The air in the Lore Department didn't just grow cold; it became stagnant, as if the oxygen itself was being consumed by the sheer presence of the man standing at the threshold. Chase felt a phantom weight settle over his own shoulders, the familiar, heavy pressure of a battlefield where the outcome has already been decided by the dead.
The stranger began to walk. Every footfall of his heavy boots rang out against the polished corporate floor with the finality of a funeral bell. Staff members instinctively shrank back, their primal instincts screaming at them to avoid the path of a predator that had long since transcended the need for a pack.
When he finally stopped five paces from Chase's desk, he reached up and pulled back the hood of his ash-grey coat.
Chase's breath hitched. He had prepared himself for a monster—a scarred, grizzled warlord with eyes of fire and a mouth full of jagged teeth. Instead, he found himself looking into the face of a boy.
Vincent didn't look a day over nineteen. He had a pale, porcelain complexion and ethereal, lavender-tinted hair that fell in messy, unkempt strands over his brow. But it was his eyes that stopped Chase's heart. They were the color of a winter twilight, wide and hauntingly beautiful, yet utterly devoid of life. There was no rage there, no thirst for blood, and no spark of the "Legion-Slayer" legend. There was only a vast, echoing emptiness—the face of someone who had already lost everything and was simply walking through the motions of a world that no longer mattered.
"You smell of her," Vincent said. His voice wasn't the gravelly growl of a killer; it was soft, melodic, and terrifyingly calm. It sounded like a lullaby sung at a gravesite.
Chase stood his ground, his hands resting flat on his desk to hide the slight tremor of his own Essence reacting to the void in front of him. "I smell like a lot of things, kid. You're going to have to be more specific."
Vincent tilted his head slightly, a lock of purple hair swaying. He didn't blink. "The scent of jasmine and demonic silk. The scent of a betrayal that turned the Western skies to ash. I have followed it through the mud of trenches and the smog of empires. It ends here, in this glass cage."
"Vincent," Chase said, using the name like a shield. "I know who you are. I know what happened at the Schism. But this is a place of business. If you're looking for a conclusion, you're in the wrong office."
Vincent's gaze shifted to the long, leather-wrapped case on his shoulder. He didn't reach for it, but the mere movement caused the glass partitions behind Chase to spider-web with fine, hairline cracks.
"I have no business with this 'OmniCorp,'" Vincent whispered. "And I am not looking for a fight. I am looking for a debt. A wife owes her husband the truth before the silence takes them both."
"She's scared of you," Chase countered, stepping out from behind his desk to close the distance. He needed to keep Vincent's focus off the executive suite where Lilith was watching. "She thinks you're here to execute the traitor."
For the first time, a flicker of something crossed Vincent's hollow face—not anger, but a profound, weary sadness. He looked down at his gloved hands. "Execution requires a judge. I am just a man who has forgotten how to sleep. I didn't come to kill her, Chase Vance. I came to ask her why I was the only one allowed to survive the fire."
He looked up again, and for a split second, Chase saw the shadow of the commander Vincent used to be—the man who had led a legion against the gods themselves. "Step aside, Warrior. Your contract doesn't cover the weight of my ghosts."
"My house, my rules," Chase replied, his own eyes hardening into steel. "You want to talk to her? Fine. But you do it on my terms, without that case, and away from this building. If you draw that blade here, I'll be forced to show you why I'm the one who survived the 'long sleep' too."
The two men stood in a deadlocked silence, two relics of a forgotten age facing off amidst the humming servers and glowing monitors of a modern world that had no room for their brand of tragedy.
The deadlock was a physical thing, a thick cord of tension that felt like it might snap and level the entire floor. Chase didn't blink, his hand inching toward the hidden sigil beneath his desk, ready to mobilize the building's spiritual dampeners.
Then, Vincent moved.
Every person in the Lore Department—from the gargoyle interns to the senior banshees—felt their skin crawl as Vincent reached up. His gloved hand gripped the strap of the heavy, leather-wrapped case on his shoulder. The air groaned, a low, metallic thrum emanating from the case that vibrated in the marrow of Chase's bones.
Vincent stepped forward, closing the gap until he was mere inches from Chase. Up close, the boy-commander looked even more fragile, yet he possessed the terrifying stillness of a deep-sea trench. He unslung the case with a slow, deliberate grace and held it out with both hands.
"Take it," Vincent whispered. His twilight eyes didn't hold a hint of deceit; they were just wide, empty mirrors. "If laying down my burden is the price to look upon her face again, I will pay it. I have carried this steel through two hundred years of cold nights. I can part with it for an hour of her truth."
Chase felt the weight before his hands even touched the leather. When he took the case, it felt like catching a falling star—dense, impossibly heavy, and humming with a mournful, jagged power that nearly buckled his knees. He had to flare his own Essence just to keep from dropping it.
"Very well," Chase said, his tone stern, his voice anchoring the room back to reality. He gripped the strap tight, the ancient leather creaking. "But let's be clear, Vincent. You aren't entering a battlefield, and you aren't a judge. You're a guest. When we reach my home, you are to sit, you are to listen, and you are to talk to her in a civilized manner. If you so much as raise your voice or leak a drop of that killing intent near her or my other roommates, our deal is void. Understood?"
Vincent looked at his now-empty hands, curling his fingers as if surprised by how light they felt. "Civilized," he repeated, the word sounding foreign on his tongue. He looked back up at Chase, a ghostly, tragic smile touching his lips. "I have forgotten how to be a man, Warrior. But for Kaelen, I will try to remember."
Chase nodded curtly. "Wait by the elevators. I have to clear this with my employer."
As Vincent turned and walked away—his footsteps now eerily silent without the weight of his blade—Chase felt a sharp, proprietary gaze burning into his back. He turned to see Lilith standing at her office door. Her face was a mask of Alpha fury and genuine fear, her nails digging into the doorframe.
Chase held up the leather case, a silent signal that he had the situation under control, even as the "Warrior" inside him whispered that he had just invited a hurricane into his living room.
"Lilith i will be back tomorrow" he said leaving the office in stunted silence.