Adrian didn't move for a long time.
The rain soaked through his clothes until the cold became dull, almost distant. The alley smelled like rust and rot, old piss and wet concrete. Somewhere above, a siren wailed and faded, swallowed by the city's endless noise.
The interface hovered in front of him, steady and indifferent.
It didn't blink.
It didn't hurry him.
That unsettled him more than anything else.
"Publicly dismantle his professional standing," Adrian repeated quietly, tasting the words. "You make it sound simple."
[No objective of consequence is simple.]
The voice was neutral. Not encouraging. Not threatening.
Just factual.
Adrian pushed himself to his feet, wincing as pain flared along his ribs. His jacket hung loose, one sleeve torn slightly at the seam. He ran a hand through his hair and exhaled slowly, grounding himself the way he had during late nights preparing cases—one breath at a time, one thought at a time.
"Explain," he said. "Before I assume I'm losing my mind."
The interface shifted, lines rearranging with mechanical precision.
[Authority Points: 0]
[Status: Unranked]
[Available Functions: Limited]
[Authority is a measure of how much influence you exert over the fate of others.]
[Ruining a life does not require murder.]
[It requires irreversible consequence.]
Adrian's jaw tightened.
"So you're not asking me to kill him."
[Correct.]
That surprised him. He didn't know why he'd expected blood first—maybe because every story he'd ever read about power went straight there. Violence. Shock. Excess.
But this… this felt more insidious.
Victor Hale didn't fear knives in alleys.
He feared exposure.
Adrian wiped rain from his face and let out a slow breath. His thoughts began to align, falling into old familiar patterns. Strategy. Evidence. Leverage.
"Public dismantling," he murmured. "Which means his reputation, his firm, his clients."
[Correct.]
"And I'm guessing," Adrian continued, "that if I half-ass this, I get nothing."
[Failure yields no reward.]
"Do I get punished?"
A pause. A fraction longer than before.
[Only by remaining weak.]
Adrian snorted softly.
"Figures."
The interface dimmed slightly, as if acknowledging his acceptance. Not approval—acceptance.
"Alright," he said. "Then I'll need resources."
[You have none.]
"That's not helpful."
[That is accurate.]
Despite himself, Adrian almost laughed.
He didn't go home.
Instead, he walked.
The pain in his side was sharp at first, then gradually dulled into something manageable. Each step grounded him further, pulling him out of shock and into something colder, steadier.
Victor Hale.
Senior partner at Hale & Partners. Corporate litigation. Crisis management. The kind of lawyer companies hired when they needed problems buried quietly and permanently.
Adrian knew him.
Not personally—but professionally. Victor had always been immaculate. Tailored suits. Polished smile. Eyes that never revealed anything he didn't want seen.
And arrogance. Subtle, but deep.
Men like Victor believed they were untouchable because, most of the time, they were.
Adrian slipped into a late-night café two streets over from his old firm. The place smelled like burnt coffee and exhaustion. A few students hunched over laptops. A security guard nursed a drink in the corner.
He ordered the cheapest thing on the menu and took a seat near the back, away from the windows.
No phone.
No wallet.
He closed his eyes briefly, then opened them again.
"System," he murmured.
The interface appeared, faint enough that no one else would notice.
"I need access. Information. Something."
[Authority Points required.]
Adrian clenched his jaw. "You just told me I have none."
[Correct.]
"Then how am I supposed to complete the task?"
[By using what you already possess.]
"And what's that?"
The words appeared slowly, deliberately.
[Knowledge.]
Adrian leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling.
Knowledge.
He had spent years collecting it. Digging through corporate filings. Following money trails designed to confuse and exhaust. Learning where people lied—not in what they said, but in what they avoided.
Victor Hale's mistake had been assuming Adrian was disposable.
He still had copies.
Not everything. His firm had locked him out of their systems within minutes of termination. But Adrian had learned early in his career to never rely on a single point of access.
Personal backups. Notes. Patterns remembered because they mattered.
He stood, ignoring the protest in his ribs, and left the café.
By dawn, Adrian had a plan.
Not a complete one. Not yet. But enough to move.
He arrived at a public library just as it opened. The kind with old computers, worn desks, and staff too overworked to care what people researched as long as they were quiet.
He logged onto a terminal and began.
Victor Hale's public image was clean. Awards. Charity boards. Guest appearances on legal panels. Articles praising his "ethical leadership."
Adrian ignored all of that.
He went deeper.
Shell companies. Consulting fees. Non-disclosure settlements buried under layers of legal language. A pattern of associates leaving quietly, their careers derailing shortly afterward.
It wasn't illegal.
That was the problem.
Victor never broke laws outright. He bent them. Weaponized them. Used them to crush anyone inconvenient.
Adrian's fingers flew across the keyboard, pulling up archived filings, old news articles, court records most people wouldn't bother cross-referencing.
There.
A former junior partner. Daniel Cross.
Brilliant. Idealistic. Fired after "ethical disagreements."
Adrian remembered the name.
Cross had tried to block a settlement years ago—argued it exposed the firm to long-term risk. Victor had overridden him. Three months later, Cross was gone.
Two years after that, he'd been arrested for insider trading.
The charges had stuck.
Adrian leaned back, heart pounding.
"System," he whispered. "What counts as 'ruining a life'?"
[Define 'ruin' as the permanent loss of status, power, or future prospects.]
"And intent?" Adrian asked. "Does it matter if he deserves it?"
[Deserve is irrelevant.]
[Outcome is absolute.]
Adrian stared at the screen.
Victor Hale's downfall wouldn't require fabrication.
Just illumination.
By mid-morning, Victor was having a very good day.
The meeting room on the thirty-fourth floor was bathed in natural light, the city stretching endlessly beyond the glass. Victor stood at the head of the table, jacket perfectly pressed, hands resting lightly on polished wood.
"…which positions us uniquely to manage reputational risk," he was saying smoothly. "In today's climate, perception is everything."
The board members nodded. A few scribbled notes.
Victor smiled inwardly.
Control. That was the secret. Not power—control.
His phone buzzed softly in his pocket. He ignored it.
Then it buzzed again.
A flicker of irritation crossed his face. He glanced down discreetly.
Unknown Number
He frowned.
Excused himself with a practiced smile and stepped out into the hallway.
"Victor Hale," he said.
There was no greeting on the other end.
Just a question.
"Do you remember Daniel Cross?"
Victor froze.
For a fraction of a second—so brief no one else would have noticed—his composure cracked.
"Who is this?" he asked calmly.
"Someone who knows you framed him," the voice replied.
The line went dead.
Victor stood very still.
The hallway suddenly felt too narrow. Too exposed.
He told himself it was nothing. A bluff. Some disgruntled nobody trying to scare him.
Still… his hand tightened around the phone.
He returned to the meeting, his smile unchanged.
But the chill didn't leave.
Adrian ended the call and exhaled slowly.
His hands were steady.
That surprised him.
No thrill. No rush.
Just focus.
The interface pulsed faintly in his peripheral vision.
[Action taken.]
[Consequences pending.]
"That's not very reassuring," Adrian muttered.
[Ruination is a process.]
He closed his eyes briefly.
For years, he'd believed exposing truth was enough. That sunlight disinfected all wounds.
He knew better now.
Truth only mattered when someone forced it to.
And Adrian McCall was done asking permission.