Ella gripped the journal and the child tighter as they raced down the chapel's side stairs, the heavy creak of armored boots echoing behind them.
A bullet shattered the stained glass above.
Elara whimpered.
Ella didn't flinch.
She grabbed the child and dived behind a fallen statue of an angel, breath held, heart pounding like a countdown.
This wasn't a movie.
This wasn't a dream.
This was a war—and she was finally at the center of it.
She used to wonder why he built a cage for her.
Now she knew.
It wasn't to imprison her.
It was to hide her.
From them.
From Project E.
From the people who had once tried to erase her bloodline—and now wanted her daughter too.
Because Elara wasn't just a child.
She was the byproduct of two bloodlines that should've never mixed.
Hart Industries' forgotten science wing.Shen Pharmaceuticals' buried trials.
Together, they created something the world didn't understand—and certain people wanted back.
No matter the cost.
It was like peeling wallpaper only to find a wall made of bones underneath.
Leon hadn't just lied.
He had built an entire life around those lies—walls of secrecy, ceilings of guilt, and floors so unstable that one wrong step now meant death.
And yet…
He had left her a map.
Coordinates.
A backup plan.
His last card.
Because even as he vanished, he was still protecting her…
…from the future he once tried to rewrite with blood.
Ella threw open the hatch hidden beneath the chapel floor, dragging Elara into a narrow stone tunnel.
As the door closed above them, the boots thundered in like a tsunami—too late.
She opened the GPS on her phone.
Typed in the coordinates from the journal.
The screen blinked.
Unknown Location: Romania.
A facility code-name lit up:
"E-RÉVEIL."
Below it:
Subject 01: Elara Shen-Hart.Status: MISSING.Protocol: Eliminate or Retrieve.
Ella's breath hitched.
And the screen suddenly flashed red—
Device Tracked. Intercept in Progress.