Chapter 90
Chapter 90
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 90
Chapter Title: Serendipity (12)
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With just a brief prayer from me, even the half-destroyed military android was restored to perfect condition in an instant.
Celestina, who had been watching from the side, seemed to lose her composure for a moment.
Only when we finally reached the president's office on the top floor did the light return to her eyes.
"......."
The corridor bore the full scars of the fierce battle.
Tessellation's security guards, subdued by the church forces.
Their eyes, bound and crushed in various places, fixed on Celestina as she passed, but she ignored their gazes and kept walking.
And at last, we arrived at the president's office.
Inside, amid the church forces who had completely seized control, sat a gaunt man bound in place.
It was Jeremy Ober, president of Tessellation Investment.
His sunken eyes looked up at his daughter, who had just entered.
She met her father's gaze with a complicated expression.
Even as they took in each other's utterly changed appearances, neither said a word. Celestina didn't demand to know why he had done this or why he had betrayed her.
There was something more urgent to handle right now.
"......!"
She headed straight for Jeremy's personal terminal and computer in the office.
Sitting down, she began pounding the keyboard furiously.
She froze all fund transfers from the company, forcibly canceled all scheduled transactions, terminated derivative contracts, and shut down linked algorithms.
Her father, Jeremy Ober, was a thorough man. For a perfect ambush, he had designed every attack to happen in a single moment, simultaneously. Thanks to that, we could still reverse it before that time arrived.
After throwing herself into the task frantically, the moment she finished verifying that the last scheduled trade had been securely canceled...
Celestina finally let out a sigh of relief.
"Haa..."
Just to be safe, she temporarily shut down the headquarters' power grid as well.
The timer in the corner of the monitor finally read 15 minutes before the city exchange opened.
Outside the window, dawn was breaking.
A faint morning light shone over the skyline of the ashen city.
The instant that single ray of sunlight touched her, Celestina slid off the chair and collapsed onto the floor.
I watched her exhausted form and gently patted her shoulder.
"Good work."
Celestina looked up at me blankly.
"Is... is it all over...?"
"You'd know better than I would, Celestina."
"Yeah... you're right."
She nodded dazedly, then murmured to herself.
"My father... I'll have to keep him under strict confinement for a while. In the meantime, contact the board and suspend his authority first, and then..."
As she listed out the things she needed to sort out, she suddenly stopped. Then she looked straight at me and spoke.
"Eve, thank you. Sincerely."
She stood up, straightened her posture, and bowed deeply to me.
When she raised her head again, her expression was gravely serious.
"You said you don't need any reward... but I have to repay this favor. Anything. Tell me what you want. If there's anything you desire from me, I'll give it to you."
Her demeanor was so solemn and earnest that I tried to lighten the mood with a casual joke.
"Anything? Really?"
She replied with crimson eyes that wavered dangerously.
"Yes. What I have... no, even what I don't have yet. If you want it."
Overwhelmed by her intensity, I waved my hands hurriedly.
"No, I was joking. Just kidding."
"Really... you don't need anything?"
There was something oddly desperate about her. Like a child's voice fearing rejection.
Suddenly, I recalled the stories she had told me.
The despair of being cast out even by her only family, left with nothing to rely on. Her expression as she watched her father's back being dragged away had been profoundly lonely, as if all her ties were severed.
So I pointed out one unresolved detail from her story.
"By the way, isn't it strange? How did you manage to escape from here, Celestina?"
"What do you mean...?"
Tessellation Investment's security guards protecting the headquarters. They were undoubtedly strong.
If we had fought with just the church forces, we probably wouldn't have won so easily. Even with Lumina Group's security team and Sion's androids helping, they had held out precariously.
'So how did guards of that caliber let Celestina slip away?'
She had said her escape from headquarters was thanks to aides who remained inside.
But those aides couldn't have been as strong as the president's direct security detail.
For Celestina, who had been completely defenseless and captured, escaping was a near-miraculous probability.
".....!"
At my words, Celestina's eyes widened involuntarily.
Her face dawned with realization as she murmured in bewilderment.
"No way... they let me go on purpose?"
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ A few days later.
Celestina visited her father again, confined in the safehouse.
"The Tessellation board has voted to appoint me as the new president for stopping this incident."
She handed over documents notifying him that she would inherit all authority, including his shares. No consent was needed. As long as Jeremy was in her custody, it was just a matter of time even without his cooperation.
But he signed all the papers without any resistance.
"......."
Watching him, Celestina wondered why her father had done this.
Was it really just to make her mother and Lily's sacrifices meaningful... that he had staked everything to climb endlessly?
'Then... what about me?'
Celestina had always known she was the least favored child. But did he truly see her as expendable?
Their father-daughter bond had gone awry. Yet Celestina had avoided confronting that rift too. Perhaps she had resented him all along. After all, this way of living was something she had learned from him.
