The reception area of the City Council Speaker’s Office.

The walls were covered in deep red wallpaper, hung with photographs mounted in heavy, golden frames.

They were photos of Thomas Moretti with the past few Mayors of Pittsburgh.

From the earliest, a World War II veteran mayor wearing a formal hat, to the recently unseated Martin Carter Wright.

In the photos, they were smiling, shaking hands, or signing documents.

And Moretti was always standing beside them, or just slightly behind.

His hair had gone from black to white, his face from smooth to wrinkled, but his smile was like an unchanging mask.

Leo sat on the somewhat sagging leather sofa, looking at the photos on the wall.

These photos told everyone who walked in here: Mayors were transient. They came and went. Some moved up, some went to prison, some were forgotten.

But he, Moretti, was permanent.

He was the true master of this building.

Leo glanced at the watch on his wrist.

Twelve-twenty.

A full ten minutes had passed since the scheduled appointment time.

The arrogant female secretary was still sitting behind her desk, head bowed as she painted her nails, not even having offered Leo a glass of water.

Leo knew this slight was no accident.

Without Moretti’s approval, she wouldn’t have dared to leave the current mayor hanging here like a door-to-door salesman, not if she had ten times the nerve.

It was a negotiation tactic, designed to wear down an opponent’s will by wasting their time.

Reason told him he had to remain patient, that he couldn’t lose his composure before even meeting the man himself.

But the pressure of his duties was like a constantly tightening spring.

As the chief executive of a city with a population of three hundred thousand, his schedule was already meticulously planned down to the minute.

His mind couldn’t help but calculate the cost of time: if he was delayed here for ten minutes, the three o’clock fiscal budget seminar would have to be postponed, the four-thirty document signing with Ethan would have to be rushed, and even the afternoon press conference schedule Sarah was waiting to confirm would be affected.

Everything was interlinked; a delay in any one part would trigger a chain reaction.

Without Leo even realizing it, a subconscious anxiety began to seep from his pores, filling the air.

His fingers began to unconsciously tap against the armrest of the sofa, the rhythm growing faster and faster, making a rapid TAP, TAP, TAP sound.

’Calm down, Leo.’

Roosevelt’s voice rang in his mind.

’I know your impatience isn’t intentional. It’s just your body’s instinctive reaction to stress.’

’But as a leader, you must learn to suppress that instinct, not be driven by it.’

Roosevelt’s voice paused. ’Forget that damn schedule. Ethan’s documents, Sarah’s press conference, even that so-called fiscal budget seminar—right now, none of it is more important than the closed door in front of you.’

’Why?’ Leo retorted in his mind. ’Moretti just wants to humiliate me. I know this conversation won’t lead to anything substantive. I’m just wasting my time here. Besides getting provoked, I don’t see the point.’

’The point is the balance of power, my boy. This is the geometry of power.’

’What geometry? This is clearly just him showing off his arrogance.’

’No, it’s a necessary check,’ Roosevelt explained patiently. ’Local politics in the United States is like an extremely unstable geometric solid.’

’You’re the Mayor. You represent executive power. You want to spend money, start construction projects, and deliver on your campaign promises. You want to step on the gas and make the engine of this Pittsburgh car roar.’

’And Moretti is the City Council. He represents legislative power and the authority to approve the budget. What he can do is step on the brakes.’

’His existence, from the very design of the system, is to prevent some passionate but inexperienced young driver from driving the car too fast and ending up in a fatal crash.’

Roosevelt’s voice turned serious. ’If you lose your composure now out of impatience, or storm out because you think it’s "pointless," then you won’t just lose this confrontation. You’ll also be showing Moretti your weakness—that you can’t handle pressure.’

’Back in my day, I faced situations like this countless times.’

’In 1935, those four old stubborn fools on the Supreme Court used a single ruling to abolish my National Industrial Recovery Act. That was the cornerstone of my New Deal, my last hope of saving this country’s economy.’

’Justice McReynolds even turned his back on me in public, refusing to even look me in the eye.’

’At the time, I had a radical bill on my desk to pack the court. All I had to do was sign it to trigger a constitutional crisis and send those old men packing.’

’Then there was 1939, and Senator Bola, an isolationist from Idaho.’

’While I was trying to send aid to a London being bombed by the Nazis, he was in the Senate, grandstanding, claiming he had better intelligence than the State Department and asserting that war would never break out in Europe.’

’I sat by the radio, listening to him spout that nonsense, blocking every bullet destined for the United Kingdom. At that moment, I wanted nothing more than to storm into the Congress Building and sew his mouth shut myself.’

’But both times, I held back.’

’So you must learn to distinguish priorities,’ Roosevelt’s tone was calm yet powerful. ’This is a required course on power.’

’Who holds the dominant position in this relationship, who can find the fulcrum in this geometric solid—that is far more important than how many documents you have to sign or how many reporters you have to face today.’