After all, no matter what, he could not live with money.
Even though he did not look pleased, the man who received the bank card immediately relaxed. It was a marked change from the tension that had gripped him moments before.
"This is indeed our fault. Some of our internal staff did not follow guidance and colluded with outsiders. Do not worry, we will deal with this when we return and give you a satisfactory answer," a high-level official said, voice tight with forced contrition.
Zenkichi glanced over and something about the other man nudged at his memory. Was this not the older official he had met before? The older man hurried on, words tumbling out, "I am sorry for our behavior today. If you place your trust in me, I will make sure there is a proper resolution."
"You are fortunate," Zenkichi said after a short, appraising look at the official.
He recognized the man's tactic immediately. The official was trying to defuse the situation by humbling himself, to avoid drawing suspicion that he or his colleagues might be working with the dragon faction. It was an attempt to buy time and cover for internal rot. Zenkichi understood the maneuver, and he understood the deeper reason behind it: those gathered before him were weak, collectively insignificant. He needed only a motion, and they could all be broken. There was no point in wasting effort where firm demonstration of power would suffice.
But the demonstration had to hurt in the right way. It had to strike not merely at bodies, but at belief.
"I hope you will make it right, but there will be a price. Some mistakes are not forgivable," Zenkichi said, voice calm and cold.
He moved deliberately. There was no flourish, no shouting. He raised a hand and pointed a single finger toward the sky. The air itself seemed to stiffen. The clear afternoon above them darkened as layers of clouds gathered with unnatural speed. Thunder murmured in the newly formed blackness, then roared. Lightning threaded through the clouds and concentrated, drawn into a single, impossible focus.
When that bolt broke free, it was like a spear of pure intent. It shattered the cloudpack, descended with a sound that swallowed all other noise, and struck the tallest tower in Washington.
The tower was a landmark, a symbol of centuries of history to the people nearby. In the next terrible breath it caught fire. Sheets of flame licked its facade, the structure groaned under the assault and then, impossibly, it collapsed, sending dust and smoke into the suddenly charged sky.
The officials in front of Zenkichi watched with mouths open and teeth clenched. Their faces had drained of color. The tower's destruction was not merely an act of violence; it was a message.
"This is the price you will pay. I will check on the outcome tomorrow," Zenkichi said, looking at each of them in turn.
He could have ended them. He could have reduced the officials to ash and been done. But there was greater effect in leaving their bodies and shattering their certainty. To overturn their sense of safety, to make them question everything they thought protected them, was a deeper punishment. He crushed belief, not just people.
Having made his point, he turned away and left. There was no dramatized exit, no fanfare. He walked as if the moment required only a single sentence, a single lesson, and then the world should settle back to its proper order.
Around him the senior officials of Country M exchanged looks of panic and speculation. There would be internal repercussions, they understood. When the older man had spoken and not been contradicted by his colleagues, the implication was plain. Some would be sacrificed to restore honor; some would be blamed to calm the public; certain careers would be ended to show accountability.
They prayed inwardly it would not be them. The selection might be random. The selection might be inevitable. If they were chosen, their lives, and everything they had built, would be extinguished.
Zenkichi's retreating figure was a quiet promise of consequences. He did not gloat. He did not revel in the fear he inspired. He simply walked with the unshakable conviction of someone who knew the scale of his own power and used it with precision. To those watching, he was both a solution and a threat.
He respected efficiency. He did not waste life when he could instead dismantle what people believed in. He showed them that their monuments, their symbols, could fall by his will alone. That truth would echo longer than bodies burned.
After he left, the smoke rose, the sirens began their distant wail, and beneath the ash and ruin the fragile gears of political protection started to grind, rearranging alliances and deciding who would carry the cost. The city would talk for weeks, the world would analyze motives and methods, and officials would whisper fears in corridors. But among all those consequences, one fact remained absolute in their minds: Zenkichi had made his statement, and for the first time in a long while, many wondered if any of the systems they relied on could truly withstand him.
---