Shadow Marsh Hall fell into deadly silence, with only Selina's intermittent, faint moans from the distant medical center echoing like specters.

Beneath the shattered floor tiles, that Cremation Urn carved with intertwined patterns of red iris and black thorns stood silently in the darkness, emanating a cold and eerie aura.


Lucas Blackthorn collapsed at the edge of the hole, his face as white as paper. The paralyzing effect of the neurotoxin, the excruciating pain in his shoulder, Selina's continuous screaming, and the cremation urn accidentally revealed before him had almost completely shattered his mind. He struggled to lift his head and looked at Viola. She stood there, her blood-stained wedding dress resembling the robe of a judge, her eyes cold, without the slightest hesitation.

"Viola..." Lucas's voice was hoarse and broken, filled with unprecedented despair and pleading, "Stop... please... spare her. It's all my fault... she has nothing to do with this..."

Viola had no reaction, only coldly staring at him.


A flash of desperate madness crossed Lucas's eyes. He suddenly reached out with his right hand that could still move, pulled out a flat black detonator from his suit's inner pocket, his thumb pressing firmly on the prominent red button!

His arms trembling, he pointed the detonator at the cremation urn beneath the hole in the floor.


"Let me contact the medical team! Save Selina!" he roared, his voice distorted by fear and pain. "Otherwise... otherwise I'll blow it up right now! You know who's in there! You know the consequences of destroying it!"

He was gambling. Gambling that Viola cared enough about the ashes in that urn, gambling that she couldn't bear the cost of its complete destruction.

Viola's gaze finally flickered, revealing an extremely cold murderous intent, as if her last taboo had been violated. She slowly took a step forward.

Just when Lucas thought his threat was working, in that split-second when his mind slightly relaxed—

Viola moved! Her movements were as swift as a ghost, the azure dagger she had been gripping in her right hand had somehow returned to its sheath. Instead, her left hand pulled out a slender metal syringe filled with thick azure liquid from the heavy folds of her bloodstained wedding dress—it was highly concentrated, undiluted Pandora essence, with toxicity over a hundred times that of the regular dose!

Lucas didn't even have time to see it clearly, let alone press the button.

"Squelch!"

The sharp needle of the syringe, with deadly precision, viciously pierced the exposed side of Lucas's neck, directly into his carotid artery! Viola's thumb pressed down on the plunger without hesitation, injecting an entire syringe of lethal essence in an instant!

"Ugh—Ahhh!!!"

Lucas's body suddenly stiffened, like a fish thrown onto shore! An inhuman, extremely agonizing howl erupted from deep within his throat! The detonator slipped from his instantly convulsing hand and fell to the ground. The terrible, excruciating pain came not from his wounds, but from every nerve in his body! It felt as if countless red-hot steel needles were piercing and stirring through his bone marrow! The Pandora extract burned wildly through his blood vessels, impacting every corner of his brain!

He curled up on the ground, violently convulsing, foaming at the mouth, his eyes rolling back.

Viola pulled out the syringe and coldly tossed it aside. She looked down at Lucas struggling in extreme agony, her voice as calm as if stating a fact: "Threaten me? Lucas. You forgot who taught me to be ruthless."

She slowly squatted down, leaned close to his ear twisted in agony, and said word by word with absolute clarity: "And, did you think I wouldn't know? Selina Cole... she is not some impoverished minor noble at all."

Lucas's convulsions seemed to pause momentarily.

"Her real name is Selina von Iris." Viola's voice was cold as iron. "The last direct bloodline of the Red Iris Family. That little girl who 'fortunately' survived the 'accidental' great fire twenty years ago. Am I right?"

Lucas suddenly widened his eyes, and even in the midst of extreme pain, they were filled with disbelief, terror and fear! How could she know?! This secret he had buried so deeply!

"You..." he tried to speak, but could only produce hoarse, hissing sounds.

"You found her, cultivated her, and turned her into the perfect weapon against me." Viola continued, each word like an ice pick driving into his faltering mental world. "Because you knew better than anyone that nothing could devastate me more thoroughly than having my enemy's daughter completely devoted to you and carrying your so-called 'heir.' A perfect revenge, isn't it? Using Red Iris's bloodline to continue your Blackthorn 'glory.'"

"No... it's not..." Lucas struggled to deny between waves of excruciating pain, but the panic in his eyes completely betrayed him.

The holographic projection lit up again, but this time instead of live footage, it displayed encrypted files, genetic comparison reports, and an old surveillance screenshot of a little girl being carried out from the ruins of a fire.

The chain of evidence pointed unmistakably to the truth that Lucas had carefully concealed for twenty years.

"You think you're in control of everything, Lucas." Viola stood up, her voice carrying a hint of cold pity, "But you forgot that hatred is the best teacher. You taught me to doubt, taught me to dig, taught me to seek the truth at all costs."

Just then, something unexpected happened!

On the back of Lucas's neck, just above the spine, a tiny implant point that was normally invisible beneath the skin suddenly lit up with a faint blue light! The blue light flickered a few times, seemingly struggling against the surging neurotoxin.

This was Lucas's deepest life-support and control system emergency backup chip that he had reserved for himself, only activated in an attempt to take over when the host's vital signs were in extreme danger!

However, the highly concentrated Pandora extract was too potently toxic. The blue light only flickered tenaciously for a dozen seconds before quickly dimming like a candle in the wind, ultimately extinguishing completely. The backup chip's activation was forcibly interrupted and suppressed.

Yet during this brief activation window, an extremely complex encrypted data stream, impossible to capture or parse by normal equipment, seemed to have been instinctively and desperately transmitted by the chip in its final moment before complete failure, disappearing into the air. No one knew where it was transmitted to, or what information it contained.

Lucas was completely unaware of this. The chip's brief activation did nothing to ease his suffering. He collapsed completely on the ground, his consciousness drifting in an ocean of excruciating pain, left with only instinctive, subtle twitching.

His faith, his plans, his trump card—all were completely torn apart and trampled by Viola in this moment.

Viola watched all of this with cold eyes, including the futile flashing and dying of the backup chip. She didn't know what data stream was sent in that instant, but that didn't change the outcome.

The hall was deathly silent. Selina's moaning had stopped at some point, whether from unconsciousness or death was unclear. Only Lucas's weak, painful gasps could be heard.

Viola's gaze returned to the exposed Cremation Urn, looking at the intertwining red and black, her expression complex and inscrutable.

The key to the Financial Nuclear Weapon, the ultimate weapon capable of destroying the Blackthorn Empire and even entangling the global financial system - where had it gone with Lucas's complete breakdown?

Had it been carried into the abyss by that failed chip, or had it already been transferred elsewhere?

This enormous question mark, like the sword of Damocles, hung high above the shattered Shadow Marsh Castle, and also loomed in the hearts of Viola and everyone else who knew the truth.