March 2000.
Wall Street buzzed like a hive teetering on collapse. The NASDAQ was soaring past 5,000, fueled by hype, not value. But Jason had no intention of buying into the bubble.
He was preparing to feed on the ashes.
In the backroom of a Midtown deli, Jason met with one of his new contacts—Victor Tran, a disgraced former Lehman analyst who now ran a low-key financial blog followed by hundreds of insiders. Jason had found him through a comment thread predicting the fall of Pets.com.
"You really think the crash is coming this quarter?" Victor asked, folding his arms.
Jason pulled out his leather-bound planner. Inside: a hand-drawn timeline of events.
"NASDAQ peaks mid-March. Bloodbath begins before April. By May, dot-coms will be crashing by the dozen. And by September? You'll be able to buy prime tech IP for pennies on the dollar."
Victor raised an eyebrow. "What's in it for me?"
Jason smiled. "You put the word out subtly. Prep your network. I want eyes on which companies will fold first. You'll get early access to buy-ins after the crash, plus a seat on the board when I start rolling them up."
Victor's eyes gleamed. "You're talking about a tech scavenger hunt."
"I'm talking about a dynasty made from dead startups."
Meanwhile, Amy was making serious progress. She'd coded a prototype of the decentralized token system Jason outlined. They called it DarkMint—a placeholder name for a coin that would never be released publicly, only used internally for encrypted, untraceable transactions to fund early operations.
Jason set up a shell corp in the Cayman Islands. Then another in Delaware. He routed money through both, laundering betting wins into "angel investment funds."
He also hired a freelance designer to mock up a brand for StreamHub.
Slogan: "Your World. Your Screen. Your Terms."
Everything was falling into place.
Then came an unexpected email—from an anonymous address.
> "You're making noise in places you shouldn't. Be careful where you walk, Mr. King."
Jason's blood ran cold.
Only one problem: he hadn't used his real last name in any of his new businesses.
He stared at the screen.
Someone already knew.