The air at 25,000 feet was thin enough to kill a normal man in minutes, but Einstein Jacob stood on the open ramp of the stealth transport plane as if he were strolling through his own garden. The wind, screaming at sub-zero temperatures, whipped his tactical cloak around him, but the golden glow of his 15th-level King's Breath created a shimmering heat haze around his body, melting the snowflakes before they could touch his skin.
Below them, the Himalayas rose like the jagged teeth of the earth. Tucked into a forbidden valley that appeared on no civilian map was the Sovereign Spire, the ancestral stronghold of the War God Council. It was a fortress carved directly into the living rock of a mountain, protected by ancient anti-aircraft batteries and thousands of elite "Iron-Shield" guards.
"Target in sight, Young King," Rhea's voice crackled through his HUD. She was geared in white thermal-camo, her 8th-level energy dampened to avoid detection by the mountain's internal sensors. "The sister is held in the 'Heavenly Cell' at the very peak. The Sovereign Guard is mobilization. They know we're coming."
Einstein looked back at Felicity, who was strapped into a reinforced seat in the cockpit. She was wearing a high-altitude oxygen mask, her eyes wide with terror and determination. She had refused to stay in London.
"Stay with the plane, Felicity," Einstein said, his voice echoing through the comms. "Once I breach the roof, Rhea will drop the Vanguard. If the signal goes red, tell the pilot to level the mountain with the orbital strike."
"Einstein..." her voice was small, muffled by the mask. "Bring her back. Bring your family back."
Einstein didn't answer. He simply stepped off the ramp.
The Descent of the God
He fell like a meteor. As he broke the cloud layer, the mountain's automated turrets began to fire. Blue streaks of plasma lit up the night, but Einstein moved his hands in a wide arc, using the 'Celestial Deflection' technique. He redirected the energy of the blasts, using their own momentum to accelerate his descent.
He hit the roof of the Sovereign Spire with the force of a tactical nuke.
The reinforced granite shattered. A shockwave of golden Qi blew out the windows for three floors below. Einstein rose from the crater, his eyes now twin suns of incandescent white.
"Who dares trespass on the Sovereign ground?" a voice roared.
Five men emerged from the dust. They were the Great Protectors, each a 14th-level master. They wore armor made of meteoritic iron, and their combined aura was enough to make the very mountain groan.
"I am Einstein Jacob," he said, the ground beneath his feet beginning to melt from the intensity of his power. "And I've come to collect the interest on twenty years of debt."
The Protectors lunged. It was a battle that would have leveled a city. Every punch thrown by the Protectors carried the weight of a freight train; every strike by Einstein carried the force of an earthquake.
Einstein moved between them like a ghost. He used the 'Infinite Void' footwork, appearing behind the first Protector and delivering a strike to the base of the skull. The meteoritic iron cracked like glass. He spun, catching a spear from the second Protector with his bare hand and snapping it.
In sixty seconds, the five strongest guards of the Council were incapacitated, their internal meridians shattered by Einstein's superior force.
The Heavenly Cell
Einstein tore through the heavy blast doors leading to the peak. He didn't use keys; he simply placed his hand on the steel and willed it to cease existing. The molecular bond of the metal gave way under his 15th-level vibration, turning the door into fine gray dust.
Inside the cell, the air was warm and smelled of incense.
A young woman sat on a stone plinth, her eyes closed. She looked remarkably like Einstein—the same high cheekbones, the same regal brow. Chains made of 'Spirit-Suppressing Jade' bound her wrists, glowing with a faint violet light that drained her energy.
"Elara?" Einstein whispered.
The girl opened her eyes. They weren't brown, and they weren't gold. They were a deep, haunting violet. "You... you have the Sun-God aura. But you're too early. The King hasn't died yet."
"I'm your brother, Elara. I'm taking you home."
Einstein grabbed the jade chains. The violet light flared, trying to drain his Qi, but Einstein let it. He poured his $10 trillion intent into the jade. The stone couldn't handle the sheer volume of his "wealth of spirit." It turned from violet to white, then exploded into fragments.
Elara fell into his arms, her body frail but her spirit ancient. "Einstein... the High Lord... he isn't the leader. He was just a mask. The one who stole me... the one who killed Father... he's still in the room."
Einstein froze. His senses expanded, searching every atom of the chamber.
From the shadows behind the plinth, a figure emerged. It wasn't a warrior. It was a man in a perfectly tailored British suit, holding a tablet. He looked like a high-end banker.
"Ten trillion dollars," the man said, his voice smooth and devoid of emotion. "Do you have any idea what that does to the global inflation rate, Einstein? Your mother's little 'siphoning' project nearly crashed the Euro twice."
"Who are you?" Einstein demanded, shielding Elara.
"I am the Accountant," the man said. "The Council doesn't run on martial arts, boy. It runs on compound interest. Your father was a great fighter, but he was a terrible economist. He wanted to give the Jacob fortune to the poor. We couldn't allow such a waste of capital."
The Accountant tapped his tablet. Suddenly, Einstein's phone buzzed in his pocket. A notification appeared:
ALERT: ACCOUNT FROZEN. ASSETS UNDER INVESTIGATION BY THE WORLD BANK.
"You think money is your power?" The Accountant smiled. "I invented the system you're using. I can make you a beggar in the time it takes to click a button."
