From Prison scapegoat to a Multi-Trillionaire

Chapter 8: on the streets

"What did you say?" Chloe hissed, her temper finally flaring. "That fifty thousand is charity, Damien! Without it, you will starve in a ditch by next week!"

"Charity?" Damien smiled, a dark, brilliant expression that belonged to a multi-trillionaire king, not a warehouse clerk. With a swift motion, he drove the gold pen down, signing his name onto the divorce document with a flawless, commanding script.

He tossed the pen back onto the table with a sharp clack sound.

"Keep your fifty thousand dollars, Chloe," Damien said, his voice echoing through the grand villa with authority. "Use it to buy Julian a better defense lawyer. Because when the truth about his hit-and-run comes to light... fifty thousand won't even buy him a comfortable mattress in a prison cell."

"You... you signed it?" Chloe stammered, her voice suddenly losing its strength. She stared at his signature on the paper. He hadn't hesitated. There were no tears, no begging, no desperate pleas for her to change her mind. He had discarded her with the same casual indifference one would use to throw away a piece of scrap paper.

A profound, terrifying realization hit Chloe in that moment. she hadn't pushed a parasite out of her house.

"Damien! How dare you speak to my daughter like that!" Valerie screamed, her face contorting with rage as she realized Damien had completely stolen their moment of triumph. "Get out of our house! Right now! You own nothing here!"

"I'm already gone," Damien said smoothly. He didn't even bother going back up to the guest room to collect his few ragged clothes. He turned on his heel, his straight, commanding posture casting a massive, dominant shadow across the living room as he walked toward the front entrance.

He paused at the grand double doors, looking back over his shoulder one last time. His dark eyes locked onto Chloe's trembling form.

"Chloe Kingston," Damien said, his voice dropping into a quiet, chilling whisper. "Remember this day. Because from this moment on... the Kingston family will never have the privilege of standing in my presence again."

He pushed the heavy doors open and stepped out into the dark, rainy night, the heavy iron gates slamming shut behind him with a thunderous echo.

Inside the villa, Valerie was still screaming insults at the empty doorway, and Julian was trying to laugh it off, but Chloe remained completely frozen on the sofa. She looked down at the signed divorce paper, her heart hammering with a deep, inexplicable terror. She had everything she ever wanted, her freedom, her company's future, her brother's safety.

So why did she suddenly feel as if she had just signed her entire family’s death warrant?

Outside, the rain began to pour, washing the last remnants of the Kingston family’s filth from Damien’s skin.

He walked down the dark, the cool water matting his hair, but his eyes were burning brighter than the city lights.

He pulled out his phone, and the blue system interface flashed directly into his vision, illuminating the darkness of the stormy night.

> [SYSTEM NOTICE: Core Contract Severed. Host has successfully detached from the Lin Family lineage.]

> [Trial Task 2 Progress: Unchanged. Physical evidence location locked: Kingston Corporation Safe.]

> [Trial Task 3 Progress: High Synchronization achieved. Target Elena Sterling’s affection metric has initiated.]

Damien slipped the phone into his pocket, a cold, dangerous smile spreading across his face as he looked toward the glittering skyscrapers of the financial district.

The doormat was officially gone. The detective was in the wind. And the multi-trillionaire was about to take his throne.

The rain did not cease; it hammered against the cracked asphalt of the city’s lower grid, washing into the overflowing gutters. Damien walked through the downpour, his faded t-shirt soaked through and clinging to the lean, bruised contours of his chest.

To any passerby, he was just another broken soul discarded, a homeless wretch wandering aimlessly into the night.

But beneath his wet hair, the eyes of Detective Sean Riggs were sharp, scanning the alleyways and neon-lit street corners with analytical precision. He wasn't wandering. He was navigating.

He pulled out his secure smartphone, shielding the screen from the heavy rain with his palm. The luminous blue interface hummed to life in his retinas.

> [SYSTEM NOTICE: Civilian Cover active. Current proximity to private investigator tracking signal: 120 meters and closing.]

> [Warning: To maintain the integrity of Trial Task 3, do not utilize locked funds to purchase luxury real estate or high-profile accommodation. You must appear destitute to the public eye.]

Damien smiled coldly, a dark glint in his eye. 'Elena Vance’s dogs are still hunting for a trace,' he thought, his detective mind mapping out the blind spots of the tail behind him. He had fifty million dollars waiting in a hidden account, a sum that could buy the very skyscrapers towering in the distance, yet he was legally required to sleep in the dirt. It didn't bother him.

A seasoned cop knew that the best place to hide a dragon was in a nest of rats.

Turning a sharp corner into a narrow, mud lane in the industrial district, Damien stopped in front of a dilapidated, three-story brick building.

The sign hanging crookedly over the door read 'The Riverfront Boarding House'. It was a low-end tenement, a place where day laborers, fugitives, and desperate souls rented iron cots by the week for pennies.

There were no background checks here; the blind landlord only cared about the crinkled bills slid across his desk.

Damien walked inside, the floorboards groaning under his wet boots. The air was thick with the scent of cheap tobacco, damp wool, and stale cabbage. He approached the front desk, where a heavy-set man with a scarred face was reading a sports magazine under a flickering bulb.

The man looked up, his eyes instantly tracking Damien’s bruised face, his soaked clothes, and his lack of luggage. A sneer of casual disdain crept onto his face. "Fifty bucks a week. Up front. No rowdy behavior, or I throw you out on your ear."