Chapter 158: Chapter 158
Gonda was inside his base.
The room was large, but it felt smaller than usual.
Several of his men sat around the place, some near the walls and some around the table. No one spoke too loudly. They could feel their boss’s mood. Gonda had been walking back and forth for the past ten minutes, and each step made the room tighter.
Kundra stood near one side.
He was the man Gonda trusted more than most.
Even he did not ask too many questions right now.
Gonda’s face had lost its usual calm.
He knew that after this point, there was no easy way back.
He had already sent the words out. He had already touched World Zone again. The road had already been set. A man could step back before he threw the stone, but not after the stone had left his hand.
Now he could only wait to hear what it had hit.
If Bruno or Tobin survived and learned that he had helped World Zone set the road, then Gonda was finished. The hidden organization would know he had betrayed them. Bruno would turn every ambition in his body toward killing him. Rust Gate would never trust his word again.
But if World Zone succeeded, that danger would shrink. Tobin and Bruno would both be gone, and the hidden organization would lose its bridge.
Then World Zone might accept Gonda as an ally instead of treating him like a used road.
That was the best result left.
It was also the only result that kept him alive.
Still, his chest would not relax.
He knew World Zone too well to trust their kindness. They could use him today and throw him away tomorrow. But the hidden organization was no safer. If they learned what he had done, they would not waste time with warnings.
That was why he kept walking.
Standing still made his fear louder.
His phone rang.
Everyone in the room looked toward him.
Gonda stopped walking and picked it up at once.
The number was hidden.
He answered.
"Speak."
The voice on the other side belonged to one of World Zone’s men.
"Gonda," the man said, "there is good news and bad news."
Gonda did not feel excited.
The bad news worried him more.
"Say it."
"Tobin Rell is dead," the man said. "Many of his people died with him. Rust Gate will need to be opened soon. You will place our man inside."
Gonda closed his eyes for a second.
Tobin was dead.
One part had worked.
But he did not relax.
Rust Gate was important, but not more important than Bruno.
Tobin’s death could shake one side of the alliance. Bruno’s death could break the bridge to the hidden organization. If Bruno survived, then the most dangerous piece was still moving.
"And the bad news?"
The man on the other side paused.
"Bruno did not arrive."
Gonda’s eyes opened.
The room seemed to freeze around him.
"What do you mean?"
"Our people watched the road. He never came."
Gonda’s breathing changed.
Bruno never came.
That meant someone had warned him.
Or he had realized.
Or worse, the hidden organization had realized.
Gonda’s fingers tightened around the phone.
He wanted to tell them to find Bruno, but the words stuck in his throat.
If he sounded too desperate, World Zone would hear it. If he sounded too calm, they would think he was hiding something. Both paths were bad.
For a moment, he could only hear his own breath.
Bruno had not arrived.
That single fact was enough to make the room feel unsafe.
Kundra saw Gonda’s face and stepped closer.
"Sir," he asked carefully, "did the mission fail?"
Gonda turned toward him.
He opened his mouth, but before he could answer, the window behind Kundra broke with a sharp crack.
The bullet struck Kundra in the head.
For one heartbeat, Kundra remained standing.
Then his body collapsed to the floor.
The room exploded into movement.
Men shouted.
Someone reached for a gun.
Another bullet entered through the broken window and hit the man near the table. Then another shot struck the guard by the door. The firing was controlled. It was too fast for ordinary street men.
Gonda pulled his gun from his coat.
"Get down!" someone shouted.
But there was nowhere to get down.
The attack had already entered the room.
More shots came from outside.
One by one, Gonda’s closest men fell. The men who had been sitting around him, the ones he trusted to hold the base if trouble came, dropped before they could form a proper line.
Two men near the back tried to rush toward the side door.
The first fell before he reached it.
The second turned back with panic on his face. A bullet hit his shoulder before another one finished him.
Gonda fired once toward the window.
He hit nothing.
The shooting stopped as suddenly as it had started.
Smoke and dust hung in the room.
Gonda stood with his gun raised, breathing hard.
His ears rang.
He looked left and right, searching for one man who could still answer him.
No one stood.
Then he heard slow, unhurried footsteps.
The door opened.
Bruno walked in.
He held a gun in one hand, but he did not raise it immediately. Behind him, several men spread into the room with weapons ready. Some were Bruno’s people. Some were faces Gonda recognized from the outer lines, men who should have waited for Gonda’s order before moving anywhere.
They were not waiting anymore.
Bruno smiled.
That smile told Gonda everything.
His stomach sank.
The matter had been exposed.
The hidden organization knew.
Worst of all, Bruno had survived.
Bruno, the man Gonda had never wanted near the real center of power, had survived and walked back with guns behind him.
Gonda finally understood the shape of the nightmare.
He had betrayed the side that had been using Bruno as its bridge, and the bridge had returned to burn him.
Bruno stopped a few steps away.
His smile became wider.
"Yo, Gonda."
