I left my resume in a roadside diner, convinced my life was officially over, but hours later a helicopter landed, and the man who stepped out called himself the grandfather i never knew, saying he was here to help me destroy everyone who wronged me…

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The Nevada desert heat felt like it was melting the asphalt on the dilapidated Route 66. I sat in “Dusty Spoon,” a run-down diner with cracked faux-leather chairs and a creaking ceiling fan that looked like it was about to fall on my head.

My name is Lucas Cain. 30 years old. The youngest former Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Apex Dynamics.

Or rather: Lucas Cain, a wanted man, a $50 million embezzler, a seller of national secrets. Of course, that’s what the CNN news was broadcasting on the television hanging in the corner of the diner.

The truth? I was framed. By the very person I respected most – CEO Marcus Sterling, and the woman I was about to marry – Sarah. They used my digital signature, a fictitious account under my name, to launder money for drug cartels. By the time I found out, it was too late. My account was frozen, the FBI was knocking, and I had to flee like a frightened mouse.

I looked down at the table. In front of me was a crumpled A4 sheet of paper, my resume printed on it. Not the flashy CV from my Wall Street days. This was a fake one, applying for a dishwasher or mechanic job.

I had exactly 12 dollars left in my pocket. The old Ford I’d bought with cash was out of gas.

The waitress, a middle-aged woman with a tired, wrinkled face, set down her weak coffee. “Anything else, young man?”

“No, thank you,” I pushed the resume towards her. “Can I…can I leave this here? If you know anyone who needs a worker…”

She looked at the paper, then at my deep-set, bloodshot eyes. She sighed and tucked it under the sugar shaker. “Alright. But in this corner, hope is a luxury.”

I slumped my head onto the table. She was right. My life was over. I couldn’t keep running forever. Maybe I should go out there, walk into the desert, and let the vultures take care of the rest.

Suddenly, the table shook.

At first, I thought it was an earthquake. But then the rumbling grew louder and louder until it drowned out the whining country music from the old speaker. The coffee cups on the table danced. Dust swirled outside the window, obscuring the sunlight.

“What the hell is that?” the waitress yelled.

I looked out the window. A monstrous, black metal thing was landing right in the middle of the diner’s gravel parking lot.

A Sikorsky S-76 helicopter. The kind usually used by heads of state or oil billionaires.

The helicopter door opened. Two men in black suits and sunglasses stepped out, submachine guns lurking beneath their jackets. They stood in two rows, creating a passageway.

And then, a man stepped out.

He was about eighty years old, but his posture was as straight as a pine tree. He wore a perfectly tailored three-piece ash-gray suit, leaning on an ebony cane with a gold-tipped end. His white hair was meticulously combed. His eyes were cold and sharp like a hawk’s, sweeping across this dilapidated restaurant as if he were looking at a garbage dump.

He walked straight into the restaurant. The jingling of the doorbell sounded ridiculous compared to his overwhelming presence.

He approached my table, tossed my coffee cup aside, and sat down.

“Lucas Cain,” he said. His voice was deep, resonant, and powerful.

I narrowed my eyes, my hand reaching into my jacket pocket, gripping the blunt folding knife—my only weapon. “Who are you? An FBI agent? Or Marcus’s assassin?”

The man chuckled. A dry, hollow laugh.

“FBI? Marcus?” He shook his head contemptuously. “Those insignificant little guys aren’t qualified to order me around.”

He placed a thick file on the table. The cover was blank, only embossed with a family crest of a wolf holding a sword.

“I am Silas Vane. And I am your grandfather.”

Chapter 2: The Forgotten Bloodline
I was stunned. “Grandfather? My parents died in a car accident when I was five. They were poor teachers. I have no relatives named Vane.”

“Your father – my son – is a romantic fool,” Silas said, his voice sharp. “He rejected the Vane family, rejected our multi-billion dollar steel and arms empire to run after a poor music teacher. He changed his last name to Cain to escape me. I let him go, pretending he was dead. But when he was truly dead… I intended to bring you back.”

“Why didn’t you?” I asked, my throat choked with emotion. “I grew up in an orphanage! I was beaten, I was starved!”

“Because a wolf cannot be raised in luxury,” Silas looked straight into my eyes. “I wanted to see if the Vane blood truly flowed in you. I’ve been watching you from afar. You’re self-made, you climbed to the top of Wall Street by your own merit. I was very impressed. Until…”

He pointed to the crumpled resume under the sugar shaker.

“…Until you let a brat like Marcus Sterling and a slut ensnare you, then you ran away and tried to become a dishwasher in this corner. How humiliating.”

I lowered my head. Shame burned me more intensely than the desert heat.

“So what are you doing here?” I asked. “To mock me?”

Silas stood up. He tossed a black card onto the table, next to my resume.

“I’ve come to give you a sword. I’m dying.”

Lucas. Lung cancer. We need an heir. But I won’t hand over the Vane empire to a failure.

He leaned down and whispered in my ear, “Get up. Follow me. I will help you destroy all those who wronged you. Not by law. But by absolute power. I will teach you how to turn Marcus Sterling and that Sarah woman into dust, literally.”

