Chapter 2

The hum of spatial tearing made my eardrums ache.

Tens of thousands of square meters of deep-sea fortress sprawled open like a slumbering steel beast, forcibly expanding the cramped hold.

A holographic panel unfurled before me in pale blue light: [Power supply: Normal] [Air circulation: Stable] [Water purification: Ready].

Then a glaring red warning flashed: [Current supplies sufficient for single-person consumption: 30 days].

Thirty days? That meager stockpile would barely last through the long years after the tsunami.

I clenched the communicator in my palm, knuckles cracking. On the screen, the Winston Mansion surveillance feed continued playing.

My mother was carefully opening a velvet box, taking out the solid-gold mechanical pocket watch—the symbol of the family heir. She had once promised, with her own lips, to place it on me at my coming-of-age ceremony.

Now, she hung it around the adopted son's neck, her gaze so tender it seemed to drip with affection.

My father slapped my brother and the adopted son heavily on the shoulders, his voice blasting through the speakers into my ears: "From today on, this legacy belongs to you two brothers. As for Cain—pretend he never existed in this family!"

Rage churned violently in my chest. They had used the so-called "super tsunami" as an excuse, just to legitimately turn me into a skeleton at the bottom of the sea.

But they never dreamed that the system's disaster countdown was flickering live across my retinas!

The undersea volcanic chain would really erupt! They had woven a lie with truth, trying to cast me into hell—yet by sheer irony, they had locked me inside a shelter with one of the highest survival odds in this global catastrophe!

Since you want to erase me, don't blame me for draining you dry.

I yanked the control seat toward me and slammed my fingers onto the virtual keyboard. As a former executive of the Winston Group, every backdoor in the family's financial network was burned into my brain.

I breached the firewall, bypassed the dual authentication. Before emptying the accounts, I dug through the internal network and pulled up the adopted son's heavily encrypted medical file.

My gaze swept across the screen—and my breath stopped.

Rare genetic disorder. Requires long-term injections of exorbitantly priced targeted drugs to sustain life. And the side effect of those drugs? It feeds a pathological greed for material things and attention.

My parents had known all along! They knew the adopted son was a bottomless pit, yet they still chose to sacrifice their own flesh and blood to satisfy that monster's greed!

Absurdity mixed with the sting of betrayal surged through me. I clenched my jaw, veins bulging on the back of my hand, and slammed down the enter key.

Offshore accounts of the conglomerate, family trusts, liquid assets—a torrent of digits cascaded like a waterfall, pouring into my overseas accounts as hidden code.

Watching the family balance hit zero, my tense shoulders finally relaxed.

Night fell. I switched to the black-market terminal and used the money to frantically sweep up survival supplies from around the globe.

[Massive supply purchase detected. Hidden channel activated.]

Accompanied by the faint hum of spatial distortion, the metal floor at the center of the fortress slid open.

Spatial transfer technology initiated. Hundreds of crates of high-compression rations, barrels of purified water, drought- and cold-resistant plant seeds—all teleported in from nowhere, crashing down into the fortress's storage area with reassuring thuds.

Looking at the mountain of survival assets piled before me, I raised my head and stared at the surveillance feed.

In the manor, that whole family was embracing one another, drifting into sweet dreams.

The system's red countdown flickered—Day 4 remaining.

Sleep. By the time dawn breaks, you'll find that your prized capital has been reduced to nothing but an empty shell.