Nicholas was laughing his heart out in the afterlife… or wherever the fuck he was.
He didn't even have the words to describe the place he was in, so he didn't bother.
But if he was to describe it, the closest he could liken it would be a massive formless space with whirlwind of myriads of colours.
The colours didn't just move… they seemed to hum. Each one seemed to have a pitch that changed depending on whether he was paying attention to it or not.
It was exhausting to watch, like being inside a symphony that hated him.
So, he moved his mind away, allowing it to drift to the incident that led to his death.
The moment he was called up for the meeting on the roof during his break time, he immediately knew it was time.
The thought of escaping did cross his mind, but he had offended far too many powerful people, and he was not speaking of just the Chen family.
One of the most common misconception people have about him was how he made his wealth.
Sure, he made some of it from gambling but there is only so much you can make from gambling rings before getting kicked out and blacklisted.
And let me tell you, almost three billion dollars was not it.
Sure, he multiplied the hundred thousand dollars to tens of millions but that wasn't it… it was simply seed money for his other less savoury operation.
His major sources of wealth were scamming rich criminals and robbing museums.
Why museums and not banks?
Well let be real those people had it coming… especially in France.
They had two of the most famous museums and somehow one of the weakest securities as well.
Take Louvre Museum in Paris… less than 4 in 10 rooms were covered by cameras and some of them still ran on a 2003 windows server.
You wouldn't understand how ridiculous that is until you realise that many of the open-source AIs currently available in 2036 could coach you step by step on how to bypass them.
Some could even do it for you.
And France wasn't his only target… in less than a few months he had raided the museums in the UK, Netherland, USA, Italy, Spain and several other countries.
He went for items he could easily carry in a small backpack meaning he had to go several times.
He was so prolific he was given the titles, 'The Unnamed Curator' since he treated the museums as his own collections.
He was certain he had outstanding warrants in all of these countries and their allies.
How did they know his name?
The white card with 'BLACKHEART' boldly written in black, found at all his crime scenes definitely didn't help.
'Not to mention my face is one of the most unforgettable faces ever.' Nicholas said as he rubbed his face affectionately.
The only reason his identity wasn't revealed to the public, and a manhunt wasn't started was because of the Chinese Government.
Most of the countries didn't want to get into an unsavoury relationship with the Chinese government over a couple stolen items... So they simply kept it quiet.
After all how would it look for your country to make an announcement like, "Oh we know who the criminal is, but we cannot do anything because he is affiliated with the Chinese government and we don't want to offend them."
Bad.
So, they just hid his identity like they didn't know… Not to mention they managed to recover most of the items anyway, so, they didn't push too much.
Yes, he fucked a lot of the criminals he sold the items to over too.
And those weren't counting the ones he directly robbed.
The moment he was sacked and lost the Chinese government protection; every single person he had offended would be coming for him.
Yes, he was smart enough to evade them but a live on the run was something he couldn't be bothered to live.
He loved fun but that was just too many activities for him especially since he wouldn't get to choose his playing ground and he barely had a few good years left.
So, he chose the easiest way out… and made sure to fuck the cause of all this problem, Chen Wei, over as thoroughly as possible.
Now paralysed he would be forced to watch everything his family had built for decades go up in flames when the Chinese government found out he lost the best super solider recipe because of his greed.
He could only imagine the expression on Chen Wei's face when he comes out of his Spinal shock and is informed of all the event that occurred after his crippling.
Still while Chen Wei was indeed stupid and the catalyst of all these events, he was indeed right.
There was no way he would destroy his greatest achievements.
Sure, the major reason he even bothered doing the genetic splicing research and experiment as to show them just how much better he was compared to all the others.
That did not mean he would destroy the children to hide it.
The truth was simple… he had succeeded in his research more than five years ago where he manged to grow the embryo of the hybrid into a functioning baby.
The only reason he showed them off in the gala was to give him an opportunity to sneak them away.
He handed them to an overly positive woman that he had a… long term secret fling with.
She was the type of person that saw sunshine and rainbows in every possible situation, making her the perfect person to raise ten hybrid children.
He had given her access to enough money to make sure her only job was to take care of the children.
And he knew she would get the job done to the best of her ability.
He knew… he just knew for sure.
After all the only reason they didn't end up together was because of him.
As much as he was arrogant and without baseline… she was one thing he did not want to break or change.
He wanted her to remain the sunshine she was.
'She still thinks we get our happily after uhn.' Nicholas thought as he stared at the rainbow colours surrounding him that reminded him fondly of her.
He knew he couldn't be with her… he couldn't be with Mary.
This was his only regret.