Ch-12 "Kinanti’s Cry"

Scene: Mongolia – The Kidnapping

The scene shifts to the cold, windswept streets of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. The skies were dark, heavy with smog and sorrow — remnants of a cursed world left behind by the growing corruption of GAC.

Laras Widyasari, a woman of quiet strength and haunted eyes, stepped out of a local cinema. The movie had offered a brief escape, but reality snapped back the moment the doors closed behind her. The streets were eerily quiet for a city so large, and a thick tension hung in the air like a warning.

She glanced around as she walked, noting the broken signs, the shut shops, the hungry stares from alleyways."GAC's reach has extended here as well," she thought grimly, quickening her pace.But she didn't linger on the state of the world. There was someone more important waiting for her.Her daughter. Kinanti Jayasari.

She hurried along the narrow roads, clutching her coat tighter as the wind picked up. Her heart calmed the moment her modest home came into view… but that calm was shattered the moment she stepped inside.

The door was ajar.

Laras entered slowly, her instincts on high alert — and then she froze.Inside the dimly lit living room stood three tall figures, all dressed in black tactical gear, their faces hidden behind expressionless black masks. Her daughter, Kinanti, was struggling in one of their arms, screaming and crying, her tiny fists pounding helplessly.

"STOP!" Laras shouted, her voice a mix of panic and fury.She rushed forward — but it was too late.

One of the masked men struck her swiftly on the back of her neck, and the world spun violently before plunging into black.

But before she lost full consciousness, Laras's voice rang through the room, trembling and broken:"LEAVE MY DAUGHTER! I SAID LEAVE MY DAUGHTER!!"

Her words echoed in the air even as she collapsed to the ground, unmoving.

As the black-clad intruders secured her, they followed their usual protocol:

A blindfold tightly wrapped around her eyes

Duct tape silencing her pleas

And noise-canceling headphones placed over her ears — cutting her off from all sound, including her own cries.

Even in her unconscious state, Laras's lips trembled, mouthing the same desperate plea over and over again."Leave my daughter... please... leave my daughter..."Her voice had grown weak, barely audible — but the heartbreak in her words remained.

One of the guards hesitated. A flicker of humanity trembled on the edge of his lips as if he wanted to say something. His gloved fingers twitched, the moral conflict within him visible for just a moment.

But then he froze.

A rule.An unspoken law among the shadows.A rule he dared not break — one that would be explained only in the chapters to come.

With mechanical precision, he nodded at the others. They carried Laras and her daughter into two separate black vehicles, vanishing into the night as if they were never there.

And the cold wind howled in the empty street, carrying with it the remnants of a mother's cry.h-