The board meeting ended, and I checked my phone. My long-dead college group chat was exploding with notifications—all tagging me. "Thomas, Lary's getting married today and you're not coming? Who do you think you are?" That’s how I learned Lary, our old class president, was getting married. Today. Everyone was there—except me. "Busy with work," I replied, a polite excuse for people I barely knew. "Busy with what? That dead-end job? Lucky if you make two grand a month." "Just admit you're scared of being embarrassed." The moment I responded, the attacks poured in. "Afraid I just want your wedding gift?" Lary tagged me. "Wouldn’t want your hundred bucks—probably a week’s pay for you." His sarcasm was thick. "Besides, the girl you chased and never got? She’s my wife now. No wonder you won’t come." He added sunglasses emojis. I frowned. "As I recall, I never chased anyone." "Convenient amnesia?" Lary shot back, posting a wedding photo. "Take a good look." My breath caught. The bride in white was identical to the woman in the engagement photo on my desk. "Isabella?" 1 I shot upright in my chair. The woman I got engaged to last month was marrying Lary? As my mind reeled, the group chat continued its relentless assault. "Cat got your tongue? Struck dumb? Or are you crying in a corner because you saw your dream girl is now Lary’s wife?" "Shhh! Don't expose him! Isabella isn't just the campus queen anymore, she's the CEO of Apex Holdings!" "That's right! And she gave Lary a downtown penthouse and a Rolls-Royce as a wedding gift." I stared, dumbfounded. Just as I was about to type a furious question to Lary, he played the part of the magnanimous hero. "Thomas, I know you haven't done well for yourself, but we were classmates. If you show up to my wedding, I could probably convince my wife to get you a job as a security guard in the parking garage." "What do you say? A guard at Apex Holdings has to make at least five grand a month. Way better than your current gig, right?" "Sure," I typed. Then I shut off my phone. "Honey, I brought you some restorative ginseng chicken soup." "You've been working so much overtime lately. Don't burn yourself out. Have some soup, it'll help." Isabella placed the porcelain tureen on my desk. She noticed my cold stare and looked puzzled. "What's wrong?" My face was a mask. I glanced at the soup, then shook my head. "It's nothing. You can go. I have some things to handle." "Alright, but make sure you rest. Don't push yourself too hard." She walked over, leaned in, and brushed a light kiss against my cheek. "Oh, by the way, honey, I need to visit family out of town for a few days. Just some family matters to take care of." With a brilliant smile, she left my office, pulling the door closed behind her. "CEO of Apex Holdings, huh?" I watched the door shut, my mind sinking into a deep, cold place. I’d known Isabella for three years. We’d made it official a year ago, and gotten engaged just last month. Over the past year, she had cared for me with a devotion that felt absolute. Hot towels and massages when I worked late. My suitcase perfectly packed for business trips. The memories were a collection of exquisitely tender moments. But now, that tureen of soup and our engagement photo on my desk felt like props in a cruel joke, and I was the fool at the center of it. I snatched my phone, scrolling furiously through the chat history until I found the wedding venue Lary had posted. I called my driver. We were going. Even from a block away, the hotel Lary had booked was impossible to miss. A massive, ostentatious banner was stretched across the entrance. "Congratulations to Isabella, CEO of Apex Holdings, on Her Wedding Day!" Beneath it, Lary stood, resplendent in a sharp suit, his hair slicked back, eagerly awaiting his bride. He was surrounded by a fawning crowd of our old classmates. "Lary, my man! You're the real success story of our class. The CEO of Apex... and you locked her down! You're a legend!" "Seriously, man, you kept this quiet! You wait until the wedding day to tell us?" "Lary, with your talent, it's only a matter of time before Apex Holdings is yours. Don't forget us old friends when you're at the top!" I even saw our old college advisor, his face beaming, sucking up to Lary. "Lary, from the day you set foot on campus, I knew you were the one to be class president. My eye for talent is never wrong. Look at you now, the most successful of them all!" The chorus of ass-kissing was so thick it made me sick. Lary, however, was soaking it in, his grin so wide it nearly