The rain in Minato City was a dull, gray sheet. It turned the neon signs of the Grand Aether Hotel into smears of electric blue on the pavement.
Behind the obsidian front desk, I stood with the kind of perfect posture that usually hid a very deep desire to be anywhere else. I glanced at my reflection in the polished stone. Floating just three inches above my dark hair was my soul's official rating—a pale, flickering holographic number.
[ 0.01 ]
Look at that, I thought, staring at the number with a practiced weariness. It's not even a solid color today. My soul is literally a low-battery notification. If I sneeze too hard, do I just cease to exist?
I reached into my vest pocket. My fingers grazed a stack of vintage "21 and Up" greeting cards. They were "affectionate" relics from a century ago, full of soft colors and cursive handwriting.
In a city obsessed with Aether-levels, these cards were my secret rebellion. They were real. They were warm. They reminded me that humans used to be more than just decimal points.
"Hey! Zero! Are you meditating or just rebooting?"
The voice hit me like a wet sack of flour. I didn't have to look up to know the air in the lobby now smelled like an expensive campfire and a mid-life crisis.
[ 64.2 ]
Kaito Sato marched toward the desk. He was draped in a coat of synthetic white fur that seemed to vibrate with its own golden light. Sato was a "Solar-Tier," a man whose rating was so high he probably didn't have to use a microwave—he just looked at his food until it cooked.
"The Penthouse," Sato barked, slamming a gold-plated ID onto the desk. "Now."
"Welcome back, Mr. Sato," I said. My voice was flat and professional. "Unfortunately, the penthouse is currently undergoing a mandatory Aether-purge. It will be ready in six minutes."
Sato leaned over the counter. His golden eyes fixed on my 0.01.
"Did you just give me a 'six-minute' ETA? To my face?"
He looked at me like I was a bug he stepped on.
"Do you have any idea what my time is worth? I could buy this hotel and turn it into a parking lot before you finish that sentence."
Suddenly, his hand shot out.
He grabbed me by the silk tie and yanked me across the desk. My feet left the floor.
Great, I thought, my vision swimming. This tie was dry-cleaned yesterday. That's five credits I'm never getting back.
"Listen to me, you glitch," Sato hissed.
His free hand began to glow. A searing golden heat bloomed inches from my throat.
"You are background noise. If I burned you to ash right now, the police wouldn't even file a report. They'd call it a janitorial service."
I felt the heat singeing the hair on my neck. My heart was a hammer against my ribs. He's actually going to do it. He's going to kill me over six minutes.
Panic finally broke through my exhaustion. As Sato's palm moved closer, I instinctively reached out. My fingers were trembling. I just wanted to push him away.
My palm landed flat against Sato's forearm.
The world didn't just stop. It went silent.
The hum of the air conditioner, the rain on the glass—everything vanished. In the void of my mind, a screen appeared. It wasn't the public blue. It was a deep, aggressive Yellow.
[ WARNING: UNKNOWN SOUL-CONTACT DETECTED ]
[ RULE 10 ACTIVATED: COLLECTING THE 10% SERVICE FEE ]
Service fee? Am I... am I having a stroke?
A surge of liquid warmth flooded my veins. It was the most intense sensation I had ever felt—a rush of raw, vibrant heat that felt like a long-forgotten memory.
I felt a golden thread, thick and heavy, tear away from Sato's core. It fused into my nervous system.
It was Solar Aether. And it was mine now.
Sato's face went pale. The bronze glow in his eyes flickered like a dying bulb. He let go of my tie, stumbling back as if I'd kicked him in the chest.
Behind him, his bodyguards lunged forward, but they stopped dead three feet away. Their own holographic numbers started spinning wildly, throwing [ ERROR ] codes across the lobby. They looked at their HUDs, then at me.
Their faces twisted with a sudden, instinctive fear.
"My... my breath..." Sato gasped, clutching his chest.
He looked at his reflection in the obsidian counter.
[ 64.2 ] → [ 57.8 ]
Sato let out a raw, desperate sound. "My rating... it's leaking! What did you do? What are you?!"
I stood there. My hands were shaking so violently I had to grip the edge of the desk.
I felt sick. I felt powerful.
I felt like my blood was made of carbonated lightning.
What is this? Why is everything so loud? I could hear the hum of the lightbulbs. I could see the individual fibers of the carpet.
"Mr. Sato," I said.
My voice sounded different—deeper, vibrating in my own skull.
"You seem to be... having a technical difficulty. I suggest you sit down before you drop into the forties. It would be a shame to lose your executive parking spot over a lobby dispute."
Sato backed away. His bodyguards grabbed his arms, moving with the frantic energy of men trying to get a wounded king away from a monster.
As the elevator doors slammed shut, I let out a long, shaky breath. I stared at the yellow screen in my mind, waiting for it to go away.
It didn't.
[ CURRENT HARVEST: 6.4 AETHER UNITS ]
[ STATUS: UNREGISTERED ]
This isn't happening. I'm a 0.01. I don't do this.
I looked up at my own number.
[ 0.01 ]
The public system still called me a loser. The yellow screen in my mind said something very different.
I leaned against the obsidian desk to steady my jelly-like legs.
Cr-rrack. I jumped back, my eyes wide. The heavy stone didn't just break; it shattered into black dust under the spot where my palm had been resting.
I looked at my hand. Then at the wreckage of the desk.
The sheer weight of what just happened finally hit me. Ten thousand credits of obsidian. A Solar-Tier executive's soul.
"Oh, god," I whispered, my voice cracking. "There goes my paycheck."