I looked at the helicopter outside, its rotors still spinning, waiting. Then I looked at the resume – a symbol of surrender.

I took the resume, crumpled it up in my hand, and threw it in the trash.

“Let’s go,” I said.

Chapter 3: The Transformation
We flew straight back to New York.

Within the next 72 hours, Lucas Cain was dead. The man who emerged from the Manhattan penthouse was Lucas Vane.

I got a haircut, a shave, and was dressed in suits worth thousands of dollars. But more importantly, I was educated by Silas. He gave me the key to access Vane Industries’ private intelligence network.

I sat in his office, staring at the computer screen. What I saw sent shivers down my spine. Silas Vane wasn’t just a billionaire. He was a “Kingmaker” – the man behind the scenes pulling the strings of politicians and manipulating the oil market. The mine.

And Marcus Sterling? He’s just a black pawn on his chessboard.

“Tonight,” Silas said, sitting in his armchair, breathing heavily from his cancer. “Marcus’s Apex Dynamics corporation is holding a merger celebration with a European bank. This is the deal of a lifetime for him. He’ll be a billionaire after tonight.”

“And Sarah will be the billionaire’s wife,” I said, my hand tightening around my whiskey glass.

“What do you want to do?” Silas asked.

“I want to destroy the deal. I want to send them to jail,” I replied.

Silas shook his head in disappointment. “The mindset of a hired hand. Send them to jail? Too easy. They have lawyers, they’ll be out in a few years. To get revenge, you have to take away what they hold most. For Marcus, that’s fame.” “For Sarah, it’s about safety.”

He tossed me a gold-plated USB drive.

“Inside is the source code of the software Marcus is selling to European banks. He stole it from one of our subsidiaries 10 years ago, but we never sued. We saved it for this day. And there’s more… proof that Sarah used to be a high-class prostitute who extorted money from officials before Marcus ‘cleaned her up’.”

“How long have you had all this?” I asked, astonished.

“I’ve always had it.” “We’ll just wait and see if you have the guts to use it.”

Chapter 4: The Killers’ Party
The Plaza Hotel, New York.

The Apex Dynamics merger party was a lavish affair. Marcus Sterling stood on stage, raising a glass of champagne, beaming. Beside him was Sarah, resplendent in a diamond-studded gown. They looked like a royal couple of the financial world.

“Thank you everyone,” Marcus said into the microphone. “This merger marks a new era.” “We have removed the ‘cancers’ (he was referring to me) to reach purity and prosperity.”

The crowd applauded loudly.

The large doors of the banquet hall opened.

I entered. Not stealthily. But boldly. Beside me were four of Silas Vane’s bodyguards, and Silas himself, though frail, walked with authority, leaning on his cane.

The music died down. All eyes turned to us.

“Lucas?” Sarah exclaimed, her face drained of color. “You… what are you doing here? Security! There’s a manhunt!”

Marcus regained his composure more quickly. He sneered: “Ah, the sewer rat has crawled out of the sewer. You’ve come to surrender, haven’t you?” “So you’ve come to beg for my charity?”

I stepped onto the stage, standing opposite him. Silas stood below, smiling at me.

“I’ve come to give you a belated wedding gift,” I said calmly.

I plugged the USB into the party’s projection system.

The giant LED screen behind Marcus went dark, then displayed a bright red message: SERIOUS COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT WARNING.

This was followed by a series of documents proving that the core source code of Apex Dynamics was owned by Vane Industries. And immediately after that, a video recording of a phone call between Marcus and Sarah discussing framing me, along with a plan to embezzle money from the partner bank immediately after the merger.

The entire auditorium erupted in chaos. Representatives from European banks immediately pulled out their phones to call their lawyers.

“Turn it off!” “Turn it off!” Marcus yelled, lunging at the computer. But the system was locked.

The screen changed. This time it showed a series of photos of Sarah’s past, along with blackmail transactions from former victims.

Sarah screamed, covering her face as she ran off the stage, but was surrounded by reporters.

“Marcus Sterling,” I said into the microphone. “Apex’s stock just dropped 80% in the last 5 minutes. The Securities and Exchange Commission and the FBI are waiting at the door. And Vane Industries just activated the debt recovery clause. You’re bankrupt.”

Marcus collapsed to the floor. He looked at me, then at the old man standing below the stage. He recognized the family crest on his jacket.

“Vane… Silas Vane…” Marcus stammered. “You… you’re the grandson of the devil…”

Chapter 5: The Twist – The Architect of Pain
The police raided the room.

They arrested Marcus and Sarah. I stood on the stage, watching them being dragged away. I should have felt a sense of satisfaction. But I felt only emptiness.

We returned to the Vane mansion. Silas sat in his armchair, coughing violently, his handkerchief soaked with blood.

“Well done,” he said, his voice weak. “You acted like a true Vane. Ruthless. Decisive.”

I poured him a glass of water. “Thank you. Without you, I would have died a miserable death in Nevada.”

Silas looked at me, the smile on his lips suddenly becoming strange. A smile not of a kind grandfather, but of someone who had just completed a game of chess of the century.

