The warehouse was silent, save for the hum of the portable generator and the whir of Lin Hao's laptop fan.
He sat on a wooden crate in the center of the vast, empty floor. He was fully robed, his [Concealment Robe] blurring his outline into a shadow, his [Perception-Filter Mask] a gray void where a face should be.
In front of him, on a rusted metal barrel, sat the laptop. Its webcam was the only eye looking at him.
Director Zhou had worked miracles. Fear was a powerful motivator.
The screen was split into four feeds.
The top left was Director Zhou. He was in a secure BSA communications room, sweating, looking like a man with a gun to his head (which, metaphorically, he was).
The other three screens showed… death.
Screen 2: Mr. Sterling. An American tech mogul who had disappeared from the public eye two years ago. He was a skeleton wrapped in expensive silk pajamas, sitting in a hyperbaric chamber. His skin was translucent. Screen 3: Chairman Wang. The patriarch of a massive Asian real estate dynasty. He was in a hospital bed, surrounded by beeping machines, a dialysis tube running into his neck. He looked like a dried leaf. Screen 4: The Count. A European arms dealer and old-money aristocrat. He was sitting in a wheelchair, an oxygen mask over his face, his eyes milky with cataracts and desperation.
These were the "Kings of the Earth." The men who owned the governments that employed the BSA.
And right now, they looked like frightened children.
"Gentlemen," Director Zhou said, his voice trembling. "The connection is secure. The... 'seller' is present."
The three old men leaned forward. They peered at the fourth screen, at the blurry, shadowed figure in the gray mask.
"Is it true?" Sterling rasped, his voice thin and reedy. "Zhou... the report. The 'Rhino' subject. Is it true?"
"It is... undeniable, sir," Zhou said, swallowing hard. "Subject 'Rhino' was clinically dead. Heart stopped. Necrosis in 90% of his tissue. I administered the sample pill myself. He... he revived in ten seconds. He is currently in the gym, bench-pressing 400 pounds. His tissue is... reborn. He is younger than he was yesterday."
A silence fell over the chat. It was the heavy, greedy silence of starving men smelling a feast.
Lin Hao, the "Masked Expert," moved.
He reached into his robe. He pulled out the clear, glass bottle (he had transferred them from his hand).
Inside, nine pearl-white pills rested.
They were glowing.
Even through the webcam, the digital compression couldn't hide it. The soft, pulsing, white light washed out the camera's sensors, creating a halo around the bottle. It looked like he was holding a jar of captured stars.
"Gentlemen," Lin Hao said.
His voice, filtered through the synthetic modulator, was a cold, flat, inhuman drone. It sent a shiver through the billionaires.
"I am not a pharmacist," the synthetic voice stated. "I am a wholesaler. I do not sell hope. I sell life."
He tapped the glass bottle with a gloved finger.
"These are 'Minor Vitality Pills'. Spirit-Grade. Each one will cure any mortal ailment. Cancer. Organ failure. Decay. It will scour your body of rot."
He paused, letting the hook sink in.
"And... each pill will add one year of perfect, youthful, disease-free life to your span."
On screen, Chairman Wang tried to sit up, his monitors beeping frantically. "One... year?" he wheezed. "Per pill?"
"Correct," Lin Hao said. "Nine pills. Nine years."
"I'll take three!" The Count shouted through his oxygen mask, his voice muffled but frantic. "I'll pay whatever."
"No," Lin Hao cut him off. The synthetic voice was sharp.
"I am not a retailer. I do not split lots. It is inefficient."
He leaned into the camera, the gray mask filling their screens.
"I have nine pills left. I am selling the entire bottle to one of you."
The three men froze.
The dynamic shifted instantly. If they bought three each, they all lived. They all got a little time.
But if one of them bought the bottle... that man got nine years. He would become a god among them. And the other two... would die.
This wasn't a purchase. It was a gladiatorial match. Lin Hao had just thrown a single knife between three drowning men.
"The auction," Lin Hao said, his voice devoid of mercy, "starts at one billion dollars. US currency. Immediate, offshore transfer."
"One billion!" Sterling screamed instantly, his skeletal hand slapping the glass of his chamber.
"Two billion!" Chairman Wang wheezed, his eyes bulging.
"Three!" The Count roared. "Three billion! And a private island in the Mediterranean!"
"Cash only," Lin Hao said coldly. "I do not want your land."
"Four billion!" Sterling yelled. "Liquated stock! I can have it in the Cayman account in ten minutes!"
"Five!" Wang countered. "Five billion!"
"Six!"
"Seven!"
It was madness. They were throwing away the GDP of small nations. They were stripping their empires, their legacies, their children's inheritances, all for the chance to breathe for nine more years.
Finally, The Count slumped in his wheelchair, shaking his head. He was out.
Chairman Wang was gasping, his face purple. "Seven... point... five..."
Sterling, the tech mogul, glared at the camera. His eyes were wild. He had built an empire on ruthless calculation. He calculated the value of his life.
"Ten," Sterling whispered.
The silence returned.
"Ten... billion?" Zhou squeaked.
"Ten billion dollars," Sterling said, his voice gaining strength. "That is my liquidity cap. That is everything I can move without crashing the market. Ten billion. Right now."
Lin Hao, in his warehouse, felt his heart beat. Just once.
Ten billion.
It wasn't just "enough." It was a war chest. It was an empire.
"Sold," the synthetic voice said.
"To Mr. Sterling."
Lin Hao looked at the camera, at the defeated faces of the other two men who now knew they were going to die.
"Director Zhou will provide the account details. Once the funds clear, the bottle will be left at a location of my choosing."
"Wait!" Chairman Wang cried. "Please! I have... I have properties! I have gold!"
Lin Hao reached out and closed the laptop.
The screen went black.
He sat in the dark, silent warehouse.
He waited. Five minutes.
His burner phone buzzed. It was a text from the bank app he had set up, the one linked to a labyrinth of offshore shells.
[BALANCE UPDATE: +$10,000,000,000.00 USD]
Lin Hao stood up.
He took off the mask. He took off the robes.
He looked around the leaky, cold, miserable warehouse.
"System," he said to the empty room. "Pack it up."
It was time to go shopping. It was time to buy his mountain.