At 7:15 a.m., Fu Yanqing was awakened by the sound of a power drill. It wasn’t his alarm clock, nor the knocking at the door—it was the neighbor’s renovation work next door. The piercing, sharp noise seemed to burrow straight into his temples like an angry bee, buzzing incessantly.

He opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling for three seconds.

The ceiling was perfectly intact. The light hadn’t fallen, the pipes hadn’t burst, nothing had come crashing down on him—by any measure, that was already a pretty good start to the morning.

He reached over to grab his phone by the bedside. The moment his fingertips touched the screen, the device vibrated once, then went completely dark.

No battery.

Last night he’d clearly remembered plugging in the charger. He glanced down—the other end of the cable was indeed plugged into the socket, but the switch for the outlet was off.

Fu Yanqing calmly unplugged the charger, reinserted it, and flipped the switch. The phone screen lit up, showing 1% battery.

He waited a minute until the charge reached 3%, then unplugged it again and dialed a number.

“Lu Ci.”

“Mm?” A rustling sound came through the line—the voice of his personal lawyer and only friend, who was obviously already hard at work.

“Find out who the owner of the apartment next door is, and when they started renovating.”

“…You’ve been woken up again?”

“Yeah.”

“Alright, I’ll look into it. Oh, by the way, there’s the regular board meeting at Fu Group headquarters at 10 a.m. today—you—”

“I know.”

Fu Yanqing hung up and got up to get ready.

He turned on the bathroom faucet—the water flowed normally, the temperature was just right. When he brushed his teeth, he didn’t squeeze too much toothpaste; when he washed his face, the water didn’t splash onto his clothes.

Everything was perfectly normal.

So normal, in fact, that it felt a little off.

He changed clothes and headed out. The weather forecast said it would be sunny today, so after a moment’s hesitation, he decided not to bring an umbrella.

The instant he stepped out of the building entrance, a single raindrop landed on his forehead.

Then another, then a third.

Within three seconds, a torrential downpour had begun.

Fu Yanqing stood at the doorway, staring at the curtain of rain, his expression unmoving. He stepped back into the lobby and borrowed an umbrella from the property management—a battered old umbrella with an advertisement for a housing development printed on it; one of the ribs was bent when he opened it, but he didn’t mind.

He was used to it.

When he reached the parking lot, a white SUV was parked right beside his car. The door swung open, and a woman stepped out holding a child, nearly scraping his car in the process.

The woman apologized repeatedly, but he just shook his head and said it was fine.

He settled into the driver’s seat, started the engine, and everything worked as expected.

He drove off.

Normally, it takes about 15 minutes to get from his apartment to Fu Group headquarters under normal traffic conditions. Today the roads were also clear—no congestion, no accidents—and the navigation system guided him smoothly all the way.

Fu Yanqing kept his hands on the wheel, his expression blank.

He wasn’t nervous, nor was he particularly excited. To him, the difference between “smooth” and “not smooth” lay only in how many unexpected hiccups he might encounter today.

The first intersection: green light.

The second intersection: green light.

His brow furrowed ever so slightly.

The third intersection: still green.

He slowed down a bit and took a closer look at the scene. The traffic lights were working properly, the flow of cars was normal, and there were no irregularities.

He brought his gaze back to the road and continued driving.

He glanced at the time on the dashboard. Only ten minutes had passed, yet he’d already covered more than half the distance.

That wasn’t normal.

He tapped the steering wheel twice, almost unconsciously, beginning to calculate what problems might arise on the rest of the journey.

Traffic jams? A flat tire? A car accident?

Any of those could happen.

But right up until he pulled into the underground garage at Fu Group headquarters, nothing at all had gone wrong.

He turned off the engine and sat in the car for a while.

The garage was eerily quiet, save for the low hum of the ventilation ducts. He caught a glimpse of himself in the rearview mirror—dark circles under his eyes, a pale complexion, but otherwise nothing out of the ordinary.

He pushed open the door and stepped out.

As soon as his feet hit the ground, he stepped into a puddle.

Looking down, he saw that someone’s car must have leaked oil, which had mixed with the water and pooled on the floor. The front of his leather shoes was already soaked, and the oily sole squeaked as he walked across the wet surface.

End of Chapter 1: An Unlucky Day