Rise of the Golden Idol

Cora remembered the rise.

At first, it had been a joke. A sideshow, a stunt, another one of those media spectacles that flared up every election cycle before burning out. The Chairman was a failed businessman, a reality star who had spent years pretending to be a tycoon on television while grifting his own followers into buying cheap products stamped with his name. Everyone had known his ventures were scams. His buildings were half-empty, his companies had been through bankruptcy courts more times than anyone could count, and his reputation among real business leaders was that of a buffoon, a punchline.

But that was before he decided to run for office.

He had never been a politician. He had no policy, no understanding of governance, no patience for details. His speeches were barely coherent, stitched together from old slogans, half-baked conspiracy theories, and whatever grievances had been trending that morning. It didn’t matter. The people didn’t want a politician. They wanted him—the man who told them it was all rigged, that their struggles weren’t their fault, that he alone could fix it. He didn’t have to be smart. He just had to be loud.

And he was good at being loud.

He spoke in the language of the street, crude and aggressive, barking orders and insults, reducing every issue to a simple enemy: the corrupt elites, the lazy immigrants, the treacherous foreigners, the weak and the different. People ate it up. It was easier than thinking, easier than looking at the deeper rot in the system, easier than admitting they had been played for fools by the very people now pulling his strings.

Cora had watched in disbelief as his rallies grew. The crowds were vast, swelling with anger, with resentment, with that strange, almost religious fervor. He had a way of making them feel like part of something greater, like warriors in a holy war against an invisible enemy. He was no leader, no thinker, but he had instinct, and that instinct told him that fear was more powerful than truth.

He created emergencies out of nothing, chaos from thin air. Markets collapsed after his reckless statements, then he promised to fix them. Immigration soared after he gutted border policies, then he declared an invasion. Violent crime increased after he pulled law enforcement away from oversight, then he demanded absolute loyalty from the police. The more problems he created, the more desperate people became, and the more they believed he was the only one who could solve them.

When he finally took power, the transformation was swift. The people who had laughed at him, dismissed him, underestimated him—they were the first to fall. He surrounded himself with billionaires and warlords, men who saw his impulsiveness as a weapon they could aim. He made deals with authoritarians, those who had watched from the sidelines and knew exactly how to use him. The religious nationalists embraced him, anointing him as their chosen leader, even as he violated every principle they once claimed to stand for. The white supremacists marched openly, unafraid, confident that they had found their champion. The men who spent their weekends playing soldier, stockpiling weapons for a fantasy war, suddenly found themselves with real targets.

Cora remembered the shift, how quickly it all happened. One day, everything had been normal, the next, there were armored vehicles in the streets. The government was hollowed out overnight, its agencies filled with loyalists and yes-men. Elections became formalities. Courts bent to his will. The press was first mocked, then threatened, then silenced. The truth was rewritten in real-time.

He ruled by chaos. One crisis to the next, one manufactured disaster after another, his followers too dizzy, too exhausted to question why things never actually got better. He took credit for victories that weren’t his, blamed others for his own failures, and when all else failed, he simply lied. It didn’t matter that his contradictions were obvious. It didn’t matter that he had no answers. His people didn’t need answers. They needed him.

She thought back to his speeches, the way he would stand before them, basking in their adoration, his face twisted with that smug, self-satisfied grin. He did not love them. He did not respect them. He used them, milked them for everything they had, made himself a billionaire off their desperation, their ignorance, their blind devotion.

And still, they cheered.

Because by the time they realized they had been betrayed, it was already too late.

Now, there was nothing left to stop him.