I Am the Devil of This Hell

Chapter 063

The reason Thomas Walker had not answered his phone was quite simple: he was currently navigating a landscape of pure, unadulterated c*****e. His primary tactical knife had already been notched and dulled to the point of uselessness, and his fine-tailored suit was a tapestry of grime and gore. He had no capacity to think about the politics of the underworld or the calls of his superiors; his entire world had shrunk to the immediate goal of leading his men out of a localized apocalypse.

He didn't know where he was going. He just knew he had to keep moving.

Less than twenty minutes after he had led the Brotherhood convoy away from the safety of Hector Quinn’s estate, the mood of the troops had been high. They were the cavalry, the elite four hundred sent to save the Central Hub. They moved with a swagger that only comes with superior numbers and the belief in their own invincibility. But as the lead car—a heavy SUV—navigated a narrow stretch of the highway flanked by dense embankments, its front tire suddenly disintegrated.

The vehicle swerved violently, screeching to a halt and forcing the seventy-car convoy into a chaotic, accordion-style pileup. Just as the men began to climb out, their mouths open to curse the driver, the night sky underwent a terrifying transformation.

The darkness was incinerated. A crimson glow descended from the embankments as hundreds of Molotov cocktails—glass bottles filled with a volatile mix of gasoline and soap—were hurled from the shadows. They fell like a rain of liquid stars, beautiful and lethal.

"Fire!" someone screamed, but the warning was swallowed by the first explosions.

CRASH. BOOM.

The bottles shattered against the asphalt and the roofs of the cars, splashing clinging, gelatinous fire everywhere. The highway became a two-hundred-meter-long tunnel of inferno. The heat was instantaneous and blistering, peeling the paint off the vehicles and melting the rubber of the tires. In the ensuing panic, most of the Brotherhood enforcers scrambled out of their burning cars, focused solely on escaping the heat. Many forgot to grab their machetes or pistols, leaving their weapons to be consumed by the flames.

Thomas Walker rolled out of his car, his lungs burning from the toxic smoke. He looked around at the chaos, his heart sinking. His disciplined convoy had been reduced to a mob of screaming, terrified men. He tried to shout orders, to organize a defensive perimeter, but his voice was lost in the roar of the fire and the shrieks of those who had been splashed by the oil. No one was looking to him for leadership; they were looking for a way out of the meat-grinder.

When Thomas finally managed to claw his way out of the fire zone with a dozen ragged survivors, his strength failed him. He swayed, his knees hitting the scorched pavement.

Surrounding the ring of fire, where there had been only empty grass minutes before, stood a silent wall of men. They were the Warlords, their faces illuminated by the flickering orange light, their long blades gleaming with a cold, hungry light. They had the convoy perfectly boxed in.

The other Brotherhood members who had escaped the flames saw the odds and didn't even bother to fight. They dropped to their knees, hands behind their heads, their spirits broken by the suddenness of the ambush.

Manny Miles, who had been crouched nearby chewing on a piece of dry grass, stood up and stretched. He walked toward Thomas with a lazy, arrogant stride, a wide grin splitting his face.

"Hey there, Thomas. It’s been a while, hasn't it? You’re looking a little... singed. How’s the family?"

Thomas looked up, his eyes filled with a hollow, crushing despair. He saw the hundreds of Warlords closing in, and he knew it was over. His men were unarmed, exhausted, and surrounded.

"Drop the knives," Thomas said, his voice a hoarse whisper. He looked at his loyalists, who were trying to form a protective circle around him. "It’s done. Don't throw away your lives for a lost cause."

"But Thomas!" one of his guards cried, his voice breaking. "We can fight! We can break through!"

Thomas shook his head slowly, looking at Manny Miles. "They didn't just plan this ambush. If I’m not mistaken... the Old Man’s estate is already being overrun, isn't it?"

Manny laughed, the sound echoing through the night. "You’re as sharp as they say, Thomas. No wonder my boss wanted you alive. Yeah, Jax Lewis is currently taking a tour of your 'Fortress' with a thousand men. The moment your convoy cleared the gates, the trap snapped shut. And don't look to the Central Hub for help either—the Shadow Eagle Clan has a thousand men there, and they’ve likely already started the renovation. The alliance between the Warlords and the Shadow Eagle Clan has been months in the making. You never had a chance."

Thomas Walker tilted his head back, closing his eyes as the full weight of the betrayal hit him. He stayed like that for a long time, the heat of the dying fire on his face. Finally, he spoke. "I’ll go with you. But let my men live. They were just following orders."

Manny shrugged. "I’m a merciful man, kid. As long as they drop their steel and sit in the dirt, I won't touch them. I promise."

Merciful?

Thomas’s men looked at the burning wreckage behind them, hearing the faint, dying screams of those still trapped in the vehicles. They looked at the hundreds of cold-eyed killers surrounding them and muttered curses under their breath. But they had no choice. They threw their weapons into the weeds and sat down in the dirt, huddling around Thomas like sheep in a storm.

Manny watched them, his eyes bright with triumph. He didn't notice, or perhaps didn't care, about the silent, bitter tears streaming down Thomas Walker’s face as the young commander realized he was the one who had led the Brotherhood’s last hope into an oven.

