Chapter One
The Mask of Light
The sea wind was like a blade.
It sliced the island’s lights into fragments.
I stood at the pier,
watching the four hotels laid out like four exquisite cards—
Buffet: affordable yet extravagant, its 24-hour hypermarket glowing like daylight;
Millennium: the most human in flavor, Hong Kong, Mediterranean, European, and American cuisines rotating onto the table;
Grand Victorium: beneath golden light hid gaming tables, exhibition halls, and the most expensive silence in the world;
Elysian Grandeur: the golf lawn spread like a perfectly laid green carpet—when the wind passed, even the heart softened.
Behind the glass curtain walls were faces carefully polished by light.
Smiles.
Music.
Champagne.
And shadows that did not belong to paradise.
Lee Wai Hing arrived.
He pushed his sunglasses onto his head and let his wife and child enter the Elysian Grandeur Resort to check in first.
Not much luggage. More laughter from a family together.
He said this time was only for relaxation.
No cases.
No guns.
He did not know that paradise strikes best when you are relaxed.
Meanwhile, in the southern district of New City, inside a public housing unit,
a brochure for the Hoolini Bay Integrated Resort lay on the table.
Cheung Man Man, Lau Chee Yan, Lee Mun Tseng, and I had planned to leave tomorrow.
They chose a seaside cabin; I chose the one facing the sunrise.
I set my phone to silent, allowing only one number to break through—Eagle Eye.
Habit.
And a kind of unease.
The Grand Victorium Hotel, lobby.
The marble felt like ice.
The clock pointed to 8:30 p.m.; the lights had just reached that perfectly seductive glow.
The front desk received an anonymous message with only one sentence:
“We will occupy Grand Victorium and take control of Sir Fan Wai Man’s jewels and paintings.
At the same time, the casino vault will return to the hands of freedom. —K”
No attachment.
Yet it carried an invisible fingerprint—
the tone cold, the punctuation cut as if by a chemical blade.
The lobby manager’s palms began to sweat.
He locked away his smile first, then the side doors, and finally, his own breathing.
The call went straight to Paradise Island Police.
At headquarters, police-blue lights moved along the walls.
Police Commissioner Richard Fair listened to the report, his brows deeply furrowed.
He ordered the Paradise Island Special Police to head to The Grand Victorium Hotel,
requested support from his former Black Star ground-combat training teammate, Eagle Eye,
and simultaneously raised the island’s security level to Red Alert One.
Eagle Eye, commander of the Black Cetus Special Unit, received the request for assistance and departed with 40 subordinates in nine Black Whale SUVs.
He looked at the map on the wall—red dots marking Grand Victorium, the casino, the exhibition hall, and the vault transfer corridor.
Each point demanded attention.
Flipping through the files provided by the Grand Victorium manager, a familiar figure appeared in the lobby surveillance photo.
Muhammad Badr Al-Satiqan.
PhD in Chemical Engineering.
Graduate of the Urelius Institute of Technology (UIT).
Licensed pilot.
Former Black Star ground-combat trainee, alongside Richard Fair and Eagle Eye.
Until the war came.
“To combat terrorists, coalition forces bombed the northern city district.”
When he returned home, his house was gone.
The walls remained.
The smiles in the photographs remained.
The people did not.
Rage renamed him.
From then on, he was simply Muhammad. No surname.
He joined KARAM.
Cold, taciturn, unsmiling, thoughtful, observant, ruthless.
Assembling nearly impossible-to-defuse explosive devices was his specialty.
KARAM gave him companions:
Saeed Hanifnejad—55, male, former KARAM special forces, assassination expert, a man who walked without a shadow;
Mossad Jabbar—35, male, operations planner, sharpshooter, a cold mind and even colder hands;
Yuliana Mamu—28, female, Mossad’s wife, leader of the suicide squad, petite, agile as a leopard, her smile sharp as a blade.
The four had executed precise strikes in UAS and Gafili, leaving behind newspapers, flames, and unanswered questions.
So when Paradise Island received the threat, Black Whale knew—
This was no joke.
The Grand Victorium Hotel, exhibition hall.
Sir Fan Wai Man’s jewels and paintings slept beneath spotlights.
A sapphire like a drop of imprisoned sea.
Brushstrokes breathing behind glass.
Each piece worth an island’s silence.
I sat at home looking at the blue sky outside the window.
My reflection in the glass—my eyes slightly brighter than the screen.
I straightened my chair.
That posture meant—
the vacation might be postponed.
My phone came alive.
Eagle Eye.
He did not say “sorry.”
He did not say “disturbing you.”
He only said, “Something’s happened on Paradise Island. We need you.”
“I understand,” I replied.
I glanced at the packing list on the table.
Shorts. Slippers. Sunscreen.
Useless.
I crossed them out in my mind.
Elysian Grandeur Resort.
Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows was a picture of prosperity.
Lee Wai Hing’s child’s laughter passed through the swimming pool like a string of sunlight.
He draped a towel over his shoulder and told his wife, “I’ll get two coconuts.”
He was unhurried.
