Across Avalon, screens blinked to black, one by one. A ripple of static shattered routine—cutting through offices, taverns, homes, and shopfronts alike. Workers paused mid-keystroke. Families glanced up from dinner tables. Adventurers halted tankards mid-air. A sea of confusion swept across the realm. Grumbles followed. Some shook their orbs in irritation, muttering about how they'd only just replaced them.
Then, silence.
And the screen returned.
A figure emerged—young, pale as moonlight filtered through torn curtains. Black hair fell messily over amber eyes that seemed to stare beyond the glass, reaching into the very souls of those who watched. In a matter of moments, he was everywhere. In the lounges of noble estates. In the living rooms of crowded flats. In the common halls of care homes. In every pub, every post, every bastion still clinging to the illusion of order.
A beat passed before the man spoke.
"People of Avalon," he said. "First, allow me to apologize for the interruption. Whether you're sharing a warm meal, enjoying a quiet evening with family, or simply escaping into the lull of mindless entertainment... I do not take this lightly."
His eyes narrowed slightly.
"You may wonder who I am. Some call me a scoundrel. Trash. Monster. Murderer." He paused, letting the weight of the words settle. "But for those unfamiliar, you may know me as Asriel Valerian."
"To those who are familiar, they called me the Terror of Death."
A murmur broke across Avalon. In taverns, glances were exchanged. In homes, jaws tightened. Some scoffed and dismissed him as a lunatic. Others leaned forward, curiosity piqued. A few simply stared, silent and unmoving.
"Twelve years ago," Asriel continued, "I was accused, charged, and convicted of a crime by the Clock Tower. A crime I did not commit. A crime they orchestrated—crafted to bury a truth that would have brought their empire crumbling down."
"I was their scapegoat. One of many before me. And many since."
Then, the blow struck.
"All of this—came at the order of Lamar Burgess, Director of the Clock Tower himself."
Gasps broke through the quiet. Cynical smirks curled lips. Eyes narrowed. The audacity. The madness. To name him.
Asriel tilted his head slightly. "I can hear you now. Whispering. Disbelieving. The gall of a criminal to smear a decorated hero—the most exalted man in Avalon. Accusing the very institution built to protect us."
A pause.
The silence returned, taut and waiting.
"But I would not stand before you tonight if I did not possess the truth to back every word."
Asriel drew a steady breath, the weight of what came next pressing down on every syllable. "Lamar Burgess stands accused of countless crimes. Murder, abuse of power, corruption..." he said. "But none as heinous. None as damning—as genocide."
Across Avalon, the murmurs intensified. In the alleys and estates, in taverns and temples, on balconies and bunkhouses, the people stirred. Elves whispered in ancient dialects. Orcs clenched their tankards tighter. Humans muttered half-sentences, unsure if they had heard correctly. Thoughts clashed, voices rose, old suspicions awakened.
"If we were to shine a light on every crime etched into the man's name," Asriel continued, "we would be here until the end of days. But every trail, every foul deed, every ruined life—leads back to the original sin."
He let the words hang. The room, the realm, held its breath. "The most abhorrent of them all... the Dah'Tan Incident."
Some among the younger audience blinked in confusion. The term meant little to them. Another line in a dusty textbook, another forgotten chapter. But for the elders, the veterans, the survivors. The name alone chilled the blood. Memories they had long buried clawed their way to the surface.
"Despite the casualties," Asriel went on, slower now, "despite the thousands killed, the city burned, the families displaced... Lamar Burgess emerged as a hero. His name was praised, his deeds glorified."
He let the silence fester a heartbeat longer before the blade dropped. "But what if I told you… he was the one who orchestrated it all?"
Gasps.
Genuine, unfiltered, involuntary.
Shock rippled like a shockwave through Avalon. Mothers clasped their children closer. Soldiers straightened in their chairs.
And still, the broadcast played on.
"I know what you're thinking. That such an accusation sounds outrageous—ludicrous, even. No reasonable person would believe a claim so bold, so damning."
Asriel's gaze dropped for a moment, his expression darkening before he looked up once more, eyes fixed on the lens as though boring into the soul of the world itself. "And you'd be right to doubt it."
"Twelve years ago, an elven man named Keenah Seh'Lai, a senior Auditor for the Clock Tower, uncovered the truth. He spent years building a case against Lamar Burgess—a case that, if exposed, would have brought the Tower to its knees." His words hardened. "Before he could go public, Keenah and his entire family were murdered."
