Chapter 54: The Truth Doesn't Hurt, But It'll Kill You
Marriott Group Headquarters.
Chris, acting like he owned the place, took the elevator to the highest accessible floor, then exited and headed for the stairwell leading to the executive level.
However, the moment he stepped into the stairwell, two security guards who'd been taking a smoke break looked at him in shock. Without even bothering to drop their cigarettes, they immediately drew their weapons and aimed them at Chris.
"Don't move! Hands in the air!" they shouted in unison.
Looking at the AR-15 rifles in their hands, Chris nodded appreciatively.
Now this made sense.
Why would a Fortune 500 company only equip their executive protection detail with dinky little pistols like in the movies?
In America, it'd be considered restraint for these corporate titans not to have grenade launchers; rifles were standard issue.
Too bad for them they were facing Chris, who was already superhuman. With a light push off his toes, Chris launched himself directly at the two guards.
The ferocious speed—just shy of breaking the sound barrier—turned both men into red smears against the stairwell wall.
Chris didn't possess any fancy martial arts techniques that could make people stick to walls like cartoon characters, and these two definitely didn't have his regenerative abilities, so they were thoroughly dead.
After dealing with them, Chris turned and headed upstairs. He hadn't expected anyone to be guarding up here initially, so he'd been moving at normal human speed.
But now, knowing there were armed guards stationed throughout, Chris accelerated to speeds beyond human perception.
For every person Chris encountered, he gently extended a single finger and slowly placed it against their throat.
However, this "slowness" was only from Chris's perspective. For these ordinary mercenary contractors, that finger was the Grim Reaper's scythe itself.
They couldn't even register what was happening before they all became entries on Death's pending registry.
When Chris arrived at the only large door on this floor, he happened to overhear the conversation inside.
So Chris paused, hand hovering near the door handle, deciding to see what important matters they were discussing.
Then he heard them talking about his own case—and even heard them reference Family Guy.
However, considering they all existed within the same grand multiverse, information bleeding between respective universes was pretty common, so Chris wasn't particularly surprised.
Then, just as they started discussing his "insurance fraud," Chris's temper flared. He immediately shoved the door open and shouted, "Slander! That's blatant slander! That money was clearly the compensation I deserved—how dare you call it insurance fraud?!"
Everyone in the conference room turned to stare at the intruder, their faces going pale. Several senior directors immediately started shouting, "Security! Security! Get this man out of here!"
"Shut up! Can't you see I'm talking?"
Chris glared, and the weight of a superhuman being descended on the nearest executive like a physical force. The man gasped, clutched his chest, and slowly collapsed to the floor.
"See? Heart attack. Don't blame me for that one, folks."
Watching Chris literally glare a man to death, everyone in the conference room immediately fell silent.
It was CEO Anthony who showed a bit of backbone. Suppressing his terror, he stood up on trembling legs and asked in the gentlest voice he could manage, "May I ask who you are, sir? And what brings you here today?"
When Chris didn't immediately respond, Anthony glanced at the dead director and added ingratiatingly, "This was a senior director of our company, holding one point three percent of our shares. I can authorize transferring his shares to you immediately, as... as an apology for his slanderous comments."
Witnessing such a civilized method of 'eating your own' for the first time, Chris marveled aloud, "You corporate bastards really have no shame, do you? Unfortunately, I'm not here for money or power this time. I just want to borrow something from all of you to piss off someone who's even more of a bastard than you are!"
"Of course! You can borrow anything you need!"
Hearing Chris make an actual request, Marriott Group's founder and chairman, David Marriott, visibly relaxed. He'd been worried the man in front of him was some psychotic killer who wanted nothing at all.
In that case, even with hundreds of billions in assets, he wouldn't be able to influence the intruder in the slightest.
But now that Chris had asked to "borrow" something, David felt like he was back on familiar ground—negotiation territory—and immediately agreed.
It was CEO Anthony who remained more cautious. He carefully ventured, "May I ask what you wish to borrow, so we can arrange it? Also, if you could inform us who this person is that you dislike, the Marriott Group has considerable resources—we might be able to assist you."
This guy really was a professional executive. Even after Chris had directly insulted them all, Anthony acted as if nothing had happened, even flattering Chris at every opportunity.
In recognition of this man's professionalism, Chris smiled and decided to grant his request for information.
"Regarding your questions, I can certainly answer them, but I'll need to reverse the order."
Anthony, David, and the others nodded in confusion, indicating they'd follow whatever Chris wanted.
Looking at their compliant expressions, Chris chuckled. "The person I dislike is someone you cannot afford to offend. He's an entity that can control your life and death at will. You generally refer to him as Death—the Grim Reaper."
Hearing Chris name his adversary, everyone present exchanged glances, clearly wondering if the man in front of them had lost his mind.
Chris was feeling generous with this group of people who were about to die, so he ignored their skeptical looks and continued, "Of course, I prefer to call him 'Corporate Cleanup Crew,' because he once made a mistake... or perhaps more than one, but anyway, it was a screw-up that left him scrambling."
"To fix this mistake, Death started desperately planning people's death lists to fill in the previous gaps—cooking the books, if you will."
Hearing this, Anthony began to understand why Chris used that particular metaphor, because the work this Death entity did was no different from his subordinates who embezzled company funds.
Except his subordinates needed to fill financial deficits, while this Death seemed to be filling in... human lives. Human lives!
Anthony suddenly realized something was very wrong. Then he saw Chris grinning at his face and saying, "Wow, you're pretty sharp!"
"It took me several days to figure out that guy's operational mechanism, and you worked it out in just a few seconds! I'm almost tempted to keep you around to work for me!"
Hearing Chris's casual tone, Anthony shoved away the chair behind him and bolted toward the conference room's emergency exit.
As he ran, Anthony also shouted, "Run! Run! This guy's a psychopath—he's going to kill us all!"
"Dude, spoiling my reveal like that completely killed my momentum!"
Chris grabbed his head in mock annoyance, then picked up a pen from the conference table and hurled it at Anthony.
With Chris's strength, the pen in his hand became a supersonic projectile, exploding Anthony's head with a sickening crack.
His body, following his final desperate thoughts, managed two more stumbling steps forward before collapsing.
"Well, there goes the smart one. What are the rest of you morons still doing alive? Just go with him—saves me the trouble of explaining everything!"
The instant he killed Anthony, Chris kicked out with his leg, and the massive conference table—with David and the VP still pinned against it—went flying straight through the floor-to-ceiling windows behind them.
The two executives were crushed at the waist, then plummeted along with the shattered glass from the eighty-story building.
Before the others could even scream in terror, Chris had already snapped their necks, preventing them from dying of fright.
The entire sequence took less than a hundred milliseconds—from Anthony getting his head blown off to the last senior director having his neck broken. At normal human reaction speeds, they couldn't process what was happening.
After all, peak human reaction time is only around a hundred milliseconds, and the youngest person in that room was David, who'd been in his forties.
In such a brief span, it was more than enough for Chris to let them all pass away peacefully.
When the dust settled, Chris sensed Death's malice increase a thousandfold, and his mood grew even more cheerful.
"Your whole system's about to collapse, isn't it? I wonder what'll happen to you? Will some higher power come collect you?"
Chris speculated with amusement, then prepared to search for his next Fortune 500 target.
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