“Your mother—do you know how much she earns scrubbing toilets?”

The boy shook his head.

“Tell him, Elena,” Mateo said coldly. “Tell your son what your dignity sells for.”

Elena opened her mouth. Nothing came out. Tears streamed down her face.

“You won’t tell him? Fine. I will.” Mateo smiled. “Your mom earns in a month what I spend on one dinner. Amazing how this world works, isn’t it?”

“Better than Netflix,” Gabriel laughed, pulling out his phone. “We should film this.”

“Already am,” Leonardo Márquez, 54, waved his device. “The club group chat will die laughing.”

The boy’s expression was changing. Beneath the shame, something cold and controlled was igniting behind his eyes.

“Now, back to our little game,” Mateo said, turning to the safe. He patted the steel like a pet. “This beauty cost three million dollars. Just the safe cost more than your mother will earn in a hundred years.”

“Then why offer money for something impossible?” the boy asked quietly.

Mateo’s smile faltered. “What?”

“If it’s impossible to open,” the boy repeated, “then you’ll never pay the hundred million. So it’s not an offer. It’s just a trick to laugh at us.”

Silence.

The businessmen shifted uncomfortably. The kid had just exposed Mateo’s cruelty with one simple observation.

“The kid’s got brains,” Rodrigo said, forcing a laugh.

“Brains are useless without schooling,” Mateo snapped. “And school costs money. Money people like you don’t have.”

“My dad said the opposite,” the boy replied.

“Your dad?” Gabriel mocked. “Where is he? Too busy to take care of his own kid?”

“He’s dead.”

Elena choked out a sob.

The word hung in the air like an explosion. Even the most cynical among them felt something twist.

“I’m sorry,” Mateo muttered. The apology sounded hollow.

The boy stared at him with such intensity that Mateo stepped back.

“If you were sorry, you wouldn’t be doing this.”

“Watch your tone, kid,” Mateo warned. “Or—”

“Or what?” The boy was perfectly calm. “You’ll fire my mom? Take away the job that barely lets us eat? Make us poorer than we already are?”

Each question landed like a slap.

Mateo realized he’d misjudged the boy completely.

“My dad was a security engineer,” the boy continued, walking toward the safe. “He designed protection systems for banks and companies. He taught me about codes and algorithms while he worked at home. He said safes aren’t just metal and tech. They’re psychology.”