split his face. "Not at all, not at all. It's all thanks to your guidance, sir." As Lary lapped up the praise, my car pulled closer. Through the tinted window, watching their pathetic display, my mind drifted back to the first time I met Isabella. We weren't together then. She was just an intern at the company, completely lost in the cutthroat corporate world. She spent her days being bullied by senior employees, either forcing a smile or getting chewed out. I couldn't stand to watch it. We were the same age and had gone to the same school, so I stepped in and had her transferred to my office as my secretary. To be honest, her professional skills were lacking, but her attitude was excellent, and she never made any major mistakes. Over time, she grew more competent, and I started entrusting her with more significant parts of the business. I never imagined she'd relay every single detail to Lary. Or that he would use those trade secrets as his own personal bragging rights. The thought sparked a fresh wave of anger, sharp and painful, laced with a profound sadness. "Well, well, if it isn't Thomas. Had to rent a fancy car just to show up?" "This is Lary's wedding, man. Who are you trying to impress? Don't you have any shame?" The moment I stepped out of the Panamera, a couple of Lary's sycophants broke away from the group, their voices dripping with disdain. Once they started, the others noticed me and joined the chorus of ridicule. "Thomas, seriously. A day's rental on this thing must be three months' salary for you. Why bother?" "So what if Lary snagged your dream girl? Do you have to be so petty about it?" "Thomas, we were all classmates, so don't take this the wrong way, but you picked the wrong audience to flex on. Lary's wife is the CEO of Apex!" The subtext was clear: I was an idiot who couldn't read the room. My face hardened. As I was about to speak, Lary pushed through the crowd, his face a smug mask. "Where'd you rent this car? It looks a lot like my wife's." He squinted. "Wait a minute... why are the license plates the same?" The realization dawned on him. His expression twisted into a snarl, and his fist flew towards my face. "Thomas, you son of a bitch! You've been sleeping with my wife!" 2 "So that's why Bella was always 'working late' and never coming home! It was because of you!" "You're a real piece of work. You have the nerve to show up at our wedding, in her car, with her driver?" Lary's rage escalated with every word. His punch had left me stunned, my mind struggling to catch up. This has always been my car, my primary vehicle for business. I often lent it to Isabella for work. When did it become hers? "Lary, man, calm down. Bella doesn't seem like that kind of person, right? Maybe you're mistaken?" a few classmates tried to intervene, looking awkward. "Mistaken? I'd recognize this car if it was a pile of burnt scrap metal!" Lary snarled, whipping out his phone and shoving his photo album in everyone's faces. They were private, intimate photos of him and Isabella. The two of them locked in a passionate kiss in the driver's seat. Lary holding Isabella in his arms as they posed on the hood of the car. I even saw a few that were far more compromising. The license plate, the specific details of the car—it was undeniable. Isabella had been using my car to carry on an affair with Lary. In an instant, the onlookers were no longer bystanders. They were a mob, and I was their target. "Thomas. Care to explain?" "I knew there was something off about you from the start. I just didn't realize you were rotten to the core. You'd really stoop so low as to seduce your friend's wife?" Lary was completely unhinged now, jabbing a finger in my face. "I knew it! That's why you didn't want to come to the wedding! You were afraid of being exposed!" "You just couldn't stand to see me happy, could you? You had to come here and ruin everything!" Even my old college advisor glared at me with disgust. "Thomas, I am ashamed that our school produced someone like you." The insults rained down on me. Someone raised their phone, recording me while spewing obscenities. I let out a cold, humorless laugh, picking up my glasses which had been knocked to the ground. "Twisting the facts, ignoring the truth. Lary, is this who you really are?" "Go to hell! I'm the one who's ignoring the truth? You're sleeping with my wife and you have the nerve to say that? Have you no shame?" he spat. "Fine. You want to act tough? You want to roll up in my wife's car just to humiliate me?" Lary sneered, then pulled out his