The air in the Sapphire Sky Lounge tasted like money and lies.
Li Chen swirled the ice in his glass of sparkling water, his back to the wall, watching the city glitter through a sixty-story window. He was an observer here, not a participant. A ghost in a cheap suit among hand-tailored silk and Swiss watches.
A new environment can be analyzed. A new battlefield can be mapped.
That's what his father, the failed factory owner, had told him before the creditors took everything. Li Chen had learned that lesson in his bones. He'd watched his father's "friends" turn their backs, one by one, the numbers over their heads—a secret only he could see—plummeting from green to a desperate, bloody red.
That was his curse. His revelation.
His system.
Floating above every person in the lounge was a number. A glowing, ethereal digit that only Li Chen could perceive.
Potential Value.
For most here, it was a humble, steady white: 15. 22. 31. Solid, stable, unremarkable. The CEO by the bar had a bright blue 89. Ambitious, growing.
Then, his eyes caught a figure stumbling through the golden doors, chased by whispers sharp enough to cut glass.
A woman. Her designer dress was torn at the shoulder. Mascara ran in black rivers down her cheeks, but her chin was held high, a defiant statue in a storm of scorn.
The whispers hit Li Chen's ears.
"…Jiang Yue. Can you believe she showed her face?"
"Bankrupt. Her father's empire collapsed overnight."
"I heard she's selling her jewelry just to eat."
"She's toxic. Don't even look at her."
Jiang Yue. The former "Jade Princess" of Jinan City. The heiress who had graced every magazine cover. Now, she was a ghost haunting her own past.
Li Chen looked at her. Above her head, the number wasn't white, or blue.
It was a shattered, flickering grey.
Potential Value: 5.
But beneath that pathetic '5', pulsing like a dying star's last heartbeat, was another set of numerals. A deep, dormant gold, so bright it hurt his soul to look at.
[Locked Potential: 997.]
His breath hitched. Nine hundred and ninety-seven. He had never seen a number above 100. Never even imagined it.
A window, translucent and blue, materialized before his eyes, unseen by anyone else.
[Angel Investment System: Target Identified.]
Target: Jiang Yue.
Current State: Bankrupt. Socially Ruined. Emotionally Shattered.
Locked Potential: 'Phoenix CEO' (Financial Acumen: Legendary-Tier, Resilience: Mythic-Tier)
Unlock Requirement: Initial Fortune Injection of 500,000 Credits.
Projected Return on Investment (ROI): 9,800%
System Note: The world's most valuable assets are not stocks or land. They are human souls the world has thrown away. Do you wish to make an Angel Investment? [Y/N]
Li Chen's hand tightened around his glass. Five hundred thousand credits. It was every last coin he had. The money he'd scraped together through three years of sleepless nights, tiny trades, and living on rice. It was his seed capital for survival.
To invest it all… in a broken heiress the entire city was laughing at?
He looked at Jiang Yue. A man in a Brioni suit "accidentally" bumped her, spilling his champagne on her dress. He didn't apologize. He smirked. The crowd tittered.
In that moment, Li Chen didn't see a bankrupt socialite. He saw his father, standing in their emptied-out factory, facing a wall of silent, smirking faces. He saw the same crushing weight of a world that loved you on the way up and devoured you on the way down.
The emotion wasn't pity. It was cold, crystalline recognition.
They're all the same. The wolves. They only understand one thing: value. And they've decided she has none.
But I can see her real value. And they can't.
He made the decision. Not as a gamble, but as a calculation. The highest ROI he would ever find.
He placed his glass down. The sound was soft, but final.
He walked across the lounge. The whispers shifted from her to him. "Who's that?" "Cheap suit." "What's he doing?"
He stopped before Jiang Yue, ignoring the Brioni-suited man. He pulled a clean, white handkerchief from his pocket—simple cotton, not silk—and held it out to her.
Her eyes, wide and wounded and fiercely proud, met his. She didn't take it.
"I don't need your pity," she whispered, her voice hoarse but firm.
"This isn't pity," Li Chen said, his voice low, calm, cutting through the background murmur. "It's a due diligence wipe. The stain is on your dress. The shame is on them."
He gestured slightly with the cloth. Something in his gaze—utterly lacking in mockery or lust—gave her pause. She took it, dabbing at the champagne, her hands trembling.
The Brioni man chuckled. "Found a white knight from the bargain bin, Yue? How fitting."
Li Chen turned his head, just enough to look at the man. His Potential Value was a flabby 42. Satisfied. Static. A number that would never grow.
"You spilled your drink," Li Chen stated, no anger, just fact.
"So? It's just a dress. She can't afford another one anyway."
Li Chen reached for the man's hand—the one holding a fresh glass of champagne. His movement was too fast, too precise. He didn't grab aggressively. He simply guided the man's own wrist.
The entire glass of champagne tipped onto the man's pristine white shirt and million-credit suit.
Gasps erupted.
The man sputtered, staring in shock at the spreading stain. "You—! Do you know who I am?!"
"I know what you are," Li Chen said, his voice still quiet, but now every ear in the silent lounge could hear it. "A depreciating asset."
He turned his back on the stunned man, a gesture of supreme, absolute dismissal. He focused on Jiang Yue.
"Jiang Yue," he said. "My name is Li Chen. I am an investor. I believe the market has severely undervalued you. I'd like to make you an offer."
Tears welled in her eyes again, but these were different. Not of despair. Of confusion. Of a faint, impossible spark.
"An… offer? I have nothing. No company. No money. No reputation."
"You have yourself," he said. "That is the only collateral I require. Let's get out of this zoo."
He offered his arm. Not like a prince to a princess. Like a partner to a partner.
She looked at his arm, at his face, at the crowd of vultures with their mouths agape. A lifetime of conditioning screamed at her to refuse, to curl up and die.
But a deeper, older fire—the one that had earned her a 997—flickered.
She took his arm.
As her fingers touched his sleeve, a new system message flashed.
[Angel Investment Initiated.]
[Contract Established: Li Chen & Jiang Yue.]
[Fortune Injection Required: 500,000 Credits. Transfer?]
In his mind, Li Chen confirmed.
[Y.]
He felt a hollowing in his gut. His bank account, his safety net, drained to zero.
But as they walked out of the lounge, leaving a stunned silence in their wake, a new warmth bloomed in his chest. A trickle of knowledge, of instinct, that was not his own.
[Shared Trait Acquired: 'Unyielding Pride (Basic)'.]
[Shared Skill Fragment Acquired: 'Social Etiquette: High Society (Novice)'.]
He glanced at Jiang Yue, who was walking straighter, holding his arm a little tighter.
Above her head, the grey 5 shattered like glass.
In its place, a brilliant, growing golden '1' began to form.
[Current Potential Value: 1 (Rising…)]
The investment had been made.
The return had already begun.