An old man lies on a hospital bed, staring out the wide glass window beside him. Beyond it, the bustling city stretches endlessly into the night. Streams of headlights crawl along the roads like glowing veins, and the bright lights from the streets and towering buildings shimmer like scattered stars fallen from the sky.
The old man's face is tranquil, almost peaceful but his eyes are… dull.
Yes, empty of emotion. Void. The eyes of a man who has already surrendered everything inside himself. After a long silence, he suddenly speaks in a calm tone. It is so calm that it almost feels uncomfortable to hear. If you were sitting beside him, you would feel as though he were speaking not to you, but directly to your soul.
"I… I should have given up early on."
He mutters. His hoarse voice scrapes against the quiet room, rough and brittle; a testament to his withering age and the years that have worn him down.
"Life? What did I even achieve in my life?" he asks himself, staring at his faint reflection in the glass.
"A beautiful wife? Children? Money? I have them all." A faint smile tugs at his lips. Though his face is lined with age, the way he carries himself, his posture, the quiet authority in his presence reveals that he is no ordinary citizen.
This man is none other than the legendary business tycoon who elevated his family's status from middle class in America to a level no one could dare challenge. A successful man. A powerful man. A man everyone envied.
But what he says next carries nothing but regret.
"Because that's all there is to achieve here." His voice turns eerie, unsettling in its stillness. "I want more. I wish more." His words are low, barely louder than a whisper, as if meant only for himself yet there is unmistakable rage buried within them.
Then…
"I don't want to die." His voice cracks, fragile at last. "If I had known that being on top is this lonely… I could have pretended to be someone incapable."
He shakes his head and suddenly laughs. The sound is hollow, echoing softly against the sterile hospital walls.
"My age is catching up… and I'm even thinking like this? How stupid." His laughter fades, and his eyes harden with familiar ambition. "If I'm given a chance, I will still choose to be on top. NO MATTER WHAT THE COST!"
Being on top doesn't only require wits and talent. To continue reigning at the summit, you have to be almost inhuman. You're not the only one blessed with talent, not the only one capable of brilliance. So, what's the best way to stay ahead? You resort to something dirty. And dirty work isn't really dirty if no one ever finds out.
That's exactly what this old man did.
He never killed anyone. No, that would have been reckless. Murder would only bring disaster, drag his name through the mud, and land him behind cold iron bars. And for what? To throw away everything he painstakingly built over decades, just because another talented individual happened to rise? Talents are replaceable. If one falls, another will emerge in a different body, in a different generation.
But intelligence? True intelligence is the only talent truly worth anything in this world. It is the most useful, the most adaptable, the most dangerous. After all, nothing of significance can be achieved here if you are foolish. Power bends toward the mind that knows how to use it.
So instead of blood on his hands, he stained them with secrets. Quiet manipulations. Strategic betrayals hidden beneath polished smiles and firm handshakes. He buried competitors not in graves, but in scandals, bankruptcies, and silent acquisitions. Deals were made in dimly lit rooms. Alliances were formed and discarded like tools. Every move was calculated, every risk measured.
No one could point a finger at him. No evidence. No proof.
Just results.
And in the end, that was all that mattered.