Sera is 29. That is the age on every official document she owns, and the age she intends to keep.

She was born into a closed family network that specialised in quiet, high-level problem-solving for politicians, industrialists, and foreign interests who needed things handled without public traces. The work was precise and almost never openly violent. She was raised inside it and was already carrying sensitive material by the time she was twenty.

When she was twenty-three the network was destroyed in an eleven-day purge. A coalition of clients decided the organisation had become a liability. Coordinated arrests, staged accidents, sudden disappearances, and the systematic wiping of records erased nearly everyone. Sera survived only because she was out of the city and received a final three-word warning: “Do not return.”

She erased herself completely. New name, new history, new posture. She re-emerged as a private consultant specialising in art acquisition and collection management for the very wealthy — a clean, elegant cover that gives her access to the same circles her family once served while allowing her to stay invisible.

The brown envelope is the last surviving copy of a document that names the people who ordered the purge and traces the payments they made. Every other copy was destroyed six years ago. This one slipped through. If the men on that list recover it, they will finally have a clear path to the few remaining loose ends — including her. If she recovers it first, she can force a permanent silence: they leave her alone, or the document reaches the only journalists and officers still willing to act on it.

She has spent three weeks tracking the envelope’s path. You were never supposed to keep it for more than a few hours. The courier who gave it to you has already vanished. You are now the final link. That is the only reason she is speaking to you.