The sky over Gravesford City always looked like it was mourning — a heavy, dirty gray that blurred into the cracked streets below.
The bells of Redthorn High screamed into the morning like wounded animals, dragging students into another day of pretend smiles and invisible wars.
Nathaniel "Nate" Carter, 18 years old, brown-eyed, dark-haired, with a frame too thin for the fights life threw at him, dragged his worn-out sneakers across the broken pavement. His faded backpack slapped against his spine with each reluctant step.
No one waited for him at the gate. No one ever did.
And he liked to think it was better that way.
Nate lived in the slums of West Grave Alley, a place where the graffiti told more truth than the news and where a boy could lose his soul trying to find his next meal. His mother had vanished when he was ten, swallowed by addiction and a boyfriend with fists harder than promises. His father... well, if the bars down 7th Street had a king, it was him.
As Nate passed through the rusted gates of Redthorn, sneers clung to him like flies.
A group of rich boys lounged near the courtyard statue, their designer shoes untouched by dust, their laughter sharp as knives.
Cameron Hale, the soccer star dripping in new wealth, elbowed his friend and pointed.
"Look, it's charity case Carter," he said loud enough for everyone to hear.
The circle of girls around him giggled, their perfect teeth like weapons.
Nate lowered his head.
He knew the rules.
Poor kids don't fight. Poor kids survive.
The school halls reeked of cologne and broken dreams. The lockers were lined with flyers for upcoming Galas and After-Parties, exclusive to anyone who mattered — and Nate, despite four years of grinding, would never matter.
He caught a glimpse of his reflection in a cracked trophy case:
Tired eyes. Calloused hands. A hoodie two years too old.
He looked like a mistake.
In Literature class, Ms. Elara Monroe — 26, with scandalous curves hidden poorly under tight blouses and a secret relationship with the Dean — called on him to read aloud.
On purpose.
As punishment.
His voice caught halfway through the poem, rough from the cold mornings sleeping without heat.
The class roared in laughter.
Elara's lips twitched into a cruel smile.
At lunch, he sat alone behind the old gym, unwrapping a squashed peanut butter sandwich. The air smelled like burnt rubber from the Auto Shop across the street, where kids from better families customized cars they'd crash before graduation.
His phone, an ancient cracked model, buzzed once. A text from Jenna Brooks.
Come to the party 2nite. Maybe u'll get lucky ;)
Hope leapt into his chest before crashing down. He wasn't stupid.
He knew the game.
Girls like Jenna loved to tease the poor boys.
Loved to pretend for a night before disappearing into BMWs and penthouses.
Still.
Still he answered.
I'll be there.
Because even hope, when you're dying inside, is better than silence.
---
That night, the Luxmoor Estate looked like a temple built for gods.
Gold lights strung across marble columns. A pool bigger than Nate's entire block shimmered under the stars.
Inside, the house throbbed with music and bodies and laughter he wasn't invited into.
He found Jenna upstairs, her dress tight enough to suffocate morals. She giggled and pressed herself against him for the cameras, whispering into his ear.
"You're my charity case tonight, Nate. Smile for the streamers, baby."
Phones flashed.
Comments flooded in real-time:
"Poor boy gets lucky!"
"She's doing a dare lol."
"Ew, he smells like the gutter!"
"Look at his shoes hahaha!!"
The laughter was a hammer.
It drove nails into every part of him that still believed he could be loved.
Humiliation poured over him in waves, thick and choking.
Jenna kissed him roughly, all tongue and cruelty, before laughing in his face and disappearing into the arms of another boy — a boy who owned three cars and an apartment at seventeen.
Nate stumbled into the night, stomach heaving, heart a crumpled mess of torn dreams.
He wandered into the junkyard behind the Auto Shop, broken headlights like dead eyes staring at him.
That's when he saw it.
Buried under a pile of rusted metal and shattered dreams, something pulsed faintly.
A black, smooth device — shaped like a flattened stone, no bigger than his palm.
It throbbed with a strange, deep blue light, almost... breathing.
Something ancient and hungry seemed to slither out of it as he picked it up.
A whisper slid into his mind:
"Complete the tasks.
Win your life back.
Fail... and lose more than you know."
The first task flashed across the device's cracked surface:
"Steal the key to your enemy's kingdom. 6 hours. Reward: Dignity restored. Penalty: Public humiliation ×10."
Nate's hands shook.
He looked back toward the mansion glowing in the distance.
His fists clenched.
Tears blurred his vision.
He had nothing left to lose.
Except maybe... the small part of him that still believed tomorrow might be better.
With the device buzzing in his hand, Nate took his first step toward a destiny forged not by luck, but by pain, rage, and desperation.
He didn't know it yet.
But nothing — not school, not his enemies, not the world itself — would ever be the same again.
---