My Scumbag System Chapter 638: My Greatest Asset

"Because the third party I mentioned is not a person, Mr. Nakano." Seraphina walked back to the window and pressed her palm against the glass. The city sprawled beneath her like a kingdom waiting to be claimed. "It is not a government. It is not a corporation. It is not any human organization that exists within the conventional power structures of the post-Rupture world."

She turned to face me, and for the first time, I saw something in her eyes that looked almost like fear.

"It is the same entity that engineered the Rupture in the first place."

The words hit me like a physical blow. I actually took a step backward, my hand instinctively reaching for the bat case by the elevator before I caught myself.

"You’re saying the thing that caused the Rupture is still active."

"I am saying the thing that caused the Rupture has been watching humanity’s response to its intervention for twenty-five years. Observing. Cataloging. Waiting." Her voice dropped to barely above a whisper. "And I believe it has taken a particular interest in your father’s work because that work represents the first time a human being has successfully reverse-engineered even a small portion of its design."

The pendant was burning now, hot enough to leave marks. Natalia’s terror flooded through the bond in waves, and I could feel her gripping something, her knuckles white, her breathing ragged.

she said.

"The Prometheus Protocol wasn’t just about giving power to Zeroes," I said slowly. "It was about understanding the system. Cracking the code. Figuring out how Aspects actually work at a fundamental level."

"Correct."

"And whatever caused the Rupture doesn’t want that code cracked."

"That is my hypothesis, yes." Seraphina turned back to face the window, her pale reflection superimposed over the glittering lights of New Vein City far below.

"Consider the full implications of what I’m suggesting, Mr. Nakano. If Aspects can be artificially induced through technological or pharmaceutical intervention, then the genetic lottery that currently determines who manifests supernatural abilities and who remains powerless becomes utterly meaningless. The entire carefully constructed social hierarchy we’ve built over twenty-five years collapses like a house of cards. The Hunter industry—worth trillions, employing millions, defining every facet of modern civilization—becomes completely obsolete overnight. Every Zero on the planet, every single member of that increasingly marginalized seventy-two percent, suddenly gains access to the same metaphysical power that was previously reserved exclusively for the blessed twenty-eight percent."

"Complete chaos," I said flatly.

"Precisely. Chaos. Destabilization. Unpredictability on a scale that would make the original Rupture look like a controlled experiment." She pressed her forehead against the cool glass, her breath fogging the surface.

"The current system, for all its flaws and inequalities, is fundamentally controlled. It’s manageable. The Rupture released unprecedented power into the human population, yes, but it released that power selectively. Randomly. Through a mechanism that created fierce competition rather than unified cooperation. In a way that virtually ensured humanity would spend the vast majority of its collective energy fighting viciously over the scraps of power rather than ever stopping to ask the more fundamental question: where did those scraps actually come from in the first place?"

I felt sick. The kind of sick that came from staring too long into an abyss that was definitely staring back.

"You’re saying the whole thing was designed. The Gates. The monsters. The Aspects. All of it."

"I am saying the evidence suggests an intelligence behind the Rupture that views humanity as an experiment. Or perhaps a game." She turned to face me again. "Your father’s research threatened to give the subjects of that experiment a way to change the rules. And based on everything I have observed over the past eighteen years, the designer of the experiment does not appreciate rule changes."

The observation deck felt like a coffin. The glass walls that had seemed so impressive when I first arrived now felt like the bars of a cage, trapping me one hundred and forty-six stories above a city that had no idea its entire existence was built on the whims of something vast and incomprehensible.

"So what’s the deal?" My voice came out rougher than I intended. "You want me to help you find my father’s hidden file. What do I get in return?"

Seraphina’s smile returned. Cold. Knowing. The smile of a woman who had just watched her opponent walk directly into her trap.

"In return, I offer you protection. Not just for yourself, but for everyone you care about. Your mother. Your stepfather. Natalia Kuzmina. Emi Aoyama. Skylar Amane. Akari Miyamoto." She paused. "Reyna Cabana. And of course, my own sister, Celeste."

The list landed like a series of punches. She knew. She knew about all of them. Every woman I’d collected, every relationship I’d built, every vulnerability I’d created by allowing myself to care about people in a world that used caring as a weapon.

"You’ve been watching me."

"I have been watching everyone, Mr. Nakano. It is my job." She walked toward me, her heels clicking against the polished floor. "But you in particular have attracted my attention. Your growth rate. Your impossible manifestation. Your talent for surrounding yourself with powerful allies. You are either the greatest threat to Valorian stability I have encountered in twenty years, or you are potentially my greatest asset."

She stopped three feet in front of me. Close enough that I could smell her perfume. Something floral and expensive that didn’t quite mask the underlying scent of power and danger.

"I prefer to believe the latter."

I held her gaze. The woman who could see probability chains. The woman who had admitted that civilization itself was a lie she maintained through sheer force of will. The woman who was offering me protection in exchange for my cooperation.

The woman who was absolutely, definitely, one hundred percent planning to use me as a pawn in whatever game she was playing against forces that made her look like a child playing with blocks.

"And if I refuse?"