Max woke up the next morning to the pale blue light bleeding in through the cracks in the dorm blinds. He didn't move at first—just lay there, cocooned in his blanket, half-dreaming, half-aware. Then, with the sluggish defiance of someone who'd gotten too used to cheap pillows and hard mattresses, he reached over and grabbed his phone off the nightstand.
A few taps. Facial recognition. Banking app.
Balance: 32,801,287 crowns.
He stared at the number like it might suddenly vanish.
Max blinked, then slowly let out a breath that turned into a laugh. A small one at first—quiet and unsure—until it grew into something breathless, stunned, almost unhinged.
"I think I just found a cheat code to infinite money," he muttered, rubbing a hand through his already-messy, brown fluffy hair. "Need to figure out what to invest in next…"
He dropped the phone on his chest and stared up at the ceiling, a grin carving itself into his face.
"I'm really rich," he said, the words barely above a whisper—like he still didn't believe them. "I've never had money before. Not like this. And now I've got so much I don't even know what to do with it."
He sat up slowly, the blanket pooling around his waist, still grinning to himself like the punchline of a joke only he understood. The floor was cold beneath his feet, the tile sending a chill up his spine as he dragged himself into the bathroom. The shower hissed awake. Hot water poured down on him like a baptism in steam and clarity.
His thoughts stirred, tangled between ambition and invention.
Alright, gadgets, he thought as water ran down his back, washing away the haze of sleep. Now that I've got the money, I can actually make this happen. No more scrap-metal improvisation or praying for a black market sale.
A pulse of excitement thudded in his chest.
'Imagine this… I dash in, low profile, blade hits flesh—and just as I pass, dynamite goes off behind me. Controlled, timed. Boom. They're down before they even get to scream.'
He smirked, steam curling around his face.
' Yeah… that could work.'
The shower shut off with a sharp twist. Max dried off, still lost in the blueprint forming in his head. Gears, ignition triggers, reinforced pouches that wouldn't explode if someone bumped into him wrong. The logistics weren't glamorous, but that was the part most people skipped when they imagined genius.
He got dressed mechanically, throwing on a black turtleneck and his academy jacket, hair still a little damp and unruly. The toaster clicked to life as he threw two slices of bread in and leaned against the counter, the scent of scorched crumbs already filling the room.
Then.
Ding-dong.
His doorbell. Max's eyes narrowed slightly.
Nobody had ever visited him. Not once since he arrived at Nexus.
So when the doorbell rang, it cut through the quiet like a scalpel.
Max paused. Stared at the door from across the room. Then walked over, slow and cautious, and looked through the peephole.
Nothing.
His brow twitched. Ding-dong ditchers? Seriously?
He opened the door anyway, more curious than cautious now, and looked down. An envelope lay neatly on the welcome mat—white, unmarked, save for a wax seal hastily pressed and already cracking at the edges.
Max stared at it for a second longer than necessary, then picked it up and stepped back inside, locking the door behind him.
He tore it open, unfolded the letter, and scanned the words.
"Actions have consequences. You need to repay for what you did."
That was it. No signature, no sender.
Max exhaled through his nose and sat on the edge of his bed, letter dangling between his fingers.
"Threatening letters," he muttered. "Fantastic."
His eyes drifted to the ceiling, tracing invisible guilt lines.
"Who the hell sends a threat to a nobody?" he said aloud. "Who have I even pissed off? …Hmm."
A pause.
"…Harry. Or Richard. The pond guys." He groaned. "Goddammit."
He crumpled the note and tossed it into the wastebasket with a flick of the wrist. It bounced off the rim, hit the floor, and he didn't bother picking it up.
"Ruined my morning," Max grumbled, dragging a hand down his face. "And I haven't even had my damn toast."
…
It was Saturday, no classes, no mandatory events. Just silence, the kind that settled into the walls and stayed there.
Max sat cross-legged at his desk, notebook open in front of him. The pages were scrawled with looping thoughts and hastily drawn diagrams, ink bleeding where he'd pressed too hard.
A pen tapped against the edge of the wood, his mind slowly sorting itself out.
'I already use knives… kinda redundant to go overboard there. But maybe extra daggers—throwables or ones hidden in my sleeves? Hm. Possible. Something quick. Something quiet.'
He scratched that thought out halfway through, moved his pen down the margin.
'Dynamite first.'
That got circled three times. He leaned back in his chair, eyes narrowing as he imagined the flow of movement, the rhythm of a fight.
…
Max stepped out of his dorm, the door clicking shut behind him with the familiar dull finality of solitude. The air was warm, touched by the hum of the courtyard's soft electrical buzz—solar lamps overhead, clean pavement underfoot, polished too often for anyone to care.
The first person he saw was Skylar, sitting by the edge of the courtyard fountain, legs crossed, posture effortless. She was talking to a guy—tall, silver hair, low voice. Someone Max didn't recognize, and didn't really need to.