keys and carved three words into the hood of my Panamera. "FUCKING SCUMBAG." The gouged letters seared my eyes and heart. My voice dropped to an icy whisper. "Are you sure you can afford the price of carving those words?" Lary let out a bark of laughter. "Still talking tough? Who the hell do you think you're fooling?" "You stole my woman! Keying your car is getting off easy!" "You should be thanking me for not tearing that filthy mouth off your face!" With that, he raised his keys and charged at me, a wild look in his eyes, as if he fully intended to rip my lips from my skull. The crowd didn't stop him. In fact, they closed in around me, forming a human wall to ensure every one of Lary's blows landed. When he was done hitting me, his rage still wasn't spent. He grabbed a loose brick from a nearby planter and started smashing my car, shattering windows, denting panels, inside and out. His lackeys, my so-called "old classmates," eagerly joined in, their cheers mingling with the sound of destruction. "This loser Thomas thinks he can mess with Lary? Our future tycoon? Not on our watch!" After the car was wrecked and the beating was over, my face and clothes were soaked in a mixture of sweat and their spit. The evening wind was sharp, chilling my skin, but it was nothing compared to the ice in my heart. "A car is just a car. It can be replaced," I said, my voice raspy. "But when the bill comes, I hope you can pay it with the same ferocity you used to smash it." "Pah!" Lary spat a thick glob of phlegm onto my collar. "Who do you think you are? Talking like the car is actually yours." As he spoke, his eyes fell on the jade locket I wore around my neck. "The hell is this? You trying to look classy with a piece of jade?" "How much did you pay for this piece of junk at a flea market?" A cold dread seized me. That locket was the last thing my mother left me. Its sentimental value was immeasurable. He couldn't break it. My instinctive flinch to protect it only spurred him on. He kicked me squarely in the chest, sending me sprawling to the ground. "Whoa, this actually feels... nice. Doesn't seem like junk after all," Lary mused, bending down and ripping the locket from my neck. "If you touch that, I swear I will make you regret the day you were born!" I roared, my eyes bloodshot, my fists clenched so tight my knuckles cracked. "Threatening me? You?" Lary rolled his eyes and brought his foot down, crushing the jade locket into dust. "See this?" he said, holding up his hand and waggling a large, ornate ring on his finger. "This ring is what Bella gave me. This is the real deal!" I recognized it instantly. It was the engagement ring I had given Isabella. The air was punched from my lungs. I was speechless. She had given the symbol of my love for her... to him? Though my heart had already hardened against her, this final, cruel twist was a physical blow. I never imagined her feelings for Lary ran so deep. In her eyes, was I nothing more than an ATM? Seeing my look of utter devastation, the crowd around Lary erupted in laughter. "Look at this idiot. He had no idea his girl would drop a million-dollar ring on another man, did he?" "What's wrong? Your cheap trinket got crushed by the real thing? Upset?" Their taunts shocked me back to a cold, hard clarity. I smiled a chilling, empty smile and pulled out my phone. "Isabella. Get your ass over here. Now." Before I could even hear her reply, Lary kicked me down again. "Who the fuck do you think you are, calling my wife by her full name?" he seethed. "Acting like you're the damn CEO of Apex Holdings. 'Get your ass over here.' What gives you the right?" His eyes were filled with contempt as he ground the toe of his shoe into my calf. "Bella was just playing with you. Did you really think she liked you? You're so full of yourself you can't even see what you are." He kept ranting, but I just stared at him, my gaze unwavering and cold. "Keep talking. I want to see if you're still smiling when she gets here." "Huh? What's this? A little good luck charm around your neck? Didn't realize you were so superstitious." Lary ignored my warning. His eyes lit up as he spotted something else. He crouched down and snatched the small, worn leather pouch from under my shirt. "A worthless life like yours doesn't deserve this. Let's just get rid of it." I lunged, grabbing his wrist with all my strength. "Let. Go." 3 Seeing the ferocity in my eyes, Lary just laughed. "What is this, the dark ages? Still believe in this hocus-pocus?" He pried my fingers off. "Or wait... did Isabella