For a while in the mid-2000s, a refrigerator-sized box in Abu Dhabi was considered the largest chess player in the world. Its name is Hydraand it’s a tiny super-computer—a cabinet full of industrial-grade processors and specially designed chips, connected by fiber-optic cables and jacked up to the internet.

At a time when chess was still the primary gladiatorial arena for competition between humans and AI, Hydra and its exploits were briefly the stuff of legend. The New Yorker PUBLISHED a thoughtful 5,000-word piece about its emerging creativity; WIRED stated Hydra “TERRIBLE”; and chess publications covered its victories with the ferocity of wrestling commentary. Hydra, they wrote, is a “monster machine” that “slowly strangles” human masters.

True to form as a monster, Hydra is also isolated and strange. The other advanced chess engines of the time—Hydra’s rivals—ran on ordinary PCs and were available for anyone to download. But the full power of Hydra’s 32-processor cluster can only be used by one person at a time. And by the summer of 2005, even members of Hydra’s development team were struggling to change their creation.

That’s because the team’s patron—the 36-year-old Emirati man who hired them and put up the money for Hydra’s souped-up hardware—is too busy reaping his reward. In an online chess forum in 2005, Hydra’s Austrian chief architect, Chrilly Donninger, described this benefactor as the greatest “computer chess freak” alive. “The sponsor,” he wrote, “want to play day and night with Hydra.”

Under the username zor_champ, the Emirati sponsor logs into online chess tournaments and, together with Hydra, plays as a human-computer team. More often than not, they win the competition. “He loved the power of man and machine,” one engineer told me. “He likes to win.”

Hydra was eventually overtaken by other chess computers and was discontinued in the late 2000s. But zor_champ has become one of the most powerful, most misunderstood people in the world. His real name is Sheikh Tahnoun bin Zayed al Nahyan.

A bearded, hairy man who is almost invisible without dark sunglasses, Tahnoun is the United Arab Emirates’ national security adviser—the intelligence chief of one of the richest and happiest countries in the world. He is also the younger brother of the country’s hereditary, autocratic president, Mohamed bin Zayed al Nahyan. But perhaps most importantly, and most surprisingly for a spy, Tahnoun has official control over much of Abu Dhabi’s vast wealth. Bloomberg News reported last year that he directly oversees a $1.5 trillion empire—more money than anyone else on the planet.

In his personal style, Tahnoun comes across as a third Gulf king, a third fitness-minded tech promoter, and a third Bond villain. Among his many, many business interests, he heads a sprawling tech conglomerate called G42 (a book reference. the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, where “42” is a super-computer answer to the question of “life, the universe, and everything”). The G42 has a hand in everything from AI research to biotechnology—with special areas of state-sponsored hacking and surveillance powers. Tahnoun is passionate about Brazilian jiujitsu and cycling. He wears his sunglasses even at the gym due to light sensitivity, and he surrounds himself with UFC champions and mixed martial arts fighters.

According to a businessman and a security consultant who have met with Tahnoun, visitors who pass his ranks of loyal gatekeepers may have the opportunity to speak with him only after cycling with the sheikh around his private velodrome. He has been known to spend hours in a flotation chamber, the consultant said, and has flown in health guru Peter Attia to the UAE to offer guidance on longevity. According to a businessman who attended the discussion, Tahnoun even encouraged Mohammed bin Salman, the powerful crown prince of Saudi Arabia, to cut out fast food and join him in his quest to live to 150.