A warm liquid slowly trickled down the contours of his neck.
It was a bone-chilling sensation.
Viscous and carrying a metallic, iron-like scent, it dripped onto the pristine white cotton sheets.
Under the cold moonlight, the blooming patch of dark red became the only jarring color in the bedroom.
Zack Vance lay stiffly on the mattress.
His eyes were wide open, his pupils constricting uncontrollably with sheer terror.
All he could see was a fine-meshed black mask, and behind it, a pair of dull, lifeless eyes that resembled a pool of stagnant water.
Death.
The word had never felt so tangible, pressed right against his skin.
For the past half-month, he had been navigating the blind spots of Vought International.
With bowls of food, he had successfully tamed the female Homelander, a being of world-destroying power.
Watching the massive sums of money multiplying daily in his offshore accounts, and the dark web of capital he was slowly weaving in the financial markets, an illusion had inevitably blossomed in the depths of his heart.
An illusion that his foresight and grasp of human nature would allow him to glide effortlessly through this mad world.
Right now, the high-carbon steel dagger pressed against his carotid artery ruthlessly shattered all those fantasies.
This was the world of *The Boys*.
This was a hell where ordinary lives were as cheap as dirt, and supes could crush a civilian’s bones on a whim just because they were in a bad mood.
Strategic financial moves needed time to ferment, and psychological mind games required specific people as leverage.
But in the face of absolute violence, all intellect, rhetoric, and the astronomical figures in his bank accounts were as fragile as wet paper.
The black tactical glove gripping his right wrist felt like a mini hydraulic press.
Zack’s right arm muscles instinctively tried to flex, attempting to break the hold and reach for the Glock under his pillow.
But the instant his brain issued the command, before his nerve endings could even mobilize the muscles, a stabbing pain shot through his wrist.
It was the sound of his bones groaning under a terrifying grip, on the verge of fracturing.
Sweat trickled from Zack’s forehead into his hairline.
The air in the bedroom seemed to have been sucked dry.
Zack’s chest heaved violently.
In his extreme tension, every attempt to draw in oxygen became an agonizing struggle.
*I have to calm down,* he told himself frantically.
Panic and trembling would only make that sharp blade slit his throat all the faster.
The slight sting on his neck acted like a shot of adrenaline.
Zack forced his gaze away from the gleaming blade and looked directly into Black Noir’s black mask.
Time ticked away, second by second.
A full ten seconds passed.
The dark silhouette looming over him remained as motionless as an value-frozen statue.
The dagger that had nicked his skin hovered steadily in place, without advancing even a single millimeter.
This illogical hesitation was like a bolt of lightning, ripping through the fear-induced fog in Zack’s mind.
*Something’s wrong.*
Though Zack’s breathing was still shallow and rapid, the logical gears of his brain began to spin furiously.
Who was Black Noir?
He was the purest executioner of The Seven, the most obedient blade in Madelyn Stillwell’s hand.
When he executed an assassination, he never wasted a single motion.
If Madelyn’s sole purpose in sending him tonight was silence, Zack wouldn’t have even had the chance to open his eyes.
Long before Black Noir had silently picked the lock, entered, and stood by the bed, that dagger would have pierced Zack’s heart or slit his windpipe.
Vought’s clean-up crews had ten thousand ways to stage this apartment as a home invasion robbery, without leaving a single drop of blood on the wall.
But he hadn’t.
He had merely restrained Zack in the most oppressive posture possible, deliberately nicking his skin to create a suffocating aura of impending death.
He was waiting.
Or rather, he was executing another of Madelyn’s covert directives: scrutiny and assessment.
Following this line of logic, the fog before Zack’s eyes began to lift.
Madelyn had noticed something off about Joanne.
The high-and-mighty female super, who treated all of New York like her personal playground, had not only become bizarrely stable in her emotions but had also begun frequently blocking her suit’s tracking signal, vanishing from Vought’s surveillance.
To the intensely controlling Madelyn, Joanne was Vought’s core asset.
Any unknown variable trying to touch that asset was unforgivable.
She had tracked down this civilian apartment in Queens.
She had found Zack Vance, a normal Asian international student with absolutely no background on paper.
But precisely because he had “no background,” Madelyn didn’t dare act rashly.
How could a broke student with no superpowers and no corporate backing make a conceited god report here obediently every single night?
What kind of leverage did he have over Joanne?
Was it some unknown chemical agent?
Some kind of psychological brainwashing targeted at supes?
Or a meticulously laid trap by some massive rival faction?
Madelyn didn’t know.
Before figuring out Zack’s cards, she wouldn’t dare issue an execution order.
Because if Zack died, and the mysterious thread binding Joanne snapped, the consequences would be catastrophic.
She couldn’t afford the price of Joanne losing complete control and unleashing her fury upon Vought Tower.
Black Noir’s mission tonight was to test the waters.
To use the fear of death to shatter this young man’s psychological defenses and force him to reveal his hand.
Having figured this out, Zack’s pounding heart began to settle back into its rhythm.
The fatal threat was still very real; one wrong move, and Black Noir’s blade would change its mind.
But as long as he held the “Joanne” card, Madelyn’s hesitation to act would be his only way out of this dead end.
“Phew…”
Zack opened his mouth, slowly exhaling a long, slightly trembling breath.
He completely relaxed his muscles, giving up all resistance.
Feeling the prey surrender, the iron grip on his wrist loosened by a fraction of a hair, yet it maintained absolute control.
Zack let his back sink fully into the soft mattress, tilting his head back slightly away from the blade—a tiny movement, but enough to signal submission.
The silent dark figure beside the bed tilted his head slightly.
For the first time, a flicker of something unusual appeared in Black Noir’s dead gray eyes.
In his career, ordinary people facing this high-carbon steel blade either wet themselves and begged incoherently, or struggled hysterically in sheer panic before he snapped their necks like chickens.
Yet this Asian youth, after the initial tens of seconds of fear, had incredibly managed to steady his breathing.
Not only that, he had actively dropped all defenses.
His calm, almost eerie gaze as he lay on the mattress didn’t belong to a lamb waiting for slaughter, but rather a hunter plotting a counterattack.
The bedroom was so quiet that only Zack’s steady breathing could be heard.
The moonlight slowly shifted, illuminating a small reflective metal buckle on Black Noir’s suit.
Zack met the gaze hidden behind the mask.
He knew this was a silent psychological game of chicken.
Whoever showed weakness first would be torn to pieces in the ensuing negotiation.
He couldn’t act ignorant about Vought.
He couldn’t show surprise at Black Noir’s identity.
And he certainly couldn’t beg under the terrifying pressure.
Zack swallowed hard.
The movement of his Adam’s apple inevitably brushed against the cold blade pressed to his neck, sending a sharp shiver through him.
Yet he didn’t even flinch.
In his deep black eyes, the embers of fear had completely died out, replaced by a cold, penetrating composure that saw through everything.