Apocalypse Trade Monopoly
Chapter 121: – The Business of Power

Chapter 121: – The Business of Power

Ava woke to the sound of someone knocking—politely.

Which was already suspicious.

The lights in the room had begun their slow sunrise shift, syncing to her bracer’s vitals, but the knock beat them to it.

She sat up slowly, the hoodie half-twisted around her ribs, and blinked toward the door. "Yeah?"

It slid open with soft precision.

Ren Zhou, the Bai family’s head butler, stood there as crisp as a military funeral—gloves on, tablet in hand, not a wrinkle in sight.

He bowed slightly. "Apologies for the intrusion, Miss Zhang. It’s time you saw the estate’s business."

Ava blinked again. "It’s morning?"

"Technically late morning. You slept thirteen hours. Impressive, if inefficient."

She groaned as she rolled out of bed, stretching her arms behind her back. "And you’re exactly as cheerful as I remember."

Ren’s expression didn’t move. "I’ve prepared tea and access clearance to the archives. If you’re going to oversee Bai operations, you’ll need to understand what Lucas left behind."

"Didn’t he take the important stuff with him?"

"He took what was loud," Ren corrected. "The rest is quiet. And much older."

The Bai family business wasn’t just a business.

It was a network.

Ava stood now in the manor’s archive hub—smaller than the command center, but more dangerous in the right hands. One long glass table, eight surrounding displays, and an uplink node that fed directly into legacy net markets, encrypted vault boards, and every trader-only exchange that still operated in post-quake civilization.

Ren stood beside her like a ghost with admin access.

"During Master Lucas’s absence from the manor, I maintained operations at a reduced capacity," he explained. "Mostly rejection notices. Declined offers. Delayed syncs. Lucas’s priorities leaned elsewhere."

Ava scrolled through the backlog.

Offers. Dozens. Hundreds.

Some timestamped as recently as this morning. Others waiting for over a year. The system sorted them by category—Materials, Weapon Systems, System Shards, Mutant Sync Contracts, Energy Cores, Information Trades, even a few labeled "High Risk – Black Order" in crimson text.

Her jaw tightened slightly.

"You ran this remotely?"

Ren nodded. "Correct. But now, per Master Lucas’s order, you are the sole operator of our offer-gate. All trades, sync approvals, digital currencies, and third-tier deals will pass through you first."

Ava scanned the main column again.

Each trade listed assets. Terms. Counterparty status. One deal even linked to a private auction outside Bunker 7—starting bid set in legacy credits.

She frowned. "We’re still using legacy?"

"It’s become the unofficial standard again," Ren said, flipping through his own display. "Digital credits are too easily scrubbed. Token systems vary by bunker. Legacy cards, when verified, offer non-traceable, high-value flexibility."

Ava muttered, "Money laundering’s made a comeback."

"Survival always does," he replied evenly.

She sat.

Pulled the screen closer.

Selected one offer at random. It opened with a familiar logo—Noah Chen’s black market seal—and a short list of items for trade: two class-C cores, one sync-shield prototype, a cracked power cell, and a request for negotiation. The message was blunt:

[I’m only offering this to Bai. No middlemen. You want it? Buy direct. Clock’s ticking. –N]

Ava tapped the screen once.

Offer: 78 Legacy Credits.

She leaned back. "What’s our current vault?"

Ren lifted his hand slightly. "Two hundred and thirty legacy. Not counting reserves. Plenty."

She nodded. "Then this is a yes."

The system pulsed green.

[TRADE CONFIRMED – CARRIER ETA: 14 HOURS]

Just like that, it was real.

Her first deal.

Her signature.

And from the screen’s new status: the markets knew.

[ZHANG, AVA – ADMIN ID CONFIRMED – PRIMARY OPERATOR: BAI ESTATE]

The next offer loaded on its own.

Then the next.

And the next.

Within minutes, Ava was surrounded by cascading panels—each one stacked with documents, fluctuating market bids, encrypted messages, auction feeds, and sync bond requests.

Her bracer buzzed softly every ten seconds.

New offers.

New alerts.

New problems.

"...Okay," she muttered. "This is a lot."

Ren gave the faintest smile. "You’ll adapt."

Ava shot him a look. "Have you ever done this before?"

"Of course."

"How long did it take you to process a full board?"

"Three days."

Ava groaned.

Then rolled her shoulders.

"Tea?" he offered.

Ava didn’t look up. "Caffeine would be better."

Ren gave a subtle bow and vanished like smoke, the door sliding shut behind him with the grace of someone who’d already anticipated the answer.

Ava pulled the next three offers up side-by-side, fingers flying over the projection table like she was rewiring the bones of the market itself.

Click. Evaluate. Sort.

Decline. Flag. Negotiate.

Her system pulsed in rhythm—Blueprint UI parsing subtext and hidden terms, highlighting fine print most traders missed. Some of the contracts had bait clauses buried in legal sludge. Others were clean but underestimated their value. Ava rewrote two on the spot—updated margin, added kill-switch clauses, locked delivery routes.

Approved. Forward. Archive.

She barely blinked.

One offer tried to smuggle in a virus-coded handshake. Her system caught it mid-breath, flagged it red.

She torched it with a single command.

"Nice try," she muttered, dragging the wreckage into the firewall incinerator.

The display adapted to her rhythm—faster now. The estate AI started batch-sorting offers by her neural patterns, feeding her only the ones her system flagged as economically volatile or logistically important.

Thirty offers down. Fifty pending.

Ava popped her neck once and cracked her knuckles without breaking stride.

"Alright," she said to herself. "Let’s see who else is desperate."

Two auction boards auto-loaded from the private trader net.

She scanned the titles—one legit, one running on false bids to inflate pricing. She traced the bot network back to a known alt account from a supplier in the Eastern Corridor.

"Unbelievable," she muttered, typing out a direct reply. "Caught you again. Last warning. Next one goes public."

Within seconds, the auction vanished.

She moved on.

Ren returned fifteen minutes later with a fresh mug of black tea and paused silently in the doorway.

He watched her for a full beat.

The speed.

The precision.

The way she worked like the system had fused to her bloodstream.

"...You’ve done this before," he said quietly.

Ava didn’t look away. "No. Just good at patterns."

Her tone was calm. Not smug. Just true.

Ren set the mug down beside her hand. "I’ve never seen anyone process the board at that rate."

Ava sipped once. Then finally glanced up.

"I used to run barter lines in Level Three," she said. "People think it’s about survival, but it’s math. Everything is."

She tapped another screen.

"Timing. Pressure. Weakness. People give away more in a bad deal than they ever do in a conversation."

Ren tilted his head, considering her.

Then gave the faintest smile.

"You’re going to terrify this sector."

Ava shrugged. "Good."

And just like that, she kept going.