Chapter 203: Proof, Plots, And Pixiu Lies

The next morning, Kane woke to find Cyrus already dressed in a charcoal suit, standing by the window with his phone pressed to his ear.

"I need full vault access, authorized for two," Cyrus said into the device, his tone brooking no argument. "Vault Seven. Yes, I’m aware of the protocols."

Kane stretched, his nine tails fanning across the silk sheets before he remembered to retract them under his glamour.

"Going somewhere without me?" he called out.

Cyrus ended the call, turning to face Kane with an expression that suggested he’d been caught.

"You wanted to see where I’m keeping the Screaming Shard," Cyrus said simply. "I’m arranging it."

Twenty minutes later, they were in the Lamborghini heading toward Veyr Corp’s gleaming tower.

Kane cradled the dragon egg case in his lap, unwilling to leave it behind despite Cyrus’s protests about proper vault protocol.

"You know they’re going to make you check that at security," Cyrus warned as they pulled into the underground garage.

"Then they can try," Kane muttered, his protective instincts flaring.

Cyrus led Kane past the main elevators to a discrete service corridor Kane had never noticed before.

A biometric scanner flickered to life as they approached, bathing Cyrus’s face in blue light before the wall panel slid open with a pneumatic hiss.

The elevator beyond was smaller and industrial, with only two buttons: Surface and Vault Level.

Cyrus pressed his palm against another scanner, and the elevator began its descent.

Kane’s ears popped as they dropped—five floors, ten, twenty.

The doors finally opened onto a corridor that looked more like a bank vault than an office building.

Steel-reinforced walls gleamed under harsh fluorescent lighting, and containment wards pulsed with visible energy along every surface.

"This way," Cyrus said, guiding Kane toward a massive vault door at the corridor’s end.

Cyrus placed his palm against the vault door’s central panel, and Kane watched crimson energy flow from Cyrus’s hand into intricate channels carved across the steel surface.

"First verification," Cyrus murmured.

A compartment opened at waist height, revealing three crystalline slots.

Cyrus produced three keys from an inner jacket pocket—each carved from different materials that pulsed with distinct magical signatures.

He inserted them in precise sequence, and the vault hummed with building power.

"Second verification."

Another panel slid aside, this one requesting a blood sample.

Cyrus drew a ceremonial blade from his coat and made a shallow cut across his palm, letting crimson droplets fall onto an obsidian dish.

The blood ignited with black fire, and the vault door groaned as massive locks disengaged.

"Third verification complete," Cyrus said, pushing the door open.

Kane’s eyes widened as they entered. The containment protocols made the BSA’s security for the Whispering Shard look like a child’s piggy bank.

Null-magic wards crisscrossed the chamber in glowing geometric patterns, and the air itself felt dead—devoid of any spiritual energy.

Kane’s stomach twisted with certainty. If Elias had stolen the Whispering Shard from BSA’s Evidence Lockup despite intact seals and signatures, surely he’d have taken this one too.

But there, suspended in a crystalline containment sphere at the chamber’s center, the Screaming Shard pulsed with violet light.

Still there. Still whole.

Kane approached the containment sphere, his brow furrowing as violet light washed across his features.

"This doesn’t make sense," he murmured, reaching toward the protective barriers.

Crimson wards flared in warning, but Kane didn’t pull back.

"What’s wrong?" Cyrus asked, stepping closer.

Kane’s fingers hovered inches from the sphere’s surface, his mind churning through Elias’s words in that sterile laboratory.

"Elias told me—" Kane paused, his stomach twisting. "When he injected me with the Screaming Shard essence, he said the shard Madam Xiu gave you was a fake."

Kane turned to face Cyrus, confusion and suspicion warring in his amber eyes.

"But if this is the real one, what the hell did he inject into me?"

Cyrus moved past Kane with deliberate steps, his crimson aura flaring as he disabled the containment sphere’s outer wards with practiced precision.

The crystalline barrier dissolved, and Cyrus lifted the Screaming Shard from its suspension field.

Violet light bled across his palm as he turned the jagged crystal, examining every facet with the intensity of someone who’d spent centuries cataloging artifacts.

"It’s real," Cyrus confirmed, his voice tight. "No forgery could replicate this resonance pattern."

Kane’s tails threatened to emerge from beneath his glamour as frustration mounted.

"Then how did Elias have it? He couldn’t have stolen a duplicate—the essence he injected felt authentic enough to trigger my full awakening."

Cyrus’s eyes narrowed, crimson light reflecting off the shard’s surface as connections formed.

"Madam Xiu," he said slowly, each word weighted with suspicion. "She’s more cunning than I credited."

Kane crossed his arms, waiting.

"Pixiu spirits are legendary hoarders and manipulators," Cyrus continued, rotating the shard. "She wouldn’t ally completely with Elias—too much risk, too little control."

Understanding dawned in Kane’s expression.

"You think she played both sides."

"I think she gave Elias exactly what he wanted," Cyrus corrected, returning the shard to its containment field.

"The essence. The knowledge. Everything he needed to conduct his experiments."

The sphere reformed around the artifact with a crystalline hum.

"But then she swapped the depleted shard for an intact one before delivering it to me," Cyrus finished. "Ensuring Elias couldn’t reassemble the Eternal God Crystal while maintaining her reputation for honoring bargains."

"That manipulative—"

"Genius," Cyrus interrupted.

Kane watched as Cyrus began the vault’s locking sequence, crimson energy flowing in reverse through the steel channels.

"What’s all this even protecting against?" Kane asked, studying the layers of biometric scans, magical keys, and blood seals. "The BSA just uses containment wards and physical locks."

Cyrus inserted the three crystalline keys, rotating them counterclockwise.

"BSA protocols assume spirit-based threats," Cyrus explained, his tone clinical. "Their wards repel supernatural energy; their locks resist magical tampering."

He withdrew his hand from the blood scanner, the obsidian dish sealing itself.

"This vault was designed to keep out everything—humans and spirits alike. Physical barriers, magical nullification, and biometric verification that requires my specific genetic signature."

The massive door groaned shut with mechanical finality.

Kane’s ears perked beneath his glamour, his mind racing back to the empty BSA Evidence Lockup.

Intact seals. Untriggered wards. No magical signatures.

"Cyrus," Kane said slowly, watching the final locks engage. "What if whoever stole the Whispering Shard from the BSA wasn’t a spirit at all?"

Cyrus’s hand froze against the door’s surface, crimson eyes meeting Kane’s amber gaze.