After the boy in the Martial Arts dress exited the Deva Hall, a heavy, suffocating silence descended upon the room. For several long minutes, the gathered elites of Novus City remained frozen, their eyes locked onto the shattered chessboard in Allen Morgan’s hands. The jagged line cut through the wood was more than just property damage; it was a conceptual assassination of the status quo.
Those seated in the hall were all seasoned veterans of the corporate jungle. They understood the subtext immediately. The long-standing peace in Novus City had been officially declared dead. The two titans, Vita Corporation and the Stone family, were moving toward a collision course that would inevitably result in a scorched-earth scenario.
Almost simultaneously, the heads of various minor families and