The True Power
Einstein looked at the phone, then at the Accountant. He started to laugh. It was a low, dangerous sound that vibrated the very foundation of the mountain.
"You're right," Einstein said, stepping forward. "Money is just paper. And the system is just numbers."
He crushed the phone in his hand.
"But my power didn't come from the bank," Einstein roared. "The $10 trillion was just the fuel I needed to burn the system down!"
Einstein tapped into the Final Gift—the hidden reservoir of energy his grandfather had sealed within his very DNA. He wasn't just a 15th-level King anymore. He was reaching for the 18th-level: The Sovereign of Reality.
The Spire began to crumble. The Accountant's tablet exploded in his hand as the electromagnetic pulse from Einstein's aura fried every circuit in the fortress.
"You can't!" the Accountant screamed, his calm mask finally shattering. "Without the money, you're nothing! You're just a man!"
"I am a Jacob," Einstein said, his hand closing around the Accountant's throat. "And a Jacob always pays his debts."
The Escape
The mountain was collapsing. Rhea and the Vanguard descended on ropes from the transport plane, snatching Elara and Einstein from the crumbling peak just as the entire Spire slid into the valley below.
As the plane leveled out, heading back toward the safety of international waters, Einstein sat on the floor, Elara's head in his lap. Felicity ran to them, tears streaming down her face.
"You did it," she whispered, touching Elara's hand.
"The money is gone, Felicity," Einstein said, his eyes returning to their normal brown, though a spark of gold remained deep within. "The Accountant froze everything. We're back to zero."
Felicity looked at him, then at the sister he had rescued, then at the loyal Vanguard standing at attention. She smiled—a real, genuine smile.
"We have a villa, a signed Iron-Core contract, and the most dangerous man in the world as my husband," she said. "I think we'll be just fine."
Einstein looked out the window at the rising sun. He knew the Council wasn't dead. The Accountant was still out there, and the global banks would be hunting them. But as he felt his sister's pulse steady against his own, he knew he had won the only thing that mattered.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a single, crumpled $100 bill—the one he had kept from the very first day.
"Rhea," Einstein said.
"Sir?"
"Find us a place to land. I'm hungry. And this time... I'm buying."
Epilogue: The Architects of a New World
One year later.
The city of London was draped in its usual silver mist, but the skyline had changed. Standing taller than the ancient cathedrals and the glass shards of the financial district was the Jacob-Vanguard Plaza. It wasn't just a building; it was the nervous system of a new kind of empire.
Inside the penthouse office, Felicity stood before a massive floor-to-ceiling window. She wore a tailored suit of charcoal silk, her presence radiating a calm, absolute authority. She was no longer just the CEO of an advertising firm; she was the Managing Director of Global Sovereign Equity, the most powerful private investment firm in history.
The "Accountant" had tried to freeze Einstein's assets, but he had made a fatal error: he believed wealth was only what could be tracked by a bank. He hadn't accounted for the loyalty of the people Einstein had saved, the secret gold reserves in the Final Vault, and the fact that Einstein could now perceive the flow of digital data as clearly as he perceived the flow of Qi.
"The Iron-Core expansion is complete," Felicity said, not turning around as she heard the door hiss open. "The Bradleys have been liquidated, and their manufacturing plants have been converted into clean-energy hubs. We own the city's infrastructure now, Einstein. Just as you planned."
Einstein walked into the room. He wasn't wearing a tuxedo or tactical gear. He was in a simple black shirt, his sleeves rolled up to reveal the faint, glowing tattoos of the 18th-level Sovereign on his forearms.
"The money was always a distraction," Einstein said, joining her at the window. "A way to keep the Council busy while we built the real foundation. How is Elara?"
"She's leading the research team in the basement," Felicity smiled. "Her violet eyes... she can see market fluctuations before they happen. She calls it 'Temporal Economics.' Between her sight and your power, the Council doesn't stand a chance of ever regaining control."
The New Vanguard
Downstairs, in the high-security training levels, Nick and Simon were no longer the scrawny students who shared a single bun for lunch. Under Rhea's brutal tutelage, they had reached the 7th-level of combat. They were the commanders of the New Vanguard, a global peacekeeping force funded by the Jacob fortune.
They weren't fighting for a "War God" anymore. They were fighting for a world where "unproductive" people were given a chance to become something more.
The Final Move
Einstein's phone chimed. It was a encrypted message from an untraceable source in Zurich.
"The Accountant has been located. He's hiding in a bunker beneath the Swiss Alps, trying to restart the old system. Should we engage?"
Einstein looked at Felicity. A year ago, she would have been terrified. Now, she simply checked her watch and nodded.
"He owes us for the stress he caused during our honeymoon," she said dryly.
Einstein smiled—a predatory, kingly smile. He reached out and took Felicity's hand. For five years, they had been strangers in the same bed. For the last year, they had been the twin engines of a global revolution.
"Rhea," Einstein said into his comms, his eyes flashing with the incandescent gold of a Sovereign. "Ready the jet. And tell the Accountant to have his books ready. I'm coming to audit his life."
As the sun set over London, the "unproductive husband" and the "businesswoman" stepped out onto the helipad. They weren't just a couple anymore; they were the architects of the future. The Council had tried to play a game of chess with a man who could move the stars.
The board was finally theirs.