The Hidden War

Wafula paced back and forth in his hotel room, his phone pressed tightly against his ear. His workers back home were frustrating him beyond words.

"How the hell do you install a plain tee fitting in reverse? Against the water flow? What kind of sorcery is that?" he barked into the phone. "You are telling me, right now, that instead of letting water pass through, you've blocked the whole damn pipeline?"

The man on the other end of the call stammered, trying to explain. Wafula groaned, rubbing his forehead. "Do I have to draw for you a diagram? You know what? Reverse it! Sometimes I wonder if I hired plumber or a clown."

He hung up, shaking his head. He was thousands of kilometers away, but even here, he couldn't escape such incompetence.

What he didn't know was that while he was ranting about plumbing disasters, Heinrich was facing a far greater problem.

---

Downstairs, in the dimly lit dining hall of the hotel, Heinrich felt a cold sweat form at the back of his neck. The five men who had approached their table were no ordinary guests.

They were 'Challengers' men blessed with powers from an ancient war, warriors who carried the weapons of legend.

And one of them, the one in the center held the Excalibur.

The real one.

The sword that once belonged to King Arthur himself. A weapon whose spirit would only acknowledge the rightful wielder, granting him the strength and wisdom of ancient kings.

Heinrich knew this man by name: Sir Dorian of the Silver Order.

To put it plainly, Dorian was not a man anyone wanted to cross.

His presence alone was enough to send a warning. "We know what you did."

The Golden Chalice had been taken. And although they had stolen the fake one, the world now believed that Eleanor was in possession of the real one.

Eleanor, sitting beside Heinrich, kept her expression unreadable. But Heinrich could see the subtle way her hand trembled as she lifted her glass.

Dorian and his men stood silently, making no move to attack. Their message had been delivered simply by appearing.

This wasn't just a battle over an artifact. This was a warning from an entire hidden society.

---

Long before time was measured, before nations were born, before history was recorded on scrolls there was a war.

The War in Heaven.

It was a battle between light and darkness, between the Creator's loyal angels and those who chose to rebel against Him.

When Satan and his army were cast down from the heavens, the war did not end. It simply moved to Earth.

The world's first protectors were chosen not kings, not prophets, but ordinary men and women blessed with divine abilities to keep humanity safe.

They were given holy weapons, crafted to combat the fallen ones and their influence.

Each weapon had a spirit, a consciousness that would recognize and bond with its rightful master.

Over time, these warriors became a secret order, a Hidden Society dedicated to ensuring that the banished angels and their allies never gained control over the world.

But as the centuries passed, many of the original protectors died. Their weapons were scattered across the world, hidden in ancient ruins, buried under forgotten cities, lost to time.

New challengers could claim these weapons, but only if the weapon accepted them.

The greatest danger, however, was the arrival of more fallen angels.

They came not as monsters, but as beings of unparalleled knowledge and power. Some posed as gods, some as rulers, others as teachers of forbidden wisdom.

The war had evolved.

Now, the protectors were no longer simply warriors. They were hunters tracking down these entities, defeating them, and claiming their weapons before they fell into the wrong hands.

But not all protectors stayed loyal to their cause.

For those who defected, who chose to side with the fallen, a terrible fate awaited them.

The moment they turned against their oath, their blessing was stripped from them.

Their weapons, once loyal, would reject them.

And without their weapons, without their abilities, they would become ordinary, powerless, and forgotten.

Some defectors tried to steal blessings from others, forcefully taking weapons that did not belong to them. It was possible but only if the weapon accepted them as worthy.

This was why warriors like Sir Dorian and his men were feared.

They had not only claimed weapons of legend but had also proven themselves worthy time and time again.

And now, they had come for Eleanor.

They believed she had the Golden Chalice.

And if she had it, they had to claim it before it acknowledged her.

Because once the Chalice bonded with its new owner, it could not be taken unless they were defeated or willingly gave it up.

---

Wafula, meanwhile, was completely oblivious to the history of what was happening and what had just unfolded before him on recent times.

Still fuming over the plumbing fiasco, he threw his phone onto the bed.

"What kind of idiots am I working with?" he muttered.

As he rubbed his face, a sudden thought crossed his mind.

The Chalice.

It had merged with him in the river.

No one had seen it happen. No one knew.

Yet, outside his hotel room, in the grand halls of the dining area, the world's most powerful warriors were on a stand off over a fake one.

And Heinrich and Eleanor were at the center of it all.

Wafula shook his head.

"This is why I like fixing pipes," he muttered to himself. "Pipes don't come with swords and curses."

He picked up his phone again.

If there was one thing he knew how to do, it was handling problems.

And right now, his biggest problem was a bunch of clueless workers back home.

"Listen," he said when the call was answered, "I don't care if you have to watch YouTube tutorials. Fix the damn pipeline before I get back."

As he hung up, he sighed.