Can relate to your post. Our situations are very similar. I am around your age, and lost my N-father when I was 18. I went NC with my N-mother a few years ago.

I know this is really messed up, but I was honestly rationalizing to myself that I had to play nice with him at this point so I wouldn't be removed from his will. He just retired and his health is questionable.

You already know all this, but odds are he will remove you from the will anyway. Even if you "play nice" for the rest of his life, he'll either find some reason to "disqualify" you and remove you from the will, or he'll spend every dime he has so he has nothing left to leave you. Either way, trying to get any kind of inheritance from a narcissist is an exercise in futility.

But it's such a relief to no longer need anything from them. They no longer get to hold any kind of leverage over you, and that is a really empowering feeling. It makes you immune to anything they try.

I feel so much better. But now I need to know where to start as far as building a new life, independent of all of this abuse. It's a bit overwhelming. But I am excited. I finally did it. I've held it in my whole life. It's forced me to stay a child in my adulthood. I am too smart. I can't be manipulated without knowing it anymore. That's what made it so painful. I knew I needed to separate myself and I never did. I just kept walking into the same shitty situation. Hurting myself while hoping to make him happy (and others.)

Well, I can tell you what I did: I moved to a city where I no longer needed a car. Where I live, public transport commonplace, and it is more than enough to get to where you need to go. And jobs are everywhere in the event that you need to switch to something else. I also live in a doorman building, which means even if my N-mother wanted to fly over here to harass me, she wouldn't be able to get past the lobby. The city is also an expensive place to buy a house, which means she would have to downsize her lifestyle significantly if she wanted to move here. A city is also nice because there are people everywhere, activities going on all over the place, etc, so it's a great way to meet people, make friends, etc.