"Oops! The Chicken Boy Is The Billionaire's Son"

Chapter 5: "It's Over Between Us!"

The heat in Nathan's chest boiled over.

He sprinted across the asphalt. He didn't say a word. He just covered the distance, grabbed Mark by the shoulder of his Italian blazer, and shoved him hard against the side of the car.

Mark grunted, his keys clattering to the ground. But Mark was heavier, well-fed, and spent his afternoons in a private boxing gym. Before Nathan could throw a punch, Mark spun around, planted his feet, and drove his fist straight into Nathan's face.

The crack of bone on bone echoed in the empty lot.

Nathan stumbled back, tasting copper immediately. The inside of his cheek was busted, and his vision swam for a second. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, smearing blood across his knuckles.

"Are you insane, you freak?!" Mark yelled, shaking out his hand. "I'll have you arrested for assault!"

Nathan ignored him. He looked straight at Amanda. She had jumped back, clutching her expensive purse to her chest, looking at Nathan with disgust instead of fear.

"How?" Nathan asked, his voice breaking. He didn't care that he sounded pathetic. He needed to know. "Amanda... what went wrong? How could you do this to me?"

Amanda stared at him. Then, her posture relaxed. She let out a heavy sigh and rolled her eyes, completely dropping the 'scared girl' act.

"Ooh... poor thing," she mocked, her voice dripping with venom. She stepped closer to him, her heels clicking on the pavement. "I made you believe I loved you all these months. I brought you coffee. I held your hand. Ooh, so wicked of me. Do you want an apology, Nathan?"

She laughed, a harsh, grating sound.

"See, Mark here promised he would sell your little project for a hundred million dollars or more," she said, casually adjusting the strap of her dress. "And he promised to give me a whole sixty percent cut just for bringing him the code. What were you going to do with it, Nathan? Let me guess. You would have used your cut to... who knows... save the world? Make free energy for the poor?"

She sneered, looking him up and down, taking in the cheap suit, the melting ice cream, the bleeding lip.

"Save your fucking broke pocket first before you try to save someone else," she spat. "You were so dumb. Gosh. You really thought a girl like me would settle for a guy who lives in a basement? I endured the smell of that damp room for six months just to get the math out of you."

Nathan just stared at her. It was like looking at a stranger wearing the face of the girl he loved.

Amanda reached into her small designer clutch. She pulled out the silver flash drive, the real one, the one she had used on stage.

"And hey," she said, casually tossing the drive at him. It bounced off Nathan's chest and hit the ground near his worn-out shoes. "I won't be needing this anymore. I've already copied the files to my personal cloud. Just like I won't be needing you anymore. It is over between us."

Mark picked up his keys and opened his door. "Leave the dimwit alone, babe," Mark laughed, sliding into the driver's seat. "We have a party to get to. The champagne is waiting."

Amanda shot Nathan one last look of utter disdain, climbed into the passenger seat, and slammed the door. The engine roared to life, and the sports car zoomed off into the dark, its red taillights burning into Nathan's retinas until they disappeared around the bend.

Nathan was left entirely alone in the lot.

He didn't pick up the flash drive. He just turned and started walking.

He bypassed the main gates and took the old service road which was the loneliest road on the campus. It was a long, long, unlit stretch of asphalt lined with thick pine trees. The wind picked up, cutting through his thin jacket. The ice cream on his neck and back was cooling rapidly, making him shiver, but inside, his whole being was boiling.

He kept his head down, kicking stray stones with the toe of his shoe.

Tears were falling from his eyes, hot and fast, tracking through the dirt and sweat on his face. But he wasn't crying. There were no sobs. There was no gasping for air. Just a silent, continuous leaking of water from his eyes, driven by a rage so deep it terrified him.

Eighteen whole months. She had brainwashed and fooled him for eighteen whole months. She had smiled at him, kissed him, planned a fake future with him, all while counting down the days until she could steal his brain to buy designer clothes.

He kicked a large rock, sending it skittering into the dark woods. He cursed himself. ‘Was I that dumb? That stupid? That foolish?’

‘Where did things go wrong?’ He had trusted the system. He had trusted love. He had believed that hard work and intellect would be enough to pull him out of the gutter. How had he been so blind to the reality of the world?

The world didn't care about hard work. The world cared about power. Epstein had power. Mark had power. Amanda allied herself with power. And Nathan? He was just the dirt they stepped on to get higher.

He wiped his bleeding mouth with his sleeve. ‘Is this how villains are born?’ he wondered. Because right now, he didn't want to save the world anymore. He wanted to burn Braxton University to the ground and watch Epstein and Mark choke on the ashes.

Suddenly, a pair of headlights cut through the darkness behind him.

Nathan didn't move to the side of the road. He just kept walking, kicking stones. Let them honk. Let them hit him. He didn't care anymore.

But the vehicle didn't speed past. It slowed down, matching his walking pace.

Nathan glanced to his left. It wasn't just one car. It was a convoy. Three massive, armored black SUVs, gliding silently along the asphalt like sharks in deep water.

The convoy pulled up just slightly ahead of him, effectively boxing him in against the tree line. The vehicles shifted into park with a heavy, mechanical clunk.

Nathan stopped. His muscles tensed. He raised his fists, fully expecting Mark and his frat-house buddies to jump out with baseball bats to finish the job.

The doors of the front and rear SUVs opened simultaneously. Four men in tactical black suits stepped out, their eyes scanning the dark tree line, their hands rested casually near the bulges under their jackets.

Then, the rear door of the middle SUV opened.

A man stepped out into the cold night air. The streetlamp caught the sharp cut of his suit, the subtle gleam of a ridiculously expensive watch, and the calm, imposing posture that commanded total obedience from the armed men around him

It was the man from the VIP section. The man who had just offered five billion dollars for the stolen machine. Dr. Sage Walters.

The richest man in the world looked at the bruised, bleeding, ice-cream-stained boy standing on the dirt shoulder. He didn't look disgusted. He didn't look pitying

He walked slowly up to Nathan, stopping just a few feet away. The silence stretched between them, heavy with the weight of eighteen long years of secrets.

Sage adjusted his glasses, a faint, almost imperceptible smile touching the corner of his lips.

"Hello, son," Sage said, his deep voice carrying over the rustle of the wind "that was quite a drama, wasn't it?"