I sat heavily against the cold brick wall of the alley, my legs stretched out over the blood-stained asphalt. Beside me rested the absolute tragedy that was my brand-new, two-million-dollar sports car. The entire front hood was caved in like a crushed soda can, the engine hissing and leaking expensive fluids onto the street.
Yes, my body was completely fine, completely devoid of scratches thanks to my glitchy healing factor, but looking at the smoking ruin of my stealth-fighter-jet-on-wheels physically hurt my soul. That amount of money would have been an unattainable, mythical dream just a month ago. Even as a newly minted billionaire, watching your favorite toy get violently destroyed by a pack of discount werewolves was deeply depressing.
I was sitting there, lamenting my terrible fate and surrounded by the massive corpses of the wolves—which, to my mild disgust, were slowly beginning to shrink and revert back to their naked humanoid forms—when my superhuman ears picked up a low hum in the distance.
It only took a few minutes for a sleek, completely nondescript black van to turn the corner and slowly roll down the deserted street.
It came to a smooth stop right in front of me. The heavy front door swung open, and a man dressed in a tactical black jumpsuit stepped out into the glow of the streetlamps. I remained seated, but I had to actively crane my neck just to look at his face. He was massive. He stood easily over two meters tall, boasting impossibly wide shoulders and bulging, tree-trunk muscles. His bronze skin was covered in a complex, mesmerizing labyrinth of runic tattoos that seemed to faintly pulse in the dark.
But the most astonishing, reality-breaking sight wasn't the hulking giant. It was the thirty-centimeter-tall, winged humanoid casually sitting cross-legged on his bald head. She looked exactly like a stunningly beautiful, miniature woman wearing a delicate, short purple robe, her translucent wings fluttering softly.
I expected the tiny, magical creature to be the spokesperson, but it was the giant who spoke first.
"Hello, dear client," he rumbled in a shockingly flat, deadpan monotone that sounded like an automated customer service bot. "We have been informed by an acquaintance of yours, Miss White, that you required our assistance. So, here we are."
I finally snapped out of my bewildered daze, pushing myself off the brick wall and standing up to greet them properly. Even though my system upgrades had pushed me to a towering 189 centimeters, standing in front of this absolute mountain of a man still made me feel like a scrawny middle schooler.
"Yeah, that's me," I said, gesturing vaguely to the bloody carnage decorating the pavement. "I need to safely dispose of those."
The tiny woman on his head suddenly fluttered her wings, hovering off his scalp and floating gracefully down until she was eye-level with me.
"My name is Clarice, a pixie of the Faerie Realm," she introduced herself with a bright, professional smile, before pointing a tiny finger back at the giant. "And this is Shawn. He is my protector, a bear shifter."
A bear shifter and a pixie running a supernatural mafia cleanup crew. Sure. Why not? I thought, completely numb to the absurdity of my life at this point.
After the brief introductions, Clarice flew over to the four naked, bloody corpses. She hovered above them, raising her tiny hands, and began to softly incant a spell. A shimmering purple bubble materialized out of thin air, rapidly expanding until it completely engulfed the dead werewolves. With a sharp flick of her wrist, the massive bubble violently collapsed inward, compressing the corpses until they were nothing more than a single, marble-sized purple bead.
She gracefully caught the bead, pulled a miniature porcelain bottle from the folds of her purple robe, dropped the bead inside, and made the bottle vanish into thin air.
Next, she turned her attention to the cracked pavement, the blood-splattered walls, and the heartbreaking wreck of my sports car. She hovered higher into the air, chanting loudly in an unknown, ancient-sounding language. As she reached the crescendo of her spell, a brilliant, warm golden glow erupted from her tiny body, expanding in a massive, one-hundred-meter radius that enveloped the entire street.
I had to shield my eyes from the blinding light. When the glow finally faded and I lowered my arm, my jaw practically hit the floor.
It was as if a bomb hadn't just gone off in the middle of Nebula City. The cracked asphalt had perfectly knitted itself back together. The bloodstains were completely gone. But best of all, my beautiful, two-million-dollar sports car was sitting on the curb in pristine, flawless showroom condition.
Clarice let out a tiny, exhausted huff, her wings drooping slightly as she flew back and settled comfortably onto Shawn's bald head.
"Dear client, we have completed our task," Shawn stated, his voice still completely devoid of emotion. "The corpses will be returned to their respective families, if you have no objections."
"No, none at all. Be my guest," I replied, still deeply amazed by the flawless magical restoration. "Thanks for your assistance."
I assumed that was the end of the transaction and that they would just drive off into the night. But Shawn remained planted perfectly in place. Up on his head, Clarice suddenly conjured a magical, glowing calculator out of thin air. Her tiny fingers flew across the holographic buttons with alarming, practiced speed.
