Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 80431 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 402(@200wpm)___ 322(@250wpm)___ 268(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80431 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 402(@200wpm)___ 322(@250wpm)___ 268(@300wpm)
“And his Ravens will kill without question.” Lion sneered.
Jo shook her head. “No, they won’t. But Woyashi is a known terrorist on the FBI’s, DHS’s, and TSA’s lists. They’ll believe the threat is real and the elimination order is a righteous kill.”
The elders were silent, listening and observing, but Valor knew they were creating a plan as Jo spoke.
“Zelmir is only twenty-four years old, and his crime is being too ignorant to know not to create a weapon so vast and powerful that it would be targeted by every superpower in the world. It was so dangerous that the Chinese Academy of Science and Physics destroyed it. Though not fast enough. The director wanted Zelmir to recreate the same portable thermonuclear weapon for him, but Woyashi never delivered Zelmir.
“Now he’s furious and has given orders to take out both Zelmir and Woyashi. The mercenaries in his pocket will probably kill Zelmir’s young wife and son to tie up loose ends.”
Valor flexed his hands, needing the director’s throat in his grasp more than he needed the air flowing into his lungs.
“As I’ve reported, he has been unsuccessful in creating more Ravens. The seven men who have volunteered under false pretenses these last two years”—Jo ducked her head—“unfortunately didn’t survive the transformations.”
“Why are we still letting this man breathe?” Zorion snapped, searching the wise faces of the elders. “We should’ve gone back and killed him a long time ago before he could destroy anyone else.”
Master Rho—his and Omega’s grandmaster—stood and paced around them with his hands tucked behind his back, his head lowered.
“Because, Zorion, you needed training and discipline. If you attack before you are ready, you will be fighting two battles, one with your enemy and one with yourself. You can only be victorious in war when the mind and body are one.”
Zorion nodded.
“We know of the Black and the Brown Ravens,” Master Rho continued. “We have studied them from afar. Omega and Lion have trained you both to combat them.”
“Meridian and Ex walk the path of emptiness. They know not of compassion nor the burden of remorse. Warriors devoid of the soul’s fire. They feel nothing, save for the tether that binds them to one another.”
Valor put his hand on Zorion’s shoulder to calm him.
Master Rho stared directly at him. “The Blacks way of combat is to deceive, mislead, and then erase.”
Valor felt no fear of this Ex and Meridian. They were Ravens, and therefore, they were dangerous, but their training had limits.
He and Zorion had far surpassed those limits under the guidance of the Order.
“Grace has the strength of a bull if he doesn’t take you from afar,” Grandmaster Heng Ju added, his warning directed at Valor and Lion. “Grace is never alone, though it will appear so. But from his shadow, death will appear. Mirage is, as his name implies, an optical phenomenon. A master of phantom blades.”
“Grace will have a 308 Daniel Delta to make a kill shot from four point nine kilometers away.” Jo allowed that distance to sink into their minds before she finished. “It’s the longest in history if he doesn’t miss…and believe me…he won’t miss.”
The elders directed Lion and Omega to intercept the Brown Ravens before Grace could make the shot and to take ten of their disciples to assist Zorion and Valor with overtaking Woyashi’s convoy.
“The Blacks owe the Browns a debt,” Jo informed. “Lion, Omega, if you can make Grace and Mirage’s situation dire, they will call on Ex and Meridian for backup. Grace would swallow his pride to save Mirage.”
“And then, Valor and Zorion, you can move in and extract Zelmir Benton and take him to safety.”
“Eliminate the clan and have the disciples take Woyashi alive to the tribunal to stand trial.”
“Yes, Master,” Lion answered.
“My team has a safehouse ready for Zelmir in the forest village of Poppenbüttel, eleven miles from the extraction site,” Jo said.
“How can we be sure that Zelmir will have the physical strength to make that trek?” Valor asked.
“We have to assume he’s being kept reasonably healthy.” Master Rho continued to circle. “It’d be impossible for him to reproduce a bomb of that caliber if he is injured.”
“Very well, we leave at sundown,” Lion ordered.
Chief Styles Sawyer
Zorion
The chopper ride was silent.
Jo’s team continued to swap uneasy glances between the four assassins and the ten cloaked disciples surrounding them.
Lion and Omega were draped in flowing black, their oversized hoods concealing their faces. Their presence alone was probably enough to unnerve Jo’s team.
He and Valor mirrored Lion and Omega’s stillness—clad in lightweight and bulletproof deep-green armored suits that would allow them to blend into the forest they’d attack from.
Jo nodded to Sable, their weapons specialist, as she stood and pulled a large black case from behind her seat.
Sable smiled, raising the brow with the scar splitting the center.
“Zorion, I present to you my pride and joy. I’ve been working on it the entire time you’ve been training at the Order.”