There are places in Veil City where even shadows won’t linger.
One of them is The Hollow Line—an underground rail system abandoned after the Third Triangle War. Scarlet remembered it from whispered bedtime stories and bruised-knuckle missions. But she never thought she’d be dragged back into it in chains.
Miro kept pace beside her, wrists zip-tied, mouth bloody.
“You could’ve left,” she muttered.
He didn’t answer.
Because he had left. But guilt is a cruel leash.
Delora Vale walked ahead, her high heels echoing like war drums. “You two are history,” she said. “You just don’t realize which part yet.”
Scarlet clenched her jaw. Her leg still throbbed from the dart. But her eyes were clear now—ice over fire.
Behind them, an explosion.
Not planned. Not friendly.
Delora cursed and ducked. Guards scattered.
Then came the second blast—right under the tracks.
The floor gave out.
Scarlet and Miro plunged into darkness.
Flashback — The Real Enemy
Kaydence sat across from a man with no name.
His contact in the Vault called him Gray. No fingerprints. No allegiance. Just trade.
“She’s in The Hollow Line,” Gray said. “But getting her out won’t be cheap.”
Kaydence didn’t blink. “Name it.”
Gray smiled. “I want your sins.”
Kaydence blinked once.
“Done.”
Back Underground
Scarlet woke on steel.
Her hands free.
Miro gone.
The tunnels stretched in all directions, glowing faintly with emergency lights.
She pulled herself up, every bone screaming.
Footsteps echoed ahead.
Not guards.
Scavengers.
People who lived in the tunnels. Fed on the dead. Worshiped chaos.
She ran.
They followed.
Jasper sat inside a surveillance truck parked two blocks from the east junction.
His team? Two rookies and a pissed-off hacker named Lune.
“We have ten minutes max before the blackout fails,” Lune warned.
Jasper loaded a flare gun. “We only need five.”
He fired.
The power grid in Sector 4 exploded.
Every light in Veil City flickered.
And The Hollow Line went black.
Scarlet stumbled. Her breath fogged in the cold. The Scavengers were getting closer.
A hand grabbed her shoulder—she turned with a blade—
Only to find Kaydence.
“I told you to run when the lights go out,” he said.
Scarlet wanted to cry.
But she didn’t.
She kissed him instead.
Blood, sweat, and promise.
They reached the junction.
Lune’s voice crackled in Kaydence’s comm: “Ten seconds.”
Miro stumbled into the tunnel, dragging a briefcase. “We’re not done.”
“What is that?” Scarlet asked.
Miro opened it.
Inside: DNA vials. Contracts. Veil Industries’ master ledger.
“The Break Line isn’t just a tunnel,” Miro said. “It’s the birthplace. Of everything.”
Above them, the ceiling trembled.
Lune: “Five seconds. You better move.”
Scarlet grabbed the case.
Kaydence grabbed her hand.
They ran.
Behind them, the tunnels collapsed.
And Delora watched from the shadows, untouched.
Smiling.
Because she had her own copy of the ledger.
Veil City burned under a sky of fractured glass.
The city’s towers blinked in and out of power as emergency grids tried and failed to stabilize. Sirens sang lullabies of ruin, and over the eastern skyline, a new flag rose—black with a blood-red crown.
Scarlet watched it from a rooftop safehouse, a fresh wound stitched across her shoulder. She held the briefcase like it was her lifeline.
“Are you ready to bring it all down?” Kaydence asked.
She didn’t look at him.
“I was born for it.”
Elsewhere — The Vault Fractures
Delora Vale had always planned for the end.
She just didn’t think it would come from Scarlet and Annora.
Her mistake.
Annora now stood in the main vault chamber of Veil Industries, veil lifted, gun drawn. “You thought I’d stay in the shadows forever?”
Delora raised a brow. “No, darling. I thought you’d come back. And ruin everything with your heart.”
Then came the shot.
Not from Annora.
From behind.
Miro.
Annora fell.
Delora didn’t flinch. “You always were mine.”
Miro’s hands shook. “I’m no one’s anymore.”
He vanished into smoke.
Scarlet stood before a hacked city feed.
Her voice went out across rooftops, phones, TVs, radios.
“My name is Seina Sallow. But my birth name—my true name—is Scarlet Veil. Daughter of the man who built your prisons and poisoned your skies. I was raised in shadow. But I am no longer hiding.”
She opened the briefcase on screen. Contracts. Names. The ledger.
“And I’m not alone.”
Behind her, Kaydence appeared. Jasper. Lune. Dozens more.
“We are the Red Crown. We will dismantle Veil Industries. We will expose every betrayal. Every death. Every name.”
Scarlet looked directly into the camera.
“And we’re starting with yours, Delora Vale.”
The Queen That Bled
Somewhere underground, Annora awoke.
The bullet had missed her heart.
But the betrayal did not.
She stared at her blood-stained ring.
Her fiancé would come looking for her.
And this time…
She’d let him burn it all.
Because if Scarlet Veil wanted war—
She’d get a queen’s reckoning.