Chapter 274

“All right, Xiaowei, shut it. I really did quit.”

Emily Ward rose with a cold face. Kevin Ward shoved both hands into her shoulder and slammed her back into the seat. His face twisted as he roared, “Emily Ward! I’ll say it one more damn time. Without my say-so, you’re not quitting for shit! Now tell your squad to take me and my brothers with them. Right now! Or I’ll deal with you myself!”

“You beast! Kevin!”

Emily’s anger burst. She shot to her feet again, yanked out her pistol, and jammed it toward her brother’s forehead. Kevin stepped forward instead of back, pressing his brow against the muzzle, and bellowed, “Then shoot! If you’ve got the guts, pull the trigger and kill me! Fine by me! I’ll go down and keep Mom company. I’ll ask her real nice how exactly you pissed her to death!”

“Kevin! Mom died because you were a worthless animal who never learned—”

“Enough.”

Magnus Specter let out another long breath. He had seen enough. He cut across the two of them and said flatly, “If you want to fight, stay here and fight. We’re leaving. Fall in.”

He turned and started back. The women answered in one voice.

“Yes, Captain!”

“Hold it!” Kevin shouted at once. “Nobody leaves! I wanna see who the hell dares!”

Magnus stopped.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Emily lower the gun again, even now, even at this point. He cursed her in his heart. Damn it. There was no fixing this kind of softness.

He turned back, raised his pistol, and aimed straight at Kevin. His voice dropped cold as iron.

“Kevin Ward. Say one more damn word. Try me.”

He was not his sister.

Kevin opened his mouth, then shut it again. He did not dare bark back.

Emily hurried in front of him, blocking the line of fire. “Magnus! What are you doing?”

“Kevin. I’m giving you one last chance.” Magnus did not even look at Emily. He kept the gun up and said in a hard, flat voice, “For your sister’s sake, you get two choices. One, you come with us alone. Two, your sister stays here with you. But I won’t leave you even one grain of food. Not one. Pick.”

The air froze.

Everyone went still.

Even the female squad members already boarding the Ice Regiment vehicles were stunned. What? The captain was still willing to take this bastard in?

Just because he was Sister Emily’s brother?

But then again, some of the women felt a sting in the chest. If the captain could make room for even a filthy thing like him because of Sister Emily... then if one day they ran into their own family...

Of course, their kin would never be as rotten as Kevin.

Still, their thoughts tangled into a knot.

Emily and Kevin, needless to say, were in even worse shape.

Go with my sister. Go with all those women. Women I like. All of them.

Kevin’s eyes drifted past Magnus and locked onto the line of women behind him, one after another, all with neat ponytails swaying behind their heads.

They’re mine. All mine.

Damn it.

From now on, I’ll live like an emperor.

“We choose...” Kevin’s gaze turned dull, almost drunk with it. He stared at the women behind Magnus and asked hoarsely, “If we go back with you... will you still let my sister be captain?”

“You can still change your mind.”

Magnus looked at him, then, as if by accident, flicked a glance at the men behind Kevin. Two or three of them already had their hands clenched around their gun grips.

His tone sharpened.

“Xiaowei. You’re your sister’s heart and blood. If you’re willing to join our Ice Regiment alone...”

At that, Magnus turned his head just a little. Barely anything. But it was enough for Kevin alone to catch the meaning.

He meant the ponytailed women behind him.

Magnus went on, voice low and smooth, “Everything in our regiment will be yours. Wealth. Comfort. Women. A life you won’t spend in full.”

Then he swept another glance at the men behind Kevin and put more weight into every word.

“We’d even pay any price. We’d trade the whole regiment’s resources for you alone, as long as you stay safe. So I’ll ask you one last time. Will you join the Ice Regiment alone? Or will your sister stay here with you, while we leave without giving you a single grain of food?”

He paused.

“Think real hard before you answer.”

“Then... then I’ll go with you.”

Both Kevin and Emily were facing Magnus, with their backs to Kevin’s five companions. Neither of them noticed anything strange.

But Magnus did.

And so did Sophia Reid and the women behind him.

The instant Kevin said the words, the five men—already smelling that things were going bad—drew their guns together.

