Crazy Bitch
Crazy bitch.
The sudden bankruptcy of a major hedge fund.
The aftershocks left the global economy reeling.
The Nasdaq had plunged a full −15%.
It had come right up to the edge of a Stage 3 circuit breaker.
Swift action from the U.S. government. Unprecedented cooperation from every major institution. Miraculously, the markets found their footing again.
But still—
Ptui!
Once the market had heaved like that, there was no way the aftershocks would simply vanish.
When a wave rises in America, a tsunami hits everywhere else.
Sudden capital flight. The collapse of countless derivatives. Several countries were driven to the brink of sovereign default.
"Is there really a fucking bastard like this in the world?"
"Can't even go quietly when it's time to leave, tsk tsk."
Plenty of people had every reason to hold a grudge.
The building that had housed the hedge fund had become a pilgrimage site for Wall Street types.
And not in a good way.
"Is this the spot?"
"Yes. You can spit right here."
"Ptui!"
Its reputation had been rotten for a long time already.
A miser who would do anything for money. Not exactly a rare character on Wall Street. Everyone there was fighting with money on the line.
"W-wait a second!"
"Yes?"
"Spit is one thing, but pissing—you could get arrested for public indecency. There's CCTV!"
"Already did."
Even by those standards, it had been excessive.
People said it was more vicious than the private equity funds. The number of funds it had driven into bankruptcy wasn't one or two. Corporations had been chewed up by the dozens.
Psssshhh~!
Reasons enough for hatred.
The atmosphere was such that no one even tried to stop a man from taking a leak on the hedge fund's nameplate.
It had crossed every moral line.
And the scale of the atrocities that fund had committed was so global that people could almost understand why.
You need to understand market risk.
Short-selling giant Mr. Lee continues to insist that several European nations still face liquidity crises.
ECB's Nagezel: We remain optimistic that no further measures are required.
FED's Jameson: We are monitoring the situation in Europe.
Greece, Italy, and other European countries have tightened entry restrictions on American and Korean nationals.
It had escalated all the way into an international diplomatic issue.
A regular fixture on Financial Juice, it had seized the public eye. In a short span it had become more famous than Berkshire Hathaway.
He had soared as a star investor leading the era—
Ptui!
Ptui!
—but the notoriety piled up right alongside it.
His investment style, aggressive to the point of inhumanity, split opinion clean down the middle. Loyal clients and a fanatical following only made it easier for him to turn the markets into a complete shitshow.
That reign of terror was finally over.
"Finally my sleep schedule is going to be protected."
"No more neuroses over passive fund management."
Even the Wall Street crowd—people whose hobbies and daily lives consisted of land, sea, and air combat—were shuddering with relief.
There was a reason they bothered to come all the way to the building just to spit.
Fear.
It still sat in a corner of their hearts. If they didn't cast it out through action, they felt they would never overcome it.
Gulp.
The spit they meant to launch got swallowed instead.
The terror and awe he inspired were not things you could shake off overnight.
"Surely he wouldn't…"
"Hm?"
"…suddenly make a comeback in the sector I'm trading, right…?"
"Don't even say that!"
It wasn't as if such a thing had never happened.
Crash!
A completely ruined investor climbing back. Like the old saying that a rich man stays rich for three years even after going broke—there was always money left. And there would always be people willing to lend more.
Gulp.
Especially if you factored in his ability.
A chill ran straight down the spine. It was an investment worth making. A man skilled at leverage and high-stakes gambles could multiply capital in no time and still have room to spare.
"I heard they have a saying in Korea, where he's from."
"What?"
"Words become seeds."
"Holy shit!"
"Yeah. Don't even put it in your mouth."
They prayed it would never become reality. They did not want to lose the hard-won daily life they had just clawed back.
CW Fund
That was why they kept checking. Just in case this nightmare of a fund somehow rose from the dead.
"That's what you get for making enemies."
In front of the nameplate the spitters had already abandoned, a woman with a parasol came to a stop.
At a glance she looked young. The air she carried was that of a noble house.
"Hmph. You brought this on yourself."
And that was the truth.
Rachel, head of the Rothschild family, knew this fund better than anyone.
She was the one who had brought it down, after all.
The full power of the family had been thrown into the effort. It had still taken a fair amount of time, but in the end it had been nothing more than a matter of time. The sheer scale of movable capital and power was simply different.
"You were so arrogant and self-righteous that when things truly got hard, there was no one left at your side. I'm sure you've realized that by now."
In truth, what had been harder than crushing him was rising to become head of the family.
The structure of the Rothschilds was unique. There were multiple branch houses. The heads of each branch competed, and only the one who finally received the elders' recognition became head of the main house.
No—there had never been a "main house" to begin with.
What the world knew as the Rothschild family was nothing more than a shell.
It was hard. But I did it. The desire for revenge against you is what made me strong.
Hide a tree in a forest. Just like the proverb, they performed the image of a declining chaebol family. Centuries had passed. The Rothschilds had put down roots across the world under other names as well. And through competition they were culled again and again. The superior genes survived and made the family prosper further.
"Haa…"
Even thinking about it again, it had not been easy.
Especially for her—she had never married. There was no allied family to lean on. Her own branch had always been one of the weaker ones.
Even so, she had clawed her way through. She had poured her entire youth into a single goal.
