(Near) Omniscient Villain.

N, the primary antagonist in my story, is known for his ridiculous ability to acquire information, even really private matters. He knows your family line, your shameful and troubling secrets, and vulnerability. He also understands how many factions' power structure works and easily exploits them, like when he completely dismantled one of the biggest companies in the world within a week.

For example, he knows that one of the protagonists used to be a gang leader and another the heir to the family of assasins, and the fact that their mentor is an immortal (how, he doesn't know, although he has a distrubingly close guess.)

In short, he knows pretty much everything about any plot relevant character, and so far the only thing he doesn't know is something that the main character is a Reality Warper.

The problem is, he learn about them within only a year after moving to their country.

Would the fact that he has an exceptionally high information acquirement skill, Superfast Reading, and his occupation as a substitute teacher in their school be enough? Is there any place that teaches you how to acquire information? For one thing, I don't want to give him any superpower, because he's the resident Badass Normal.

edited 28th May '11 9:55:58 AM by dRoy

How does a Badass Normal dismantle a worldwide company in less a week?

He exposed some of the more illegal cost cutting methods it was using and managed to talk the big hands with major stock share to ditch this one. Well, that's...what I think can happen.

Just ditching one of the biggest companies in the world sounds much more catastrophic than entering a long legal procedure, where they can hire the best lawyers in the world and bribe their asses out of it.

Noramlly, yes. But when, after the news got out, some of the most prominent media figures compared you, using the words like "Mengele" and "experiment" along the way, then you are pretty screwed. It does help that he's a lawyer and a dastardly good one at that.

Even in that case, they should still be able hold for half a decade, and minimize their loses by closing and then opening new companies, basically recycling what they already have. Okay, as you describe him, N might be able to find the connections between the old and the new, expose them, and do some more mess, but still, there's no way they will just say "screw this".

Keep in mind, we're talking about one of the biggest companies in the world. No one, absolutely no one wants it to be dismantled. It's against the interests of everyone involved. Polititians, media, other companies, whole countries even.

(I don't really know anything about how these things work though, I'm just using common sense. All of the above may be wrong.)

Believe me, common sense is one of the things that I lack the most. Seriously.

Hmm, you have a point. Gotta rework on that. I'm not really good at this kind of stuff either, but dammit I need a way to show that this guy is a really an evil genius.

So, it's not it. Got to do some research on that. Anyways, how would he be able to acquire so much information in short period of time without being a psychic or such?

edited 28th May '11 10:35:57 AM by dRoy

Internet?

...But even then, that's somewhat pushing it. Sorry, don't really have a serious answer.

edited 28th May '11 10:38:41 AM by Yej

Yeah, neither do I.

If he's alert, and listens to what is going on around him, to what is said about as well as by people when they don't realize anyone is listening, and is generally well-informed about what's going on in the world and has an excellent memory, he could certainly gather a lot more information about people than they expect, faster than they expect, and more accurately than they expect. He probably wouldn't know everything about them, but the examples you give in your second paragraph are not beyond belief.