He returned to his room after dinner. As he left the dining room, his father gave him a slight nod. His mother offered a brief phrase:
"Good night, Álvaro."
"Rest well," he replied.
Nothing more. Nothing less. It was protocol. Efficient, respectful. There were no smiles or hugs, but there was acknowledgment. A calibrated farewell.
The door closed behind him with a pneumatic whisper. He took off the uniform and placed it into the cleaning assistant. The system absorbed it silently, releasing steam and nanofilaments to restore it to optimal condition. The room dimmed to nighttime lighting. The temperature dropped by half a degree.
Álvaro sat on the bed and, for the first time that day, let go of the character.
He took a deep breath.
Then lay down.
The resting surface adapted to his posture with a muscular support system designed for high-performance students. It wasn't soft. It was precise. Every fiber of his body aligned with the rest pattern the corporation deemed "optimal."
He looked at the ceiling. Dim light. Silence.
Time to think.
He activated the pad with a gesture and placed it on his chest. The floating panel projected into the air with a soft hum.
User: Álvaro Reinos Projected cognitive capacity: 170.4% base efficiency No medical alerts. No locks. No restrictions.
He didn't react. Didn't smile. Didn't frown. He just stared at it.
That number wasn't supposed to exist. Not in a student. Not in someone his age. But there it was. Stable. Validated. No anomalies flagged by the system.
The information required no interpretation. Only utilization.
He reviewed files. Tactical diagrams, urban combat simulations, legal databases. His mind absorbed them. Not just memorized: it classified, sorted, extrapolated. As if his neural network were optimizing in real time.
He closed the tab after twenty minutes. What would've taken days of study now felt elementary.
His account balance was pathetic.
A digital figure barely enough to cover nutritional supplements, study materials, and basic academic content licenses. Transport, housing, and university were handled directly by his parents through the family system. He wasn't even authorized to move assets—much less invest.
Total dependence. No margin. No capital.
He closed the tab with a soft blink. The reflection of nighttime Madrid returned his gaze from the glass.
There was stability. Security. Resources assigned with precision.But if he wanted to move, to act on his own...he needed a different kind of tool.
And above all, he needed money.
He lay back again. The pad floated in suspension above the bedside table while he closed his eyes. Not to sleep. Just to think.
He could learn anything he wanted. His mind was in a state of constant absorption.Every piece of data, every fragment of code, every mental model stuck with him as if he had memorized it ten times.
That was an advantage.
But advantage wasn't power.And in this world, power had a price.
Paid by those who knew when to move.And he… was still calibrating.
He sat up slowly. His mind never stopped working, but he needed to disconnect. Not fully, just enough not to overheat.
He searched through the terminal's functions for something he hadn't looked at since his first academic year: rest music. He still remembered it. Sleeping with music was an old habit. Something that connected him to a part of himself that wasn't strategy or calculation. Just instinct. Feeling.
He activated the playback module. The system offered a series of predefined playlists, most aimed at bodily relaxation or sleep stimulation. He dismissed them.
He opened a blank list and began loading it from the available files.
He didn't think too much about the order. Let intuition handle it. Selected fragments from known genres: synthetic pop, classic rock, heavy thrash, electro EDM. Rhythms that felt familiar, though distant.
Then he explored the new genres. The ones of this era. Some he didn't even know how to pronounce:
— Neurowave: binaural pulses and frequencies that stimulated specific areas of the limbic system.— Synth-Grime: aggressive mix of glitch-hop and white noise with vocal layers processed beyond human.— Chrome Blues: slow, ambient melodies with impossible instruments and digital echoes.— Streetcore: beats with urban loops, compressed city sounds, percussion recorded from real protests.
He let the system choose the order. The first track began with a soft synth intro and a female voice filtered through vintage modulators. The volume was calibrated not to interfere with sleep patterns.
He turned off the floating projection and lay down again.
The music slid through the room like a sonic mist, soft and steady. Álvaro closed his eyes, letting each beat carry him, little by little, away from logic, from analysis, from constant vigilance.
He wasn't thinking about strategies. Not yet. Nor tactics. Nor paths.
He just… rested.
The night passed without incident.And for the first time since he awoke, he slept deeply.