All the whispers and pointed fingers snapped to a halt.

Zara’s face swung from red to pale. Her lips trembled, but no words came out.

I gave her a quick, dismissive look, and the others, instantly subdued, lowered their heads, pretending to be occupied with something else.

Without another word, I turned on my heel.

In the suffocating silence, I walked back to my private office, shut the door, and began gathering my personal things.

As I moved, my fingers brushed a slightly worn photo frame on the desk. It held a picture of me and my team after our first successful game test.

Back then, everyone wore genuine smiles, eyes bright with fire.

Now, things had changed.

Gradually, the anger burning in my chest faded into a deeper, heavier sadness.

Nine years. A full nine years. I had dedicated the best years of my life to this company.

How many nights was I the last one to turn off the lights in the office?

How many weekends had I spent in the server room, debugging alone?

How many times did I lead the team through the toughest problems, taking on the most complex tasks myself?

And that game—the one that won an international award and sold for a sky-high price—its core framework, its original concept, its hardest algorithms and code, wasn’t every line earned through my blood, sweat, and tears?

Then, as if fate had been waiting to tip the scales, last month my mom fell critically ill and was hospitalized. The situation was dire.

By then, the main development was complete, and we were in the final phase—tedious, yes, but not technically demanding.

I was stretched thin and had to delegate.

The dedicated and timid intern, Regina Addison, approached me and offered to take on more responsibilities, allowing me to focus on my family.

I was grateful and handed her the simpler, repetitive tasks. I even praised her publicly in a department meeting for being proactive and responsible.

I didn’t anticipate that the 'simple tasks' I delegated would turn into 'the core of the game' for Grant.

Likewise, I didn't foresee that the overtime I sacrificed to care for my mom would be portrayed as 'evidence' of my 'lack of dedication' and my supposed tendency to 'leave on time.'

Just then, the door to my office eased open, and a familiar figure stepped in.

It was Regina. She felt guilty and uneasy, hesitating as she moved closer.

“Avery… about the $10 million… I don’t deserve it. This bonus should be yours. I want to return it to you,” she said, her voice small.

I paused my packing, not looking up.

Images of Regina at the beginning flickered through my mind, polite and demure with her notebook clutched to her chest. Whenever she ran into a problem, she would slip over to my desk, shy but eager, her eyes bright with a hunger to learn.

“Alright,” I replied at last. I finally looked up, met Regina's gaze, and took out my phone. “Let’s do the transfer now. I’ll be waiting.”

The guilt on her face froze, like someone had hit pause.

A flicker of surprise and irritation flashed in her eyes. She clearly hadn’t expected me to be so blunt.

After a brief, stiff pause, she forced a smile.

“Avery, I was just being polite. You actually want it?” she said, a laugh catching in her throat.

Regina tilted her head, a smile tugging at her mouth. “I earned it on merit. Mr. Jefferson saw that. I wrote the core game code, I worked long hours, and I closed the nights. Tell me, what claim do you have on it?”

Her eyes, filled with a possessive gleam, drifted across the office as she spoke with obvious satisfaction.

“Come to think of it,” she added with a smirk, “I should thank you for giving up your spot so willingly.”

“From now on, this… will be my private office,” Regina announced, chin tipped up.

The smug expression on her face had no resemblance to the modest, soft-spoken intern I remembered.

“By ability?” I asked, my voice low.

I stepped forward, closing the distance between us. “You mean your ability to change variable names in parameters I already debugged, reformat my annotations, and then submit neatly organized test cases as if they were core algorithms? Or do you mean the ‘ability’ to start hammering away at useless lines of code or open a pre-written document whenever Mr. Jefferson happens to walk past your desk?"

My quiet words stung, each one targeting her most sensitive spots.

These were details I’d only pieced together in hindsight.

She took advantage of the fact that I was too busy caring for my mom’s illness to pay close attention. She utilized her position as an intern, despite not having access to the core system, and was exposed to intermediate files and test cases.

In just a month, she carefully created the illusion that she’d 'deeply participated' in the project, even 'led' it.

Regina’s expression changed. That layer of fake confidence and pride instantly broke, replaced by a bright, embarrassed flush.

Her breathing turned rapid, her composure unraveling.

"Y-You’re lying!” she snapped, her voice shrill, her eyes darting with panic.

She couldn’t even look me in the eye.

“You know better than anyone whether I’m making this up,” I replied, my tone staying cold. “Those so-called core modules you submitted, the ones you claimed to have written yourself? Their low-level function calls and logical structure are identical to the framework I built at the start. You just slapped on a clumsy wrapper with flashy, useless annotations and a decorative layer.”

I tilted my head, pressing the point. “Would you like me to line up your code with my original designs, side by side, and post it on a tech forum for everyone to admire and dissect?”

That broke Regina completely.

Her biggest weakness has always been a shallow technical base.

She can’t handle serious scrutiny.

After all, Grant Jefferson didn’t understand code. He could be fooled by surface polish.

But the tech world—the people who live and breathe code?

They see everything.

