?Chapter 1495:


    On a nearbyb table, several blood-spattered reportsy open.


    Subject X-079: Infant Neural Stripping Trial. Failure. Subject Age: 3. Dead.


    Raegan’s heart — hardened by battle, numbed by killing — was suddenly engulfed by a volcanic rage. A wave of visceral nausea clenched her stomach.


    “Monsters,” she spat through gritted teeth, her voice trembling with fury. “How low can they sink? Using children likeb rats — they deserve an eternity of torment.”


    Any lingering shred of guilt for killing the old supervisor evaporated. Complicity in this atrocity was its own death sentence.


    She took a sharp, controlled breath and forced the violent surge of emotion down. Now was not the time for rage. It was time for exposure. The world needed to see the rot festering beneath Cooper Group’s polished exterior.


    Raegan turned to her team. They stood frozen, equally stunned by the nightmare before them.


    Her voice cut through the silence, cold andmanding. “What are you waiting for? Tech team — breach the mainframe. Download and package everything. Action team — document this ce. Photograph every inch. Secure every hard drive, every file. I want Kolton Cooper stripped bare with nowhere to hide.”


    “Understood!” The response was immediate, a unified snap back to purpose.


    In the Cooper Estate study, the air was thick enough to choke on.


    Kolton paced frantic circles on the heavy carpet, his movements jerky and unhinged. His online smear campaign had bought a moment’s reprieve, but he knew it was a bandage on a hemorrhage. Only by reducing the undergroundbs to ashes — ensuring every data drive was melted and every specimen turned to dust — could he hope for absolution from Thomas, the dreaded Master of Shadows. Only then might he be granted a chance to w his way back from the brink.


    Rе??о????e???? ??a??????????????.??om ??о y??u?? ??????e??d??


    “Why is there no word…” He checked his watch again, the ticking second hand a drumbeat to his ruin. By his calction, the self-destruct sequences should have finished. The sites should be smoking craters.


    A knock sounded at the study door — hollow, arrhythmic, and heavy with grim finality.


    “Enter!”


    Kolton stopped and straightened his cor, expecting his meek assistant. Instead, a covert operative in tactical ck stepped in, drenched and reeking of rain and fresh blood. His face was a nk mask, but his eyes held no deference — only the cold assessment one gave a corpse.


    Kolton’s blood ran cold. A premonition of disaster mped around his heart.


    “Lab Three in Wront,” the operative stated, his tone disturbingly t. “The self-destruct sequence was halted. The central control room was breached. Hostiles stopped the detonation. All core data has been infiltrated.”


    The words struck Kolton like a physical blow. His face drained of all color. He swayed, gripping the edge of his desk to keep from falling.


    “Halted?”


    The word came out as a breathless rasp. His ultimate failsafe — his scorched-earth protocol — had been dismantled. Data infiltrated meant every damning record, every document bearing his signature authorizing these projects, was now in enemy hands.


    It was a death warrant. Neither thew nor Thomas would show mercy.


    “Idiots! Ipetent fools!” He mmed his fist on the desk, the crash echoing through the opulent room.


    But panic was a luxury he couldn’t afford. He choked the fury down and forced a semnce of icy calm to his features, though his eyes glinted with manic calction.


    “Report the details,” he demanded, tapping the desk.


    The operative continued, but Kolton wasn’t truly listening. His mind was already several moves ahead. If the secret was out, then every potential witness had to be permanently silenced.


    .


    .


    .