Strongest Among the Heavens
Chapter 475: B-badump!

Chapter 475: B-badump!

Pauline twirled in front of the mirror, hands on her hips, examining the way the deep blue fabric of her dress caught the light. She pursed her lips. "Too much?"

Kazi—currently Pavvo—sat in an armchair nearby, arms crossed, watching her with grave seriousness.

"No," he said after a long pause. "Colours don’t match. Your hair is too black."

Pauline laughed. "Okay, Mr. Colour Theory. What colour should I wear then?"

"A light pink shade," Kazi said. "That will work better with your eyes and hair."

"Got it!" She ducked back into the fitting room. This had become their routine. A lazy afternoon, a dress shop she wanted to browse, and Kazi tagging along because she asked—and because he didn’t have a valid excuse to say no.

Pauline tried on another dress, a softer lilac color with ruffled sleeves, stepping out and doing a little spin. "What about this?"

Kazi curled a finger around the bottom of his mask. "This one makes you look deceptively innocent," he declared. "You could use it to get away with a crime."

Pauline burst out laughing. "What is this scale you’re using?"

"I’m just being honest."

"Do you honestly think I could get away with murder on this?"

"You’d look good doing it. Don’t think you’d get away with murder though. Maybe a theft or a robbery."

"I have a butler, I could make him do all the clean-up."

"What’s the point then? If you don’t have blood splatter on the dress, then the aesthetic doesn’t work."

"Shoot, you’re right." Pauline disappeared behind the curtain again. A few minutes later, she called out, "Alright, this next one is just for fun and I need you to say you don’t like it."

His eyebrows lifted slightly. "That I don’t like it?"

"You know—since I won’t be wearing something like this anytime soon. Just say it’s bad so I don’t get attached."

The curtain parted—

And she stepped out in a wedding dress.

A delicate, ivory-white gown, with soft lace tracing down the bodice and a subtle shimmer to the skirts. It was stunning—elegant, regal, and far too fitting.

Kazi stared.

He looked at her, straight-faced, and said, "That is the ugliest dress I have ever seen."

Pauline burst into laughter and giggles. A smile that was delightful and joyous. "Perfect. Great then."

"Yeah, I hate it so much. Just wanna rip it off."

Pauline closed her eyes, laughing with her shoulders shaking, and opened them only to turn away and laugh some more. "Woah, woah, even we would get into trouble if we started ripping dresses."

Kazi’s smile steadied. "Trust me, we wouldn’t."

Pauline hopped back inside the change-room, humming. Kazi’s smile turned to a smirk. The noble lady was mid-way through adjusting the sleeves of the next dress when she heard a voice just outside the changing room. A deep, rich French accent of an old woman floated through the curtain.

"Ah, my lady, you two make such a lovely couple."

Pauline froze, blinking. "What?"

"But of course! Such chemistry, such undeniable connection!"

She let out a confused laugh. "Oh, no, we’re not together."

"Such a shame! I can tell you are deeply attracted."

Pauline’s brain stuttered.

"I—I, ah..." She frowned. Something wasn’t right. The womanly voice sounded too dramatic, too theatrical—like someone trying way too hard to sound effortlessly French.

Her eyes narrowed.

Then—realization struck.

"Wait. He wears a mask. Pavvo—is that you?"

She ripped open the curtain to see Kazi, already walking away with a laugh. He talked to their attendant and got out his card. Technically, Pavvo’s card. Same difference. He looked back at the noble lady who blinked twice, blushed ever so slightly, and went back to changing.

***

The basement of Pavvo’s home had been simple to access. It required a trick-lock that only Pavvo could open and only Pavvo knew the location of.

Kazi did not consider torture. Even taking into account his hang-outs with Pauline, he had so much free time in the house that he preferred to do the detective work and find it on his own. On the first floor, under a wooden plank under the carpet, was where the key was. On the second floor, after moving a dressing table and a painting revealed the hatch and ladder going down, down, down.

As of today, the basement reeked of blood and gunpowder. The cold concrete was slick with it. Pavvo’s meth operation was not here, no, this basement was for meetings and for torture of traitors.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

The bullets missed the mark, that being the five security guards. "I thought about killing you but you people have families and—nah, just kidding." Kazi dropped down to their level. All five were bound to a steel pole. "It makes things just a bit more interesting. I could make myself an anonymous, impossible to find mercenary or...I can build up a bit of a mythology. You go to the prison, you talk about me, and people either believe you or don’t. It’s great."

Their mouths were sealed by rope too so they couldn’t talk back. Kazi tapped them on the temple, smiling, and then moved over to the man cuffed to the chair.

Pavvo. The real Pavvo.

His fine suit torn and bloodstained, his breathing was ragged, sharp inhales of pain punctuated by low, barely contained groans. Kazi stood over him, his white-gloved hands resting on his hips.

"Going to a place filled with nobles and rich men is going to piss me off," Kazi said pleasantly, before driving his foot into Pavvo’s ribs. A sickening crunch echoed through the room, followed by a strangled gasp.

Pavvo tried to roll away, his body instinctively curling to protect itself, but Kazi wasn’t finished. He stepped forward, grabbed a fistful of the man’s expensive silk shirt, and dragged him up just to slam him back down again. The impact sent a fresh spray of blood from Pavvo’s lips onto the cold floor.

