Chapter3

The underground wine cellars of Kent castles are perpetually shrouded in darkness, filled with a nauseating smell of mold and rust.

I was pinned down to the rough cobblestone floor by two burly bodyguards. The moment the smell of rust filled my nostrils, my stomach began to spasm violently, and cold sweat instantly soaked my entire back.

When I was seven, I was kidnapped by a European gang and locked in a shipping container for five days and five nights. That absolute darkness and suffocating sense of confinement is a psychological illness that I can never cure.

Evelyn knew this better than anyone. In our first year of marriage, we were trapped in a malfunctioning elevator for ten minutes, and I nearly went into shock. She held me tightly, her eyes red, and said she would never let me stay in the dark again.

How ironic.

Now, she stands high above the only light source at the entrance of the wine cellar, wearing an exquisitely tailored trench coat, coldly watching me convulse and tremble like a fish out of water.

“Evelyn…” My hands were tightly bound behind my back with rough plastic cable ties. I tried to tilt my head back, my voice trembling with fear. “Please, don’t lock me up. Except for this… please.”

This is the first time in three years of this marriage that I have said the word "beg" to her.

Upon hearing this word, Evelyn's delicate eyebrows showed no emotion whatsoever; instead, they revealed an extreme sense of impatience and disgust.

"Stop with your disgusting self-inflicted suffering, Arthur." She looked down at me condescendingly, as if examining a defective, scrapped product. "Julian's hard work cannot be ruined by you. I'll only ask you once: will you hand over the backup of the divine revelation code? Hand it over and get out of my house; don't, stay here until you're willing to talk."

I gritted my teeth, staring desperately at that face: "I didn't take..."

"Close the door. Don't let him see anything." Evelyn interrupted me abruptly, turned around, and walked away without looking back in her high heels.

"Bang—Click!"

The heavy iron gate was slammed shut, and the three security locks on the outside were firmly engaged.

The last ray of light was swallowed by absolute darkness, and a black tide as thick as tar instantly engulfed me.

"Ugh—!"

Childhood trauma was magnified a thousandfold, and my heart felt like it was being crushed by a cold, giant hand. I rolled and screamed wildly in the boundless darkness, banging my shoulder against the iron gate like a wild beast that had lost its mind.

"One...two...three..." I forced myself to count my breaths, trying to piece together my shattered sanity from this bottomless abyss.

One hundred, three hundred, one thousand, three thousand.

The plastic buckle on my wrist had dug deep into my flesh due to my violent struggle, tearing the vein next to it. Warm blood dripped from my fingertips onto the cold stone. I don't know how many times I banged my head against the wall; my forehead was a bloody mess, and half of my face was completely numb.

But in this excruciating pain that tore at my nerves and in utter despair, something that had been holding me back suddenly broke.

My ridiculous fantasies about Evelyn during those three years, my restraint in suppressing my sharp edges for the sake of love, were all utterly crushed into dust in the darkness of those days and nights.

Forty-eight hours.

The iron gate finally emitted the strained creaking of its bearings again. The intense incandescent light pierced the wine cellar like blades.

The bodyguard who opened the door saw my horrific state and took a half-step back in fright. I was covered in blood, my forehead and wrists were mangled, and I looked like a walking corpse that had just crawled out of hell, leaning against the frost-covered wall.

Evelyn strode in with a screeching gait. She was carrying a steaming cup of Earl Grey tea and didn't even glance at me before tossing a document at my feet.

Plea Agreement and Agreement to Leave with Nothing

“It was drafted by Attorney Charlie.” Evelyn blew on the steam rising from her tea, her voice still arrogant. “It clearly states that you admit to stealing the code and voluntarily relinquish all your assets. Sign it, and you can leave Kent alive.”

She still maintained that aloof and domineering attitude, believing that she could use this favor to put me on the blame and pave the way for Julian.

Dead silence.

A few seconds later, a hoarse sound of friction against a trachea suddenly rang out in the wine cellar.

"Heh...hahaha...hahahaha!"

The broken laughter emanating from her parched throat was especially eerie in the empty underground space. I didn't become hysterical, I didn't curse, I just slowly raised my head and stared at her with the cold gaze one would give a dying person.

The overwhelming sense of oppression, far beyond her comprehension and deeply agonizing, instantly enveloped the entire wine cellar.

Evelyn's hand holding the teacup trembled violently, spilling scalding hot tea onto the back of her hand. She actually took a half-step back instinctively, a flicker of panic in her eyes, when I stared at her: "What...what's wrong with you?"

She didn't understand why I was laughing.

She had no idea that the Vance family's three-year training period had officially ended just a few hours earlier.

Little did she know, this agreement to leave with nothing wouldn't bind me at all; instead, it would be the fatal blow that severed the last legal bond between us. Once I signed it, the final agreement of the Divine Revelation System would immediately determine that "the creator has no right to intervene" and trigger the lock-in procedure.

Without my secret orders, she and Julian would face a completely paralyzed system in three days, along with massive claims from global capital that could rip them off alive. She thought she was kicking away a freeloader, but in reality, she was putting the gallows around her own neck!

I calmly picked up the pen from the ground with my blood-stained hand.

The pen tip scraped across the paper, making a soft, tearing sound. Without any hesitation, without any emotional fluctuation, I signed my name forcefully, then tossed the agreement, stained with my bloody fingerprint, back onto her shoe like a piece of waste paper.

Arthur   Evelyn lowered her head to confirm the signature, regaining a slight semblance of her arrogant aura, and sneered, "Very well. Now, take your filth and get out of my world. Never let me see your face again."

I didn't reply to her at all.

I supported my broken body as I stood up, walked straight past her stiff body, and without pausing, headed out into the blinding sunlight.

Behind her, Evelyn might be raising a glass to her victory. But she would only understand this at a terrible cost for the rest of her life—

At this moment, the "Arthur" who was willing to trample on his dignity for the sake of loving her...   "It has died completely in that dark and cold abandoned wine cellar."

Those who step out of this door are the arbiters who control the lifeline of the world's top technologies.

Silas Vance is officially back.