Chapter 512: A Kiss Before Chaos, A Funeral Without a Body, and The Boy Who Never Lost

The night sky hung heavy over the rooftop of Blackbell Hotel, where the elite's sins were often sealed with silence and silk.

Ochieng stood there, shirt bloodstained, eyes shadowed with betrayal.

Across from him? Soraya Vex, legs crossed, champagne glass in hand, lips too calm for someone whose father had been assassinated 3 hours earlier.

"I kissed you," she whispered.

Ochieng stayed silent.

"And you didn't flinch."

He finally turned. "Because I knew it wasn't about love. It was a transaction."

Soraya smirked. "Maybe. But it still tasted like power."

Suddenly, an explosion rocked the city. The banquet hall — gone.

Everyone inside… presumed dead.

Including Euphoria.

But Ochieng didn't cry.

He only asked one question:

"Who lit the match?"

Velvet Creek Cathedral stood hollow.

No body.

Just ashes in a glass box.

A funeral for someone who hadn't died — not really.

Maggy watched from afar, black veil covering half her face, the other half hidden behind sunglasses worth $16,000 — a gift from a man she thought she hated.

She didn't speak. But inside, she was screaming.

In the crowd sat Tobias Drex, wearing a smug expression.

Beside him? His new fiancée, Zelena O'Roux — 21, fashion heiress, blue diamond eyes, and a heart that allegedly stopped at birth and restarted in a lab.

Maggy's nails dug into her palm.

Her phone buzzed.

One message. No sender.

"The ashes are fake. So is the love."

She smiled coldly.

"It begins."

Across town, in a dark underground casino lit only by neon and sin, a boy stood at the center of 8 betting tables.

Nathaniel "Nate" Harker — 19, son of a billionaire tech mogul, rumored to be able to beat any game, solve any code, and predict a storm 12 minutes before the clouds gathered.

He was Ochieng's cousin. But no one knew.

Except Maggy.

And now — Soraya.

He whispered to his opponent, a crime lord known as Uncle Miro:

"You're betting money. I'm betting names."

Miro laughed.

"Names?"

Nate placed a black chip on the table. "This one unlocks a vault beneath Crimson Vale. Inside? The truth about who Ochieng really is."

Miro paled.

"You're bluffing."

Nate smiled, eyes flickering gold for a second.

"I don't bluff."

Back at the ruins of the banquet, a hand rose from the rubble.

Burnt. Bloody. Ringed with a serpent tattoo.

It was Euphoria.

And she was smiling.