Todos os capítulos de My Love's ROI Was 10%, so I Vanished: Capítulo 1 - Capítulo 9

On the other end of the line, the voice of my mentor, Henry Buckner, buzzed with suppressed excitement. "Johann, you've finally come around! Did you sign the authorization?"I looked down at my lower leg. The bone had snapped, tearing through the flesh, and blood had already turned the surrounding snow a deep crimson."Not yet." My throat was so dry it felt like I'd swallowed sandpaper."Good. Whatever you do, don't sign it. Our country needs you. Military rescue is already on the way."The line went dead, and my phone screen faded to black.Hypothermia was setting in, numbing my limbs, and my heartbeat slowed to a crawl.The three messages from my wife, Abby Wright, haunted me.None of them asked if I was alive. They were just pushing me to send her the patent authorization tomorrow. It was a spacecraft propulsion patent I'd spent countless sleepless nights developing.She wanted to use it for the electronic holographic projection at her childhood sweetheart Edward Dawson's ar

Half an hour later, Abby shoved open the doors to the private hospital's ICU ward, flanked by Edward and a crew of bodyguards.She expected to see me sobbing, begging her for mercy on my knees.The heavy doors groaned on their hinges. But the sight inside the ward instantly wiped the smirk off her face.There was no frail Mom or a desperate, broken version of me. Instead, a line of fully armed tactical officers stood waiting for them.Dark gun barrels were raised in unison, and red laser sights locked squarely onto the bridges of Abby's and Edward's noses.Just then, the tactical squad leader took a step forward, his combat boots landing hard on the floor tiles."This is a restricted military area. Intruders will be shot on sight!"Abby's eyelashes fluttered in panic, and her pupils shrunk in terror.The cold gleam of steel stung her eyes.She instinctively stumbled back, her heel twisting beneath her as she fell hard onto the floor.Edward's legs gave out entirely.A foul,

Abby's face turned as pale as a sheet.She furiously rationalized in her head that the man on TV just happened to look like me.How could a worthless loser with a negative ROI become a chief engineer overnight?That very night, she dialed several high-level officials to verify the core personnel list for Project Solaris.The second the call connected, before she could even finish her sentence, the official on the other end of the line launched into an angry tirade."Are you trying to get me killed, Abby? That man's security clearance is higher than my damn life!"The sharp dial tone hit her nerves like a sledgehammer.She had been blacklisted by every top executive across the entire industry.When it rained, it poured. By the next morning, Edward's substitute R&D firm collapsed into chaos.The product's blatant plagiarism and poor quality caused an explosion in the partner company's equipment.The Federal Trade Commission and police froze the firm immediately.The 30 million

The corridors of the detention center were dark and damp.Wearing a prison jumpsuit, Abby sat inside the visitation room.She used her last phone privilege to contact her personal lawyer, planning to blackmail me using intimate photos and private audio recordings from our past to ruin my reputation online.Her lawyer had barely finished drafting the message when his computer screen instantly went black.A red warning popped up across the display. "Involves top-secret national security asset. Device locked by military."Five minutes later, officers from the National Security Agency burst into the law firm, pinning the attorney to the floor on charges of attempting to leak state secrets.Back in the visitation room, the heavy iron door groaned open.Expecting her lawyer, Abby snapped her head up eagerly.It wasn't a police officer who walked in, but me, wearing a crisp, tailored military uniform.My combat boots struck the concrete floor, echoing with a suffocating heaviness.A

In her desperation, Abby used the few dollars she made selling junk to buy a cheap carving knife and a block of scrap wood.She tried to carve a ring like the one I had once made for her, hoping to awaken a sliver of my old affection.Her hands, ravaged by severe chilblains and broken bones, couldn't even hold the blade steady.The knife slipped time and again, slicing her flesh until her hands bled, yet she couldn't carve even a decent curve.Dragging her broken leg, she crawled through a rainy night all the way to the luxury care home where Mom was recovering.The pouring rain washed over the filth covering her body.Kneeling in the storm, she tried to pass the blood-stained wooden ring to the gatekeeper. "Please… give this to Johann."The gatekeeper used a stick to flick the scrap wood away in disgust. "What kind of trash is this? Don't block Dr. Aguirre's way."The heavy iron gates slowly slid open.I walked out of the care facility, holding a black umbrella.As if grabbi