Rising From Ashes: The Betrayed Queen Returns
I woke up strapped to a freezing operating table, a gaping hole crudely sutured over my heart.
Joi Rocha, my supposed guardian, stood nearby holding a glowing vial that contained my freshly extracted Phoenix gene sequence.
"Don't blame me, sweetheart. Gayla's body is just too weak. She needs this sequence more than you do."
In my past life, I endured years of illegal biological harvests for this family. My fiancé Brennon watched with cold eyes as they ripped the gene from my chest, while the elite academy students filmed and mocked my bleeding, broken body. They stripped me of my status, drained every drop of my worth, and left me to die in a freezing tomb just so their precious fake daughter could thrive.
Until my dying breath, I didn't understand. I had given them my absolute loyalty, so why was I treated like disposable medical waste? Why did my life mean absolutely nothing to them?
But opening my eyes again, I realized I had returned to the exact day they stole my core.
This time, I didn't cry or beg. I stared dead into Joi's eyes and smiled.
I detonated the residual energy in my chest to incinerate Gayla's stolen sequence, faked my own flatline, and injected myself with a hidden dark matter drive to completely rewrite my DNA.
If they wanted to play God with my life, I was going to burn their entire world to ash.
Chapters
Share
Chapter 7
The dorm room fell into a dead, suffocating silence. The only sound was the low hum of the air vents.
Sterling's eyes were blown wide, sweat instantly beading on his forehead. He yanked his arm back, putting all his weight into trying to rip the blade free.
It didn't move a millimeter. It felt like the blade was cemented into a solid block of titanium.
"This is impossible!" Sterling screamed, his voice cracking with panic. "Your gene sequence was stripped! You're nothing!"
Aislinn tilted her head. She looked at his sweating, terrified face, and a cruel, icy smirk touched her lips.
"Who told you," she whispered, her voice carrying through the quiet room, "that losing that pathetic gene made me weak?"
Aislinn squeezed her two fingers together. She pushed a surge of Genesis particles directly into the metal.
CRACK.
A sharp, brittle sound echoed in the room. The custom kinetic blade-a weapon designed to slice through armored vehicles-fractured right where she held it.
The cracks spider-webbed down the length of the blade with a horrific screech of tearing metal.
SHATTER.
The entire blade exploded in Sterling's hand, blowing apart into hundreds of jagged metal shards.
The violent recoil ripped through Sterling's grip. The skin between his thumb and index finger tore open, blood spraying into the air. The force threw him backward. He stumbled five steps before catching his balance.
He stared at his mangled, bleeding hand, then looked up at Aislinn. The rage in his eyes was gone, replaced entirely by raw, primal terror.
Aislinn stepped forward, her boots crunching over the shattered metal. She walked toward him with slow, deliberate steps.
"Stay... stay back!" Sterling stammered, holding his bleeding hand to his chest. "I'm the heir to the Prescott family!"
Aislinn stopped right in front of him. She didn't summon a weapon. She just lifted her right leg and drove her boot directly into his kneecap.
The bone snapped with a sickening crunch.
Sterling let out an agonizing shriek. His leg buckled, forcing him to drop hard onto one knee right at Aislinn's feet.
Aislinn looked down at him. She reached out and patted his pale, sweating cheek. The gesture was dripping with absolute degradation.
"Go back and tell Gayla," Aislinn said softly, "that this is just the warm-up. If she sends another dog to bite me, I'll grind her bones into dust."
Sterling shook violently, the pain stealing his voice. He could only stare up at her with a mix of hatred and absolute dread.
Suddenly, the personal terminal on Aislinn's wrist flashed a blinding, aggressive red.
A holographic projection shot into the air. It was a mandatory summons from the Academy's High Tribunal.
A cold, mechanical voice filled the room. Aislinn Conley. You are charged with attempted murder and destruction of Academy property. Report to the High Tribunal immediately for sentencing.
Sterling heard the voice. A twisted, desperate joy broke through his pain.
"You're dead, Aislinn!" he spat, his face contorting. "The Dean and the Board are there! You're finished!"
Aislinn didn't even look at him. She swung her leg and kicked him square in the jaw, knocking him out cold. The room went blissfully quiet again.
She tapped the terminal, hitting the ACCEPT button.
Aislinn walked over to her broken closet and pulled out a long, black trench coat. She slipped it on, the heavy fabric hiding the blue viper coiled around her wrist.
She looked in the mirror, adjusting her collar. Her eyes were pitch black.
If they want to play a game of law and judgment, she thought, I'll give them a show they'll never forget.
Aislinn stepped over Sterling's unconscious body and walked out the door, heading straight for the Tribunal.
Keep Reading
The story is getting intense! Switch to App to
Unlock All Chapters
You may also like
7.4
I thought my life was over when my sister died, leaving me to raise her two babies in a world that wanted to swallow us whole. Then I made the mistake of a lifetime: I left a bold, humiliating voicemail for the one man I should have feared most.
Anton Oryolov.
The ruthless king of the Oryolov Bratva. A billionaire monster who rules the city with ice in his veins and blood on his hands.
I expected him to fire me. I expected him to destroy me. Instead, he gave me a choice that felt like a death sentence: sign a contract and become his.