"Heh… heheh. Gives me chills. Just imagining you licking my shoes like a dog."
Rachel looked up at the building.
A 101-story tower, the crystallization of modern architectural engineering. The interior would be nearly empty by now. The fund had gone bankrupt; the employees had packed up and left long ago.
But not every floor was vacant.
Just before coming here, Rachel had received a report.
He is currently in his office on the 101st floor. No trace of him leaving the building has been found.
His location.
She was keeping close watch using the family's power. He no longer had the strength left to wage an information war against her.
Click-clack.
She stepped inside the building. Only days earlier even entry would have been blocked, but the situation was different now.
"Hey! You can't just walk in here!"
"I'm the acquirer. Is there a problem?"
"Ah—is that so? My apologies."
A security guard barred the way. It would have been stranger still if a skyscraper this prominent even on Wall Street had no management. Above him sat the building's owner.
The acquisition was already underway. Soon this place, too, would belong to her—no, to the family.
"Right."
Nothing could stop her now.
Guided by the manager, she rode up toward the upper floors.
"Nearly every floor has already withdrawn or is in the final stages. If you'd just wait a little longer…"
"Nearly?"
"Yes! The very top floor is still… Well, he is the former owner of the building, and the relationships are complicated, hahaha."
A complete 180 from the bluster of a moment ago. The guard understood the system of capitalism. The world ran on money. You did not defy the one who held it.
The bone-deep fear did not vanish overnight.
I'll help you out.
The reason they couldn't force an eviction. She immediately understood the subtle look of appeal being directed at her.
"This is it."
"What? It's completely empty…"
"Ah, that is—it doesn't connect all the way to the final floor."
Access was deliberately difficult. In the emptied 100th-floor office, stripped of desks and every other piece of furniture, a single pane of glass stood upright.
An elevator?
It looked wrong for that—the interior was completely hollow.
Rachel had only ever heard of the thing at a briefing for interested parties.
So this is that famous anti-gravity elevator.
A device that applied the Tesla coil. The scientific world had made a fuss claiming it realized the Hutchison Effect. That was as far as it went. Output and cost were nowhere near practical for real use. Only a handful of eccentrics owned them as luxury toys. Each ride was said to cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.
"You'll need to go up from here. We do have the security key, but…"
No wonder the guard was fretting. Even if the value of money had shifted from the past, it was still an eye-watering sum for an ordinary person.
I'll confirm with my own two eyes exactly what kind of wreck you are right now.
To her it was nothing. She had no hobby of wasting money, but the family policy was to spend boldly where spending was required.
Wheeeeng~!
She rose with the guard. A strange sensation wrapped her body as she lifted, little by little. Wind blew up from below. Apparently the insufficient output was being supplemented with raw physical force.
Clack!
When they reached the upper floor the floor sealed shut. It was her first time riding one, and the sensation was rather novel.
Heh.
An even more novel sight would be waiting. Lee Chanuk, sprawled in defeat. A look that suited him perfectly. She had spent decades honing the blade of her revenge just to see that face.
"Ah—there he is!"
"So he is."
"He seems to be sleeping… shall I wake him?"
In front of the glass wall that commanded a view a hundred floors down, he lay sleeping. The liquor bottles scattered across the floor told the story well enough. She could roughly guess what had happened.
From now on you won't have the leisure to take comfortable afternoon naps in penthouses like this.
The reason Rachel had become head of the family. To fulfill her grandfather's will. One of those wishes she had already achieved. The other still left her with a certain resistance, if she was honest.
Rachel, I know you have no interest in marriage, but…
Descendants.
A responsibility that came with being head of the main house. She was crushing opposition with sheer force and keeping things quiet. Given the family's nature—where branch houses could always climb—they were not particularly obsessed with bloodlines and were relatively open to adoption.
But if possible…
Gulp.
Wanting to leave one's own child behind was human nature. Of course she would not grant that privilege to just anyone.
Hmph. Hmph. As a stud horse he might still have some use.
He had lost both money and youth and grown ugly with age. The only person who would take him in now was her. She would raise him into a proper human being. A few months of thorough breaking might improve him a little.
Judging by the sex jokes he still throws around, he seems to still have some interest in me… I'll test whether he can still function as a man.
She wanted to see his face twisted in humiliation. To remind him that he had to obey her. Their first time would absolutely be cowgirl. She had intended to make it clear that she was the one on top—
"Oh my god… this is serious."
"Hurry up and wake him."
"It's impossible."
"???"
The guard who had been shaking him suddenly wore a grave expression and shook his head hard.
"He's gone cold."
"What did you just say?"
"He… appears to have closed his eyes for good. His health was never good to begin with, and recently he may have been overexerting himself…"
Words she could not believe reached her ears.
Rachel rushed to him. Just as the guard said, he was cold. It did not feel like living human skin at all.
Wh-what? You're lying, right? There's no way you'd die this easily…
She had waited decades for this moment. She had believed she had finally achieved it.
An unexpected situation.
Panicked, Rachel shook his body and snapped at the guard, but—
"S-save him somehow."
"How am I supposed to do anything with someone who's already deceased?"
"Th-then at least the sperm, somehow…"
"Excuse me?"
It had been a long time since the reincarnation button was pressed.