CHAPTER 127: BUREAU’S SHADOW

Chaos broke out.

The quiet crowd suddenly screamed in panic. People were screaming, pointing at the smoking hole in the arena floor. Academy guards flooded the stage, their weapons drawn, forming a protective circle around Jonah and the unconscious form of Draven. Medics rushed forward, their hands glowing with healing energy as they carefully lifted Draven onto a floating stretcher.

Jonah pushed himself to his feet, his mind suddenly clear but filled with anger. He ignored the guards, the medics. His eyes were locked on the source of the attack. It was a clear assassination attempt.

"LOCK DOWN THE ARENA!" the Headmaster’s voice boomed, magically amplified, cutting through the panic. "NO ONE LEAVES! INITIATE SECURITY PROTOCOL ALPHA!"

Heavy metal gates slammed down over the exits trapping everyone inside. The festive tournament had become a crime scene.

A flash of white and silver shot from the VIP box. Ariana landed softly on the arena floor, her face showing cold, controlled anger. An attempt had just been made on the life of a fellow competitor, during a sanctioned international event. This was an insult to her, and to her Empire.

She walked slowly towards the smoking rune, her eyes blazing. "This was not a malfunction," she declared, her voice showing no doubt. "This was sabotage. A cowardly act." Her gaze moved to the Academy’s security chief, who had just arrived on the scene, looking confused and lost.

"As the official representative of the Silver Phoenix Empire," she said, her voice leaving no room for argument, "I am taking command of this investigation. Your security has failed. I will find out who is responsible for this disgrace."

The security chief, a big man used to giving orders, looked like he wanted to protest. But he weakened under her strong gaze and simply gave a stiff, reluctant nod.

Ariana turned, her eyes scanning the chaos until they found Jonah. "You. You were the target. Did you see who did this?"

"No," Jonah said, his voice tight. "But I know who’s behind it."

His eyes then fell on Vanessa, who was pushing her way through the guards, her face pale but her eyes burning with a fierce light. She was holding a small scanner.

"Ariana," Jonah said quickly. "This is Vanessa. She’s a Runic Engineer. If anyone can figure out how this happened, it’s her."

Ariana’s gaze shifted to Vanessa. She quickly looked at Vanessa’s determined face and the advanced equipment in her hands. "Show me," she ordered simply.

The two of them knelt by the edge of the hole, a strange and powerful alliance of intellect forming in the middle of the chaos. The warrior-diplomat from another land and the brilliant engineer from the Academy.

"The primary circuit is completely fried," Vanessa said, her fingers flying across the controls of her scanner. A holographic image of the rune’s magical wiring appeared in the air between them. Most of it was a chaotic mess. "The overload was intentional. Someone dumped a massive amount of external energy into it to force a detonation."

"A simple but effective method," Ariana noted, her military mind analyzing the strategy. "But how did they redirect the blast horizontally? These arena runes are designed with a dozen safety protocols to prevent exactly that."

"That’s what I’m trying to find," Vanessa muttered, her brow furrowed in concentration. She zoomed in on a section of the hologram that was less damaged. "The energy signature is Bureau-standard... military grade. But it’s been... masked. Covered under a secondary layer." She manipulated the hologram, peeling back layers of energy readings. "There... wait a minute."

Her eyes widened. "It’s not just a secondary layer. It’s a secondary circuit. A hidden one, woven into the main rune’s matrix. It’s... it’s brilliant. And completely insane."

She pointed to a tiny, almost invisible line of magical code in the hologram. "This is the redirect. It’s a parasitic rune. It didn’t break the safety protocols; it hijacked them. It tricked the system into thinking a horizontal blast was the safe way to vent the overload."

Ariana’s face hardened. "So it was planned well in advance. The saboteur had to have access to the arena’s lower levels for hours to install something this complex."

Vanessa nodded, her face grim. "They knew exactly where Jonah would be standing. They knew Draven would charge. The timing... it was perfect."

The full, horrifying picture of the Bureau’s plan snapped into focus. It wasn’t just a simple assassination attempt. It was a carefully staged piece of theater.

"They didn’t just want to kill me," Jonah said, the pieces clicking together in his own mind with a sickening finality. "They wanted to frame me."

Ariana and Vanessa both looked at him.

"Think about it," he explained, his voice cold and clear. "If the blast had killed me, what would it have looked like to everyone? My own unique, unstable power going out of control during a high-stakes match. A tragic ’accident’. It would have proven their point. It would have shown the whole world that my power is a dangerous, uncontrollable threat."

He looked towards the VIP box, where the remaining Bureau loyalists were being questioned by Academy guards, they looked perfectly innocent, but it was fake. "They would discredit me, reclaim my assets for safe study, and reassert their own authority as the ones who could control dangerous phenomena. It was a perfect plan."

Ariana stood up, her face burning with anger. "They are fools," she said in a dangerously quiet voice. "To bring their pathetic arguments here. To risk student lives for political advantage. They have disrespected my honor and the honor of my Empire."

She looked at Jonah, then at Vanessa. A new, powerful alliance had been forged in the smoking hole. "They wanted a show," she said, her eyes glinting with a dangerous light. "We will give them one."

She turned to the stunned security chief. "The tournament is not canceled," she declared. "The final match will proceed. We will show these cowards who hide in the shadows that we are not afraid."