The news of Jay-jay Mariano and Keifer Watson's true identities didn't just ripple through the Great Hall; it leveled it. As the Board of Directors practically groveled at their feet, the student body remained frozen in a state of collective psychological collapse.
Author's POV
In the corner of the hall, the atmosphere was split between two worlds. On one side, Zein's inner circle—Vanessa, Mia, Jerome, Matt, and Dave—looked like they had been hit by a freight train.
"Trillionaires?" Mia whispered, her eyes darting between Jay's oversized hoodie and the deferential bows of the suited directors. "I shared my crackers with a girl who could literally buy the factory? And the country it sits in?"
Jerome rubbed his temples, his face pale. "I thought Keifer was just a moody rich kid with a god complex. I didn't realize he actually had the receipts for the godhood."
Vanessa, usually the most composed, was gripping her skirt so hard her knuckles were white. "We were protecting them. We were literally putting our lives on the line for the heirs to the global economy. I feel... I feel like I've been living in a simulation."
But on the other side of the pillar, Jay's original crew—Felix, Cin, Percy, Freya, Edrix, and Rory—stood with arms crossed, wearing matching, knowing smirks. There was no shock. There was only the smug satisfaction of the "inner circle" who had been in on the joke the entire time.
"Look at their faces," Rory chuckled, leaning against the stone. "They really thought Jay-jay was just a clumsy scholarship kid."
"To be fair," Cin added, buffing her nails, "she is clumsy. But now she's clumsy with a net worth that has twelve zeros."
Felix let out a low whistle, watching the Board scramble. "The fun is over. Now the real game begins. Once the secret is out, the vultures start circling."
Ace's POV
The weight of the world felt different now, but a more immediate weight was settling in my chest—and it wasn't metaphorical. As I watched the Board lead Keifer and Jay toward the exit, my throat began to itch.
Then it began to tighten.
I looked down at the "celebratory" hors d'oeuvres I'd mindlessly grabbed from the VIP table Zein had brought in.
Shrimp.
"Dammit," I wheezed, my hand flying to my throat. I'm deathly allergic to shellfish. In the chaos of the revelation, the kitchen staff must have mixed up the Supremo's restricted menu.
My vision began to blur. I stumbled, my knees hitting the floor.
"Ace!" Keifer's voice boomed. He was at my side in a second, his silver eyes flashing with a mix of annoyance and genuine concern.
"What happened?"
"Shrimp..." I managed to gasp, my face turning a terrifying shade of mottled red.
Keifer looked at the board members. "Get a medic! Now!" He helped me up with Percy support.
He looked at Jay and Zein, who were standing just a few feet away. "Jay, stay with Zein. Don't move from this wing. I'm taking him to the clinic. I'll be back in five minutes."
"Go, Keifer! He's turning blue!" Jay shouted, her face full of worry.
As Keifer sprinted toward the medical wing with my dead weight in his arms, I caught a glimpse of the hallway. The lights flickered. A shadow moved. But as the darkness of anaphylaxis took me, I couldn't scream a warning.
Jay-jay's POV
The hallway felt too long. Keifer had been gone for three minutes, and the silence of Hell University was starting to feel like a physical pressure against my eardrums.
"We should go back to the dorms, Jay," Zein said, her hand on her holster. "I don't like how the hallway just... quite."
"Give it a minute, Zein. Keifer said—"
Suddenly, a hand clamped over my mouth from behind. A thick, chemical smell filled my nose—chloroform. I thrashed, kicking out, but the grip was like iron.
"Don't worry, Princess," a voice hissed. "We're just taking you to a private audit."
I saw Zein spin around, her eyes widening, but she was intercepted by a tall figure wearing a mask and a familiar leather jacket. Raze? No—the movement was wrong. Too stiff.
Before I could scream, the world dissolved into a black abyss.
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My head felt like it had been put through a blender. I opened my eyes, squinting against the harsh, flickering light of a swinging bulb. I was tied to a metal chair in what looked like an abandoned warehouse on the edge of the school grounds. The air smelled of rust and damp earth.
Across from me, Zein was still slumped in a chair, her head hanging low, her hands bound behind her back with thick zip-ties.
"Finally. The Trillionaire wakes up."
I looked up. Standing there was Roxane, the "Queen" I had supposedly dethroned. The purple bruise on her cheek from Zein's slap stood out vividly against her pale skin.
Beside her stood a man in a black mask, wearing Raze's signature clothes. But he was not Raze.He's fake Raze. Behind them stood a handful of elite students, the ones who had lost the most social standing when our identities were revealed.
"Roxane," I spat, my voice raspy. "You really are an idiot, aren't you? You saw the Board of Directors bow to us. What do you think happens to you when Keifer finds this place?"