get this for you?" My teeth ground together, my hand shaking uncontrollably as I held onto his wrist. "The car, the locket, I don't care. But you do not touch that charm." I tried to scramble up from the ground, to snatch it back. My mother had gotten that charm for me from a remote mountain shrine. I was only five, struck by a mysterious illness that left me in a coma, unable to eat or drink. We went to every hospital, tried every folk remedy. Nothing worked except to make me vomit blood from all the failed treatments. We spent our life savings seeking help abroad, only for the world's top specialists to tell my mother to give up on me. Of course, she refused. She heard of a shrine, a place of great power. Carrying me in her arms, she climbed the mountain, bowing her head to the stone path with every single step. It was a long, grueling path. Her forehead was a bloody mess, her knees worn down to the bone. But I, nestled in her arms, felt only warmth. I was her only hope, the only thing that kept her going. I never knew... that my life would be bought with her death. Whether by some miracle or sheer coincidence, as soon as she placed the blessed charm around my neck, I woke up. Overjoyed, she ignored her pain and bowed again and again to the shrine’s keeper, her bloodied forehead leaving a dark red stain on the stone floor. Perhaps the ordeal had drained every last bit of her strength. On the way down the mountain, she was exhausted. She entrusted me to a kind stranger for a moment while she sat to rest by the side of the path. When she tried to stand, a wave of dizziness overcame her, and she stumbled towards the cliff's edge. In the final moment before she fell, I saw the look in her eyes. It was pure, unconditional love. And no regret. I know the only reason I'm still alive today is because of that charm, a charm my mother bought with her own life. It was the only proof I had that she had loved me. It was my breaking point. My absolute limit. And I would not let anyone destroy it. "You say I can't touch it? Well, I'm going to do it just to spite you!" Lary's face twisted into a demonic grin. And right in front of my eyes, he tore the leather pouch in two. Yellowed paper scraps and a tiny, faded black-and-white photograph fluttered down in front of me. My vision blurred with tears. "Lary... Han... sen!" A searing pain ripped through my chest, so intense I could barely breathe, let alone speak. "I will kill you!" A surge of power I didn't know I possessed shot through me. I launched myself to my feet, knocked Lary to the ground, and brought my fist down on his face with every ounce of strength I had. It was the most satisfying, and most heartbreaking, punch I had ever thrown. Lary lay on the ground, a disgusting mess of blood and snot. "Son of a bitch! You dare touch Lary? Are you fucking insane?" As I raised my fist again, one of Lary's lackeys kicked me squarely in the back. "Lary's about to marry the CEO of Apex! His future is set! If you scramble his brains, do you think your worthless life could ever pay for it?" "You pathetic freeloader! You dare hit the real deal? You think we're just gonna let you?" The whole group swarmed me then, kicking and punching my collapsed body relentlessly. Only when they saw the blood pouring from my nose and mouth, my face a swollen, bruised mess, did they finally stop, laughing. "Pah!" "If we weren't old classmates, we would've killed you today." Lary, clutching his jaw, was helped to his feet by a crony. He spat a bloody glob of phlegm onto my chest. Our old college advisor finally stepped in, but only to take Lary's side. "Lary, that's enough. Why waste your energy on low-life scum like this? It's not worth it." She shot me one last look of utter contempt. The pain was a white-hot fog, making it impossible to think. I curled up on the pavement, each breath a ragged, shallow gasp. "I... will make you... pay for this..." Even then, beaten and broken, the hatred in my heart didn't lessen one bit. "Pfft!" "You? And what army?" Lary scoffed. "I'd love to see what kind of price you think you can make me pay!" The words had barely left his mouth when the roar of engines filled the air. A fleet of a hundred luxury cars, a symphony of raw power, descended upon the street. There wasn't a single vehicle in the convoy worth less than a quarter of a million dollars. Click. Car doors opened in perfect unison. Figures emerged—tall, powerfully built men in sharp, dark suits, their faces grim and unyielding...
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