Chapter 87
Chapter 87
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 87
Chapter Title: Serendipity (9)
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Omega Detroit's city center.
Amid towering skyscrapers stood one building that particularly caught the eye, its pristine white exterior gleaming.
Arcadia Medical Center. It was one of only six top-tier medical facilities in the entire city.
Just then, a sleek luxury air vehicle descended toward the upper levels of the facility.
A vehicle entering not through the hospital's main entrance, but via the VIP-exclusive high-altitude air port.
Its license plate was automatically scanned, and a private hangar slid open.
⚙ SYSTEM NOTIFICATION ⚙ "VIP insurance client, Celestina, confirmed. We sincerely welcome your visit to Arcadia Medical Center." The mechanical voice of the hospital's main system greeted the visitor.
The door of the parked vehicle slid open, and a woman in her usual elegant suit stepped out.
Her face heavier than usual, she boarded the elevator without a word.
"......."
Moments later, she arrived at a custom private room designed for just one person.
Warm-toned wallpaper and softly playing classical music.
The cozy surroundings evoked not a hospital room, but a luxury hotel suite— a heartfelt wish from someone hoping the occupant would feel even a little more at ease.
In the center of that room stood a massive cylindrical glass capsule.
Celestina approached with even greater caution.
She gazed through the transparent glass wall at the figure lying inside the sterile pod.
A girl lay there, quietly asleep with an artificial respirator tube inserted.
Her small body bore symmetric burns on both sides, half-melted away.
Celestina spoke.
"Lily, it's been a while."
Staring at her sleeping sister inside the capsule, she unconsciously held her breath.
Lilliana Oberth. Celestina's one and only little sister had been on life support here since the incident three years ago.
Burns from a car fire that had seared past the dermis into muscle and bone. Two necrotic limbs had ultimately required amputation. Without the astronomical costs of cutting-edge medicine poured into her care, she could have breathed her last at any moment.
And so Lily had slept through three full years of life support.
Even if she awoke, the excruciating pain of those horrific burns would likely prevent any normal activity.
Doctors had said cybernetic enhancements or artificial skin grafts were impossible. She simply lacked the strength to survive the surgeries.
Perhaps it was better for her sister to remain asleep like this.
"....."
Gazing at her, Celestina bit her lip until it bled.
The panic symptoms she'd thought were improving clawed at her heart once more.
Guilt crushed her chest. Regret seeped from every breath.
She could barely stand to look at her sister's face any longer. After all... this was all her fault.
Once upon a time, a company called Stratos Bionics existed in this city.
Three years ago, Celestina had spotted its vulnerabilities.
Executive corruption, shaky capital structure, overhyped new tech.
The white shark smelled blood and didn't hesitate.
The target was torn apart and devoured like any other prey, collapsing into ruin.
Typically, a fallen executive would scrape together whatever assets remained and vanish quietly. That was the rational choice. An individual stripped of their company's power daring to challenge a behemoth like Tessellation? It was suicide, nothing more.
But not everything in this world proceeds rationally.
The former president of Stratos Bionics liquidated every last asset for a terrorist attack on the Oberth family. In the process, Celestina's mother died... and her little sister Lily ended up like this.
'If only it had been me... if I'd been the one.'
That was the regret that kept her awake every night.
She had been the one to greenlight the investment.
Yet their revenge hadn't targeted her or even her father, the head of Tessellation.
Ironically, it struck her mother and sister—people utterly unconnected to the company business. They were simply less important to the corporation, so their security had been lax. They alone became the sacrifices.
The terrorists' end, driven by vengeance for vengeance's sake, was anticlimactic.
The security team, alerted by the emergency signal, arrived on-site and turned them into Swiss cheese. Among the shredded corpses was the ex-president himself, who had orchestrated it all.
The incident ended emptily.
But its aftermath shattered the two remaining family members.
Celestina plunged into deep disillusionment. She could no longer comprehend the point of making money this way. All she could do was regret and blame herself.
But her father, the only family left, was entirely different.
He didn't stop. Far from dialing back his investment strategy, he grew even more aggressive, expanding the company.
Thanks to that, Tessellation devoured competitors and climbed into the mid-upper ranks of the top 100 corporations.
Yet he still wasn't satisfied. Even now, he pressed onward endlessly.
'Going that far... what exactly is he trying to achieve?'
Once, he had been the man she admired and idolized above all else in the world.
But now, she could no longer understand him.
She felt like she could no longer keep up with his footsteps.
Ding-
Suddenly, an alarm pierced the silence.
Celestina absently pulled out her communicator. It was a call from headquarters.
"......."
She stared at the screen for a moment before gently placing her palm on the glass over her sleeping sister.
"I'll come back later, Lily."
As she headed for the elevator to leave, Celestina turned once more and whispered softly.
"...I'm sorry."
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ The moment Celestina returned to headquarters and tried to enter the top-floor president's office.
"Please return your comm device here."
The secretary politely yet curtly offered her a small basket.
"......"
Celestina handed it over without a word.
Her father was a perfectionist, and his principles allowed no exceptions—not even for his daughter and heir.
She'd once admired that ironclad demeanor. Now? She wasn't sure. It just felt suffocating.
Stepping into the office, she found a gaunt, corpse-like man waiting.
Jeremy Oberth stood with the city nightscape at his back, speaking without turning.
"You're late."
"I went to see Lily."
"......."
Only then did her father slowly turn. But even mentioning their hospitalized daughter, his eyes held no emotion.
Celestina felt something surge up inside her.
Then, out of nowhere, Jeremy said,
"Regency Group."
He fixed her with eyes gleaming sharply amid his emaciated face.
"You've heard the news, I assume?"
"...Yes. I know their two sons are in a succession dispute right now."
How could she not?
Regency Group—third in capital ranking among the top 100 corporations.
Its presence was absolute. The world's foremost investment firm, holding more cash than any entity in human history. Rumors even swirled that its assets exceeded the company's scale, owning fully 10 percent of the world's circulating currency.
The reason it had ascended to that pinnacle was simple: they'd developed Oracle, a super-advanced AI that outstripped every existing investment algorithm.
The machine god reigning over capitalism had monopolized financial markets, elevating Regency Group to mega-corp supremacy.
But in that meteoric rise lurked a vulnerability even they hadn't foreseen. To fund Oracle's astronomical development costs at launch, they'd woven the company holding its usage rights into their circular investment structure.
Splitting shares across multiple entities had seemed a wise move back then.
But with the Regency chairman's sudden death, it had boomeranged.
The revealed control structure was far more tangled than imagined. Now, the two sons were desperately burning through their cash to buy back scattered shares from every corner.
Jeremy continued flatly.
"Tessellation Investment plans to enter the fray."
Celestina blinked in confusion.
"...Playing kingmaker between the two?"
It was a reasonable guess.
The heirs were bloodshot-eyed for every scrap of Oracle equity. With public shares nearly exhausted, their value had skyrocketed.
Anyone unearthing even a modest holding stood to profit immensely.
But her father replied,
"No. We're going to hunt Regency Group."
".....!"