After the Contract Was Torn Up, the Already Crazy CEO Regretted It Even More Crazily

The storm hammered the enormous floor-to-ceiling windows, each crash of thunder rolling through the luxury villa perched halfway up the mountainside. It sounded as though the rain meant to swallow the entire house.

In the grand hall, crystal chandeliers spilled cold light over a black marble floor polished to a mirror shine.

Evan Sinclair was on his knees against that unforgiving stone, clutching a damp cloth as he scrubbed at a footprint so faint it was almost invisible. His movements were mechanical, humiliatingly obedient.

Sweat gathered at his temples and dripped to the floor, mingling with the water tracked in from outside. He wiped it away at once. The chill beneath his knees pierced through his thin trousers, but he didn’t dare pause.

The man lounging on the leather sofa nearby was the master of this little kingdom: Adrian Blackwood.

Adrian wore a perfectly tailored black silk robe, its open collar revealing the pale line of his collarbones. His long legs were crossed carelessly. He held a steaming cup of black coffee, and through the rising mist, his dark eyes rested on Evan with the detached scrutiny one might give an object that had no life of its own.

“Your only purpose,” Adrian said in a low, pleasing voice, “is to remind me never to be fooled by the same face twice.”

The words that followed were colder than the rain outside. They struck Evan straight through the heart.

The same face…

Evan’s fingers jerked. His nail caught on the rough cloth and split at the edge. A thin line of blood seeped out, tinting the water around his fingertips pink.

He let out a small sound of pain, then bit down hard on his lip. He would not give Adrian the satisfaction of hearing him weaken.

It had all started with one cup of coffee.

Adrian never drank a latte. Black coffee was the only thing he wanted. But after staying awake for two days and nights, Evan had been so exhausted and distracted that he’d mistakenly brought him the latte Daniel Reed, Adrian’s secretary, had prepared.

For that tiny mistake, Adrian had ordered him to kneel and scrub the floor in front of every servant in the house.

The staff hurried past with their heads lowered. Not one dared look at Evan for more than a second, as if even a glance might draw Adrian’s anger.

Only Helen Parker, the older housekeeper, hesitated as she passed. While turning away, she slipped a pair of soft knee pads beside his hand and whispered so quietly that only he could hear, “Put these under your knees, dear.”

Evan gave her a grateful look, but all he could do was shake his head and discreetly push them back.

Adrian’s gaze was fixed on him. Nothing escaped those sharp, hawklike eyes. If Helen were caught helping him, she would suffer for it too.

Just then, the phone in Evan’s pocket vibrated faintly.

His heart clenched. He didn’t dare reach for it, yet he already knew what the message would say.

A moment later, Daniel Reed approached with an expression as blank as ever. He held out Evan’s phone, displaying the screen for him to read.

A message from Central City Hospital glowed on it: “Mr. Sinclair, your mother’s condition has suddenly deteriorated. She urgently requires a second operation. Please pay the remaining 300,000 yuan within twenty-four hours, or…”

There was no need to read the rest.

The room tilted. A high ringing filled Evan’s ears.

Three hundred thousand yuan. Where was he supposed to find that kind of money?

To pay off the thirty million yuan in gambling debts his father had piled up, Evan had signed a contract that placed everything he owned—including access to his bank accounts—under Adrian’s control.

“Mr. Blackwood,” Daniel reported respectfully, “Mr. Sinclair’s account has been frozen.”

“I see.” Adrian’s reply was casual, as if he had been told that the weather might change.

He set down his coffee and rose. Then he strolled toward Evan.

His expensive custom-made shoes stopped beside Evan’s bloodied fingers.

“Want me to unfreeze your account?” Adrian asked, a cruel trace of amusement in his voice. “Beg me.”

Evan slowly raised his head. His face was drained of color, but in his eyes, a stubborn flame still struggled to stay alive.

He stared at Adrian’s beautiful, merciless face. His throat felt stuffed with cotton. Not a word would come.

He had begged too many times already. Every plea had earned him nothing but deeper humiliation and another round of torment.

Adrian’s patience vanished. He gave a contemptuous laugh and turned toward the stairs.

“Apparently,” he said coldly, “your mother’s life is worth less to you than your pride.”

The lights in the hall went out, leaving only a few floor lamps in the corners. Their dim glow stretched Evan’s kneeling shadow into something long and lonely.

He couldn’t have said how much time passed before he dragged his numb legs back to the room called his bedroom—a prison with a bed.

Curled up in a corner on the cold floor, he watched the red indicator on the surveillance camera blink without rest. In the darkness, it looked like a demon’s eye, tracking every move he made.

He pulled painkillers from a drawer and swallowed several without water. His stomach was empty, and the pills burned on the way down. He doubled over, fighting a gag.

Despair rolled over him like a rising tide.

His father’s gambling debts. His mother’s failing health. Adrian’s endless cruelty. Each burden pressed down on him until he could barely breathe.

Just as consciousness began to slip away, a cold, emotionless mechanical voice sounded inside his head.

[Host detected in a state of severe emotional suppression. Mental threshold meets binding requirements.]

[Perfect Life Comeback System initializing…]

[Binding successful!]

Evan jolted. For a moment, he thought he was hallucinating.

Then a translucent blue screen appeared in front of him.

[Newbie Quest: The First Step Toward Dignity]

[Objective: Without revealing the system’s existence, make Adrian Blackwood offer you a glass of water of his own accord.]

[Reward: Unknown.]

[Failure Penalty: None.]

[Time Limit: 12 hours.]

Make Adrian… offer him a glass of water?

The idea was absurd.

The man who could barely look at Evan without disgust—the man who seemed to enjoy breaking him—would never willingly do such a thing.

But the task carried no penalty for failure. For the first time in a long while, something stirred in Evan’s heart, faint as a pulse beneath ice.

The countdown on the screen ticked mercilessly onward.

Evan slowly got to his feet and went to the bathroom mirror.

The young man staring back at him was pale, with cracked lips, dark circles beneath his eyes, and a gaze so unfocused that he barely recognized himself.

He watched his reflection. His trembling fingers gradually curled into fists.

From the medicine cabinet, he took another unopened blister pack. Carefully, he crushed several tablets, tapped the white powder into an empty pill bottle, and slipped it into his sleeve.

His movements were quiet and unhurried. Every small gesture carried the resolve of someone who had decided to risk everything.

“If I can’t even get a glass of water…” he whispered hoarsely to his reflection, “then I’ll spend the rest of my life on my knees.”

The words had barely left his mouth when a stark white bolt of lightning split the night, briefly illuminating his young face.

Something in his once-dazed eyes was changing. Tears gathered but did not fall; at last, they gave way to a resolve so cool it bordered on cruelty.