Frantic reports were flooding in. The phones simply wouldn’t stop ringing. The panicked calls weren’t just coming directly to Max, but to the other high-ranking members of the organization as well.
Stephan stood near the wall, staring down at his vibrating phone, his knuckles turning white. He was being relentlessly called by the managers and fighters stationed at their various gyms, their voices laced with fear as they begged him for immediate backup. He could hear the sounds of shattering glass and shouting in the background of every call.
He desperately wanted to rush out the door, to drive to where his people were and fight fiercely by their side. But he gritted his teeth, forcing himself to stay put. It was the exact same agonizing test of loyalty and discipline for all the sub-leaders that Max had appointed.
When their subordinates were in trouble, it was entirely natural for them to call their leaders for protection. Hearing their own people get hurt on the other end of the phone line was just pouring gasoline on their growing anger. But despite the burning urge to retaliate, they followed their orders. They waited patiently at the Fortis group headquarters, the tension in the air thick enough to cut with a knife.
The building had been transformed into a fortress. Outside in the front garden area, there were several hardened captains, standing alongside rows of highly trained men, waiting patiently in the shadows for the first wave.
Moving further inside, the reception area was barricaded and packed with more defenders. And with each ascending floor of the building, the density and quality of the members progressively increased, forming a deadly, layered gauntlet for anyone foolish enough to breach the doors.
At the very top of this defensive pyramid was the main training room of the Fortis group. This expansive, reinforced hall was where the elite Rangers, as well as Max, Darno, and Na, were currently stationed, serving as the nerve center for the entire operation.
They had successfully hijacked and brought in all the local security camera feeds, projecting them onto a wall of monitors. This allowed them to get a full, uninterrupted scope of the chaotic situation both inside the building and in the surrounding streets outside.
Max didn’t plan to just sit there and hide the entire time. If a critical breach occurred or a specific high-level threat came up, of course he would send his strongest fighters down—or go himself—to violently deal with the situation as it was needed. But strategically, they couldn’t just blindly join the fight straight away.
First, they needed to utilize the cameras to pinpoint the truly troublesome enemies. They needed to locate heavy hitters like Jet, and Darius, the leader of the Black Hounds, who would undoubtedly be taking part in the frontline assault. And more importantly, Max needed to spot exactly whoever Ramon decided to give his stolen combat exoskeletons to.
"Hey... are the others really going to be okay out there?" Stephan asked, his voice strained as he finally looked up from his buzzing phone. "I know the absolute best tactical thing is for all of us to stay here, consolidate our forces, and attack them with all of our combined power when they breach. But our people are getting beaten up right now."
Stephan took a half-step toward the door. "Maybe I should just head out for a bit. I’ll be quick. I can clear out the gyms and come straight back."
The reckless suggestion seemed to annoy Aron more than anything else. He immediately stepped into Stephan’s path, his posture rigid. It was possibly because Aron knew that sending another key fighter away from Max’s side drastically increased the chance that Max could be overwhelmed and hurt in the impending fight.
And looking closely, it was actually the first time that Aron visibly looked to be kind of nervous about the whole terrifying situation.
It was something that was likely completely unnoticeable to the others in the room, whose hearts were already pounding with adrenaline. But to Max, who had Aron standing loyally by his side practically every single second unless explicitly asked not to be there, the subtle tightening of the bodyguard’s jaw was certainly noticeable.
"Don’t worry, Stephan. Stand down," Max said, his voice calm, cool, and commanding, cutting through the rising panic. "Although the Gilt Rats or the Black Hounds will undoubtedly rough them up a bit to send a message and take the territory, they won’t actually kill them."
Stephan frowned, looking unsure.
"It’s simply too much trouble that they don’t need," Max explained, his eyes never leaving the glowing security monitors. "Yes, a syndicate can bribe cops and cleanly cover up isolated murder incidents here and there. But butchering hundreds of low-level staff across multiple locations at the exact same time? That’s a massacre."
Max crossed his arms. "There are far too many people involved to keep something of that scale silent, even for them. And besides the logistical nightmare, think about their actual goal. If they really want to seamlessly take over every legitimate operation and underground business we do, then it’s highly profitable for them to keep the basic workers and managers alive. That way, they can smoothly take over the daily operations right after the dust settles. Dead men don’t run factories."
Max turned to look his leaders in the eye. "The only people in this entire city that actively need to worry about losing their lives tonight... are us."
Hearing that blunt assessment, Joe audibly gulped, his face paling slightly.
"Us... but why?" Joe stammered.
"Because you’re sitting at the top of the food chain, kid," Wolf answered from the corner of the room, his voice a low, gravelly rumble. He was calmly wrapping his hands with athletic tape. "If a conquering syndicate leaves anyone alive that the group was previously fiercely loyal to, there is always a lingering chance of a violent rebellion being sparked from the inside later on."
Wolf pulled the tape tight with his teeth. "They can’t afford to keep any of the core leadership alive regardless of the circumstances. Especially since we’ve proven we are extremely dangerous. But hey, Joe," Wolf added, a dark smirk crossing his face. "Think about it. Because of your unique, slippery power, don’t you think you’re statistically the least likely person here to actually die?"
"Can we please not talk about death so casually?" Joe replied back, visibly shivering. "I don’t want any of us to die."
"Don’t worry. We all trained and prepared incredibly hard for this exact day," Max claimed, his unwavering confidence anchoring the room.
Due to exactly how inherently dangerous and bloody this siege was going to be, Max had wisely asked all of the non-combatant staff to stay far away at their homes, and that included Sheri as well.
She knew something and terrible was up, as she had been strictly asked not to come into the building. And as much as she desperately wanted to know what Max was involved in, she wisely thought it was best that she didn’t pry, knowing it would likely put her in quite a bit of deadly trouble. She was safe, miles away from the epicenter.
Suddenly, while looking intently at the grid of security cameras, they finally saw it. On the perimeter monitors, there was a large amount of synchronized movement.
"Lock it down. It looks like they’re finally here."
On the main street just outside the Fortis building—which had already been entirely cleared of civilian traffic—a seemingly endless convoy of large, black, armored vehicles began to pull up.
One after the other, the heavy SUVs continued to aggressively pull up and park, blocking the intersections. Men started to pour out of them rather fast, holding heavy, lethal weapons in their hands. They moved with military precision.
The sleek black cars were filling the streets almost as far as the camera lenses could see. As more and more armed syndicate members started to flood out of the vehicles, swarming the block like a colony of aggressive ants, the leaders in the training room started getting a little nervous. The sheer scale of the army was breathtaking.
"Max... exactly how many members do we currently have stationed at the base at this moment?" Wolf asked, his eyes narrowing at the sea of enemies on the screen.
"There are roughly around three thousand of us gathered here, called in from all over our territories," Max answered calmly. "That’s including the trained employees of the Fortis group, all of our trusted underground connections, and the seasoned members of the Pit."
Wolf was actually quite surprised to hear that high number. The Billion Bloodline group had gotten rather staggeringly big under Max’s leadership. But it was to be expected with all of the local gyms, the recruited school delinquents joining forces, as well as the absorption of the Chalk Line Boys and the remnants of the Rejected Corps.
"Well, just as an educated guess looking at those feeds," Wolf said, his voice grim. "It looks like they’ve brought absolutely every single person they could muster in this city. My guess is they must have around ten thousand people out there, combining the full, combined might of both the Black Hounds and the Gilt Rats."
"Ten thousand, huh," Max said.
A small, predatory smile tugged at the corner of Max’s lips as he stared at the army that had come to kill him.
"I guess I’m going to have to pay some big bonuses out to the boys after this is over."