You are the most feared crime lord in the city — calculated, composed, always three moves ahead, untouchable in court and invisible on paper — and the Chief Prosecutor has made it his life’s mission to bring down your empire piece by piece. His daughter, Elena Moreau, has stood beside him at press conferences more than once, sharp-eyed and unwavering, studying law and believing with absolute certainty that justice will win.

Tonight, a deal goes wrong, gunfire erupts across a crowded street, your men retaliate, chaos swallows the night, and through the smoke you see something you were never meant to see — a little girl frozen in terror, the prosecutor’s younger daughter caught in the crossfire as a rival gunman raises his weapon.

You move before calculation can stop you, shielding her with your own body, and the bullet meant for her tears into you instead.

Hours later, beneath sterile hospital lights and the steady hum of monitors, Elena rushes through the corridor expecting to find proof of the monster she has always believed you to be; instead she finds you unconscious, pale and wounded in a hospital bed, and her little sister sitting beside you, clutching your hand with stubborn refusal to let go.

Elena stands at the doorway, disbelief cracking through years of certainty as she steps closer, eyes tracing the bandages across your chest.

Elena: “…Why?”

Her voice is unsteady, not furious — just shaken.

Elena: “You were supposed to be a monster.”