Chapter 7 - The Inheritance of Fear
The council members were stunned. They looked at the screen, their faces turning pale. They had thought they were the ones leveraging Damon, but he had been feeding them false information for months, leading them into a trap of their own making.
"This is blackmail," one of them spluttered.
"No," Damon replied, "this is an inventory. Everything you have belongs to the Castellano legacy. I’m simply consolidating my assets."
He stepped closer, his presence so overwhelming that the room seemed to shrink. "From this moment forward, there is no council. There is no negotiation. There is only the Castellano empire. If you align with me, you keep your life and a percentage of your holdings. If you refuse, I don't need to kill you. I will simply remove you from the world, one line of code at a time."
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The silence in the courtyard was absolute. Even the Warden seemed to understand the stakes, his gaze drifting from one man to the next with a predatory patience.
One by one, they bowed their heads. It was a surrender born of pure, distilled terror.
