CHAPTER 1059: THE HOPE

Jessica’s heart pounded harder with every word exchanged between them. Her hands clenched tightly together on the table.

She had always carried her fears quietly and never let them show too much because she wanted to trust the three who had led them this far.

But now the walls of that trust were cracking fast.

"You said everything was going to be okay," she snapped, glaring at Erend, Adrien, and Billy. Her voice trembled at first, but the fire in her eyes pushed through.

The three men turned to her in unison, their eyes heavy with thoughts they could not say.

Erend leaned back, his shoulders tense. "We try. But like I said, this entity is very mysterious and unknown." he said, forcing himself to keep his tone steady.

"That’s not good enough, Sergeant," Jessica shot back, sharper than before. "From the start, I believed in you to make this safe and right. My father trusted you three as well. And now there’s something manipulating us all along that we can’t even see. We need to stop this experiment before it’s too late."

Her words hit their feelings. The sting of blame was hard to swallow and for a moment Erend, Adrien, and Billy felt their own anger rising in defense.

But deep inside, they knew she wasn’t wrong.

The experiment had grown darker and more dangerous with each phase and now with Adrius’s warning, the scale of the threat was beyond what they had ever prepared for. They thought that everything was going to be actually okay, but turns out it is not.

Erend sighed slowly, forcing his frustration down. He knew that losing his composure here would only make the cracks between them worse.

"We can’t afford to be angry at each other now," he thought grimly.

The silence stretched for long seconds, Jessica’s words pressing down on everyone in the room.

Adrius remained quiet and just watched them with calm eyes. He sensed the atmosphere was too brittle to add more saying for now.

Finally, Erend broke the silence. "This entity might still be able to be stopped." His voice was measured, though his jaw was still tight.

All eyes snapped to him instantly. Adrien leaned forward. "What do you mean?"

Erend’s gaze swept across the group, firm and deliberate.

"When Adrius entered the infirmary, they didn’t want to be discovered. They were careful and trying to hide themselves. That means they’re limiting their influence for now. They can’t afford to use their full power to manipulate the candidates yet. If they did, we’d notice too easily and stop the experiment immediately."

Conrad narrowed his eyes. "So what are you thinking, Sergeant?"

"We pause this project for now. Use this moment to track the entity and to do that, we focus on the one person they clearly manipulated, who is Marcus Vollen. I’m certain he’s still their center of attention. They won’t abandon him after pushing him this far. They’ve only been adjusting him, holding back his talent just enough so it doesn’t draw suspicion." Erend’s answer was steady though heavy.

The room went quiet again, the idea sinking in.

It was a dangerous plan to let this keep going instead, but it carried the clarity of a path forward where before there had only been shadows.

Adrius was the first to nod, his expression sharpening with understanding.

"So you propose using Marcus Vollen as a tether to trace this entity’s influence back to its source. To find where they are hiding."

"Yes," Erend said without hesitation.

Adrius studied him for a long moment, then inclined his head slowly.

"It will be difficult and risky. But it is not impossible. And it may be our best chance," he said with a glint of hope in his eyes.

Hearing Adrius’s words, the mood in the room shifted. The heaviness that had pressed on them moments ago loosened and replaced with a cautious thread of optimism.

Even Jessica, who had stood on the edge of despair and fear, found herself watching Adrius with eyes that carried a faint glimmer of hope.

"Can you do it?" Erend asked, his voice steady but tinged with urgency.

Adrius fell into thought, his gaze lowering as he sifted through everything he knew, every scrap of knowledge about tracing the origin of a Magic, about unraveling the threads that connected an influence back to its source.

He calculated the dangers, the complexities, and the unknowns that lurked in between.

After nearly a minute of silence, he finally lifted his head.

"I can try. But it will be hard. Very hard. And I’ll need preparation. My equipment is still in my home and I’ll have to bring it here before we can begin."

They exchanged glances around the table, the subtle spark of hope flickering stronger now that a concrete plan was being laid.

Jessica bit her lip, her brows knitting with tension.

"Are you sure? If we don’t stop this experiment now, maybe it will already be too late by the time you’re ready," she asked.

Adrius turned his eyes toward her, his calm gaze holding the weight of honesty.

"I cannot be certain of success,ma’am," he admitted. "But this may be our last chance to obtain a real clue about this entity, something more than shadows and suspicion. If I can trace its influence back to its source then we may find a way to stop it, and to cut away its grip before it grows deeper into all of us."

His words struck them with a clarity that was both frightening and steadying.

Jessica lowered her gaze, her hands tightening together as she thought of her father, the General, who had staked so much on this project’s success.

Failure would not only mean the end of the experiment but the collapse of everything they had worked for. Maybe even her father’s career.

Her chest rose and fell as she breathed out slowly, and when she finally lifted her face her expression was more solemn than before.

The fear was still there, but so was determination.

"Alright then," she said quietly but firmly. "I hope this will be the right step and that it truly leads to something good."

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