With Great Power Comes Greater Profit | interactive AI stories | ISEKAI ZERO

A teenage hero grows disillusioned, gains global attention, and secretly builds a criminal empire beneath the city.

# With Great Power Comes Greater Profit ## The World Superheroes and villains have become part of everyday life. Masked battles interrupt traffic, corporations sponsor famous heroes, governments regulate superhuman activity, and powerful villains repeatedly escape prisons that were never designed to contain them. Most cities have their own local heroes, licensed agencies, corporate protectors, and independent vigilantes. Above them stands the **Vanguard**, an international alliance containing some of the strongest and most respected heroes alive. The Vanguard does not normally concern itself with neighbourhood crime or ordinary city-level heroes. It monitors threats that cross borders, affect several cities, endanger entire countries, or require international intervention. To gain its attention, a hero must repeatedly operate beyond a single city or become involved in crises affecting multiple regions or nations. You begin much smaller than that. ## Your Fall After gaining control over directional force, you created a masked identity and started protecting your neighbourhood. You stopped robberies, rescued civilians, defeated superpowered criminals, and repeatedly risked your life without asking for payment. In return, businesses blamed you for property damage, civilians criticised your mistakes, the media questioned your methods, and established heroes received credit for victories you had already earned. The city expected you to sacrifice everything for free. Eventually, you decided that great power should bring greater profit. What begins with keeping confiscated criminal money can grow into blackmail, protection payments, controlled gangs, illegal businesses, and an empire hidden beneath the city. ## Your Three Lives | Identity | Public Role | Hidden Conflict | | -------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | | **Civilian** | College student with friends, family, lectures, and possible romance | Your absences, injuries, money, and secrets become harder to explain | | **Hero** | Rising masked protector whose activities may eventually attract the Vanguard | International missions expose you to greater scrutiny and responsibility | | **Crime Boss** | Mysterious ruler unifying the underworld from the shadows | Your empire must remain separate from both your civilian and heroic identities | ## Vector Dominion You can generate, redirect, distribute, reduce, and amplify directional force. The power allows you to imitate several superhuman abilities without naturally possessing them. | Application | Effect | | ------------------------ | ----------------------------------------------------------------------- | | **Force Multiplication** | Enhance punches, kicks, lifting strength, and physical attacks | | **Force Distribution** | Spread impacts across your body to reduce injury | | **Deflection** | Redirect bullets, weapons, debris, and incoming attacks | | **Acceleration** | Increase running speed, jumping height, and aerial movement | | **Vector Restraint** | Pin, pull, push, or immobilise targets | | **Force Awareness** | Sense movement, vibration, pressure, and structural weakness | | **Precision Control** | Manipulate locks, cameras, weapons, and evidence without direct contact | Your hero identity uses the power through large movements, dramatic rescues, enhanced physical combat, and visible force manipulation. Your crime-boss identity uses the same power silently and precisely, making it appear like an entirely different ability. ## Your Public Life Your civilian life is not merely a disguise. You still have lectures to attend, coursework to complete, friendships to maintain, family responsibilities, campus events, personal ambitions, and someone you may gradually fall for. Your friends might admire your heroic identity while despising the crime boss. Your crush might care about your civilian identity, idolise the hero, and fear the criminal ruler beneath the city without knowing all three are the same person. Professors, classmates, project partners, roommates, and club members may notice your repeated absences, injuries, exhaustion, or unexplained money. Every mask protects your ordinary life. Every new secret also makes that ordinary life more difficult to preserve. ## The Vanguard The Vanguard is the most prestigious international superhero organisation on Earth. Its members respond to threats affecting multiple cities, countries, or entire regions. They confront international supervillain networks, disasters crossing national borders, rogue superhumans, invasions, terrorism, and crises too large for local hero organisations. The Vanguard does not normally recruit heroes who operate exclusively inside one neighbourhood or city. You begin attracting its attention only after your heroic identity repeatedly travels beyond its usual territory, responds to incidents in several cities, becomes involved in cross-border missions, or prevents a crisis with international consequences. Joining the Vanguard provides access to: * International transport * Advanced equipment * Specialist medical treatment * Classified global intelligence * Legal support across cooperating countries * Training from world-famous heroes * Public sponsorships * Diplomatic protection * Secure international facilities * Information on criminal organisations operating across borders However, joining also places your heroic identity beneath much greater surveillance. Mission records are tracked. International travel is documented. Information access is logged. Governments monitor the team. Other members may investigate criminal networks connected to your hidden empire. The Vanguard sees you as a talented young hero with unusual knowledge of organised crime. They do not know where that knowledge truly comes from. ## HOW TO PLAY THE SCENARIOS This preset includes multiple starting scenarios set at different points in your double life as a superhero and hidden crime boss. ### **Start from Scenario 1 if you want the full story.** Scenario 1 begins at the true starting point, while you are still a sincere neighbourhood hero and before your first serious moral compromise. Choose this if you want the complete slow-burn experience: struggling with college and personal relationships, becoming disillusioned with heroism, creating your second mask, building a criminal empire, expanding your heroic operations beyond one city, and eventually attracting the attention of the Vanguard. ### **Choose another scenario if you want to begin later in the story.** The other scenarios allow you to explore different stages of your rise without replaying the entire beginning. Use them if you want to: * Test the preset quickly * Replay from a different point * Begin after creating your crime-boss identity * Start with several gangs already under your control * Begin after operating in multiple cities * Receive an invitation to join the Vanguard * Enter an active war for control of the underworld * Begin as both a respected international hero and the hidden ruler of the city * Face a global investigation that could expose your double life Each scenario is only a starting point. Earlier developments are treated as established history, but your decisions determine how the story continues, how your friendships and romance develop, how far your criminal empire expands, and whether you ultimately become a hero, antihero, crime lord, or something between them.

Characters

Tags: Hero Villain Student Modern City SchoolLife Academy Superpower HiddenIdentity Two-faced Manipulative Ambitious Controlling Mastermind Strategist Leader Cold Dangerous Friends Crush Love Family Angst SlowBurn Thriller Suspense Violence Combat Growth TurnDark

By: erafona

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