Crown of the Empire

Chapter 19

Chapter 19

I didn't wake up to birds or the sun filtering through curtains. I woke up to my phone screaming like it had been possessed. Buzz after buzz, notification after notification, until even Nikolai's estate walls couldn't mute the chaos.

And when I blinked the sleep out of my eyes and checked the screen, it wasn't my friends sending memes or Solene asking if I'd eaten. It was Bloomberg, Reuters, The Financial Times, even local vultures like Rappler and Inquirer. All of them plastering my name like I'd just declared war.

"Vergara Heiress Pulls Out 35%—Bank Shares in Freefall."

"Mariya Elena Vergara Starts Financial Earthquake."

"End of the Vergara Dynasty?"

For the record, I hadn't started the earthquake. My father did, years ago, when he decided my uterus made me less valuable than Reigan's existence. I just pulled the trigger.

Thirty-five percent. My thirty-five percent. The part my mother had secured for me the moment her doctors told her she'd never carry another child. Barren womb, wealthy daughter. She knew better than anyone what it meant to be erased in a man's world, so she fused the Antonio wealth into Vergara Banking and carved my name into it. Indelible.

And now? That indelible mark had turned into a financial guillotine.

I scrolled through the reports, part horrified, part smug. Liquidity ratios down by 6.2% overnight. Stock confidence shattered. The BSP already "monitoring" for compliance with capitalization requirements. Translation: my father's empire was on the ventilator, and I was the one holding the plug.

For those too busy counting their mistresses to read balance sheets, let me simplify. Banks don't really collapse because money vanishes. They collapse because people believe it will. Confidence is oxygen. I had just ripped the mask off.

"Oh no," I murmured into the silk pillow, voice dripping with mock sympathy. "The old men are panicking. Someone fetch them their heart meds."

I swung my legs out of bed, toes sinking into the carpet, and checked the markets. Shares had plunged 15% within hours of the withdrawal announcement. Investors were calling emergency meetings. Salvador—my oh-so-brilliant uncle—was quoted as saying, "The heiress is being emotional."

Emotional.

Right. Because reallocating hundreds of billions into ventures I can control, instead of leaving them under the thumb of my misogynistic father, was just me crying into ice cream.

The comments on social media weren't kinder.

Nepo-baby heiress throwing tantrums.

She's killing her own family's bank just to make a point.

She's a woman. They're all too emotional for business.

I snorted. "If this is what an emotional tantrum looks like, then boys, you might want to keep crying too. You'll be broke soon."

A soft knock at the door. One of Nikolai's staff. "Young Mistress? Coffee?"

"Yes, black. And a side of chaos, please."

The tray came, immaculate as always, and I sipped while scrolling. My father's PR machine was already trying to spin it—talk of "restructuring," "streamlining," "strategic refocus." Corporate euphemisms for "we're screwed."

And here's the delicious irony: by law, shareholder withdrawals of my magnitude had to be honored. Republic Act 8791, General Banking Law, plus the Corporation Code. They couldn't just brush it aside. They had to liquidate, adjust, and bleed.