He did not notice two unfamiliar men now standing by the pool.
Their skin darker than the sun, backs hurried, no sweat.
The Grand Victorium Hotel.
Nineteen minutes after the anonymous email.
The second message:
“Six hours to countdown.”
Coordinates.
Landing precisely on the maintenance corridor behind the casino vault.
Richard Fair crushed out his cigarette.
“Seal the island.”
He said it lightly.
As if giving an everyday reminder.
But everyone knew—it was the gesture that cut Paradise Island from laughter back into reality.
Inside the Raptor mobile command vehicle.
Eagle Eye pulled up a file.
ZETA-2.
Not a person.
Not merely a plan.
Like a shadow that always cleared the road one week before KARAM struck.
Some said it was an algorithm.
Some said connections.
Some said an insider.
Paradise Island Airport.
Man Man, Chee Yan, Mun Tseng, and I met Eagle Eye at immigration and boarded the Raptor command vehicle together.
Eagle Eye briefly outlined the situation.
I do not like guessing.
I only care which side it stands on this time.
He pushed an image onto my screen.
“Look at this.”
The thermal image of the maintenance corridor wall resembled a face unable to hide emotion.
One area showed abnormal heat—
warm.
As if someone were breathing inside the wall.
I remained silent.
Short sentences are habit.
And preparation.
Grand Victorium basement level two.
Casino.
The sound of chips like rain.
The dealer’s fingers moved faster than rain.
No one noticed the surveillance frame rate drop by half a frame.
Just half.
But half a frame was enough to erase a face from the image.
That face belonged to Yuliana.
Her steps were like a cat—
no, like wind trained to have no expression.
Her heartbeat did not rise as she passed security.
Inside her bag: lipstick, a mirror, mint candy.
And a ring unrecognized by any machine.
In light, the ring behaved.
In shadow, it began to speak.
Elysian Grandeur Resort.
When Lee Wai Hing returned with two coconuts, the unfamiliar men were gone.
His child shouted from the pool, “Daddy, jump!”
He smiled and jumped.
Water splashed up like a nearby white cloud.
He did not know paradise was about to change.
Night fell.
Grand Victorium’s exhibition hall changed shifts.
I walked last, like a needle that did not wish to be noticed.
The glass reflections split me into two.
One cold.
One colder.
Man Man called; her voice steadier than the sea wind.
“I’ve canceled the luggage.”
“Good,” I said.
“Watch your step.”
I smiled.
She understood me.
I understood her.
We have lived too long on the edge of a blade—even our breathing has learned to be light.
Police cordons rose across Paradise Island.
Tourists still took photos.
Some said it was a movie.
Some asked which star would appear.
I did not answer.
I know the real star is the bomb.
It always arrives on time.
Never needs an announcement.
The real show begins when you least expect it.
The third email arrived.
Three words: “The wind—has—risen.”
Below, the same coordinates, with one additional dot.
Between Elysian Grandeur and Grand Victorium—an underground connecting corridor.
I spread out the island’s blueprint.
The lines like palm lines.
Fate written across it—no one can read it, only feel it.
Eagle Eye asked, “Your judgment?”
“Not robbery,” I said.
“Occupation.”
He nodded.
“KARAM.”
“And ZETA-2.”
He was silent for three seconds.
“I’ll watch the sky.”
I understood—
air routes, drones, low-altitude signals, satellite blind spots.
He handled the sky.
I handled the ground.
Heaven and hell, separated by a single line.
Grand Victorium rear maintenance corridor.
We found the place “breathing in the wall.”
The thermal image looked like a heart.
I pressed my hand against it.
The wall trembled faintly, like a living person.
We opened it.
Inside was a metal box.
No nails. No lock.
On it were written the words:
“Not disturbing is the deepest form of intimidation.”
I felt a chill.
Not because of the box.
Because the sentence felt like me.
I often choose not to disturb.
But tonight, I knew I could not.
“Open it.”
The engineer’s hands were steady as a straight road.
The box opened.
No explosives.
Only a photograph.
Two unfamiliar men by the Elysian Grandeur pool.
Backs turned. No faces.
In the corner, faint words:
“Family Day.”
I gripped the photo.
The world narrowed its focus.
I saw Lee Wai Hing.
Saw his child’s smile.
Saw paradise’s most fragile place.
The air outside the casino vault grew lighter, as if pressure had been drained in advance.
I heard a faint “click” in the distance.
As if someone unseen had placed a chess piece.
I slipped the photo into my pocket.
“All units, move into shadow.”
The lights of paradise remained bright.
But I knew the real drama unfolds only in darkness.
The sea wind shifted.
Flags turned with it.
Elysian Grandeur’s lawn rippled like a sea about to swell.
Grand Victorium’s crystal chandeliers swayed gently.
Millennium rang with the first clink of cutlery.
Buffet’s shopping carts glided like silver arrows across the floor.
I stood inside Wansheng’s doors.
Watching paradise put on its face.
I put on mine.
This face had no expression.
Only a pair of eyes.
Paradise was burning.
Hell had not yet awakened.