The morning sun barely pierced the cracks of the crumbling apartment building in the slums of Eastwind City. 18-year-old Evan Thorne sat on the edge of his battered mattress, his body aching from another sleepless night. The tiny room smelled of damp clothes and moldy wood, a reminder of how forgotten he was by the world.
The walls around him were stained with the memories of arguments, slammed doors, and broken dreams. In the corner, an old radio buzzed faintly, struggling to stay alive. His school uniform — a secondhand shirt and pants that clung awkwardly to his tall, skinny frame — lay crumpled at his feet.
Today would be no different.
Today he would be mocked again.
Today he would be humiliated again.
Today he would wish he was invisible.
Evan dragged himself up, staring into the cracked mirror nailed above a rusted sink. His once-hopeful brown eyes now looked hollow, distant, lost. He ran a hand through his messy black hair, exhaling slowly.
His phone, an ancient model with a spiderweb of cracks across the screen, buzzed on the floor.
A text.
From: Unknown
> "You're a joke. Stay home, loser."
He deleted it without reading more.
They always sent the same things.
At Halcyon High, a school where the rich flaunted their glittering watches and electric sports bikes, Evan was nothing but a walking target. His only possessions were the bruises on his ribs, the laughter echoing in his head, and the endless questions — Why me? Why am I alive?
He walked to school with holes in his shoes, the city's cold air biting into his skin. As he reached the towering gates of Halcyon High, gleaming students flooded in — girls draped in designer jackets, boys tossing keys to exotic cars, influencers livestreaming their morning outfits.
Evan kept his head down.
From behind him, Brayden Knox, 19, the school's golden boy and heir to a luxury car empire, slammed a palm into the back of Evan's head.
"Oops. Didn't see the trash walking!" Brayden's voice dripped with mockery.
Everyone around them laughed — even the teachers at the gate. They smiled awkwardly and looked away. No one would challenge Brayden. His father funded half the school's luxuries.
Evan stumbled forward, heat rising to his face.
He wanted to disappear.
But it got worse inside.
In the central courtyard, where a grand fountain sprayed crystalline water into the air, a group of girls — Selena Moore (18, live-streaming queen, blue-dyed hair, piercing green eyes) and her posse — sat at their throne-like marble bench. They saw Evan approaching and whispered between themselves.
Selena turned her phone toward him, broadcasting his entrance live.
"Guys, check out the charity case," she giggled into the camera. Thousands of viewers sent laughing emojis.
Humiliation.
Live.
For the world.
Evan felt something inside him die. Again.
At lunch, he sat alone at a table near the trash cans, his tray holding a dry sandwich and a sour apple. He watched as boys like Axel Hart (18, future racecar driver, arrogant smirk always on) and Derek Vance (19, fashion model, drug addict hidden behind pretty smiles) laughed with girls like Maya Lin (18, upcoming music star, secret heartbreaker) and Tessa Bloom (18, billionaire's daughter, closet sadist).
They lived in another world.
Evan wasn't even a background character in their story.
Across the field, he saw Ms. Lillian Hayes (28, English teacher, devastating beauty, rumored to have secret affairs with students), laughing intimately with Mr. Carter (45, corrupted principal who took bribes to protect the rich kids).
Evan clenched his fists.
Even the adults were twisted.
At night, Evan worked part-time at Gideon's Auto Shop, wiping grease off expensive cars he would never afford. The other workers — middle-aged men broken by life — barely spoke to him. He was invisible here, too.
After his shift, he trudged home through alleys thick with the stench of rotting garbage and the murmurs of drug dealers selling fake dreams.
That night, as he collapsed into his bed, wondering if anything would ever change, he noticed a faint glimmer beneath the bed frame.
Curious, he reached under and pulled out a strange device — small, metallic, cold to the touch, shaped like a curved shard of glass. A faint blue light pulsed at its center.
Screen flicker:
> Welcome, Evan Thorne.
Your pain has been acknowledged.
Tasks will be assigned. Rewards will be unimaginable.
But failure... will cost you everything.
His heart pounded in his ears.
For the first time in his broken life, Evan felt a whisper of something unfamiliar.
Hope.
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