Asriel gave a bitter scoff. "And yet, despite the blood they spilled… they never found what they were looking for. Not for lack of trying, mind you. After my arrest, they tore Keenah's home apart. Room by room, wall by wall. Every crate, every letter, every friend he had a conversation with, they investigated. They hunted down every lead, pulled every thread."
"But they came up empty. As expected, Burgess, in his arrogance, dismissed it. Chalked it up to a ghost chase, convinced himself the evidence had never existed. He returned to his seat atop the Tower, safe and satisfied."
Another pause. "But nothing stays buried forever."
His eyes seemed to burn through the screen. "The only reason they never found the evidence… is because, before he died, Keenah entrusted it to me. He knew they were closing in—he felt the breath of the wolves at his door. And still, some part of him held onto hope. Hope that the Tower, for all its cruelty, wouldn't cross that final line. That they wouldn't resort to such barbarism."
Asriel's expression darkened. "But he prepared for the worst. And when that day came, when they butchered him and his family to silence the truth… he had already made sure that truth would live on in me."
"Back then, I didn't understand his fear. I didn't grasp the full weight of what he had uncovered. But I do now. But words… words alone are fleeting things," Asriel said. "They can be twisted, broken, repackaged into lies, or dismissed as delusion. Spoken by saints or devils, they weigh nothing on their own."
He let the silence stretch a moment longer.
"In the end, a man's word is always met with doubt—suspicion, even. No matter his intent, no matter what his truth, belief is rarely granted freely."
He straightened.
"So, I won't ask for your belief. I'll let this speak for itself."
A flick of his hand.
"Here it is… the truth."
****
Sirens howled through the crumbling facility, their shrill wail echoing off the cold, metallic walls as crimson warning lights spilled across steel corridors in rhythmic pulses, casting long shadows that trembled with each passing second. The catwalks trembled under the stampede of boots, the clang of metal on metal swallowed by the cacophony of screams and fractured cries that filled the air like smoke.
In the city of Dah'Tan, order had collapsed, swallowed whole by the slow and inevitable spread of panic, which now threaded its way through every street and alley, every home and high-rise, until it wrapped itself around the very breath of those who once believed themselves safe. Families clung to one another in desperation, fleeing toward the edges of the city where evacuation routes had been hastily opened, though even the officers issuing commands knew how pointless it was.
This chaos was not born of accident or misfortune. It was the culmination of years of planning—of quiet meetings, smuggled blueprints, and smothered rage—crafted by McGrath and the broken souls who followed him. For them, this was more than revenge. It was a message carved into the concrete bones of the city, a final stand to prove that the discarded, the ones used and abandoned by the very machine they once fought for, were not forgotten relics of some faraway war. They were men of flesh and blood, wounded in body and spirit, and they had come to reclaim the voice history tried to silence.
Once, they had been soldiers—veterans of a foreign conflict that had swallowed half a decade of their lives in a place most citizens had only seen on filtered news reports. They returned to a country that had no place for them, to streets that no longer felt like home. Their sacrifices were not met with parades or medals, but with cold stares and whispered apologies. Many had buried comrades whose names would never be etched into memorials. Others had left parts of themselves behind—legs, arms, eyes, and hope. What remained was a fractured brotherhood, bound not by duty, but by the ache of betrayal.
Standing at the heart of the facility beneath the towering reactor core, McGrath stared upward, his expression unreadable beneath the dim red light. Light armor clung to his frame, dulled by age and wear, half-hidden beneath a long brown duster that brushed the tops of his boots. His face bore the weight of everything he'd lost: a ragged scar carved down the left side, beginning above his brow and slicing through his blind eye before vanishing into the bristled edge of his beard, where a patch of hair no longer grew.
His short, coarse black curls thinned toward the top, revealing a retreating hairline that added years to an already battle-worn face. He cleared his throat with a gravelly cough and spat onto the grated floor, the sound swallowed by the hum of the reactor above.
His family was gone. A wife and son vanished to the outskirts of Avalon, their departure a wound deeper than any blade could deliver. His command—the high offices and cold bureaucrats who once saluted his name—had left him to rot, offering no support, no recompense, not even a word of thanks. He had not been the only one. His entire platoon had been left to drown in the aftermath, their service quietly erased from records, their pain swept beneath the rug of politics and peace treaties.
As his gaze swept across the faces around him, hardened and weathered by the same bitter history, he counted barely a dozen still standing. The others had fallen during the opening assault, their lives traded for the breach they now occupied. And yet McGrath held no regret. Their blood would not be spilled in vain. Not this time.
