were spoken without haste. Every sylble weighed, precise, deliberate, leaving Archer little room to question the pn.

  They moved along the edge of the roof with practiced caution, shadows stretching long beneath the dim light of the estate mps.

  Archer reached the window first, his body slipping through with silent precision. Adrian followed, his hands gripping the ledge before he dropped lightly to the floor.

  Their feet touched without a sound, the faint creak of the boards beneath them swallowed by the night.

  The interior was nearly deserted. A few scattered mps cast pools of muted light, revealing the quiet corridors and empty rooms.

  Adrian's eyes swept the space, noting the absence of staff moving through the estate. It seemed the household slept or worked only in the shadows, leaving the night eerily still.

  Adrian and Archer paused just before the office door, the polished wood gleaming faintly under the mp light. Archer's hand tightened around the handle, his movements deliberate, controlled.

  Inside, Baron Devon's muttered frustration filled the quiet room.

  "Shit… how am I going to pay Viscount Giles Ironwick?"

  The words revealed the weight pressing upon him, the unseen chains of taxation stretching beyond even his grasp. He was burdened not only by his own domain but by the demands of a higher lord, the relentless grip of a hierarchy that spared no one.

  The door creaked open.

  "Who—"

  Baron Devon barely had time to finish before the room erupted into action.

  Adrian's hands shot forward, covering the Baron's mouth with unerring speed.

  Archer pressed down, restraining him firmly against the floor.

  The Baron's eyes widened in shock, struggling against their hold, his voice muffled under Adrian's grip.

  Every movement was precise, elegant, controlled. The masks and bck clothing rendered them shadows given form, predators in the dimly lit office.

  No scream would escape. No arm would sound. The moment had passed before it had begun.

  Adrian's hand pressed firmly over the Baron's mouth, his gesture deliberate, silent—a command more than a touch. The motion spoke volumes: quiet, stillness, compliance.

  Archer leaned in, his golden eyes narrowing as they met the Baron's. His voice was a low whisper, measured and icy, brushing against the man's ear.

  "If you scream… you ensure your own death."

  The words carried the weight of inevitability, the calm menace of a predator assessing its prey. There was no anger, only certainty.

  Together, Adrian and Archer moved with coordinated precision, lifting the Baron and guiding him into the office chair behind his desk. The chair groaned faintly beneath his weight, but not a sound of struggle escaped.

  Every movement was controlled, restrained, executed with the elegance of inevitability—the prey repositioned, powerless under the predator's gaze.

  Adrian slowly withdrew his hand, maintaining a measured distance. His voice was calm, deliberate, carrying a quiet authority that filled the room.

  "I'll remove my hand now. But if you scream, we will not only kill you… but every single person within this estate."

  The Baron's eyes glinted with defiance, a futile spark against the weight of control pressing down on him.

  Adrian's hand fell away completely. Silence settled. The Baron's breath, shallow and cautious, barely disturbed the still air.

  His voice came low, almost contemptive, as if acknowledging the gravity of the moment. "Who… are you people?"

  Without hesitation, both Adrian and Archer lifted their masks, letting them rest atop their heads. Faces revealed, their expressions cold and unyielding.

  The Baron's complexion drained of color. His gaze shifted to Archer, recognition and fear intertwining. "You… you know that killing nobility without just cause… is a crime punishable by death."

  The room hung in tension, every corner absorbing the weight of inevitability, the quiet menace of two figures who had already seized control.

  Archer's hand slipped into his pocket.

  He withdrew a small vial filled with translucent liquid, holding it between his fingers so the mplight could pass through it. A faint smile curved along his lips—measured, knowing.

  "They won't investigate… unless it appears you killed yourself."

  His gaze shifted toward Adrian, lingering for a brief moment.

  The Baron followed that look. Recognition dawned.

  "Oh… you're looking for revenge. Since I struck you."

  Adrian did not respond.

  He did not blink. He did not shift. His expression remained cold, detached—untouched by the accusation.

  That silence unsettled the Baron far more than anger would have.

  Fear began to settle into his bones.

  Archer stepped closer, lowering his voice as though savoring the intimacy of the moment.

  "Choose, Devon."

  A pause.

  "Between you… or your family."

  The office felt smaller then. The mps flickered faintly, casting long shadows that seemed to lean inward.

  No raised voices. No frantic movement.

  Only a decision waiting to be made.

  Adrian finally stepped forward.

  A faint smirk rested upon his lips—unhurried, composed, almost courteous. There was no anger in his expression, no visible cruelty. Only a calm certainty that made his presence heavier than any shouted threat could have achieved. He looked directly at the Baron, and when he spoke, he made deliberate emphasis on the man's name.

