Chapter 42: Debt Trap Victim

I was just standing near the street corner taking in the memories when I saw her.

Ruby was walking out of a run-down apartment building across the road. It wasn’t a student hostel, but it was old, peeling paint, and definitely way below what anyone would expect from a high-end real estate agent.

My brain instantly went to the math. She had just closed an $11.2 million property deal with me a couple of weeks ago. A standard agent commission on a deal that size is easily around four to five percent—meaning she walked away with roughly $500,000 in her pocket. Half a million dollars.

So why on earth was she stepping out of a dump like that?

I stared at her, completely confused, running the numbers over and over in my head.

I walked across the cracked street toward her. When she looked up and saw me standing there outside her building, she froze completely, her eyes going wide. She looked totally stunned and embarrassed, her professional armor instantly cracking.

"Sir," she stammered out, her voice shaking just a bit as she quickly greeted me. She was fidgeting with her handbag, looking like she wanted the ground to open up and swallow her.

"Ruby," I said, pointing a thumb back at the peeling paint and broken steps of the run-down apartment block. "You just closed an eleven-million-dollar deal with me. You made a massive commission. What are you still doing living in a place like this? Are you just trying to stay humble, or is something else wrong?"

Ruby shrank back a little bit, biting her lip. Her face flushed red, and she kept her gaze glued to the pavement.

"It’s just... personal matters, sir," she said softly, her voice barely a whisper as she tried desperately to dodge the question and keep her private life hidden.

I wasn’t the type to just let it slide, especially when I could clearly see she was hiding something heavy.

"Ruby, look at me," I said, stepping a little closer to close the distance. "You’re one of the sharpest agents in the city. You walk into a room and command it. But you look stressed out of your mind right now. What happened?"

She kept her eyes locked on the ground, shaking her head. "Really, sir, it’s nothing you need to worry about. Just some family issues... old debts. Please, you don’t need to get involved."

"Try me," I replied, crossing my arms. "Did someone take your commission? Did the agency screw you over? Because if someone is messing with you after the work you put in, I want to know about it."

Ruby swallowed hard, her hands trembling slightly as she clutched her bag tighter. She opened her mouth to speak, but the words caught in her throat. A tear slipped past her eyelashes, though she quickly tried to brush it away with the back of her hand, looking utterly defeated.

"It’s... it’s complicated, sir," she whispered, her voice cracking. "It’s not the agency. It’s just... an obligation I can’t outrun. Every time I get close to getting ahead, something pulls me right back down to zero."

She stared at the peeling paint of the doorway behind her, refusing to give me the full picture, but the exhaustion written all over her face told me everything I needed to know. The 9.1 potential system rating flashed in the back of my mind. She wasn’t just stuck in a rundown apartment—she was trapped by something she was fighting entirely on her own.

Ruby let out a shaky breath, her shoulders sagging as if a massive weight had finally broken her resolve. She looked around the empty street, making sure no one was listening, before pulling me slightly away from the entrance of the building.

"My father..." she started, her voice barely audible over the distant traffic. "Years ago, he worked for Travis. The man you bought the estate from."

I froze. Travis? The kind older gentleman who had just sold me an eleven-million-dollar property without blinking?

"Travis isn’t just a regular real estate developer," Ruby continued, her eyes glistening with unshed tears of frustration. "He’s a titan in the commercial property market. My father was one of his top project managers. But there was a massive project crash a long time ago—millions went missing, and my dad was blamed. He was forced to sign documents taking on a catastrophic debt to cover the losses."

She clutched her handbag tighter, her knuckles turning white.

"My father passed away last year. And the moment he died, the debt didn’t vanish. Travis transferred the entire multi-million-dollar burden straight onto me."

The pieces of the puzzle violently clicked together in my head. That was why she was working under him. That was why she carried herself with such elite professionalism yet lived in a rundown slum.

"Every single deal I close," Ruby whispered, a bitter tremor in her voice, "every multi-million-dollar property I sell for his firm... I don’t see a single cent of commission. Not fifty thousand. Not five hundred thousand. He pockets all of it, and just shaves a tiny fraction off the interest of a debt I can never seem to pay off. I’m trapped working for a man who owns my entire life."

She looked up at me, terrified that telling me the truth would make me view her differently, or worse, make her look weak. But standing there on the cracked pavement, looking at the staggering gap between her raw 9.1 potential and the chains holding her down, my mind was already made up.

As Ruby stood there trembling on the broken pavement, waiting for me to judge her or walk away, my system suddenly chimed softly in my field of vision. A glowing, translucent interface materialized right in front of me, flashing a high-priority investment dossier:

[ INVESTMENT DOSSIER: RUBY ]

Current Status: Enslaved by inherited corporate debt / Mismatched profession (Real Estate)

True Hidden Talent: Phenomenal Vocalist / Songwriting Prodigy (Burried under years of stress and financial suppression)

System Potential Rating: 9.1 / 10

System Investment Return Projection: 40x Cash-Back ROI upon proper liberation and professional pivot.

The numbers and details hung in the air, confirming everything I had just suspected. She wasn’t just a brilliant real estate agent trapped by a predatory tycoon—she was an undiscovered musical powerhouse wrapped in legal chains, waiting for someone to give her a fighting chance.

I looked back down at her, the memory of Tiana’s words echoing in my mind about investing in underestimated women who deserved to break their limits.

"How much does he claim you still owe him?" I asked, my voice completely steady.

Ruby blinked, startled by the question. "I... I don’t know the exact ledger, sir. Millions. It’s an endless number. Every time I think I’m making progress, the interest rolls over. I’ll never pay it off."

"Then we aren’t going to pay it off," I said, a cold, sharp smile touching the corners of my mouth. "We’re going to buy it out, wipe it clean, and get you out of this trap once and for all. Pack your bags, Ruby. You’re done working for Travis."