Magnus had been waiting for exactly that.

His wrist snapped. The muzzle swung toward the three men trying to line up Emily in their sights. He fired three times in a row.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

The other two had their guns aimed at the back of Kevin’s head. Then those three shots cracked through the carriage like thunder. One of the two panicked. His hand shook. His finger clenched by reflex.

Bang!

A bloody hole burst open in the back of Kevin’s skull.

Blood sprayed out in a hot red arc, splashing across the shooter’s face.

Only then did Sophia Reid fully react. She ripped out her pistol and fired at once.

Two shots.

The last two men dropped where they stood.

The whole thing took only a few seconds.

Emily had still been half lost in a daze, her mind stuck on Magnus’s earlier words—

We’d even pay any price. We’d trade the whole regiment’s resources for you alone...

When he said that, something inside her had trembled.

She had been moved. Deeply.

And then, only seconds later, her brother died right in front of her.

The world spun.

The light twisted.

Then everything went black.

She saw nothing more.

Magnus looked at Emily collapsed on the floor, unconscious, and a bitter taste rose in his chest. Hard to name. Harder to swallow.

He let out a long breath and slowly lowered his pistol.

At least this was over.

From the moment he had Chloe Clark tell the women to tie their hair into ponytails, he had already guessed how this would likely end.

This was not hindsight. Not some cheap after-the-fact excuse.

He knew Emily. He knew Kevin.

He had known them across two lives.

Emily loved her brother to the bone.

Kevin was trash, but in his own crooked way, he still cared about loyalty.

If Magnus refused to let Kevin join the Ice Regiment, Emily would absolutely choose to stay behind.

And Kevin would never agree to that.

Then Magnus had the women tie ponytails, even use cartoon-pattern hair ties. With his understanding of Kevin, no matter how much that dog barked about brotherhood, there was no way he could resist.

Magnus had been certain.

Kevin would betray his old team and choose to join the Ice Regiment alone.

And then there were those more than one hundred and forty good-looking female squad members. That alone was enough to stab greed straight through the hearts of the other men in Kevin’s group.

On top of that, Magnus had thrown out that final line—

We’d pay any price for Kevin.

He was gambling that those men would risk everything and try to seize Kevin.

The only thing Magnus had not been fully sure of was the last shot.

He could not know whether, once he fired first, they would pull the trigger too. If they had held back—if they had only pressed guns to Kevin’s head—

Then Magnus would have rushed in to save him.

And if, in that chaos, Kevin still somehow lived, then Magnus would have had to let him into the Ice Regiment for the time being.

After that, he would wait for a chance.

Use the little blue bottle from his space.

Let Kevin’s beast nature boil over.

Arrange for enough female squad members to witness it.

Then find someone to shoot him in lawful self-defense.

A bullet through the head.

Not even a Life Crystal could save that.

No matter what, Kevin was never walking away alive.

Still, this result was the best one.

The cleanest one.

It saved a long string of trouble after this.

“Fall back.”

Two female squad members came over and supported the unconscious Emily.

Sophia Reid took five women with her. They crushed Metal Crystal and butchered every man left on the train. As for the women, the rest of the female squad members took them away and offered them a chance to join the Ice Regiment.

Two trains.

Sophia and five women killed more than two hundred and thirty men.

They rescued over seventy women.

Then the whole force withdrew and returned to the mall stronghold.

Emily still had not woken up.

Magnus did not know if his little trick would fool her in the end. That worry sat like a stone in his gut.

He told two female squad members to carry her into his RV to rest, then had Sarah Franklin and Taylor Carroll stay and watch over her.

After stepping down from the RV, Magnus let out a long breath.

Strangely enough, not seeing Kevin die with his own eyes had not given him the pleasure he expected.

Instead, a dull weight pressed on his chest.

Charlotte Renard walked up beside him and matched his pace. After a while, she sighed softly and said, “You meant for Kevin to die, didn’t you?”

Magnus stopped.

He turned and looked at her.

“Do you think Sister Emily will blame me?”

“I don’t know.” Charlotte shook her head faintly. “But if it were me...” She paused, eyes quiet and cold. “I probably wouldn’t forgive you for the rest of my life.”