“Lucas,” he said slowly. “Have you ever wondered why Marcus Sterling—a mediocre CEO—was able to trap a genius CFO like you?”

I froze. “What do you mean?”

“You’re smart, Lucas. You always meticulously check every signature, every transaction. How could you have been so careless as to let him use your electronic signature for six months without knowing?”

A chill ran down my spine. “Because… the internal security system was compromised at the highest level (Root Access).”

“That’s right,” Silas nodded. “And who provided that security system to Apex Dynamics?”

I remembered. It was a subsidiary of… Vane Industries.

I recoiled, dropping my glass of water to the floor. Crash.

“You…” I whispered. “You knew?”

“Knowed?” Silas chuckled maniacally. “I didn’t just know. I ordered Marcus to do it.”

My world crumbled for the second time.

“What?”

“Marcus is my dog, Lucas,” Silas said, his voice icy cold. “He owes me a lot of money. I ordered him to frame you. I ordered Sarah to seduce you and betray you. I cut off all your escape routes, causing you to lose everything, forcing you to flee to that shabby diner in Nevada.”

“WHY?” I screamed, lunging forward and grabbing the collar of the dying old man. “Why did you do this to your own grandson?”

Silas showed no fear. He looked straight into my eyes, his gaze blazing.

“Because you’re too much like your father! You’re too weak! You work hard, you live honestly, you believe in love and justice. Those things are rubbish in the world of Vane! I need an heir, but I need a monster, not a lamb.”

He brushed my hand away and adjusted his shirt.

“I had to destroy you. I had to strip you of everything, drag you down to the depths of hell, to see if you had enough hatred to crawl back up. And you did. You abandoned morality to destroy Marcus tonight. You didn’t use the law, you used power and trickery. Congratulations, Lucas. Now you are truly my grandson.”

Chapter 6: The Death Sentence
I stood there speechless.

This man – my grandfather – had orchestrated the entire tragedy of my life. He had turned me into a criminal, ruined my honor, only to “forge” me into a cruel copy of himself.

Marcus and Sarah were just pawns. They followed his orders, and he used me to eliminate them when they were no longer useful.

“You are a devil,” I said, my hands trembling.

“And now you are too,” Silas smiled triumphantly. “I’m dying. This entire empire is yours. You can refuse it, go back to being a poor fugitive. Or you can accept it, and become King.”

He pushed another stack of documents toward me. It was the Will and the Power Transfer Agreement. Beside it was a pistol.

“I’m in terrible pain from cancer, Lucas,” Silas said, closing his eyes. “I don’t want to slowly die in a sickbed. Prove you’re ready to sit in this chair. Help me end this suffering. Consider it your final act of revenge.”

I looked at the gun. Then at the old man.

He ruined my life. He deserved to die.

I picked up the gun. Its weight was cold in my hand.

I pointed it at Silas’s head. He kept his eyes closed, smiling expectantly. He believed he had won. He believed I would pull the trigger, and that act would seal my soul forever in darkness, turning me into a second Silas Vane.

BANG!

A gunshot echoed through the office.

But Silas didn’t die. He opened his eyes, bewildered.

The bullet had lodged in his portrait hanging on the wall behind him, piercing the forehead of “Silas in the painting.”

I threw the gun down on the desk.

“I’m not you,” I said, my voice calm but imbued with a newfound strength. “I won’t kill you. Because death is too easy a release for you.”

I walked to the desk, picked up the transfer file, and signed it.

“I will take over this empire. But not to become a copy of you. I will use your money, your power, to destroy all the dark legacies you’ve built. I will sell the weapons factories. I will dismantle the intelligence network. I will turn the name Vane into something good, or I will bury it forever.”

Silas began to panic. “No! You mustn’t do that! That’s my life’s work!”

“You taught me ruthlessness,” I smirked—a cold smile I learned from him. “This is ruthlessness…”

“My greatest insult to you is: I will let you live.”

I walked to the door.

“I will hire the best doctors, the best equipment to keep you alive. You will live, Silas. You will live a long, long time in a hospital bed, paralyzed, unable to speak, unable to move, and you will have to watch helplessly as I dismantle this empire of sin brick by brick on the daily news.”

“NO! LUCAS! KILL ME!” “Kill me!” Silas screamed, trying to grab his gun but falling to the floor.

I closed the door. His screams were trapped behind the thick oak door.

Chapter 7: The New King
One year later.

I stood in Silas’s old office. The portrait with the gaping forehead still hung there as a reminder.

The Vane Corporation had been restructured. I had sold the arms division to invest in clean energy and healthcare. I used the money to clear my name and compensate Marcus’s victims.

In a high-end private hospital not far away, Silas Vane was still alive. He had suffered a stroke the night before and was now suffering from Locked-in Syndrome. He was fully conscious but unable to move, only able to roll his eyes.

Every day, the nurse turned on the TV for him. And on the TV was the image of me – Lucas Vane – using his money to… He would do charity work to erase what he worshipped.

I looked down upon New York City. I am neither a sheep nor a wolf, as Silas intended.

I am a survivor of the desert. And I will rule this kingdom in my own way.