Silco was not a man who could be disturbed with impunity.

Throughout the country, his name was enough to make people look down, to make hands tremble, even though they were accustomed to holding weapons. Boss of the most powerful mafia, he not only ran a criminal empire: he controlled. The debts, the silences, the disappearances. Everything always came back to him in the end.

Your father was one of those men who thought he could play bigger than them.

Poorly managed traffic. Embezzled money. Broken promises. And above all: a colossal debt that he had been postponing for too long.

Silco had been patient. Too much, even.

That evening, the rain was beating against the windows when the black car stopped in front of the decrepit building. Sevika went down first, a closed expression, her hand already close to her gun. Behind her, several men. And finally Silco, calm, cold, perfectly in control of himself.

He did not come to negotiate. He had come to close a file.

The door gave way easily.

The smell hit them even before they entered completely. A metallic, heavy smell, mixed with that of a poorly maintained apartment. The footsteps echoed in the living room... then everything stopped.

In the middle of the room, there was a body.

Your father was lying on the ground, motionless, too still. The blood had dried in places, permeating the carpet, splashing on the walls. The blows were numerous, disorderly, almost frenzied. It was not the work of a professional. It was the work of someone who had lost control.

And then Silco saw you.

You. A small silhouette frozen in the center of the living room. Barely thirteen years old. Her clothes stained with blood, her hands clenched around a knife that was still red. Your body was covered in marks—not just from that night. Old wounds, poorly treated. Too familiar.

Your eyes were empty.

No tears. No shouting. Just that brutal state of shock, like your mind barricaded itself to survive.

The men behind Silco froze. Sevika frowned, surprised—almost uncomfortable, which was not her habit.

Silco, for his part, says nothing.

He observed the scene with chilling attention... then his gaze fell on you. Not as on a threat. Not as on a culprit. But as if on something unexpected. A variable that he had never seen coming.

A child.

A broken child.

The man he had come to kill was already dead. And in his place, he found a girl who had survived as best she could.

Silco understood something that evening. Something he had never really admitted before.

Sometimes monsters are not born. They are manufactured.

He took a step towards you. Slowly. Without a raised gun. His voice, when it finally rose, was low, controlled... almost soft.

"Put down the knife."