The rules were simple. I belong to him. I live in his shadows. In exchange, he protects the children. But as the doors of his mansion locked behind me, I realized the "forced proximity" wasn't just a business arrangement. It was a cage.
He thinks he can use me as a pawn in his dark mafia games. He thinks the children are just leverage to keep me in line. But he's starting to look at me with a hunger that isn't in the contract, and I'm seeing a man beneath the monster that I never expected to find.
In the Cruel Paradise of the Bratva, loyalty is a lie and love is a weakness. Our deal is signed in ink, but it's going to end in blood.
He owns my signature. He owns my safety. Now, he wants my soul.
7.5
I was the adopted daughter of the wealthy Ruiz family, but the moment their true heir appeared, I was thrown away like trash.
Not long after being kicked out, my adoptive father and uncle hired a hitman to stage a fatal car crash on Mulholland Drive.
Pinned under an overturned Porsche with a shattered leg, I watched the hitman point a suppressed pistol between my eyes.
"The Ruiz family sends their regards."
Before this, my reputation had already been completely destroyed by a director, a pop idol, and a reality TV star, leaving me blacklisted and universally hated.
My adoptive family didn't just want me ruined; they wanted me permanently silenced to tie up loose ends.
The hitman pulled the trigger, and the original Alicia died in despair, tasting only rain and blood.
Until her last breath, she didn't understand.
Why did the family she loved treat her like a disposable object? Why did those three men maliciously frame her and turn the world against her?
Opening my eyes again, the fear was gone, replaced by an ancient, cosmic indifference.
I, the Arbiter, had taken over this deceased vessel.
Moving faster than the human eye, I crushed the hitman's steel gun with my bare hand and turned his soul into dust.
Looking at the memories of those who wronged this girl, I signed a contract for the very reality show they were starring in.
Since I borrowed this body, taking out the trash is a required courtesy.
8.7
My little brother's heart monitor was screaming its final warning. I called my husband, Dante Volkov, the ruthless underworld king whose life I'd saved years ago. He had promised to send his elite medical team.
"I'm handling an emergency," he snapped, then hung up. An hour later, my brother was dead.
I found out what Dante's "emergency" was from his mistress's social media. He had sent his team of world-class surgeons to deliver her cat's kittens. My brother died for a litter of cats.
When Dante finally called, he didn't even apologize. I could hear her voice in the background, asking him to come back to bed. He even forgot my brother was dead, offering to buy him a new toy to replace the one his mistress deliberately crushed.
This was the man who had promised to protect me, to make my high school tormentors pay. Now, he was holding that very tormentor, Seraphina, in his arms. Then came the final blow: a call from the clerk's office revealed our seven-year marriage was a sham. The certificate was a forgery.
I was never his wife. I was just a possession he was tired of. After he left me to die in a car crash for Seraphina, I made one call. I texted a rival mob heir I hadn't spoken to in years: "I need to disappear. I'm calling it in."
8.7
My new boss is gorgeous, arrogant, and filthy rich.
The only problem?
He doesn't know he's also the father of my baby.
Six years ago, I was supposed to get married.
But the night before the wedding, my groom-to-be showed me sides of himself I'd never seen before.
I might've died in that hotel room...
If Mikhail Novikov hadn't burst in to save me.
Handsome, strong, capable knight in shining armor-sign me up, right?
WRONG.
Because Mikhail wasn't just the hero I never knew I needed...
He was also way more dangerous than I ever could've known.
But for one night, I let myself do something I never should've done.
It was worth it-several times over, if you catch my drift.
In the morning, though, I did the reasonable
I RAN.
For six years, I keep running.
Until I walk into work one day, and find my new boss waiting in my office.
Guess who?
And guess what he does when finds out about our baby?
8.5
"You are getting married, huh?" A shrill voice asked me from behind. "You don't look happy.'
"It's a complicated situati..." He cut me off.
"I can make you happy."
My eyes darted between his lips and eyes, he noticed my indecision and locked his lips with mine.
While battling with betrayal, Iris melts into a mafia's touch without knowing who he is. Now she must bear all the consequences that follow.
7.3
While I was pregnant, my husband held a party downstairs for another woman's son.
Through a hidden mental link, I overheard my husband, Don Dante Rossi, tell his consigliere he was going to publicly reject me tomorrow. He planned to make his mistress, Serena, his new mate.
An act forbidden by ancient law while I carried his heir.
Later, Serena cornered me, her smile venomous. When Dante appeared, she shrieked, clawing her own arm and blaming me for the attack.
Dante didn't even look at me. He snarled a command that froze my body and stole my voice, ordering me from his sight as he cradled her.
He moved her and her son into our master suite. I was demoted to the guest room at the end of the hall.
Passing her open door, I saw him rocking her baby, humming the lullaby my own mother used to sing to me.
I heard him promise her, "Soon, my love. I'll sever the bond and give you the life you deserve."
The love I felt for him, the power I'd hidden for four years to protect his fragile ego, all turned to ice.
He thought I was a weak, powerless wife he could discard. He was about to find out that the woman he betrayed was Alessia De Luca, princess of the most powerful family on the continent.
And I was finally going home.