The Romanée-Conti didn't just taste bitter; it tasted like failure.
Kaelen swirled the glass, watching the red liquid coat the sides. In his last life, he had been a man of order, a man who believed that if you built a big enough wall, the chaos couldn't get in. He had been a fool. The chaos was always inside the walls—it wore Italian suits and held boardroom meetings.
"The 1945?" Marcus asked, leaning against the doorframe. He looked confused, his brow furrowed as he checked his Patek Philippe watch. "Kaelen, we have the press downstairs. The Voss-Heidemann merger is the biggest event in the tech sector this decade. If we pull out now, the stock will crater. We'll lose billions in market cap in minutes."
"Billions in market cap," Kaelen repeated, his voice devoid of emotion. "And tell me, Marcus, what is the value of a 'market cap' when the power grid fails? What's the exchange rate for a stock option when a Level 5 Pyro-beast is burning down Wall Street?"
Marcus let out a nervous laugh. "Are you... are you having a breakdown? You're talking about monsters and power grids. Look, maybe you need some air. Elena is waiting in the lobby—"
"Elena," Kaelen interrupted. He felt a phantom pain in his chest, right where her bullet had entered in the future. "Tell Elena to go to my penthouse. Tell her I have a 'surprise' for her. And tell her to wait there until I arrive."
Wait there for a death that won't come for another ten years, Kaelen thought. But she'll be waiting in a cage she doesn't know I've already built.
"Fine," Marcus said, his tone shifting. There was a glimmer of the snake beneath the skin now. "But the Board won't like this. You're the CEO, but you aren't the only shareholder."
"The Board is about to have a very bad day," Kaelen said, standing up.
The Genius Move
Kaelen didn't go to the press conference. He didn't go to the Board. Instead, he walked to his private server room—a cold, hum-filled sanctuary of blinking blue lights and fiber-optic cables. This was his true domain. As a Level 9 Technomancer in his past life, he could manipulate data with his mind. Now, without his powers fully awakened yet, he had to rely on his greatest weapon: Future Knowledge.
He sat at the terminal. His fingers danced across the mechanical keyboard, a rhythm that sounded like gunfire.
Step 1: Liquidation.
He didn't just "cancel" the merger. He initiated a massive short-sell on his own company's stock. He knew the exactly 11:15 AM, a minor glitch in the global banking system (a precursor to the Mana-pulse) would cause a temporary flash-crash. In his first life, he had fought to stabilize it. In this life, he would trigger it.
Step 2: The Black Market.
Using an encrypted VPN routed through seven different countries, he entered the 'Shadow-Net'—the digital playground of the Mafia syndicates. He needed Mana-Cores. These were crystalline shards that had begun falling in meteor showers over the remote parts of the world weeks ago. Right now, scientists thought they were just rare radioactive minerals. Kaelen knew they were the batteries of the new world.
"Voss-Tech stock for Mana-shards," he typed into the terminal of the 'Iron Fang' Syndicate.
The reply came back instantly.
[Who is this? We don't trade in paper money.]
Kaelen smiled. He knew exactly who was on the other end. Viktor 'The Butcher' Volkov, the future Mafia King of the Eastern Wastes.
[I'm not offering paper. I'm offering the access codes to the US Satellite Defense Grid for 5,000 units of Raw Mana-Crystals. Delivered to Warehouse 14 by midnight.]
The chat was silent for thirty seconds.
[You're insane. Or a God. Which one?]
[By tomorrow morning, it won't matter,] Kaelen replied.
The Face-Slapping Begins
By 2:00 PM, the financial world was in flames. The news headlines were screaming: CEO KAELEN VOSS GOES ROGUE. VOSS-TECH STOCK IN FREEFALL.
Kaelen walked into the executive lounge. It was filled with angry men in suits—the Board of Directors. At the center was Marcus, looking triumphant. He held a legal document.
"Kaelen! There you are!" Marcus shouted, his voice echoing. "The Board has voted. Under the 'mental incapacity' clause, we are stripping you of your CEO powers. You're out. The merger goes through at 4:00 PM, and we're selling your personal shares to cover the losses you caused this morning."
Elena was there too, standing by Marcus's side. She looked at Kaelen with pity, a look that made his blood boil.
"Kaelen, honey," she said, stepping forward. "Just sign the papers. You've worked too hard. Let Marcus take the stress. We can go away... just the two of us."
Kaelen looked at the document. He looked at the faces of the men who would, in twenty-four hours, be begging him for a crust of bread in the ruins.
"You want my company?" Kaelen asked, his voice eerily calm.
"We have your company," Marcus sneered. "Sign it."
Kaelen took the pen. He signed with a flourish.
The room erupted in sighs of relief. Marcus grabbed the paper, grinning like a hyena. "Finally. Guards, escort Mr. Voss from the building. He no longer has security clearance."
Kaelen didn't move. He checked his watch. 2:59 PM.
"Actually," Kaelen said, "you might want to check the news again."
The large TV on the wall flickered. A frantic news anchor appeared.
"Breaking News: The Global Bank of Settlements has just announced a total freeze on all electronic transfers due to a 'catastrophic data corruption' event. Experts say all digital currency—including the funds intended for the Voss-Heidemann merger—have vanished into a black hole of code. Simultaneously, the Voss-Tech patents have been released into the public domain by an anonymous hacker, rendering the company's value... zero."
The silence in the room was deafening. Marcus's face turned from a triumphant red to a sickly, ghostly white.
"What... what did you do?" Marcus whispered, the paper in his hand now completely worthless.
"I didn't do anything," Kaelen said, walking toward the door. "I just moved my assets into something... physical. While you were busy stealing a paper empire, I bought the only things that will matter tomorrow."
He stopped next to Elena. He reached out and gently tucked a stray hair behind her ear. She flinched, her eyes wide with terror.
"You wanted a CEO, Elena," Kaelen whispered into her ear. "But tomorrow, you're going to find out what it's like to serve a God. I'll see you in the Wastes."
As Kaelen walked out of the building, the first streak of purple light crossed the afternoon sky.
The Zero-Day had arrived early. And he was the only one with a gun in a world about to be overrun by monsters.