Faking My Death Broke the Mad Scientist
By @john1208
Olenka's transmigration into the gothic-industrial novel 'The Iron Apotheosis' begins with a brutal public humiliation at the Grand Exhibition. But when her reclusive, genius employer, Dr. Casimir Zhelanov, steps in to violently maim her tormentors, Olenka realizes he isn't just a brilliant scientist - he's a terrifying, unhinged obsessive. When her system violently glitches, warning her that her proximity to him guarantees a zero percent survival rate, it forces her hand. She fakes her death in a massive alchemical laboratory fire, leaving behind a charred biomechanical corpse. Thus begins a breathless, high-stakes game of cat and mouse across the smog-choked underbelly of the city. Olenka narrowly evades his clockwork hounds and relentless enforcers, believing she is escaping her doom. But Casimir is a genius who knows her fatal weakness. He engineers a devastating, localized affliction in her slum hideout, heavily guarding the only cure. Kind-hearted to a fault, Olenka cannot let innocents die and steps directly into his inescapable trap. As his possessive grip closes around her, she uncovers a horrifying twist: the system didn't want her to run to save her life. It wanted her to run so Casimir would lose his mind and trigger the apocalypse. Can she extinguish the apocalyptic obsession she accidentally ignited?
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