Julian stared into Nicholas’s eyes for a long, heavy moment after hearing the cold threat. The room hung in a brief, fragile balance—until Julian’s lips twitched, his shoulders shook, and he suddenly thrown his head back, bursting into a loud, boisterous laugh.The sound ricocheted off the grand marble walls, shattering the brief tension. Right on cue, the surrounding cousins and younger relatives joined in, their high-pitched snickers and booming giggles echoing through the gold-leafed reception hall. To them, Nicholas’s solemn warning wasn't dangerous; it was the single funniest joke of the entire evening."Take everything from me?" Julian wheezed, wiping a tear of fake amusement from the corner of his eye. He stepped forward and slapped Nicholas hard on the shoulder—a heavy, patronizing pat meant to emphasize the physical and social gap between them. "Did you hear him, everyone? The scholarship boy thinks he's a lion because he was summoned one last time! Do you think you were call

Julian strolled lazily across the carpeted library floor, the soft click of his handmade Italian leather shoes breaking the heavy quiet. He pulled a crisp, uncirculated hundred-dollar bill from his leather billfold, holding it up between two fingers like a magician showing off a trick.With a flick of his wrist, he let the bill float downward. It drifted through the warm air of the library before settling softly onto the dark, polished marble floor right in front of Nicholas’s shoes.The relatives along the front rows shifted in their leather chairs, their faces lighting up with sharp, eager amusement.Julian took another slow step forward, pulled out a second bill, and dropped it next to the first.Float.Float.He repeated the motion four, five, six times, creating a small, green trail of cash across the floor while the surrounding uncles and aunts watched with growing delight. The atmosphere in the library shifted instantly from legal solemnity to a cruel, high-society circus.Juli

Nicholas woke early the next morning to an unfamiliar, profound sense of stillness. The persistent, heavy knot that had rested in his chest for years—the quiet, desperate need to prove to the world that his mother hadn't spent her life loving a ghost—was gone.He lay on the crisp, high-thread-count sheets of his penthouse master bed, staring up at the ambient recessed lighting of the ceiling. Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, the morning sun was just beginning to burn through the thick Capital fog, painting the glass towers of the skyline in shades of pale gold and silver.He didn't feel broken by the events at Peterson Manor. He felt clean. For the first time in his memory, he was completely detached from the weight of the Peterson surname. He wasn't Henry's illegitimate mistake, nor was he the secretary's son begging for a seat at their table. He was simply himself.With a thought, Nicholas summoned the System interface.The glowing red banner from the previous night had settl

Adrian’s loud, hysterical laughter echoed across the central plaza, drawing supportive snickers from the members of the Elite Business Society standing behind him. He took a half-step closer to Nicholas, pointing a mocking finger directly at the phone screen."Look at you!" Adrian sneered, his voice dripping with condescension. "Holding your phone like you're tapping out a multi-million-dollar wire transfer! What, did you just transfer your last five dollars to buy a cup of cafeteria coffee? Or are you texting your dead father to ask for a bigger allowance?"The surrounding crowd chuckled, enjoying the high-society drama unfolding before them. Vivian stepped forward, her face flushed red with indignation, her body instinctively positioning itself between Nicholas and Adrian."Adrian, that is completely out of line!" Vivian barked, her knuckles white as she pointed back at him. "You’re using student society privileges to settle a personal political grudge for Peterson Global! You have

The towering fifty-story headquarters of Orion Technologies gleamed like a dark glass blade under the late afternoon sun.Nicholas walked through the revolving glass doors into the marble-floored lobby, his long dark coat swaying slightly with each calm, measured step. Vivian walked half a step behind him, her hands clenched tightly in her coat pockets, her eyes scanning the imposing rows of security turnstiles, private elevators, and uniformed guards patrolling the floor."Nicholas," Vivian whispered, her voice tight with nervousness. "Brandon Steve doesn't just run Orion Technologies—he’s an executive board member of the regional trade alliance. If we make a scene here, he could easily use his corporate security to throw us out or call the municipal police.""We aren't making a scene, Vivian," Nicholas replied smoothly, his tone as unruffled as a calm lake. "We're here to conduct business."At the far end of the lobby near the executive elevator bank, Brandon Steve stood surrounded