Right there, Regina’s face shifted from red to white, then white to a sickly green. Just then, her eyes caught sight of something: the old photo frame on my desk.

It held a picture of my mom and me, taken during our trip last year.

A flicker crossed her eyes.

Suddenly, with a deliberately casual sweep, she knocked the frame off the desk.

It fell to the floor with a loud crash, shattering glass that scattered everywhere.

Regina lurched a step forward and deliberately brought her foot down, hard, onto the broken glass and the photograph.

“Oh no, sorry, Avery. Didn’t see it there,” she said, feigning innocence.

In that instant, it felt like all the blood in my body rushed to my head.

My palm met her cheek, and the crack of the slap cut through the office.

Regina’s head snapped to the side, a vivid red handprint already blooming on her cheek.

“Get out!” I shouted.

The office door flew open.

“Ms. Sanderson, what the hell are you doing?!” Grant barked.

Grant Jefferson stood in the doorway, his face dark with anger.

He must have been passing by and caught the scene.

Regina wasted no time. Her inner actress came out instantly as she trembled with just the right amount of hurt and fragility.

“Mr. Jefferson, I-I just came to apologize to Avery about the bonus. I didn’t know why she suddenly got so angry, and then she just hit me…”

“Avery!” Grant snapped. “I never thought you’d be this petty! The company made its decision about the bonus. Even if you’re dissatisfied, that’s no excuse for hitting a colleague! Especially when Regina came here in good faith to apologize!”

“Apologize?” I turned to him coldly, pointing at the broken frame on the floor. “She smashed a photo of my mom and stepped on it. That’s your idea of an apology?”

Grant glanced at the floor, his brows tightening, then smoothing out.

“It’s just a photo frame,” he said dismissively. “So it broke, what’s the big deal? Is it really worth getting so upset over?"

He then shot me a look, his voice rising. "I think you’ve lost your mind, all this over a bonus.”

Regina, standing off to the side, let out a perfectly timed sniffle, looking even more fragile and helpless.

“Mr. Jefferson, please don’t blame Avery. Maybe it’s really my fault. I must’ve done something to upset her…” she murmured, eyes glistening.

Grant looked at her, his anger spiking.

“Avery, I gave you a chance. You didn’t appreciate it. Now, pack up your things. Get out of the company immediately,” he ordered, voice like ice.

Quietly, I picked up the photo and placed the last of my personal belongings into my bag.

The silence and calmness in my actions caught both Grant and Regina off guard. They probably expected me to explode, to argue, to lose my composure.

But I didn’t. Instead, I zipped up my bag and walked straight toward the door.

As I passed Grant, I stopped.

Turning slightly, I met his eye, my voice steady and flat. “Mr. Jefferson, remember what you said today. I hope you won’t regret it. And I hope Regina… truly is as ‘competent’ as she’s trying to appear.”

Grant’s brow furrowed, as if he wanted to say something. But I didn’t give him the chance. I stepped forward, leaving without looking back.

There was nothing left for me to stay here for.

...

Back at home, my mom, just out of the hospital, was resting on the sofa.

When she saw me get home much earlier than usual and noticed the change in my demeanor, she looked at me with concern.

“What’s wrong? Did something happen?”

I didn’t hide anything. I told her everything about resigning and losing the bonus.

My mom didn’t blame me at all. She simply took my hand and gently patted it.

“You did right,” she said softly. “That kind of company isn’t worth my precious daughter’s sacrifice. Your health comes first, and peace of mind is even more important. I still have some savings. Don’t rush to find a new job. Take some time to rest.”

Her words washed through me like a warm current, easing something tight in my chest.

...

In the days that followed, it felt as though my life was moving at a snail's pace.

In the mornings, I went with my mom to the market, listening to her haggle with effortless skill as we picked the freshest vegetables.

In the afternoons, we'd head to the park, and I'd awkwardly join the older folks practicing yoga, fumbling through the movements.

Afterward, we'd sit on the balcony, sipping herbal tea, watching the leaves drift by, and chatting about family stuff. Time passed by slowly, quietly, and peacefully.

That long-forgotten, steady rhythm started to heal the numb heart I’d crushed in the corporate world.

In that rare quiet, the past few years played back in my mind like faded film reels, each frame sharp again.

I remembered the company’s hardest early days. To break through the technical barriers of our first game, I led a handful of core game developers and spent three straight months in the office, eating and sleeping there.

When we were wiped out at night, we’d spread cardboard under our desks and grab a nap.

In the end, we didn’t just solve the problems; we crafted an optimization plan that exceeded expectations, helped the company achieve its first real profit, and built our reputation in the industry.

I also recall an incident where a competitor maliciously attacked our servers, nearly bringing our services to a standstill.

Clients were furious. The system was hanging by a thread.

I stayed awake for forty-eight hours straight, leading the team to trace the attack. Not only did we successfully fend off the assault, but we also identified a loophole on their side, saving the company from huge losses and delivering a decisive counterpunch.

That battle catapulted our reputation in the industry.

And then there was the game that won the international award.