Introduction

My empire crumbled, my life, cold ash. Olivia was gone. In their derelict New York apartment, a sealed box yielded her unseen journals.

I opened one. Inside: a meticulous record of my casual cruelty-my blatant affairs, sneering dismissals, every humiliation. Then, the chilling truth: her hidden terminal leukemia diagnosis. This wasn't just a dying marriage; it was the torturous last act of a woman suffering alone, beneath my roof.

Each page, a fresh wound. I recalled her "Legacy Tour"-five desperate tasks I'd scorned, obsessed with my freedom. I remembered mocking her headscarf, tossing her "filthy" wig, blind to her ravaging illness. My neglect hadn't just buried her hope; it brutally hastened her death.

How could I have been so blind? So monstrously cruel? The wife I reviled was secretly ArchX, the preservationist I unknowingly battled, and a brilliant artist. She loved me, inexplicably, as I extinguished her light.

Her final, faint question from the grave haunted me: "Will he... ever... regret?" Yes, Olivia. I regret. And I will dismantle the world that made me this monster, beginning my terrifying penance, even if it means sacrificing everything.