A steady pulse throbbed at my temple. Inside the silence of the Presidential Suite, scented with luxurious lavender, the shattered screen of my phone kept lighting up, its piercing ringtone echoing through the room.
The name on the display read: Siska.
I stared at it for several seconds, letting the anger in my chest settle into something cold and lethal. Then, with an unhurried motion, I slid the green button and switched the call to speaker.
"Arkan! You finally answered your phone, huh?!" Siska's shrill voice instantly shattered the silence. There was unmistakable panic beneath it, but the disgusting arrogance and pride she always carried were still there. "Where are you right now? You're not dead, are you?! You ran off last night after making a scene in front of Brandon's house!"
I walked toward the floor-to-ceiling window, gazing down at the glittering financial district of Arkadia below.
"What does that have to do with me, Siska?" My voice was flat, almost completely devoid of emotion.
She fell silent for a second. I could hear her frustrated breathing through the phone.
"What do you mean, what does it have to do with you?! You think acting all mysterious is going to make me worry about you? Get over yourself! Listen, I'm only calling because the mansion security guards said you got hit by something last night. Brandon is furious because of the mess you caused outside his gate. He said if you don't disappear from this city by tomorrow, he'll personally make sure your life ends in a much more brutal way!"
Hearing the threat, a cynical smile spread across my face.
The memory of Brandon throwing a hundred-dollar bill at my face replayed in my mind.
"Tell Brandon," I said quietly, stressing every syllable until my words sounded like a sentence handed down from the darkness itself. "Tell him that instead of worrying about last night's little incident, he should start checking his company's account balances and logistics assets. He won't have time to think about me over the next twenty-four hours."
Siska laughed mockingly, her sharp laughter dripping with contempt.
"Are you insane? You've completely lost your mind, Arkan! You're nothing but a broke delivery guy! Stop fantasizing about being rich just because Brandon crushed your pride last night! That's enough! Don't ever show your face in front of me again. Brandon is sick of looking at your trashy face!"
"Enjoy your time with Brandon, Siska," I cut in coldly, without the slightest hesitation. "Because the two of you... don't have much time left."
Click.
I ended the call.
The very next second, I turned around and walked out of the hospital, leaving behind my tattered courier uniform.
A few hours later, the roar of the million-dollar Koenigsegg I had just purchased tore through the quiet afternoon in the Northern District. The doors of the Royal Motors dealership I had just left were still trembling as I accelerated the futuristic hypercar straight toward the headquarters of Elite Professional Placement Agency.
Following the System's instructions, I needed someone capable of managing the assets I was about to sweep off the market.
The moment my car stopped in front of the agency's luxurious lobby, a woman was already waiting for me.
She wore a perfectly tailored navy blazer, her hair neatly tied back with a silver clip, and her eyes were as sharp as an eagle's. She was Elena, the assistant candidate selected by the System as the pinnacle of investment management talent.
"Good afternoon, Mr. Arkan. I'm Elena, your personal assistant," she said the moment I stepped out of the car. Her eyes briefly assessed my appearance. "I've reviewed your employment contract and profile over the past five minutes. Forgive my bluntness, but according to my analysis, this car is far too conspicuous for someone intending to build an empire from the shadows."
I met her piercing gaze.
"Do you work for my System or for my money, Elena?"
She remained silent for a moment.
The corner of her lips lifted into a faint smile filled with calculation.
"For both, sir. And your first mission is to transform Arkan the courier into the man who holds power over Arkadia's real estate assets before dawn tomorrow."
I tossed the Koenigsegg's key to the valet, who froze and trembled at the sight of the vehicle, then walked into the building with Elena.
"How many of the Dirgantara family's assets can we buy right now, Elena?" I asked as we crossed the agency's grand lobby.
She tapped rapidly across her tablet.
A small holographic display materialized in the air, pulsing with wild red and green market graphs.
"The logistics sector controlled by the Dirgantara Group is currently facing a liquidity crisis caused by failed speculation. We can enter as a shadow investor. With the one hundred billion rupiah you currently possess, we can acquire fifteen percent of the voting shares through minority shareholders who are panicking."
"Fifteen percent?"
A crooked smile crossed my face.
In the corporate world, that was a sacred number for staging a coup.
"Do it."