Meanwhile, at the Central Hub, the situation had shifted from a battle to a m******e.

The Shadow Eagle Clan had pushed deep into the main hall. Under the dual pressure of the Direwolf Syndicate and Hades Crew, the Brotherhood defenders were being ground into the floorboards. The air was a thick mist of blood and dust.

Rex Dalton, the man they called Mad Tiger, was no longer a man. He had become a force of nature. The s*******r had awakened something primal and ancient in his blood. He had lost his primary blade—buried deep in the chest of some forgotten lieutenant—and was now using two half-dead bodies as improvised clubs. He swung the unfortunate men with terrifying strength, their limbs flailing as they were smashed into the incoming ranks of the Brotherhood.

He was a Bloodlust-fueled specter, his entire body painted a deep, glistening red. The sheer, unadulterated violence of his movements created a vacuum around him; even his own men stayed back, terrified of being caught in his blind, homicidal orbit.

In the center of the hall, Ray Quinn was fighting like a man possessed. He swung his heavy iron rod with desperate, lunging strikes, cracking skulls and shattering ribs. He saw the c*****e Rex was causing and felt a cold, sharp fury. He began to push through the crowd, his eyes locked on the Mad Tiger.

When he was less than fifteen feet away, Ray let out a guttural roar. "Die, you monster!"

He launched himself into the air, his entire body weight behind the downward swing of his iron rod. The metal hissed through the air, aimed directly at the back of Rex’s neck.

Rex, who appeared to be in a trance, suddenly smirked.

He had been baiting the "Young Master" for the last ten minutes. He knew that if he acted like a mindless beast, Ray would see an opening. As the rod descended, Rex dropped the two bodies he was holding, his feet digging into the floor. He didn't move forward; he exploded backward, like a spring-loaded trap.

In mid-air, he twisted his torso with a violent, snapping motion, his palms blurring.

" The Crusher!"

Before Ray could even realize his target had vanished, Rex’s palms slammed into his chest and abdomen. The strikes weren't just punches; they were focused bursts of Kinetic energy that bypassed the ribs and struck the organs.

THOOM. THOOM.

Ray Quinn let out a spray of blood that caught the light like a fan of rubies. His iron rod flew from his hands as he was hammered backward by a force that felt like a head-on collision with a freight train. He hit the ground hard, tumbling and bouncing across the blood-slicked floor until he slammed into the base of a marble pillar.

He tried to breathe, but his lungs felt like they were filled with broken glass. His vision was swimming in a sea of gray and black. Through the haze, he saw a dark shadow looming over him.

Rex had retrieved Ray’s iron rod. He stood over the broken boy, his eyes cold and devoid of any humanity. He raised the heavy rod, the downward swing carrying the weight of his entire leap.

CRUNCH.

Ray instinctively crossed his arms to protect his head. The iron rod shattered both of his forearms with a sickening, wet snap. But the blow didn't stop there. The rod slammed into his chest, staving in his ribcage and exposing the white edges of bone and the frantic, dying pulse of his heart.

"Young Master!" the Brotherhood members shrieked, but they were held back by a wall of Shadow Eagle blades. They were forced to watch as their future was dismantled in front of them.

Rex looked down at the twitching, ruined mess that was Ray Quinn. "You thought you could touch me?" Rex spat, his voice a low, vibrating growl. "In front of Kane, in front of the Shadow Eagle Clan, you’re nothing. If you’re a dragon, you crawl. If you’re a tiger, you lie down. Anyone who challenges us dies. Period."

He reached down and grabbed Ray by the throat, hoisting him into the air with one hand. He held the dying boy up like a trophy, his eyes sweeping across the horrified faces of the defenders.

"Look at your leader!" Rex roared. "Look at this piece of trash!"

With a brutal, snapping twist of his wrist, the sound of breaking vertebrae echoed through the hall, a sharp, clean sound that somehow carried over the roar of the battle. Ray Quinn’s eyes clouded over, his head lolling to the side at an impossible angle. The prince of the Brotherhood was dead.

Nearby, Joseph Romano, who had been fighting a losing battle against Titus King, saw the life leave his master’s eyes. He let out a wail of pure, unadulterated grief, the tears carving clean paths through the blood on his face.

The old man who had been cowering in the corner, a caretaker who had watched Ray grow up, collapsed to his knees. He looked at the dead, gray eyes of the boy he loved, his own mind snapping under the weight of the tragedy. He slumped over, unconscious before he even hit the floor.

Titus King, seeing Joseph distracted by grief, saw his opening. He wasn't a man for sentimentalities. He swung his heavy blade in a wide, powerful arc, the steel biting deep into Joseph’s neck. The force was so great that the blade buried itself halfway through the man’s torso.

Joseph Romano, the last of the three "young lions," fell beside the body of his master.

In a matter of minutes, the leadership of the Brotherhood’s new generation had been completely erased. Some had died in the mud, some had burned in their cars, and the best of them had been executed in the heart of their own temple. The era of Hector Quinn had ended, not with a whimper, but with the sound of breaking bone and the roar of the Shadow Eagle.