Maybe she even wanted to blame her own failures on others.
But...
Celestina gazed into the distance and quietly spoke.
"A few days ago, I heard that Lily's medical insurance premiums have already been prepaid. Enough to cover any treatments for decades, no matter what."
And one more thing. When interrogating the guards who had chased her from the new headquarters, their intended destination for her wasn't headquarters... but a safehouse in another city.
'Could it be that Father, perhaps...'
Megacorps were ruthless but equally cunning. They had the power to erase even conglomerates that crossed them, but such actions yielded no profit.
Especially now, with Regency Group's internal cleanup unfinished.
With the two heirs glaring at each other, desperate for any opening. Rather than diverting attention elsewhere, there was a chance they might opt for the simplest, quickest resolution.
Perhaps they planned to purge only the rebellious leadership and install the defiant daughter as a puppet president to seize the company.
It was a low-probability scenario, but if it played out that way, Celestina's life would have been spared even if things went wrong. Maybe that's why her father had never visited Lily personally—to avoid signaling concern for family, which could drag them all down if it backfired.
But all this was just Celestina's speculation.
If he truly cared for his daughters, he shouldn't have started this in the first place.
So she asked her silent father again.
"Why... why did you go this far?"
His sunken eyes stared at her for a long while before he finally answered.
"I was too tired. I wanted to end it all."
What followed was a voice laced with ancient pain.
The young Celestina had grown disillusioned with her actions and regretted her mistakes.
But Jeremy Ober couldn't blame himself. He had lived that way his entire life. The pride built over decades, his way of life—he couldn't call it wrong or abandon it.
Caught in limbo, unable to go forward or back, he simply pressed on.
He never showed it, but her father had been driven to extremes in his own way. A life stripped of meaning, sustained by inertia and nothing but pain. He must have wanted to end it immediately.
Yet he couldn't stop halfway.
With too much horrific sacrifice already made, it had to end meaningfully.
Torn between those, he made an irreversible choice.
Hunt the megacorp to ascend beyond the heavens, or challenge their hegemony and perish gloriously. Either way, he wanted to give this wretched life a meaningful end.
After hearing everything, Celestina sighed.
"Father, you're an idiot."
Truly, unbelievably foolish. Unthinkable for the head of a world-class investment firm. Pathetic enough to make a passing beggar laugh.
But... somehow, she empathized.
Celestina had been going mad in the same regrets and guilt. The only reason she hadn't taken that final step off the cliff like her father was pure chance.
A stroke of luck from meeting one person.
"We've both been such fools until now, but even fools have their own salvation, it seems."
She realized something. For fools as weak as them... if they regretted and suffered, perhaps what embraced them warmly was divine mercy.
At that moment, the door behind Celestina slowly opened.
And through the gap, a little girl cautiously entered.
Jeremy's sunken eyes widened more than ever before.
He tried to leap from his chair but collapsed back, strength failing. His trembling hand froze in midair, unable to reach out. As if facing someone from a dream who might vanish at a touch.
In that instant, the girl threw herself into his arms.
"Daddy!!!"
Three years skipped, and at last, he heard that voice again.
The moment he did, nothing else mattered.
The father who reclaimed his lost daughter simply held his most precious treasure tight, speechless.
Surging emotions overflowed as hot tears.
With a cracked voice, he barely whispered her name.
"Lily..."
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ Camera flashes exploded relentlessly in the press conference hall. At the center podium, before the mic, stood a woman.
Her long platinum hair cascaded down, her features so perfect she could be mistaken for an actress.
Celestina Ober, possessing both beauty and talent, declared confidently.
"Former president Jeremy Ober is retiring due to health reasons. And from today, with the full consent of the board, I, Celestina Ober, take over as the new president of Tessellation Investment."
The flashes intensified.
Bathed in that barrage of light, she continued calmly.
"From now on, Tessellation Investment will grow alongside everyone, fostering mutual prosperity. We will use our resources to positively impact society and help people."
Considering Tessellation's original nature, the new CEO's vision was revolutionary. Reporters buzzed, flashes multiplying to capture her.
Amid the lights, the small necklace around the new president's neck gleamed especially bright.
It resembled a star pattern, like dazzling radiance.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ Bzzz— bzzzz—
At the faint vibration on the table, I paused my work and looked at the terminal.
The screen filled with nonstop new text messages.
[Eve, can you talk now?]
[Just finished the board report. It was a bit boring, but thinking back to that day...]
[Any plans for lunch today? Should I order the same? ...]
Bzzzzz—
"......."
This was weird. Really weird.
She had just become president, so she must be busier than ever.
Yet the frequency of messages to me... had tripled exactly.
Bzzzzzzzzz—
"........"
I just stared at the incessantly vibrating terminal on the desk, my face blank.