"Sir." Elena's voice suddenly grew more tense. "There's a data update. Brandon Dirgantara is currently attending a board meeting at PT Arkadia Jaya, the logistics company where you used to work. They're planning to merge illegal assets to conceal the family's debt."
I stopped in my tracks.
Memories flashed through my mind of how the managers there had constantly cursed at me and docked my pay just to please Brandon.
"If we move now, we'll need to be there in person," Elena continued.
I glanced at the cheap watch still wrapped around my wrist, the only relic of my former life that remained.
It was two o'clock in the afternoon.
"Prepare a suit. I don't intend to look like the man they trampled yesterday."
Thirty minutes later, an exclusive fitting room on the second floor was lined with rows of designer suits.
When I stepped out, the reflection in the mirror showed a completely different man.
The sharply tailored charcoal gray suit fit my now broad shoulders perfectly. Elena walked beside me, now dressed in an even more elegant business outfit.
"Are you ready to become their worst nightmare, sir?" Elena asked as she adjusted my collar.
"I was born to destroy them, Elena," I replied, my carefully restrained fury flashing through my eyes.
Together, we walked toward the luxury sedan waiting outside.
The car sped through the crowded city streets, heading for the PT Arkadia Jaya shareholders' meeting.
I turned toward the window, watching the streets of Arkadia, a city that would soon kneel beneath my feet.
"Elena, send one message to our acquisition team," I said, my eyes fixed straight ahead. "Don't just buy their shares. Buy every building, every logistics route, and every debt they own. Let the Dirgantara family sit at the boardroom table as guests while we hold the power they once called their own."
For the first time, Elena smiled broadly.
It was the smile of a victor before the war had even begun.
"Understood, sir. Arkan the courier has officially become history. Arkan, the ruler of Arkadia, has just begun his day."
Twenty minutes later, our luxury sedan came to a stop directly in front of PT Arkadia Jaya's main lobby.
This building had once felt so intimidating to me, the place where I had bowed my head and endured insults every single day.
I stepped out of the car.
Inside the lobby, the atmosphere was tense. Several staff members rushed back and forth with pale faces.
"The board meeting started two minutes ago on the top floor, sir," Elena whispered just behind me, her eyes never leaving the holographic tablet. "Brandon has just submitted a proposal to fire forty percent of the employees to cut operating costs, and your former supervisor is being forced to sign it under threat."
I adjusted the buttons of my suit jacket, feeling the dominant aura surging through my body under the System's influence.
"Good," I murmured, striding confidently toward the heavily guarded VVIP elevator. "Let's see the look on Brandon's face when he realizes that today's fate... is being decided by the 'trash' he threw away last night."
Latest Chapter
Behind the Mirror's Reflection
“You think you’ve escaped the simulation and returned to the real world, Arkan...? Open your eyes... You’ve just allowed them to lock your true soul inside this mirror forever.”A sensation as cold as liquid ice spread from the tips of my toes, rapidly crawling through my spine and freezing every drop of blood in my body. The whisper did not echo through the air. It vibrated directly within the core of my nerves, pure, sharp, and filled with soul-rending despair.“E-Elena...?” My voice came out as a pitiful, hoarse squeak.I crawled across the cold, worn wooden floor of the boarding room, slamming my chest against the floor as I reached for the old mirror lying beneath the desk. My violently trembling fingers pressed against its dusty glass surface.Behind the cracked reflection, the gray-suited version of Arkan, drenched in blood, stared back at me with a smile so cold it belonged to a man who had lost every shred of sanity. But what made my chest feel as though it had been struck by
The Illusion Behind the Mirror of Reality
[00:00:02...][00:00:01...]The pain exploding in the left side of my chest was more than mere physical burning. It was existential agony tearing through every nerve in my body. Thick, crimson blood continued to flow, soaking my expensive gray suit and dripping rhythmically onto the cold marble floor.Yet what made my heart feel as though it had stopped beating was not the lead bullet... but the woman in my arms.Elena, the only reason I had endured crawling through thousands of hells, froze.The clear blue light in her eyes suddenly vanished, fading into a hollow grayness devoid of life. Her fingers, which had been clutching my suit, slowly unraveled into weightless particles of transparent pixels."E-Elena...?" My voice cracked, trembling violently with the purest fear I had ever felt in my life. "Elena! Look at me! For God's sake, don't leave me!"I pulled her body against me with every ounce of strength I had left, but my arms passed through an empty shadow.There was no warmth. N
Device Ownership and the Transaction of Reality’s Electrical Power
[ABSOLUTE WARNING: REALITY DEVICE SHUTTING DOWN.][INITIATING SHUTDOWN PROCESS OF THE ENTIRE INNER UNIVERSE IN: 00:00:03...]00:00:02...00:00:01...Pure darkness struck like a sea of spilled ink, swallowing everything from view. The Megapolis City skyline beyond the window, the walls of the Publisher Headquarters, even the cursor on the Apartment Writer’s computer slowly lost their color, fading into dim gray pixels before freezing rigidly in place.Our existence was no longer being seized, deleted, or crossed out. We were being erased from the very roots of existence, like an old television whose main power cord had been forcibly ripped from the wall socket."Arkan! My hand... I can't feel my fingers anymore!"Elena's scream shattered the hollow silence. Her voice trembled violently, filled with a pure terror I had never heard from her before. She clutched the collar of my gray suit with what little strength she had left, pressing her increasingly weightless body against my chest."