"Everything's in place, Captain," came a voice beside him—steady, gruff, and laced with the weariness of a man who had seen more battles than he could count, and earned little more than scars and silence for his trouble. The speaker stood tall, his posture rigid from decades of hardened service, a man who had marched through foreign soil with nothing but duty to guide him. "We're just waiting on word from the Council."
McGrath didn't look at him at first. He stood there, arms folded across his chest, eyes still fixed on the thrum of the reactor above as the glow bathed his scarred face in red. "Good," he muttered. "Soon enough, justice will be served, and our fallen will sleep easier for it."
The man beside him shifted slightly, boots scraping against steel. "You really think they'll give in?" he asked. "The Council's not known for bending. If anything, they've already had the Tower send in their best. Wouldn't put it past those bastards."
"I'm counting on it," McGrath replied, lowering his gaze to the pulsing red button embedded in the control panel before him. "But as long as we hold the city in our grasp, those decrepit old cowards won't dare risk a direct assault. Not without burning their own hands."
A sharp metallic clang echoed through the chamber, halting every thought, every breath. All eyes turned instantly, drawn to the sound of boots slamming against the upper catwalk, followed by the flash of motion as a figure dropped from above and landed with a solid thud. A wand gleamed in his hand, already raised.
The man was mid to late thirties at most—with short-cropped brown hair and matching eyes, both sharp and smiling. Light armor clung to his wiry frame, and confidence rolled off him like heat from a forge. He grinned as he straightened, lowering his wand only slightly.
"Hello there," he said, tone far too casual for the tension in the room.
A dozen wands snapped up in an instant, crackling with restrained energy, until McGrath raised his hand. "Stand down," he ordered without taking his eyes off the newcomer. His words were steel, quiet but absolute. "He's with us."
There was a moment of hesitation, then the wands lowered, one by one. The man stepped forward, his smirk still in place as he crossed the floor.
"Cutting it bloody close, aren't we, McGrath?" he said.
McGrath turned to face him fully now, jaw clenched. "You said there'd be no resistance, Lamar. I lost men getting here. Good men. You don't get to smile your way past that."
Lamar's grin faded. His gaze hardened as he stopped a few paces away. "Spare me the sob story," he snapped. "We're soldiers. Every last one of us knows what this costs. And before you start sounding ungrateful, remember this—none of this would've been possible without me. I got you through the gates. I gave you the routes, the codes, the timing. Without me, you'd have been cut down at the front door long before you even saw the city skyline."
McGrath stared at him for a long, cold moment, the red light casting deep shadows across his face.
"I know what you've done," he said quietly. "Just make sure it was worth the price."
"That," Lamar said, "depends entirely on you."
He didn't look at McGrath as he spoke. His eyes remained fixed on the reactor core. The pulsing light danced across the metallic surface, reflected in the calm calculation behind his gaze.
"You know," he continued, fingers brushing lightly over the control panel, "back at the Tower, we planned for any number of threats. Weapons of mass destruction. An undead siege, summoned by some mad necromancer. Even the possibility of an incursion by eldritch horrors from the beyond. We had protocols. Contingencies. Containment measures."
His palm pressed flat against the steel surface, the warmth of the reactor humming beneath his skin, subtle but alive—like a heartbeat trapped within metal.
"But never," he went on, "did we think the greatest threat would come from something so bloody... ordinary." He turned slightly, just enough to glance at McGrath over his shoulder. "Lacrima. The cornerstone of our entire civilization. Every inch of progress in the last century, powered by the stuff. Keeps the trains running, the wards humming, the skies above us clean. And yet, this miracle. This gift of the gods—is also the one thing that could burn the entire world down if we ever lost control of it."
McGrath's jaw tightened. "Aye," he said. "The Institute's discovery turned the tide of the war. Drove the savages back across the wastes. I've seen what Lacrima can do when it's harnessed with purpose... and when it's used without restraint."
He fell silent then, the weight of that truth settling between them.
"Indeed," Lamar replied, a faint smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. "I'll be sure to keep that in mind... when I'm made Director."
McGrath's head turned sharply, one brow lifting. "What are you—"
A sudden flash of emerald light seared through the air, painting the metallic walls with a sickly green glow. The man beside McGrath stiffened, eyes wide in a silent gasp, before collapsing to the floor in a lifeless heap. No final words. No warning. Just a thud.
