SSS-Rank Corporate Predator System

The broadcast ended.

The smiling, predatory face of Silas Cross vanished, leaving only the quiet, humming silence of Gideon's hidden lab.

Miles stood frozen, his eyes fixed on the blank screen.

The ultimatum was a block of ice in his gut.

The Crystal for the mentor.

Come to the Cross Corp tower.

Alone.

"Well," his internal monologue whispered, the sarcasm a thin, brittle shield against the crushing weight of the moment.

"That's a very clear, very concise, and very stupid invitation."

"I should RSVP."

"'Dear Mr. Cross, thank you for the lovely invitation to my own capture and probable dissection. I would be delighted to attend. Will there be snacks?'"

He felt a familiar, cold logic begin to settle over him, the system's way of dealing with overwhelming odds.

It presented the facts without emotion, a digital autopsy of his own impending doom.

[ANALYSIS: INFILTRATION OF CROSS CORP TOWER, SOLO.]

[ENVIRONMENT: HOSTILE. EXTREME.]

[ENEMY FORCES: UNKNOWN. ASSUMED OVERWHELMING.]

[PROBABILITY OF HOST SURVIVAL: 3.2%.]

Miles almost laughed.

The sound was a dry, humorless crack in the quiet room.

"Wow," he muttered to himself, his voice a low, shaky thing.

"Three-point-two percent."

"You're a real optimist, you know that?"

"I was thinking more like a solid zero, with a margin of error of 'definitely zero'."

"What's the point-two percent, anyway? Do I trip and accidentally fall out a window to safety? Does Silas have a fatal allergic reaction to my hoodie?"

He was spiraling, the gallows humor a desperate attempt to keep the sheer, crushing terror at bay.

This was it.

The endgame.

And the board was set for him to lose.

It was a trade.

His life, the SSS-Rank system his parents had died to give him, in exchange for Gideon's.

It felt like a betrayal.

A desecration of their sacrifice.

But the alternative, leaving Gideon to be tortured and dissected in The Nursery… that was unthinkable.

The weight of command, a responsibility he had never asked for, settled on his shoulders like a mountain.

He was the leader.

He had to make the call.

And there was only one call to make.

He took a deep, steadying breath.

"I'm going," he said, his voice quiet but firm.

He turned to face the others, his expression a mask of cold, hard resolve.

He expected arguments.

He expected fear.

He got a revolution.

"No," Clara said instantly.

The word was not a suggestion.

It was a statement of fact.

She stood up, her arms crossed, her eyes blazing with a fierce, protective light that he had only ever seen directed at him.

"Absolutely not," she stated, her voice the calm, precise instrument of a master strategist dismantling a flawed argument.

"That's not a plan, Miles. That's a suicide note."

"It's exactly what he wants."

Leo, who had been sitting in a corner, looking pale and shaken, shot to his feet.

The usual sarcastic energy in his eyes was gone, replaced by a raw, desperate loyalty.

"Are you insane?" Leo asked, his voice a high-pitched, incredulous squeak.

"You can't go in there alone!"

"That's Cross Tower! Their security system has a security system! I've tried to hack it from the outside just for fun. It's impossible!"

"Going in there by yourself isn't brave," Leo continued, his voice cracking slightly. "It's stupid!"

Miles just looked at them, his resolve unwavering.

"It's my fight," he said, his voice a low growl.

"It's my legacy. My burden."

"I'm not putting you two in the line of fire."

"Too late," Clara countered, taking a step toward him.

"We're already in the line of fire, Miles. We have been since the day we walked into that tournament with you."

"Silas isn't just hunting you anymore," she said, her voice dropping, becoming more intense. "He's hunting anyone who stands with you."

"He knows about us. He knows you're not alone. This whole 'come alone' thing is a test."

"He expects you to be a lone wolf," she argued, her mind moving at a thousand miles an hour, dissecting Silas's strategy. "He expects you to be an arrogant, emotional, and predictable hero who thinks he can solve everything with his own power."

"He's baiting you. He wants you to play the part he's written for you."

"And you're about to walk right on stage and read your lines."

Leo nodded frantically in agreement.

"She's right!" he said. "This is a classic villain monologue trap! It never works!"

"Haven't you ever seen a movie?"

He took another step, his face a mask of guilt and a fierce, burning determination.

"And besides," he said, his voice dropping, becoming more personal, more raw. "Gideon… he saved my life."

"He took me in when I had nothing. When I was just another broken toy that Cross Corp had thrown away."

"I'm not going to let him rot in a cage, Miles."

"I owe him."

"We do this together," Leo finished, his voice no longer shaking, but filled with a new, hard-won strength. "Or we don't do it at all."

Miles stood there, caught in the crossfire of their unwavering, and deeply inconvenient, loyalty.

He looked at Clara, at her brilliant, strategic mind that saw the game with a clarity he could never match.

He looked at Leo, at his fierce, guilt-ridden heart that refused to abandon the man who had become his father.

He had spent his whole life as a ghost.

Alone.

He had thought that was his strength.

He was beginning to realize it was his greatest weakness.

He was a weapon, yes.

But a weapon was useless without a hand to guide it.

A strategist to aim it.

A fire to fuel it.

He was the ghost.

But they were the machine.

The weight of command was still there, a heavy, crushing thing.

But for the first time, he didn't feel like he was carrying it alone.

He looked at his two friends, at the first real team, the first real family, he had ever had.

He saw the fear in their eyes.

But he also saw the resolve.

They were not going to let him do this alone.

And a small, terrified, and deeply grateful part of him was glad for that.

He let out a long, slow breath, the sound of a king conceding to his council.

The sound of a general trusting his soldiers.

The sound of a boy finally accepting that he didn't have to be a ghost anymore.

He looked at them, a slow, grim, and deeply determined smile touching his lips.

"Okay," he said, the word a quiet surrender, a solemn vow.

The weight on his shoulders shifted, became something manageable.

Something shared.

"We do this together."

He paused, a flicker of the old, cold, and dangerous Miles returning to his eyes.

The hunter who had walked into an ambush and turned it into his own personal playground.

He looked at them, his new, impossible, and absolutely essential team.

"But we do it my way."