Roxane laughed, a shrill, hysterical sound. She stepped forward and grabbed my chin, forcing me to look at her. "Keifer is busy playing nursemaid to a dying Supremo. And the Board? The Board cares about money. But if you're dead, or 'missing,' that money needs a new steward. We have friends, Jay-jay. Friends who don't care about your conglomerates."
"You're pathetic," I said, leaning in despite the ropes. "You're so scared of losing your little crown in this dump that you'd risk a life sentence."
"I am the Queen of Hell University!" she screamed, her face contorting. "You're just a freak with a bank account!"
SLAP.
My head whipped to the side. The sting was instant, a hot, throbbing pain that made my vision swim.
"Don't you ever look down on me," Roxane hissed.
"Was that it?" I whispered, turning back to her, a drop of blood leaking from my lip. "My grandmother hits harder than that, Roxane. Is that all the 'Queen' has?"
Zein's POV
The slap was the alarm clock I needed.
The adrenaline surged, cutting through the fog of the sedative. I didn't open my eyes. I felt the zip-ties. Cheap. Standard grade.
They didn't know I'd spent my summers training with tactical extraction teams.
I shifted my wrists, tensing the muscles until the plastic bit into my skin, then snapped them with a sharp, muffled crack of focused strength.
"Hey, Bitch," I muttered, my voice low and dangerous.
Roxane froze, turning toward me. "You're awake? Good. I wanted you to watch while I—"
I didn't let her finish. I launched myself from the chair, the momentum carrying me forward. I wasn't just fighting; I was venting weeks of suppressed rage.
I hit the first student guard with a double-palm strike to the solar plexus, hearing the air leave his lungs in a sickening wheeze. I didn't stop.
I spun, my leg connecting with the Fake Raze's jaw. His mask flew off, revealing some nameless senior.
"Brutal," Jay whispered from the chair.
I grabbed Roxane by the hair, slamming her face into the metal table. "You touched her," I growled, my voice sounding like grinding stones. I delivered a knee to her midsection, then a spinning back-kick that sent her flying into a stack of wooden crates.
I was a whirlwind of precision and violence. Two more guards rushed me. I ducked a swing, grabbed a stray piece of rebar from the floor, and swept their legs out.
As they hit the ground, I didn't hesitate—I brought the metal down on their shins. The sound of breaking bone filled the warehouse.
I was moving toward Jay to untie her when a shadow loomed behind me.
CRACK.
A heavy wooden beam descended on my shoulder and back. The world tilted. The pain was white-hot, radiating through my spine. I fell to one knee, my breath hitching.
"Zein",I heard Jay.
"Stay down, bitch," the Fake Raze snarled, holding the splintered wood. He raised it for a finishing blow.
Keifer's POV
The clinic was a blur. I'd shoved the EpiPen into Ace's thigh myself when the nurse fumbled.
"Stay with him," I barked at the medic. I looked at the empty hallway. My gut twisted. Jay.
I didn't go to the guards. I went to the only people who knew the real Jay-jay.
I found them in the courtyard: Cin, Felix, Edrix, Rory, Freya, and Percy. They were already geared up.
Felix held a tablet, his fingers flying across the screen.
"I planted a tracker in her hair tie three months ago," Felix said, not looking up. "The signal is bouncing off the old industrial sector. South-east warehouse 4B."
"Why are we standing here?" Freya snapped, checking the magazine on a sleek, black tactical crossbow.
"We aren't," I said. My voice was calm, but it was the calm of a hurricane's eye. "Jay and Zein are missing. We are going to them.Kill anyone who comes in way."
We moved through the shadows of the campus like a pack of wolves. No one saw us. No one heard us. We reached the sector-4 in record time.
Suddenly, a we a roared behind us. Ace, pale and sweating but upright, skidded to a halt. "Where are they?"
"You're supposed to rest, Ace," Percy noted.
"I'm the Supremo," Ace wheezed, his eyes bloodshot but fierce. "Nobody kidnaps my people. Let's go."
We reached the heavy steel doors of Warehouse 4B. The tracker was pinging dead center. I didn't knock. I signaled Edrix and Rory, who kicked the doors off their rusted hinges.
Author's POV
The doors hit the concrete floor with a thunderous boom that echoed through the cavernous space.
Keifer stepped into the light first, his silhouette framed by the moonlight. Behind him stood the elite circle of the Mariano and Watson empires, and Ace, the weakened but defiant Supremo.
But as they looked into the center of the room, the taunts and threats died in their throats.
They saw....
A/n
Guys excited for next chapter...
What do you think they saw..
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