Undisclosed Location – Coastal Port, Black Sea Region
Time: 03:12 AM
The sea was silent. The docks, abandoned.
Fog clung to the water like breath held too long.
Beneath it, death was waiting.
The Orlov Syndicate—one of the largest illegal arms networks west of the Urals—was preparing to finalize a weapons deal worth over $200 million. Russian military surplus. NATO knockoffs. Experimental tech siphoned from black-budget labs in Syria, Turkey, and Algeria.
Six buyers. Twelve bodyguards. Two cargo freighters. No oversight. No witnesses.
Or so they thought.
Perimeter
The guards patrolled in rotating shifts. Predictable. Jason had predicted every one.
From a nearby rooftop, he gave the order.
"Execute."
Tactum flowed like music through encrypted comms.
Shadows descended.
The League moved like ghosts. No shouting. No gunfire. No mistakes.
A patrolling guard turned just in time to see the glint of a blade before his throat opened silently. Another crumpled under a three-point nerve strike—paralysis within seconds, dead before he hit the deck.
Jason watched from the high crane above the shipyard, cloaked in black, helmet gleaming under the dock lights. Red. Cold. Unmarked.
He didn't move like a general.
He moved like the blade itself.
03:17 AM
Inside the Cargo Hold
The buyers were laughing.
Cigars. Brandy. One of them—an old Sicilian—told a joke about carving lungs out with ice picks.
The laughter died the second the lights cut.
Darkness swallowed the room.
Panic bloomed.
The guards reached for weapons, but one by one, they were swallowed by the dark—dragged into the rafters, down through the floor grates, into silence.
A single overhead light flickered on.
Jason dropped into the center of the room.
No cape. No theatrics.
Just precision.
"You traffic arms to warlords who buy children to carry them," he said, voice muffled behind the helmet.
"You destabilize governments to feed your accounts."
"You are parasites."
One of the buyers fumbled for his pistol.
Jason shot him in the knee.
The man screamed.
The others froze.
"I'm not here to negotiate," Jason said. "I'm here to purge."
Another reached for a panic button.
Jason fired again.
This time, center mass.
No one moved after that.
"Tell your people," he said to the one still conscious, writhing on the floor. "Tell every syndicate, cartel, shadow broker, and corporate puppet master—"
He reloaded slowly. Methodically.
"—The League no longer works for the highest bidder."
"We answer to no one."
"There is only one directive now: cleanse."
03:25 AM
Outside the Port
Two helicopters attempted escape from the upper pad.
Jason had already planted charges.
He tapped his comm.
"Now."
Twin detonations bloomed in the fog—fiery blossoms lighting up the sea.
No survivors.
The ships were next.
Inside, crates of weapons cooked off under the secondary payload—thermite laced with volatile accelerants. Everything melted down to slag before even the coast guard's corrupt advance teams could arrive.
By the time anyone responded, there was nothing left but fire, ash, and a whisper on the wind:
Red Hood.
08:42 AM — Geneva.
Interpol analysts watched satellite footage in stunned silence.
They had no jurisdiction.
No suspects.
No demands.
Only questions.
"We know it wasn't a nation-state," one said. "Too fast. Too surgical."
"Not a rival syndicate, either," another added. "No signs of acquisition. No survivors. No theft."
The footage paused on a blurry freeze-frame.
A figure in red.
Backlit by fire. Standing in the smoke.
Watching.
11:37 AM — Gotham City. The Cave.
The news report played across the Batcave's main screen.
"In the early hours of the morning, an unknown group carried out what authorities are calling the most precise extrajudicial assault on a criminal arms network in modern history. No survivors among the targets. No casualties among the attackers. No trace left behind."
"Interpol and NATO security forces are baffled. All signs point to a new player—dubbed only by witnesses and encrypted chatter as 'Red Hood.'"
Bruce stood still, arms folded, jaw clenched.
"That's not war," he said finally.
"That's an execution."
Alfred watched the footage from behind.
"He left no survivors, sir. No message beyond the act itself."
Bruce didn't answer.
He didn't need to.
The silence between them was filled with a cold, grim knowing.
Jason wasn't just acting out vengeance anymore.
He was defining a new law.
That Night — Somewhere in the Hindu Kush
Jason stood on the edge of the highest peak above the fortress. The stars stretched forever. The wind howled.
Behind him, the League moved with discipline.
No longer whispering.
No longer doubting.
They had seen what he could do.
What he would do.
He didn't need loyalty. He didn't need love.
He had results.
He held his helmet in one hand. Stared at it.
The red gleamed like blood under moonlight.
"The world doesn't need symbols," he muttered. "It needs scalpel work."
"And I'm done being anyone's mistake."
He slid the helmet on.
The wind stilled.
The Red Hood was no longer a rumor.
He was judgment.