McGrath's blood turned to ice. Slowly, mechanically, he turned his head toward Lamar, who now stood with wand raised, lips curled into a maddened grin. For a moment, time seemed to hesitate—then came the explosion of fury.
Shouts erupted around the chamber, cries of betrayal, panic, rage. Wands were drawn, the air charged with energy as streaks of neon light erupted in every direction. But Lamar was already moving. He danced between the spells like a phantom, gliding through the chaos with inhuman speed. His wand cut through the air, each flick precise, each flash of green a death sentence. One after another, McGrath's men fell—no time to scream, no chance to fight back. Their eyes remained open, frozen in shock, breaths stolen mid-gasp.
Lamar surged forward like a storm, disarming one man with a brutal strike to the wrist before flipping him over and sending a killing curse point-blank into his chest. Another turned to flee—Lamar's spell caught him in the back, crumpling him instantly. There was no mercy. No hesitation.
"Expelliarmus!"
A blast of red light burst across the room, slamming into Lamar's wand and knocking it from his grip. He staggered for the briefest moment, stunned—but it didn't last.
McGrath was already preparing his next spell when Lamar rushed him. He moved like a blur, arm sweeping back as he reached for the weapon slung across his back. There was a sharp metallic whine as the blade unfolded with mechanical precision.
Too fast.
Before McGrath could react, the blade sang through the air and severed his wand hand clean at the wrist. The detached hand hit the floor, still clutching the wand as McGrath let out a raw, guttural scream. A second strike followed, cleaving through his leg just above the knee.
He collapsed, writhing in agony as blood poured from his ruined limbs, pooling rapidly around him.
Lamar stood over him, the weapon folding back into its compact form with a series of metallic clicks before sliding into place behind his shoulder. He stared down at the broken man at his feet with a smirk of theatrical disdain.
"So this," he said coolly, "is all the infamous Bloodbath McGrath has left to offer? Honestly, I expected more. And here Wilhelm spoke of you with such reverence. Seems he was wrong."
McGrath gritted his teeth, eyes glassy from pain, rage bubbling beneath the surface. "You backstabbing son of a whore," he snarled. "You betrayed us!"
Lamar raised a finger and waggled it in mock chastisement. "Tut tut. You betrayed Avalon. You betrayed the Council, and you betrayed the Tower," he replied with calm, venomous clarity. "You and your band of washed-up, bitter old killers, playing at revolution. You should've stayed in the dirt where you belonged. But no—you chose to rise. You chose to threaten the world with genocide."
He clicked his tongue, looking around at the bodies. "All these lives. All that fire. All that destruction. What a tragedy. What a waste."
McGrath coughed, pain flaring with every breath. "What the hell are you talking about?" he rasped as the blood beneath him thickened into a growing puddle.
Lamar knelt beside him, just far enough to stay out of the spreading crimson.
"Oh, come now. Did you honestly think I helped you out of some misplaced sense of kinship? That I believed in your righteous little cause?" He leaned in slightly, the smirk growing wider, more twisted. "Let me spell it out for you, Captain—I used you. You and your lot. And like the obedient little pawns you are, you danced to my tune the moment I dangled purpose in front of your broken pride."
Lamar rose with unhurried ease, brushing imaginary dust from the front of his coat, the gesture casual—almost theatrical.
"You see," he began, "I've always been a man of ambition. Always have. Once I set my sights on something, I pursue it with everything I've got—relentlessly, unapologetically. Doesn't matter how noble the cause appears, or how vile the path becomes. Because in the end, you and I both know something most refuse to admit…"
He glanced down at McGrath, then smiled faintly.
"History doesn't remember the method. Only the result. In fact, some of Avalon's most revered champions. Men immortalized in marble, names etched into the spires of the Tower, committed unspeakable atrocities to get there. And yet, the world looks the other way, so long as the story ends in glory."
His eyes narrowed, the mask of civility slipping just enough to reveal the bitterness beneath.
"For too long, I've been shackled by cowards and clerks. People whose only talent lies in obstructing progress, who cling to their seats not out of merit, but out of fear of those more capable." His lip curled slightly, disdain etched into every word. "So, you can imagine my delight, Captain, when I stumbled upon the perfect storm."
He began to pace slowly, hands clasped behind his back. "You and your broken comrades. So desperate for retribution, so hungry to be heard. You were the ideal spark. All I had to do was feed the flame. I gave you direction, a purpose, a cause to rally around. And in turn, you tore through every blockade in my way."