Kazi crouched down beside him, tilting his head. "You’re weaker than I expected," he mused, his voice almost conversational. "I thought a man running an international drug empire would have more fight in him."

Pavvo wheezed, his chest rising and falling rapidly, his eyes wide with fear and fury. "You... you’re insane..." he managed. "You think you can just—"

A sharp slap cut him off. Kazi had struck him with an almost lazy motion, as if he wasn’t putting in any effort. "Shh. You talk too much."

He wiped his glove on Pavvo’s shirt and stood, rolling his shoulders as if to loosen them. His head tilted up slightly, the gold trim of his mask catching the dim light. "Don’t worry. After today, you’ll be going back to being Pavvo the France Dealer. Oh, but uh, don’t expect things to be the same. I put you in those cuffs for a reason; you’ll be getting used to them some time soon."

Pavvo’s eyes widened in realization and he shook his head weakly. "Please—"

Another kick, this time to his face. His nose shattered with a sickening crunch, blood splattering onto the floor. Pavvo twitched, then went still. Not dead—just unconscious.

***

The night of the MaskdeMasque Ball had arrived, and Kazi—wearing the identity of Pavvo—waited as the sleek, black limousine pulled up in front of his residence.

"Hellooo~!"

The tinted window slid down. Pauline sat in the back seat, draped in an elegant evening gown of deep sapphire blue. The silk fabric hugged her frame tastefully before flowing outward at the bottom.

"Look at that, my lady." Kazi waited for the butler to go and open the door for him. Noble arrogance and all that. "It’s the one I personally recommended."

The door opened and he saw Pauline in full. "You do have good taste, my dear."

The noble lady’s mask, a Venetian-style piece with delicate silver filigree, curved gracefully along her cheekbones, obscuring part of her face yet leaving enough to highlight her sharp, regal features. Pauline held out a silver gloved hand theatrically, smirking. "Oh, but Pavvo, my dear, do hurry. We mustn’t keep the world waiting."

Kazi slipped inside the limo, all cool with his arms crossed. "My Lady, is it not our job to keep the ordinary waiting?"

"True! Quite true!" A brief pause and a lean in with a smile. "Should we purposely be late? Does that actually help?"

"Just slightly. The president will be there. Security will be strict. We can’t be too late."

"Aw. I thought we could have some more fun."

"No fun tonight, my lady."

"And I was so inspired." A sigh. A genuine one too.

The drive was long and Pauline was in high spirits, which made her all the more animated. Despite himself, Kazi found the banter oddly enjoyable. It was rare to engage with someone whose idiocy was endearing, even if she was as much a part of the world he sought to dismantle as the criminals he was hunting.

Upon arrival, the ball was already in full swing. The venue—a sprawling 18th-century château—stood against the night like something out of a fairy tale. The golden glow from the grand chandeliers bled through the enormous glass windows, illuminating the garden outside with manicured hedges, people, and food. Guards lined the grand staircase leading into the ballroom, their black suits almost blending into the darkened night.

Opulence reigned in the ball. The walls bore heavy velvet drapes and every table shimmered with crystal glasses and silver platters laden with the most decadent offerings France had to provide. Live music swelled through the vast room, a full orchestra playing something elegant and unintrusive.

Pauline went on her toes to lean toward his ear. "Well? Does it meet the standards of the great Pavvo?"

Kazi made a show of tilting his head, examining the scene before nodding in mock approval. "It will suffice."

"Excellent!"

Kazi smiled behind his mask before letting his gaze sweep the room, filing away names and faces. He already knew eighty percent of the attendees—businessmen, government officials, socialites. But Pavvo was no fool; his criminal operation existed in shadows. In some years, he predicted the use of social media and computers would explode. That time was not today. Everything was done in-person under the shadows. The truly dangerous figures would never be so easily found. Still, there were gaps in his knowledge, and tonight was about filling those gaps.

He turned to Pauline as they navigated the crowd. "Do me a favor?" he murmured softly, his voice a thread beneath the noise.

"Depends," she replied.

He gestured subtly with his champagne flute toward a group of sharply dressed men near the eastern balcony. "Tell me who they are."

Pauline thought about it for a bit, cocking her head left and right as she thought about it. "The one in the navy tux is Jacques Lemoine—CEO of a logistics company. The balding one? Christophe Lavigne, finance. The others... Middle Eastern investors, Qatari I believe. My mother’s been working with them recently."

"Nothing else?"

"What else is there to know?"

’I figured all that on my own. Useless.’ A breath. ’But for her sake, it’s good that she knows.’

So far, nobody had approached or looked at them. In fact, most eyed Pauline with wearier eyes than him. Pauline was the infamous daughter of the host, after all.

He fake laughed. "Nothing. Just testing to see if all that isolation has made you socially inept."

"My butler tells me some stuff. Oh, but I guess not too much."

Kazi recognized Lemoine from photos on Pavvo’s computer. He was a mentor type friend. Kazi didn’t need to meet or see him.

He was about to press further when the air around them shifted. Pauline stiffened, her grip tightening around her champagne flute.

Kazi turned, already knowing what he would see.

Pauline’s mother stood before them.

"Pavvo."