That coffin

The first thing Adrian Voss noticed was the silence.

Not the ordinary silence of wealth and privilege.

Not the quiet hum of a room full of powerful people pretending not to watch one another. Not the carefully controlled stillness that settled over elite gatherings before an important announcement.

This silence felt wrong.

The moment Adrian stepped through the doors of the grand ballroom, he felt it.

The room was filled with people—more than three hundred guests gathered beneath crystal chandeliers that glittered like captured stars. Politicians stood beside celebrities. Billionaires exchanged glances with royalty. Industry leaders and media moguls occupied every corner of the enormous hall.

Yet not a single voice could be heard.

No conversations.

No laughter.

Nothing.

Everyone was staring.

Adrian slowed his pace.

The polished marble floor reflected the light above him as he moved forward, his footsteps echoing faintly through the silence.

For a brief moment, he wondered whether some speech had already begun.

Then he noticed where everyone was looking.

Toward the center of the room.

Toward a single spotlight.

Toward a coffin.

Adrian stopped walking.

His expression remained calm, but something cold settled in his chest.

A black marble coffin stood alone beneath the light.

White lilies surrounded it.

The flowers looked strangely beautiful against the dark stone.

For several seconds, Adrian simply stared.

Then his eyes lifted to the massive painting positioned behind it.

And everything inside him went still.

The painting depicted a funeral.

His funeral.

Someone nearby let out a nervous laugh.

"That's a little too dramatic."

Another guest whispered quietly enough that they probably thought he wouldn't hear.

"Imagine being him."

Adrian ignored both comments.

His gaze remained fixed on the artwork.

The Exhibition of Futures.

The invitation-only event was one of the strangest traditions among the world's elite.

Every year, Blackwood Estate hosted a gathering unlike any other. Artists, psychologists, futurists, analysts, and visionaries were invited to create a single work based on one challenge:

Paint the future.

Most years produced entertaining nonsense.

Predictions of economic collapses.

Technological revolutions.

Political upheavals.

Some paintings imagined wars. Others imagined miracles.

They sparked conversation for a few weeks before being forgotten.

No one took them seriously.

No one was supposed to.

This year was supposed to be no different.

Yet there it was.

A life-sized painting displayed beneath a spotlight for everyone to see.

A black marble coffin.

White lilies.

Rain pouring from a storm-dark sky.

A crowd gathered around a grave.

And engraved into the headstone behind it:

ADRIAN VOSS

1992 – 2027

A chill crawled slowly down his spine.

He read the inscription again.

Then a third time.

The date did not change.

The room felt colder.

The air suddenly seemed heavier.

For the first time in years, Adrian found himself at a loss for words.

He wasn't a man who frightened easily.

Fear belonged to people with something to lose.

Adrian had spent his life learning how to survive.

He had built one of the largest technology empires in the world from nothing more than ambition and relentless determination.

Competitors feared him.

Governments negotiated with him.

Investors followed him.

He had faced threats before.

But standing in front of his own funeral was different.

His eyes narrowed.

Every detail was perfect.

Too perfect.

The expensive watch resting on the corpse's wrist.

The faint scar near the jawline.

The ring he never removed.

His fingers instinctively touched that ring now.

Cold metal met warm skin.

Impossible.

Nobody should know those details.

Not the watch.

Not the scar.

Not the ring.

The artist would have needed access to information almost no one possessed.

A murmur finally began moving through the crowd.

People exchanged uneasy glances.

Others studied Adrian as though comparing him to the painting.

As though checking whether the corpse truly resembled the man standing before them.

It did.

Perfectly.

The resemblance was unsettling.

Adrian forced himself to look away.

That was when he noticed her.

A young woman stood directly in front of the painting.

At first, she seemed unremarkable compared to the spectacle surrounding her.

Yet something about her immediately captured his attention.

Perhaps it was the fact that she wasn't looking at the artwork.

She was looking at him.

Dark hair framed her face.

Pale blue eyes held his gaze without hesitation.

Her black dress seemed oddly simple compared to the expensive gowns worn by the women around her.

Yet she somehow stood out more than any of them.

Beautiful.

Undeniably beautiful.

But that wasn't what stole Adrian's attention.

It was the expression on her face.

Shock.

Pure shock.

As though she had seen something she never expected to see.

Or someone.

Him.

The woman took a step backward.

Then another.

Her eyes never left his.

Adrian frowned slightly.

Why was she looking at him like that?

More importantly—

Why did it feel as though he knew her?

The thought made no sense.

He had never seen her before.

He was certain of it.

Adrian rarely forgot a face.

Especially one like hers.

And yet something about her seemed familiar.

Not familiar in the ordinary sense.

Deeper than that.

Like a memory he couldn't quite reach.

A dream half forgotten after waking.

The sensation sent an unexpected shiver through him.

The woman stopped moving.

For several seconds they simply stared at one another across the crowded ballroom.

Then something strange happened.

Adrian felt an unfamiliar tightening inside his chest.

A pull.

An instinct.

A need to reach her.

The feeling was absurd.

He didn't believe in fate.

He certainly didn't believe in love at first sight.

Yet standing there, looking into those pale blue eyes, he found himself unable to look away.

Every instinct told him to leave.

To find the artist responsible.

To demand answers.

Instead, he began walking toward her.

The crowd parted automatically.

People always moved when Adrian Voss walked.

Power had a way of creating space.

Conversations died.

Guests stepped aside.

A clear path opened between them.

Still, the woman didn't move.

She remained exactly where she stood.

Waiting.

Watching.

As though she had known this moment would happen.

The closer Adrian came, the stronger that strange feeling became.

His heartbeat slowed rather than quickened.

A calm certainty settled over him.

It made no sense.

Nothing about this night made sense.

When he finally stopped, only a few feet separated them.

Up close, her eyes were even more unsettling.

Not because they were beautiful.

Because they were familiar.

The realization struck him again.

Stronger this time.

And just as impossible.

For several long seconds neither of them spoke.

The noise of the ballroom faded into the background.

The painting.

The coffin.

The crowd.

Everything seemed distant.

Only the woman remained clear.

Then she whispered,

"You weren't supposed to be here."

Adrian blinked.

Of all the things he expected her to say, that wasn't one of them.

One eyebrow rose slightly.

"I own the building."

For a fraction of a second, he almost expected her to smile.

She didn't.

Instead, her face turned pale.

"No," she said quietly.

The confidence in Adrian's expression faded.

Something in her voice unsettled him.

"Not here."

A strange shiver passed through him.

He studied her carefully.

She wasn't joking.

She wasn't confused.

If anything, she looked frightened.

"What does that mean?" he asked.

The woman glanced toward the painting.

Toward the date engraved beneath his name.

2027.

Then she looked back at him.

For the first time, Adrian noticed fear in her eyes.

Not fear of him.

Fear for him.

The realization caught him off guard.

Why would a stranger be afraid for him?

Who was she?

And how did she seem to know something he didn't?

The woman swallowed.

Her gaze lingered on his face.

As though she were searching for something.

Or trying to decide whether to tell him the truth.

The silence stretched between them.

Around them, the crowd watched openly now.

Nobody pretended otherwise.

Everyone wanted to hear what she would say.

Adrian wanted to hear it too.

More than he cared to admit.

Finally, she spoke.

Her voice was barely audible.

Almost lost beneath the silence of the ballroom.

"You're not supposed to meet me until the day you die."

For one endless second, Adrian simply stared at her.

The words echoed through his mind.

Impossible.

Absurd.

And yet the fear in her eyes made it impossible to dismiss them completely.

Before he could answer—

The lights went out.

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