Chapter 81: Digging a Deeper Grave

Inside a sprawling, heavily reinforced military command tent pitched in the center of a fortified refugee sector, the air was thick with the suffocating stench of cheap wine, unwashed bodies, and stale cigarette smoke.

Thick Persian rugs, looted from upscale villas during the early days of the collapse, covered the cold dirt floor.

Looted velvet curtains hung clumsily over the tent poles to block out the harsh desert glare.

At the center of this hedonistic nest sat a man in his mid-thirties, lounging heavily upon a makeshift throne constructed from stacked military supply crates and velvet cushions.

His name was Austin Pitman, the eldest son and primary legal heir of the Supreme Commander.

Austin possessed a long, painfully sharp face with thin lips, greasy dark hair slicked back against his skull, and small, beady eyes that radiated a constant, predatory cruelty.

His pale skin was marred by minor blemishes, and his posture reeked of an entitled aristocrat who believed the entire world existed purely to serve his basest impulses.

Surrounding him inside the plush tent were half a dozen terrified women, all completely naked and trembling as they knelt upon the rough carpets.

If anyone looked closely at their pale, abused bodies, they would immediately see the brutal purple bruises, cigarette burns, and open welts starkly contrasting against their skin.

Most of them wore agonizing, hollow expressions of pure trauma, their eyes locked rigidly onto the floor because they were far too terrified of drawing his wrath to even let out a whimper.

Austin raised a crystal glass filled with amber liquor, taking a slow sip before his thin lips curled into an ugly, crooked sneer.

He glanced lazily down at the shivering women surrounding his feet, his mind drifting back to the disturbing reports his scouts had just whispered into his ear regarding the convoy approaching Baidu.

"Salma Al Mansari?" Austin muttered aloud, his voice dripping with spiteful condescension as he swirled the alcohol in his glass.

"Is she really the mother of that bitch?"

"Yes, sir," answered a muffled, subservient voice from right outside the heavy fabric flap of the tent door.

"Hmph. Just a mere leader of a small underground faction," Austin spat out bitterly, his temper flaring up as old, festering hatred boiled in his chest.

Without warning, he swung his heavy hand outward, brutally slapping the nearest kneeling woman directly across her face with a loud crack.

The girl grunted sharply from the sudden, vicious impact, her head snapping to the side as a red handprint bloomed across her cheek.

Yet, despite the stinging pain, she immediately forced herself back into a kneeling position, biting her lower lip until it bled, too terrified to even scream or cry out.

"How dare those fuckers threaten me that day," Austin snarled, his grip on the crystal glass tightening so violently that his knuckles turned completely white.

He still remembered that day with agonizing clarity, long before the sky had torn open and the dead had risen to walk the earth.

His meticulously laid plans—a delicious scheme to corner and break a certain proud, beautiful girl who thought she could defy him—had been completely ruined.

First came a cold, terrifyingly detailed threatening phone call, followed swiftly by an encrypted digital file sent straight to his personal inbox containing every single illegal transaction, extortion scheme, and dark secret he had ever tried to bury.

If those incriminating files had ever leaked to the public or the tribunal, not only would his own life have been utterly destroyed, but his powerful father would have been fatally implicated as well, dragging the entire Pitman family name down into the mud.

Even though he had been denied the chance to break his primary target that day, he had still attempted to settle for her closest friend instead.

He had thoroughly busted that whore, treating her with absolute brutality before casting her aside.

Yet, instead of quietly breaking under the pressure like all the others, that insolent bitch had somehow managed to obtain all the proof against him.

To make matters worse, she had actually had the sheer audacity to coordinate a strike and launch a public retaliation against him.

He vividly remembered how furious his father had been when the scandal nearly broke.

The Supreme Commander had practically held a loaded pistol to his head, screaming that he was a worthless idiot who almost brought down their entire political dynasty.

Although that specific disaster had been swept under the rug through his father’s immense political leverage, Austin had been forcefully stripped of his status and shipped far away overseas as punishment.

Four long years had dragged by while he was exiled abroad, forced to cool his heels in disgrace.

And just when he had finally returned to domestic soil, plotting a slow, agonizing revenge against that woman and everyone she cared about, the apocalypse arrived and shattered modern civilization into dust.

At first, rumors had reached his ears that the girl he hated had died during the chaotic opening weeks of the outbreak.

But as fate would have it, her mother and sister were apparently still breathing, operating out in the lawless badlands as the leaders of some rogue faction.

In this brutal, lawless new world where governments had collapsed and the strong did whatever they pleased, why on earth should he care about old scandals or leaked wrongdoings anymore?

Laws were dead. Ethics were buried. Only raw power mattered.

Austin threw his head back and laughed aloud, a sinister, grating sound that echoed unpleasantly off the canvas walls of the tent.

’If I don’t get to break her, breaking her mother is a fantastic alternative,’ Austin thought to himself, his beady eyes narrowing with wicked anticipation.

"If her daughter was such a meal, then the mother would also be the same, right?"

Outside the tent door, standing completely motionless in the shadows cast by the military floodlights, a tall man in a dark tactical uniform listened to every single vile word echoing from within the enclosure.

For the vast majority of the conversation, the operative remained entirely passive, a living extension of the dark landscape around him.

But the exact second Austin casually uttered those final, arrogant threats regarding Salma Al Mansari, a subtle change rippled through the air.

The operative’s eyes suddenly flared open in the darkness, flashing with an intense, freezing wave of killing intent that could have frozen water on contact.

’He actually dared to utter such filth and stain the noble name of our young miss,’ the man muttered beneath his breath, his jaw tightening into a hard line of absolute disgust.

Without moving a single muscle of his physical body, the operative accessed his internal network, opening a direct, encrypted shadow link that bridged the vast distance across the desert plains straight to his superior.

’Derrick,’ the operative transmitted mentally, his voice razor-sharp and dripping with suppressed fury.

’Let me kill him.’

A heavy, lingering silence stretched across the mental link for several long seconds as the distance dissolved.

Then, a low, calm, and effortlessly steady voice echoed smoothly back into the operative’s mind.

’Do not kill him yet,’ Derrick’s composed voice replied through the shadows, carrying the unquestionable weight of executive command.

’In fact, assign a covert detail to protect him. Ensure he survives no matter what.’

The operative blinked in confusion, taken aback by the unexpected order to safeguard such a repulsive piece of trash.

’Protect him, Commander? Why? The man is actively plotting against young miss.’

’Because,’ Derrick continued smoothly, a faint hint of chilling amusement underlying his disciplined tone, ’our young miss watched him run his mouth, and based on her current temperament, that pest is being saved exclusively for her to handle. Let him dig his own grave a little deeper. When the time is right, he will serve as excellent live combat practice.’

Austin had no idea that the fate waiting for him was far more brutal than what he inflicted on his victims....