Once she finished, she tapped Shawn's forehead.
Shawn looked down at me. "Dear client, after making a full account of the environmental damage, the disposal fees, and the restoration magic, we have calculated that you owe us $70,000."
I blinked. "I'm sorry, what?"
"$70,000," the giant repeated, absolutely unyielding.
"This..." I stammered, my heart clutching in sudden, irrational panic.
"There is no mistake, dear client," Clarice explained kindly from her perch. "To be completely honest, restoring your extremely expensive vehicle accounts for more than three-quarters of the total fee."
I stared at them, my brain warring with itself. Logically, paying $70,000 to instantly repair a totaled $2,000,000 car was the absolute bargain of the century. Any mundane mechanic would have charged a fortune and taken months. But emotionally? My deep-seated, deeply ingrained poverty trauma was screaming in agony. You can take the boy out of the Coldstone district, but apparently, you can't take the Coldstone district out of the boy. Handing over seventy grand still felt like a physical blow to my internal organs.
Sigh. "Fine," I muttered bitterly, pulling my cracked smartphone from my gym bag. "Since my car is the main reason for the massive bill, I can only pay."
I quickly opened my mobile banking app, typed in the designated routing numbers Clarice provided, and authorized the transfer.
DING.
Clarice pulled a regular-sized smartphone out of nowhere, checking the notification on the screen.
"Payment received! Thank you for choosing Pixie & Associates!" she beamed, smiling sweetly at me. She then looked down at her silent protector and delivered a sharp, swift kick to Shawn's scalp with her tiny foot.
"Yes. Thank you," Shawn droned, as deadpan as ever.
Without another word, they climbed back into the black van, and soon, the engine's hum faded into the distance, disappearing seamlessly into the city traffic.
I walked over to my newly repaired car, running a hand over the perfectly smooth, pristine metal hood. I was intensely curious about the underlying mechanics of that golden restoration spell, but I figured it was vastly beyond my current pay grade. I slipped into the driver's seat, revved the purring engine, and sped straight toward home, praying I wouldn't run into another supernatural ambush.
I don't know if there were any gods actively watching over my drive, but I managed to reach the Arkum district in one piece. It's incredibly sad that not getting violently attacked twice in the same day is now considered a massive blessing, I thought morosely as I pulled into my private garage.
As soon as I stepped into my penthouse, I stripped off my ruined, blood-soaked gym clothes and headed straight for the bathroom. I sank into the massive, scalding hot tub. It was deeply thrilling having to constantly sneak around and avoid human sight for fear of someone noticing I was absolutely covered in blood, but it was also incredibly exhausting.
After an hour-long soak that finally managed to melt the residual tension from my muscles, I dried off, threw on some comfortable sweatpants, and walked into the living room toward my high-end computer setup.
This past month had been incredibly, wildly busy for me. Aside from mastering three lethal martial arts and spending quality time navigating the chaotic dynamics of Chloe and Stella, I had also mastered coding and cybersecurity. With my system-enhanced brain, I was basically a walking supercomputer. But since I was a billionaire with twenty percent shares in a global financial empire, I didn't actually need to use those skills to get a corporate job or hack for cash.
Instead, I used them for one highly specific, deeply personal project. I had spent the last two weeks developing a video game. It was an ambitious, immersive RPG, and it was almost entirely completed.
I had actually brought it up during a recent lunch with my Uncle John—who was turning out to be a surprisingly reasonable and supportive family head, unlike Thomas. Uncle John had taken a look at my code, was genuinely blown away, and told me that if the final product was polished, I could officially release it through the Green Group's gaming subsidiary. I wasn't doing it for the money, of course. I just genuinely wanted to apply my newly learned skills and create something cool.
Speaking of my newfound family, I hadn't spent much time bonding with my cousins yet—excluding the psychotic, magic-blasting Cole, obviously. So, my uncle had arranged for us to go on a vacation together. Maddie and Laure, John's genius daughters, had planned a getaway with a group of their wealthy elite friends to a private island somewhere down south, and I was officially invited. It was scheduled right after my upcoming date with Stella.
I leaned back in my ergonomic desk chair, cracking my knuckles, and opened a new tab on my browser.
Because I had been so insanely busy fighting werewolves, dodging vampire politics, and coding a video game, I was severely behind on my reading list. I navigated to my favorite web novel site and saw dozens of unread chapters waiting for me.
Despite the fact that my actual life had recently turned into a literal, violent urban fantasy novel full of ancient monsters and billion-dollar inheritances, I absolutely refused to lose my passion as a dedicated otaku.
It was a matter of pride.
I clicked on the first chapter, prepared to pull a complete all-nighter, fully intending to sleep entirely through the next day. Immortality had its perks, but uninterrupted reading time was definitely at the top of the list.