Chapter 1

The headache was the first thing she registered. A sharp, splitting pain behind her eyes, as if a server was crashing and rebooting inside her skull.

Red error codes flickered across her vision, faint and translucent against the silk canopy of a four-poster bed. `[CRITICAL_FAILURE: USER_DATA_CORRUPTED]`.

Jazmin blinked, and the codes vanished.

She was in a bedroom. Not her small apartment with the worn-out couch and the lingering smell of instant noodles, but a vast, opulent space that smelled of money and gardenias. White marble floors, floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking a glittering cityscape, a walk-in closet the size of her entire living room.

A string of words, alien yet familiar, echoed in the silent space of her mind: Legacy of Ruin: The Garretts' Contract Wife. It felt like a title, a designation for the bizarre reality she had woken up in. The headache pulsed again, a system warning against probing too deeply. All she knew for certain was that this place was a cage, and the raw, unfamiliar power humming beneath her skin was the key.

The sound of the shower cut off from the adjoining bathroom. A moment later, Adrian Garrett walked out, a white towel slung low on his hips. Water droplets traced paths down his perfectly sculpted abs. He was exactly as the fragmented memory had rendered him: devastatingly handsome and radiating a chilling arrogance.

His eyes, the color of cold steel, landed on her. There was no warmth, only disdain.

"Finally awake?" he drawled.

He crossed the room, his bare feet silent on the marble. He wasn't walking toward her, but toward a mahogany desk. He picked up a sheaf of papers and tossed them onto the bed. They scattered across the silk duvet, one of the sharp edges slicing a thin, white line across her cheek. Strangely, no blood welled up, as if her skin were made of something other than flesh.

"Sign it," he commanded. The words were clipped, devoid of emotion. "It's the divorce agreement."

Jazmin didn't flinch. She picked up a page. Her eyes scanned the text, not with the horror of a spurned wife, but with the detached focus of a tester reviewing a spec sheet.

Division of Assets: Zero.

Alimony: Zero.

Penalty for Breach of Marital Contract: Ten Million Dollars.

"You get nothing," Adrian said, as if reading her mind. He walked to his closet, pulling out a tailored suit. "Melody is the one I love. She deserves everything. You were just a placeholder, a pretty piece of furniture my grandmother insisted on."

Jazmin's fingers tightened on the paper. A strange sound, a low creak like stressed metal, echoed from her knuckles. Her bones felt... dense. Different.

A new notification glowed in the corner of her vision.

`[ABNORMAL_PHYSICAL_PARAMETERS: LOADED 100%]`

She pushed herself up from the bed. The movement was too powerful. The solid oak nightstand beside the bed scraped against the floor and toppled over with a heavy crash, a crystal lamp shattering into a thousand pieces.

Adrian whipped around, his face a mask of fury. "What the hell is wrong with you? Having another one of your fits?"

Jazmin ignored him. She started walking toward him, her steps feeling unnaturally heavy. The plush carpet compressed under her feet, the fibers sinking deep as if she weighed a thousand pounds.

Something in her dead-eyed calm must have finally registered. Adrian took an instinctive step back, his bare back hitting the cold wood of the wardrobe door.

He resorted to his usual tactic. He lunged forward, his hand reaching for her throat, his face twisting into a familiar sneer. It was a move meant to intimidate, to remind her of her place.

Jazmin didn't even try to dodge.

His fingers closed around her neck. She felt... nothing. A faint pressure, like a mosquito landing on her skin. It was pathetic.

She lifted her right hand, her movements fluid and precise. Her fingers, which he once called delicate and perfect for wearing his diamonds, closed around his wrist.

A scream tore from Adrian's throat. It was a raw, agonized sound. His face, once smug, contorted in pure, unadulterated pain.

Her grip was like a vise of steel.

"You're hurting me," he gasped, his voice tight with shock and agony.

Jazmin's expression remained unchanged. She looked at his hand on her neck, then back at his face, as if observing a curious insect. Then, with a flick of her wrist, she tossed him aside.

Like he was a bag of trash.

Adrian flew across the room. The sound of his body hitting the floor-to-ceiling window was a sickening crunch, followed by the explosive shatter of tempered glass. He landed in a heap on the outdoor terrace, shards of glass raining down around him.

Blood began to trickle from a gash on his forehead. He stared at her, his eyes wide with a terror she had never seen there before. It was the terror of a predator who had just realized it was prey.

Jazmin stepped over the threshold, her bare feet crunching on the broken glass. She didn't feel a thing. She walked over to him, her shadow falling over his prone body. She planted her foot directly on the chest of his thousand-dollar custom suit.

"The protagonist template's damage resistance is surprisingly low," she murmured, the technical jargon sounding like nonsense.

Adrian didn't understand the words, but he understood the chilling emptiness in her eyes. He scrambled backward, crab-walking away from her, his limbs trembling.

Jazmin raised her right fist. The air seemed to whistle as it cut through the space between them.

Then came the dull, wet thud of bone breaking.

Adrian let out one last, gurgling cry before his eyes rolled back in his head. His left cheek swelled instantly, a grotesque purple bloom on his perfect face.

The bedroom door burst open.

Arthur, the family's long-serving butler, stood frozen in the doorway. A silver tray carrying a teapot and a single cup was in his hands. His eyes widened in horror as he took in the scene: the shattered window, the blood, and his young mistress standing over the unconscious, brutalized body of his master.

The tray slipped from his trembling fingers, clattering onto the marble floor.

Jazmin slowly turned her head to look at him. She calmly wiped a smear of Adrian's blood from her knuckles onto her silk pajama pants.

"Call an ambulance," she said, her voice as cold and flat as a dial tone. "Or a coroner. Your choice."