📍 Location: Zurich, Switzerland – Mercer Holdings Safehouse – Day 41
David Mercer paced inside his high-rise suite, staring down at the stock ticker on his tablet. Numbers dipped. Accounts froze. Lawyers wouldn't answer. His legacy—his name—was bleeding.
"It's him," David muttered. "It has to be him."
Crane.
He had dismissed Ethan as a bug in the past. Now the world bowed to him.
But David wasn't done. Not yet.
He opened his emergency vault, revealing hard drives and old blackmail folders. Dirt on senators. CEOs. Quiet payments. Crypto transactions.
If he wants war, David thought, I'll drown him in fire.
📍 Location: Crane Dominion – Blackline Tower – Deep Ops Room
[ALERT: David Mercer attempting to leak blackmail dossiers to global media]
Threat Level: 4/10 – Amateur Panic Play Detected
Ethan chuckled.
"Desperate already?"
VERA projected David's location on the screen. Every keystroke. Every call. Every file he opened—watched.
"Let him hit send," Ethan said.
"Then kill his signal. And flip every file."
VERA replied:
"Executing counter-protocol: Mirrorfall."
Within seconds, the data David leaked… changed.
The names stayed the same. But the crimes? Twisted.
Now the story showed David as the orchestrator behind every dirty scheme. His signature. His accounts. His face plastered on breaking news around the world.
"EXPOSÉ: DAVID MERCER – BLACKMAIL KINGPIN EXPOSED BY UNKNOWN SOURCE"
📍 Location: Zurich – 5 Minutes Later
David's door exploded open.
Swiss regulators. FBI liaisons. Global media camped outside.
He turned on the TV.
"Mercer's empire allegedly tied to seven financial crimes across four nations—"
His face went pale. "No. No, I didn't—this isn't—"
His own voice played across the screen.
An edited, AI-perfected sentence:
"I've controlled half these people for years. And they never saw it coming."
That's not what I said! David screamed internally.
But it didn't matter.
Everyone believed it.
📍 Crane Dominion – Skyline Lounge – Midnight
Ethan leaned back, watching the footage of David being dragged out in cuffs.
"He was always the face. The mask."
He swirled his glass.
"I just taught the world to fear the man behind it."
đź“Ť System Update
Main Quest Update: Break the Prince – COMPLETED
Reward: $100M liquid assets seized from David's hidden accounts
Skill Upgraded: "Digital Puppeteer Lv.2" – Now controls narratives across five major regions
Bonus Passive: Reputation Avalanche – Enemies fall faster when one is publicly destroyed
Next Phase Unlocked: "The Offer"
Objective: Give Lila a final choice—kneel or vanish.
Status: Pending…