'The Big Five's split up today,' Max noted, eyes flicking from Skylar to the quiet absence of the others. 'I need a better nickname for them. Something less dramatic.'
He didn't pause as he walked. Just let his steps guide him through the small crowd gathered near the front gate—students gathering in clumps, voices overlapping, laughter here, a complaint there. Weekend freedom brought with it a tide of energy, and Max let himself drift with it.
Out past the courtyard's edge, the academy ended. The city began.
Glass towers rose like daggers stabbed into the sky, lights blinking across mirrored surfaces. Flying cars zipped along invisible lanes overhead, weaving through the concrete horizon. Massive digital billboards lined the upper walls, streaming bright advertisements for monster contracts, combat gear, energy drinks, and private guild recruitments.
Max adjusted his collar and kept moving.
He still relied on his GPS—flicking his phone up now and then, its dull blue glow guiding him through streets he hadn't memorized yet. Nexus City was vast, layered in a way that made every corner feel like it was hiding something. Even after three weeks, Max barely knew where anything was.
Crowds moved past him in all directions—monster trainers with reinforced cases slung across their backs, mechanics in oil-stained uniforms, merchants shouting from under tech-draped stalls. A man walked by with a mechanical hawk perched on his shoulder. Another held a glowing briefcase that let out the faint hum of compressed mana.
It wasn't a city designed to be gentle.
It was alive with friction. With movement. With possibilities. And underneath all of it—danger.
Max stuck close to the edge of the walkway, hands in his pockets, watching for the place he'd marked on his phone. The alchemy shop.
When he found it, it barely looked like a shop at all. No flashy signs, no glass front. Just an old brick building wedged between a weaponsmith and a half-shuttered potion bar, its entrance marked only by a small brass placard: "Elixium."
He stepped up to the door, brushed his fingers across the plate, and pushed it open.
A dull bell rang overhead, but the scent hit him first—thick with crushed herbs, old parchment, and something vaguely metallic. It was warm inside. Warmer than it had any right to be. Rows of jars lined the walls, some glowing faintly, others filled with powders or floating organs. Instruments clicked and whirred on the counters—alchemy rigs mid-process, half-built bombs cooling under protective glass.
The bell above the door didn't chime—it groaned, like it resented being disturbed.
Max stepped inside. The shop smelled like burnt sugar and copper, thick and clinging to the throat. Vials lined the walls in cracked wooden shelves, each with a label scrawled in a handwriting only its author could understand. Glass glinted in the low light. A faint hissing came from somewhere in the back.
Behind the counter, Riley didn't look up. She had on a pair of oversized goggles that made her eyes bug out unnaturally, and her hands were wrapped tight around a vial of something thick and bubbling. It hissed like it was alive.
"Shop's open," she muttered, waving one hand vaguely at the shelves without taking her eyes off her work. "No bartering, no returns, no mana on site. If it explodes, it's your problem."
Max let the door close behind him, the noise swallowed by the heavy air. "Hello."
Riley blinked behind the lenses. Her voice perked up. "Max? That you?"
He raised an eyebrow. "You remember me?"
"Of course I do. Who else walks into an alchemy shop asking for a training dummy?" she said, finally glancing up, goggles pushed to her forehead. Her red hair was messily tied up in a way that suggested she hadn't slept properly in at least two nights.
"Is it holding up?"
"Use it every day," Max replied.
"Sweet," she said, grinning. "That one had a lot of glue and just a little blood in it. Pretty sure it's illegal to sell, but, y'know, minor detail."
She went back to stirring the concoction in the vial with a glass rod that had seen better years. Sparks hissed up the sides. "I'm trying to make something that boosts fire resistance, but the ingredients don't want to play nice."
Max leaned on the counter, eyes scanning the chaos of her workbench. "Crazy that you can drink something and suddenly fire just... doesn't burn you."
Riley shrugged. "Not that crazy. I've made worse. Or better. Depending on how you define 'crazy.' One time, I made a potion that lets you scream at a pitch that shatters teeth."
He looked at her. "Why?"
"Commissioned by a bard with anger issues," she said without hesitation.
There was a beat of silence between them, broken only by the bubbling of the potion and the distant hum of some machine in the back room.
"I'm in the market for explosives," Max said casually, eyes drifting toward a cluttered shelf stacked with sealed crates, none of them labeled.
He paused, then nodded toward the bubbling vial. "And… was that potion a joke?"
Riley snorted. "Of course it was a joke. I'd never sell teeth-shattering potions to bards with anger issues." She leaned back, smirking under the weight of her goggles. "I gave it to him for free."
Max blinked, but let it slide. "Right."
She pushed the vial onto a metal tray, then turned fully toward him. "So explosives. What are we talking about? Smoke bombs? Impact charges? Napalm-in-a-bottle?"
"Dynamite," Max said flatly.