Lamar chuckled, the sound sharp and humorless. "The rest, well... the rest practically wrote itself." He came to a stop, turned his head slightly, and gave a small, satisfied shrug. "And now?"
He rolled his shoulders, shaking his head with mock regret. "The board is cleared." His gaze returned to McGrath, flat and final. "Thank you for your service."
Lamar strode toward the control panel with measured steps, his boots clanging against the steel floor. He stopped just short of the glowing red button, its pulsing light reflecting off his coat like a heartbeat waiting to flatline.
McGrath's breath caught. His eyes widened with dawning horror. "W-What are you doing?" he rasped. "Wait—don't. If you press that, the reactor'll go into Overdrive. You'll trigger a cascade. The explosion alone will level Dah'Tan!"
Lamar turned his head, slowly, like a man indulging in the final act of theatre. His gaze settled on McGrath with a glimmer of satisfaction.
"Oh, my dear Captain," he said smoothly, "I'm counting on it."
Without hesitation, he slammed his fist down on the button.
The response was immediate. Sirens shrieked through the chamber, deafening and shrill. Dials jerked violently to the right. Warning lights strobed as the word DANGER began flashing in harsh red across every display.
McGrath writhed, desperation overtaking his pain. "You're mad! You damned lunatic! All those lives—every man, woman, and child—you'll have their blood on your hands!"
But Lamar merely smirked. "No, no. Your hands, Captain McGrath," he said. "When I'm done with the press, the world will know exactly who orchestrated this atrocity. You and your men. Violent insurgents, relics of a forgotten war—will be cast as the villains of this tale. And I? I shall be the survivor. The witness. The tragic hero who tried to stop you."
He reached into his coat and withdrew a small, cube-shaped device, its surface humming softly with pale blue light. McGrath's eyes locked on it, his throat tightening.
"A Portkey…" he whispered. "You planned this. You planned it from the very beginning."
Lamar gave a soft chuckle. "Of course I did. Do you think I'd leave something of this scale to chance?"
He turned back toward the reactor, the sirens wailing behind him like a funeral choir.
"And now," he continued, giving an exaggerated, theatrical bow, "the curtain falls on a rather spectacular performance. When the ashes settle over what remains of Dah'Tan, your name will be struck from every archive, every roll, every stone. Forgotten by the world you tried to remind of your existence."
He paused, then added with an air of quiet mockery, "Well, not entirely forgotten. I shall remember you. The foolish little man who cleared my path to the top."
The Portkey cube in his hand began to glow, light swirling across its edges with increasing intensity.
"Farewell, Captain," Lamar said, turning to him one last time. "Do give my regards to whatever demon rules the Hell you're bound for."
With a crack of light and a flash that briefly drowned out the reactor's glow, Lamar vanished.
"Burgess!" McGrath roared, his voice echoing through the chamber like a dying curse—just before the reactor core burst in a searing white light.
The screen flickered. Then cut to static.
****
Every soul across Avalon fell into stunned silence.
From the hearths of quiet homes to the boisterous taverns, from the precincts where enforcers watched with grim faces to the grand halls of the Clock Tower itself. No place was spared the weight of that broadcast. Screens flickered in every corner of the realm, casting the same horrifying footage across eyes wide with disbelief and mouths left wordless. Breath caught in throats. Hearts stopped mid-beat. In those frozen seconds, it was as if all of Avalon stood still, its very spirit locked in stunned, collective silence.
Then, the image shifted. The screen returned to Asriel's face.
"Now you know the truth," he said evenly, his voice carrying the steady gravity of a man who had waited years to be heard. "Burgess' plan was nearly perfect. He counted on the Overdrive to destroy every trace of his betrayal—believed that no evidence would survive. And in truth, almost nothing did."
He leaned forward, shadows shifting across his face.
"But what he failed to account for was this—months before the incident, the factory's storage facilities had been relocated deep underground, sealed behind reinforced barriers designed to withstand even the most catastrophic fallout. What should've been vaporized endured."
He paused, letting the silence settle once more.
"Why, then, did it take so long for the truth to surface?" His gaze sharpened. "Because the residual magic at ground zero made it impossible for anyone to get near. The air was thick with lethal arcane radiation. No living soul could step within a mile of the ruins. It took nearly a decade before the levels fell to something even remotely safe."
He drew in a breath.
"And it was then... Keenah recovered the surveillance footage."
His eyes lowered.
"This is what Burgess killed for," he said, quieter now. "Keenah. His wife. His two youngest children. My Tala…"
He looked up again, his eyes narrowing into the lens.
