Alright. I understand clearly now đ
You want the same content, but:
â Very easy language
â More explanation
â Clear thoughts
â Novel-style narration
â Slow, detailed, readable
â No rushing
â No complex wording
I will rewrite Chapter 1 â Part 1 completely in simple, clean novel prose, while keeping all meaning and depth.
I will only write Part 1 again, then stop.
CHAPTER 1 â DEATH WITHOUT WITNESSES
Part 1 â A Life Built on Observation
Grim Cavendish woke up before his alarm rang.
It wasn't because he was energetic or motivated.
His body had simply learned that waiting for comfort was pointless.
The room he lived in was small. Very small. One bed, one table, one chair, and a narrow window that looked directly at another building's wall. No sky. No trees. Just old concrete with cracks and stains left by rain. The kind of place that reminded a person they were easy to replace.
Grim lay on his bed for a few seconds, staring at the ceiling.
He listened.
Water pipes clicked inside the walls.
Someone upstairs walked too fast, probably late for work.
An elevator groaned like it might break one day.
The building was old. The city was old. Everything felt tired.
Grim didn't rush to stand up.
There was no one waiting for him.
No one who cared if he was early or late.
When he finally got up, his movements were calm and precise. He folded his thin blanket neatly. Not because it mattered, but because he liked patterns. Patterns told the truth. Chaos always had a reason behind it.
He stood in front of the bathroom mirror.
The man staring back looked⌠normal.
Not handsome. Not ugly.
Black hair that never stayed neat.
Eyes that looked calm, but not cold.
A face people forgot easily.
Grim didn't look at himself with pride or hate. He looked the way a mechanic looked at a machine.
Was anything wrong?
No shaking hands.
No heavy breathing.
No strange emotions.
Everything was stable.
He brushed his teeth, washed his face, and put on simple clothesâdark colors, nothing noticeable. Grim didn't like standing out. People who stood out attracted attention. Attention brought danger.
He picked up his bag and notebook and left the apartment.
Outside, the city was already awake.
People walked quickly, following invisible rules. Everyone knew where to go, when to stop, when to hurry. Grim walked with them, but he didn't feel like one of them. He watched instead.
He noticed how confident people walked when they had money.
How nervous people looked when they didn't.
How power showed itself before words ever did.
Posture. Eye contact. Speed.
Power was obvious if you knew how to look.
Grim worked as a systems support analyst. It sounded important, but it wasn't. His job was simple: study systems that were already built and figure out why they failed.
Traffic systems.
Power grids.
Supply chains.
He didn't design solutions.
He didn't make decisions.
He only explained why collapse happened.
And he was good at it.
Most people wanted to fix things. Grim wanted to understand them. Because fixes were temporary. Causes were permanent.
At his deskâfar from windows, far from managersâhe opened his computer and read the daily reports.
Nothing serious.
Small power fluctuations.
Minor data errors.
Network delays that didn't match usage.
Nothing anyone else cared about.
Grim copied the data into his notebook anyway.
Small problems always came before big disasters.
At lunch, he sat alone.
He always did.
He chose a seat where he could see the exits, reflections in glass, and the people who thought no one was watching them. His coworkers talked loudly nearby.
Promotions.
Marriage.
Rent problems.
They spoke like effort always led to reward.
Grim didn't interrupt.
He knew better.
Systems didn't reward effort.
They rewarded obedience.
They rewarded stability.
They rewarded people who didn't ask questions.
Before closing his notebook, Grim wrote one line:
All collapses are approved before they happen.
When work ended, no one noticed him leave.
That was fine.
Grim liked being invisible.
He stepped back into the crowd as the city lights turned on. For a brief moment, the lights flickered.
Just once.
No one reacted.
Grim stopped walking.
Something felt wrong.
Not cold. Not hot.
Just⌠thin. Like reality itself had a crack in it.
Deep under the city, something failed.
Grim adjusted the strap of his bag and continued walking.
He didn't know it yet, but this was the last normal moment of his life.
Grim blended back into the crowd as if he had never stopped.
People brushed past him without looking twice. A woman bumped his shoulder and didn't apologize. A man cut in front of him at a crosswalk like Grim wasn't even there. This was normal. Grim had learned long ago that invisibility was not a lack of presenceâit was a role the world assigned.
And he fit it perfectly.
He crossed the street with the others, following the signal even though no cars were coming. Rules mattered to people, even when they made no sense. Especially then. Grim watched how everyone obeyed without thinking, how comfort lived inside repetition.
He understood why systems worked.
They didn't need force.
They needed habit.
As he walked, Grim replayed the small data errors he had seen at work. The power fluctuations didn't bother him on their own. What bothered him was how familiar they felt. He had seen patterns like this beforeâyears ago, in old archived failures that no one liked to talk about.
Failures that started small.
Quiet.
Unimportant.
Until they weren't.
A large screen above the street played the evening news. Grim glanced up without stopping. A reporter spoke calmly about a minor infrastructure issue in another district. The words were reassuring. The tone was confident.
Grim knew that tone.
It meant someone higher up had already decided nothing was wrong.
He looked away and kept walking.
He reached the underground transit entrance and went down the steps, swallowed by the flow of bodies. The air below was warmer, heavier. Lights buzzed overhead. Advertisements flickered on the walls, promising comfort, upgrades, happiness.
Grim stood near a pillar, waiting for the platform to clear slightly before moving forward. He didn't like being boxed in. He preferred space, even if it was an illusion.
He checked his phone.
No messages.
No missed calls.
That was normal too.
The train was delayed. A recorded voice explained the delay using polite words and careful timing. People sighed, complained, checked their screens. No one left. No one questioned it.
Grim watched the ceiling.
For just a second, the lights dimmed again.
Not enough to panic.
Not enough to alarm anyone.
But enough for Grim to feel it in his chest.
That thin feeling returned.
Like the city was holding its breath.
He stepped a little farther from the platform edge, instinctively choosing a position with fewer people around him. He didn't know why. He only knew that instincts existed for a reason.
Somewhere far below, metal groaned.
It wasn't loud. It wasn't dramatic. It was the sound of stressâlong, slow, patient stress.
Grim's fingers tightened around the strap of his bag.
People laughed nearby. Someone complained about overtime. Someone else talked about dinner plans.
Life continued.
Grim lifted his eyes and noticed a thin crack running along the tiled wall near the tracks. He was certain it hadn't been there yesterday.
The crack spread by a fraction of an inch.
No alarms sounded.
No warnings appeared.
Grim didn't move.
He simply watched, calm and focused, as the world prepared to make a decision without asking him.