On the gilded corner of Dynasty Avenue, two figures huddled in the filth. One sat in a rusted wheelchair, his legs twisted at unnatural angles. The other, a woman whose face was a melted ruin of scar tissue, clawed at a half-eaten sandwich someone had thrown away.
“It’s mine!” the man, Chad, snarled, snatching it from her. “I saw it first!”
“You pig!” Lily shrieked, her voice a raw rasp. “You’d let me starve?”
Suddenly, the colossal LED screen wrapping the skyscraper above them flared to life. The faces of news anchors appeared, breathless with excitement. “An unprecedented moment as the Vance Dynasty, the family controlling a hundred-billion-dollar fortune, announces its new Chairman…”
A face filled the screen. A face of cold, chiseled perfection, radiating absolute power. Lily’s scarred jaw dropped. A choked sound escaped her throat. “No… no, it can’t be.”
Chad squinted, his eyes widening in horror. “Ethan? The janitor? The heir to the Vance Empire?” The words were poison on his tongue. The screen showed Ethan, standing before world leaders, accepting the sigil ring of the dynasty. A reporter’s voiceover boomed, “Lord Ethan Vance, the most powerful man in the world.”
Lily began to sob, a hideous, broken sound. “We had him,” she wailed, pounding her fists against the grimy pavement. “I had the world’s greatest fortune in my hands, and I threw it away for you!” She spat at Chad.
Just then, a convoy of black Phantoms purred to a stop at the curb. Bodyguards in sharp suits fanned out, opening a rear door. Ethan Vance emerged, his gaze sweeping over the skyscraper he now owned. He didn’t look down. He didn’t see the vermin at his feet.
Hope, insane and desperate, flared in their eyes. They scrambled forward, a grotesque crawl across the marble sidewalk. “Ethan! Mr. Vance! Please!” Lily cried, her mangled fingers reaching for him. Chad shoved his wheelchair forward with his hands, his face a mask of pathetic begging.
They crawled over to clutch the hem of his trousers and beg for change. A bodyguard kicked them away: ‘Stay away from Lord Ethan, you filth!’ Ethan never even turns his head.