"And me."
Gasps rose from those watching, and the silence broke into hushed murmurs. Names were whispered. Questions traded like currency in the dark.
Asriel continued. "Twelve years ago, I was being transported to Revel's End. But I escaped. For weeks, I ran with the Tower breathing down my neck. Lamar spared no effort—every agent, every hound, all sent to drag me back or leave me dead."
"Eventually, they caught me." He paused. "It happened in a cave. That's where my story should've ended. And in a way... it did."
His hand rose, fingers curling into the air—and with a sudden rush of heat, a black claymore materialized in his grasp. The blade was veined with threads of molten fire, pulsing like a living thing.
"But it was in that cave that I was reborn," he said. "I forged a pact. With Nemesis, with the Sword of Damocles—and in return, I was given life. Not just to survive… but to make the wrong things right."
The weapon dissolved in his palm, vanishing into smoke and glowing ash.
"Over the years, I—" He caught himself, then corrected with measured resolve. "We. We have hunted Lamar's inner circle. His most loyal agents. The ones who flourished in his shadow, committing atrocities without consequence."
The air thickened with quiet fury. "One by one, we've made them face what they so long escaped." A pause. "And now, we come for the one who started it all."
It was then that three more figures emerged from the shadows behind Asriel—one a broad-shouldered dwarf, another an elven woman with hair bound in braids and eyes like sharpened ice, and the third an orc built like a siege engine, arms folded across a scarred chest. They stood in silence, flanking him, their expressions unflinching, resolute. Not soldiers. Not insurgents. Executioners with cause.
"Rules," Asriel began, "and consequences—concepts that Lamar Burgess, and the rot he's allowed to fester within the Tower, have long abandoned. They prey on the weak in broad daylight, draped in the illusion of legitimacy, hiding behind badges and banners while their corruption spreads unchecked. For too long, we've been shackled by laws meant to protect us. Laws twisted into chains by the very institutions sworn to uphold them."
His tone darkened.
"To the survivors of Dah'Tan. To those who lost everything beneath the heel of a man who saw you as nothing more than fuel for his climb to absolute power—this message is for you. And to those who endured his brutality at the Canterlot Insurrection… the blood he spilled, the homes he razed, the lives he shattered… it all leads here."
His voice rose.
"The serpent who sits atop the Tower can no longer hide behind eloquence and ceremony. No more polished speeches. No more clever lies. No more allies to shield him. The truth is laid bare, and with it, so is his guilt."
He let the words hang, then continued.
"As for you, Avalon… the time has come to choose."
The silence that followed was heavy, expectant.
"Will you cling to the illusions he fed you, year after year? Will you let yourselves believe you're safe, when in truth you're chained. Slaves in gilded cells, ruled by fear and dressed in the trappings of order?"
He shook his head slowly.
"Even now, I'm certain his agents are racing to silence this. Armored. Armed. Blood in their eyes. They'll try to erase our words, to bury what we've shown you. But it's too late." He looked to the three behind him, then back to the screen. "We've said our part. The truth has been spoken."
Asriel drew a breath, steady and final.
"And as for you, Burgess… this is where it ends. No more lies. No more bureaucracy. No more immunity. No more politics."
A pause.
"It's time to give the devil his due."
His eyes narrowed, the weight of a promise behind them.
"And we're here to collect."
With one final flicker, the screen faded to black. Leaving only the weight of what had been revealed.
****
The sharp sound of shattering glass rang out through the office, clean and final. The crystal tumbler slipped from Lamar's hand and crashed against the polished wooden floor, bursting into jagged fragments that scattered in all directions. Whiskey seeped outward in a spreading stain, amber liquid glistening under the low light, while the ball of ice spun in place for a moment before coming to a quiet, lifeless stop.
Lamar stood frozen, his eyes wide and unblinking, drained of color. His jaw hung slightly open, but no words came. His entire body seemed gripped by a numb stillness, broken only by the faint tremble starting in his knees. A storm of emotion surged within him. Shock, disbelief, dread. All crashing together into a sickening chill that clawed its way down his spine, coiling deep into his gut.
The air felt heavier with each second. Reality, once distant and controllable, was now pressing down on him with unrelenting force. He could feel the weight of it—the truth laid bare, the lies unraveled, and the mask he had worn for years now reduced to ash.
There was no escaping it. No spin, no speech, no shadow thick enough to hide behind now.
The truth had been revealed.
And all of Avalon had seen the true face of Lamar Burgess.