The Billionaire Who Forgot How to Love

Chapter 10: The Cost of Being Chosen

Paris — The Museum of Things Left Unsaid

The Louvre had been closed for years, since the first collapse. Not due to war, but neglect. No one remembered why it mattered. The world had been too busy forgetting.

Elias walked its silent halls alone. The paintings stared down like gods, weeping in oil and dust. One piece stopped him: The Martyr's Architect. A man building a cathedral while bleeding. Everyone passed by the structure. No one saw the man.

A small plaque read: "He built for others and died without a door to rest behind."

That was Elias.

Only this time, he was still alive.

Selene joined him, arms crossed. "We've been restoring minds. But who's restoring you?"

He didn't answer.

Because the truth was, no one was.

The Broadcast

It was time. The first global memory broadcast — a resurrection of truth. Every country. Every language. Every screen.

Elias stood before the world, no suit, no title. Just a man.

"My name is Elias Monroe. And I remember everything I tried to forget."

He shared his story. His failures. His abandonment of family, of love. His regret. The people who used him. The ones he failed to save. The woman he couldn't protect. The child he barely knew.

"This isn't about being brilliant or broken. It's about being human again."

Liv watched from behind the camera. Selene stood beside her, holding her breath.

In Uganda, a boy cried. In Ireland, a woman took off her wedding ring and forgave herself. In Shanghai, a father picked up the phone to call his estranged son.

The world didn't change in that moment.

But it wanted to.

And that was enough.

The Hospital — Choices We Can't Undo

Liv collapsed the next morning. Stress. Fatigue. Worry. The pregnancy was taking its toll.

Elias sat beside her bed, holding her cold fingers.

"She's strong," the doctor said. "But she's holding onto a lot of fear."

That night, Liv woke to find Elias sleeping in the chair, his head buried in his hands.

"I'm not afraid of dying," she whispered.

He jolted awake. "Don't say that."

"I'm afraid you'll forget me again."

Elias crawled onto the bed beside her and wrapped his arms around her waist, forehead against hers.

"I've lived two lives," he said. "And you were the only thing that ever felt real in both."

Zurich — The Dealbreaker

Oblivion's last legal node was tied up in a private firm. Old-world contracts. Untouchable files.

Selene hacked the outer shell. But they needed someone from the inside.

Enter Reza — Elias's former protégé. Brilliant, arrogant, and fueled by betrayal.

"You gave me dreams and then killed them," Reza said. "You made me think compassion could survive capitalism."

"Maybe it can," Elias replied. "But not in a system built to devour it."

"You want me to break my NDA, risk my life, just to help the man who abandoned me?"

"No. I want you to become the man I hoped you would be."

Reza stared long.

And then he handed them the key.

Florence — The Wedding That Wasn't

Mireille's name appeared again in a private announcement: a wedding to a politician known for rewriting memory laws.

Liv and Elias stood at the edge of the old chapel. Elias watched, silent.

"You still love her?" Liv asked softly.

"I think I loved who I thought she was."

"Do you love who I am?"

He turned, eyes raw.

"Yes. Even when I don't know how to show it. Even when it scares me."

The Letters Selene Never Sent

Selene left them by his bedside.

I used to write to you, even when you were gone. In my head. In notebooks. In code.

You were my ghost parent. My imaginary protector. My villain and my hope.

You've made mistakes. But you came back. And I think that matters more.

Elias wept.

And in the morning, he made pancakes from her favorite recipe.

They tasted like forgiveness.

Cairo — The Ashes of the Past

The final Oblivion core was buried beneath a war-ravaged library. Not a digital vault — a physical one. Paper, stone, ash.

Inside were names. Stories. Children erased from systems. Women rewritten. Artists vanished.

Elias sat there for hours, copying names into his notebook.

"We can't save them," Liv said.

"No. But we can remember them."

He built a digital wall of their names. A sacred record. Not to be monetized. Not to be filtered.

Just remembered.

The Ghost Room — Tokyo Penthouse

Elias hadn't been back to his penthouse in Tokyo since the collapse. It was a sky temple of silence. Chrome and marble, sterile yet haunted.

But one room had always stayed locked.

It belonged to his daughter. In his first life.

He stood at the threshold now, trembling. Inside, the walls still held her drawings. Crayon suns. Crooked rainbows. "I love Daddy" scrawled in bright pink marker across the closet door.

He stepped inside, knelt by a tiny toy piano. Pressed a key. A hollow note rang out, echoing across the years.

And then, he broke.

"I'm sorry," he whispered to the air. "I should've been there. I should've heard you play. I should've told you more than just 'later.'"

His sobs didn't echo. The room swallowed them whole.

And still, the piano note lingered, like a memory refusing to fade.

Liv's Inner Chapter — "The Things I Don't Say"

She kept a journal. Always had. But these days, the pages had grown heavier.

He's changed. He looks the same, walks the same, but it's like there's a storm in his chest.

Sometimes I want to scream at him: "Love me like it's the first time." But I'm afraid he already is, and it's still not enough.

I'm afraid of raising a child with a man who forgets how to stay.

Liv closed the journal.

Tears didn't come. Not this time.

She had cried enough in her first life.

This one… this one would be different.

Even if she had to teach Elias how to be present.

Selene and Elias — Rooftop Questions

They sat on a rooftop in Marseille. The stars burned above. Wind whipped through their silence.

"Why did you leave?" Selene finally asked.

Elias rubbed his hands together. "I thought... if I succeeded, you'd forgive me."

"That's not how forgiveness works."

"I know. But I didn't back then."

She leaned against him.

"I wanted to hate you forever," she said. "But now... I just want to understand you."

He kissed her forehead. "That makes one of us."

The World Responds

A montage of hearts:

— A boy in Lagos writes his estranged father. — A woman in Osaka replays her wedding memory for the first time. — A former soldier in Ukraine visits a grave he'd avoided for years. — An AI technician in Seoul restores his grandmother's voice.

All because Elias spoke truth.

All because the world remembered.

The Nightmare

Elias dreamed.

In it, the world forgot again. Liv was gone. Selene's voice was silent. He stood atop a billion-dollar tower, glass and steel and echoes.

No one called his name.

He screamed. But no sound came out.

He woke with a gasp, drenched in sweat, and Liv's name on his lips.

She was beside him, breathing.

He reached for her hand. And didn't let go.

The Hospital Rooftop

Liv was discharged two days later.

They stood on the hospital rooftop, looking at the smog-drenched cityscape.

"I want this future," Elias said. "With you. No more running. No more forgetting."

She nodded.

"And when the past comes back?"

"We'll face it. Together."

She placed his hand on her stomach.

And for the first time in either life, Elias smiled without guilt.