Chapter 289 — Snapped I

Damian didn’t respond and didn’t blink.

Just continued staring at nothing with those empty crimson eyes.

Ashley waited for several seconds, then leaned forward slightly.

"Mr. Valcor? Can you hear me?"

Still nothing.

Warren James exchanged a glance with Ashley, concern flickering across his features. The boy looked completely unresponsive to external stimuli.

Then Damian’s hand moved slowly, reaching into his spatial ring with small movement.

A cigar materialized between his fingers and he placed it between his lips with deliberate slowness.

Then a lighter appeared.

Click

The flame caught, casting orange light across his blood-stained features and hollow eyes.

He drew slowly, the end glowing red, smoke curling upward in the sterile air.

The officers behind Ashley shifted, their frustration clearly visible on their faces. The casual disrespect of smoking during an official interrogation making them want to intervene.

But something about Damian’s complete disconnect from reality made them hesitate.

Puff

Damian exhaled, smoke drifting across the table toward Ashley’s face.

His crimson eyes finally moved, tracking her face with that same empty stare.

"Don’t mind if I smoke," he said flatly, his voice completely devoid of inflection. "My mind is not in the right place, and you people just won’t let me rest."

"You should be the one who’s dead... not me... you were nothing... you are nothing..."

Ashley leaned back in her chair, her expression showing something like amusement mixed with contempt.

"It feels like it was only yesterday I came to investigate you regarding the Norrington incident," she began, her tone conversational. "You were fifteen then. Just a kid who’d somehow killed trained terrorists with methods that suggested years of professional experience."

Damian took another drag, his eyes tracking her mouth as she spoke but showing no comprehension of the words.

"From the start, I found you suspicious," Ashley continued. "Everything about you was wrong. Your background too clean, your skills too practiced and your behavior too controlled for someone who’d supposedly never killed before."

She leaned forward slightly.

"I thought you belonged to a criminal organization, some sort of shadowy group that trained child soldiers or assassins. That was the only explanation that made sense for what I saw on those security recordings."

Her smile became cold.

"But I was wrong about that, wasn’t I?"

Damian’s eyes remained fixed on her face, but he said nothing. His hand brought the cigar to his lips mechanically, drew smoke and exhaled it toward the ceiling.

"Worthless... always worthless... street rat playing at being human..."

"You aren’t part of a criminal organization," Ashley said softly. "You made one yourself, built it from nothing with remarkable speed and efficiency and created something so well-organized that even the SFD can’t get information on it."

She tilted her head.

"Even GIA seems to be hiding your information... Very strange for a first-year Academy student to have that level of protection from the Federation’s Admin AI."

Damian took another slow drag, his face showing absolutely nothing.

Ashley’s eyes narrowed slightly, studying him, recognizing that something was indeed fundamentally wrong with his mental state.

"...Are we here to talk about my Mafia?" he asked quietly, his voice still completely empty.

The question emerged automatically, defensive reflex rather than a genuine question.

"No," Ashley said. "We’re here to talk about what happened inside that portal, about the choices you made and about the students who died because of those choices."

She opened her notebook, flipping through pages covered in notes from other testimonies.

"According to multiple witnesses, you killed several Noble students inside the portal. Not in combat against the creatures and not in self-defense... But executed them after the first battle ended."

Damian’s eyes tracked her mouth forming words, but his expression remained blank.

"You killed so many people... and you couldn’t save the one person who mattered..."

One of the police officers behind Ashley spoke up, his voice carrying accusation.

"You murdered fellow humans in a hostile portal where every life should have been precious and where survival depended on cooperation and unity."

The SFD officer added his voice.

"You took it upon yourself to be judge, jury, and executioner. You decided who deserved to live and who deserved to die based on your personal moral code."

Damian’s hand holding the cigar remained perfectly steady, but something flickered behind his eyes. It was not awareness exactly, but the beginning of reaction buried beneath exhaustion.

Warren James leaned forward, his grey eyes sharp.

"The testimonies also mention your abilities. A dangerous Art that you used extensively... One that clearly affects your mental state given your current condition."

His voice became firmer, carrying authority.

"The Capitol has concerns about such abilities being possessed by someone with your history and connections. We’re going to need you to provide full details about this Art... How it works, where you learned it and what its limitations are."

Ashley’s smile widened.

"And eventually, you’ll need to hand it over to proper authorities for study and classification."

"They want to take everything from you... just like you let them take me..."

Damian continued smoking, his face showing nothing, but his jaw clenched once. A tiny movement, barely visible, the first sign that words were actually reaching him through the fog.

The accusations kept coming, voices overlapping and building pressure through sheer volume.

The female SFD officer spoke next, her tone sharp.

"You positioned yourself as a savior while eliminating political rivals. That’s what really happened, isn’t it? You saw an opportunity to kill Nobles who might oppose your criminal organization later and took it under the cover of justice."

"The Noble heirs testified that you manipulated the entire situation–"

"Created dependence so students would follow your orders–"

"Killed people who were trying to survive just like everyone else–"

Damian’s breathing changed slightly, becoming less mechanical and more ragged.

His eyes started moving faster, tracking each speaker, his empty stare beginning to fill with something that looked like suppressed rage.

"Let them take everything... you deserve to lose everything... just like I lost everything because of you..."

Then Warren James delivered what he clearly thought was the killing blow.

"You’ll hand over that Art to proper authorities. Something that dangerous can’t be allowed to remain in the hands of someone with your background and psychological instability."

The cigar in Damian’s hand stopped halfway to his mouth.

He stared at Warren for several long seconds, his crimson eyes still hollow but now carrying heat beneath the emptiness.

Then something inside him snapped.