  "You see, Devon…"

  The name lingered in the air, stripped of title, stripped of honor.

  "We are actually showing you respect."

  He moved slowly around the desk, fingertips brushing the polished wood as though admiring the craftsmanship rather than orchestrating a man's end. His tone remained conversational, almost reasonable.

  "We could have already id hands on you. We could have forced this."

  A pause. His smirk did not fade.

  "But if we did that… the noise would wake the estate. And if that happens, we would make this look like a bandit attack."

  His eyes did not waver. Not once.

  "We would rape your wife in every way imaginable."

  "We would kill everyone."

  "We would brand this entire pce to the ground."

  The words were spoken evenly. No rise in pitch. No flicker of hesitation. The violence was described as though it were a logistical alternative—nothing more than a path not yet chosen.

  "But we are being respectful."

  "You should take the poison. No one else has to die."

  Silence followed, thick and suffocating.

  In that instant, the Baron's world narrowed to a single unbearable decision: his life, or the lives of every soul within these walls—including his wife. The weight of it crushed whatever defiance had remained in his posture. Sweat gathered at his temple. His breathing lost its rhythm.

  Across from him stood a man whose eyes did not tremble, whose smile did not falter.

  And though it was a lie—though Adrian had no intention of sughtering innocents—he sold it with such fwless conviction that the Baron saw no deception. There was no wavering in Adrian's gaze. No crack in his composure.

  Only inevitability.

  Though Adrian did not kill, Archer did not share such restraint. If necessity demanded it, he would carry out most of the acts Adrian had described—without hesitation, without remorse.

  Archer's lips curved into something sharper than a smile. He turned slightly toward Adrian, as though revising a minor detail in an otherwise fwless pn.

  "No… let's not kill his wife."

  A quiet breath escaped him, almost thoughtful.

  "We can keep her. It would be a waste to do such a thing."

  "We may simply use her as our pything."

  The word lingered in the air like rot.

  The Baron stared at him in disbelief, watching this man discuss his wife not as a person—but as an object to be preserved for amusement. There was no fury in Archer's face. No madness. Only indulgence.

  Amusement touched both their expressions.

  The Baron's hand began to tremble. Slowly, unsteadily, he reached for the translucent vial Archer had pced upon the desk. His fingers brushed the gss. He hesitated, weighing the poison against the horror painted so vividly before him.

  Despite his greed, despite the taxes that crushed those beneath him, there remained something within the man that had not fully rotted. He would not condemn his servants. He would not condemn his soldiers. And he would not condemn his wife to the fate described so calmly.

  If his life could be exchanged for theirs—then so be it.

  He looked up at them, searching their faces for something human.

  "Is everyone's life guaranteed… if I drink this?"

  The mps flickered faintly. Their faces remained half-consumed by shadow.

  Only their eyes were clear.

  Archer's glowed gold.

  Adrian's glowed red, the white beneath the iris exposed like fractured porcein.

  Together, without pause, without discrepancy, they answered:

  "You can trust us."

  The lie hung thick in the air.

  They looked untrustworthy in every conceivable way.

  Yet conviction radiated from them with such terrifying certainty that doubt seemed irrational.

  The Baron gathered what little resolve remained within his shaking body. He lifted the vial.

  And in a single motion—

  He drank it.

  The poison did not grant him a peaceful end.

  It began subtly—his hand trembling as the vial slipped from his grasp. The gss struck the floor and shattered, the sound thin and fragile against what followed.

  His body convulsed.

  He clutched at his chest as though something inside him had ignited. Blood forced its way past his lips, spilling down his chin in thick streams. It did not stop there. It poured from his nose. It welled from his eyes. It traced dark lines from his ears.

  It was as though his insides were being boiled alive.

  Within seconds, his complexion turned ashen. Veins darkened beneath his skin. His posture twisted unnaturally, his mouth hanging open in a silent scream that no longer carried breath.

  Ten seconds.

  That was all it took.

  By the end, he looked less like a man and more like a corpse that had momentarily forgotten it was dead. The blood did not remain within him—it abandoned him. It seeped from every opening, pooling across the desk, dripping from the chair, soaking into the floorboards beneath.

  The office smelled of iron.

  Adrian watched the spectacle without flinching, though there was a faint narrowing of his eyes.

  "You did not tell me the poison does that to people."

  Archer regarded the ruin of the Baron's body with quiet satisfaction. A smile ghosted across his face, thin and lethal.

  "He was bleeding my nd dry."

  A slight tilt of his head.

  "I promised him death. I never said it would be fast."

  The final tremor passed through the Baron's body. Whatever light had remained in his eyes colpsed into nothing.