The Trial of the Creator of Language and the Acquisition of the Universe's Alphabet
[REMAINING TIME BEFORE THE WORD 'ARKAN' IS ERASED FROM ALL HUMAN LANGUAGES: 00:00:05...]00:00:04...00:00:03...A gigantic hand made from intertwined Phoenician letters, Hieroglyphs, and ancient Runes strangled my neck with enough pressure to crush space and time. Scorching heat and deadly cold erupted simultaneously in my throat.With every passing second, memories of my name were being peeled away. The concepts of the words "I," "Elena," and "Love" inside my mind threatened to unravel into meaningless nothingness."ARKAN!"Elena's scream pierced the roar of the vacuum wind rushing in from the black hole outside the Publisher Headquarters window. Her body and the Dormitory Writer were completely entangled in tentacles of liquid alphabet, lifted into the air and slowly dragged toward the black hole of existential annihilation."Arkan... look at me!" Elena's voice trembled violently, tears of fear and desperation streaming down her increasingly faded cheeks. "Don't let them erase your
The Copyright War and the Purchase of Reality Licenses
[CHARACTERS 'ARKAN' AND 'ELENA' HAVE BEEN CLASSIFIED AS INFRINGEMENTS OF REALITY COPYRIGHT.][PREPARING PHYSICAL DELETION OF ELEMENTS FROM THE HUMAN WORLD IN: 00:00:10...]00:00:09...00:00:08...That emotionless mechanical voice continued to chime, echoing inside my chest like the tolling of a death bell. The blood-red numbers flashed wildly, searing through the core of my thoughts and devouring every inch of space inside the collapsing Headquarters of the Dimension Publisher."ELENA!"My scream shattered the hollow wind rushing through the shattered glass walls. My fingers lunged forward, desperately grasping at empty air as I watched Elena's warm fingers unravel into transparent pencil lines.The elite warrior who had always stood firmly at my side, who had never once feared challenging ancient magic and the monsters of the market, was now trembling violently. The crooked smile that usually radiated lethal courage had vanished, replaced by a pure terror I had never seen before."Ar
Red Ink Publisher and the Console Coup
[PREPARING TOTAL DELETION: DRAFT 1 REJECTED BY PUBLISHER.]The blood-red lines of text flashing wildly across the monitor felt like a death sentence hanging in the middle of the night. Their crimson glow burned through the gloom of this three-by-three-meter boarding room, casting distorted shadows across the cracked walls."W-WHAT IS THIS?!" the Boarding-House Author screamed hysterically, his voice breaking and choking in his throat.The man in the T-shirt stared at his hands in pure terror. The flesh and skin of his fingers, which had been gripping the keyboard moments ago, slowly began unraveling into particles of black pixels that floated through the air, sucked into a void tearing open from the cracked wall of the room."M-MY WORK! MY DRAFT 1 WAS REJECTED BY THE PUBLISHER?!" he screamed again, crying out in brutal despair. "I STAYED UP FOR TWO WEEKS TYPING THIS DARK-CIRCLE EYES! HOW CAN THEY DELETE ME FROM MY OWN DOCUMENT?!"The dull floor tiles beneath our feet collapsed like pu
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