The siren is chewing the air to ribbons when Jace moves.
He taps Cashback Welfare.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Attribute Point assigned: Cashback track.[WELFARE] Money L1 · Cashback L1[ATTRIBUTE POINTS] 0
"Gentlemen!" The RA appears in their doorway mid-blink of the strobe, clipboard clenched like a riot shield. "Stairwell now. No elevator. IDs out."
"On it," Jace says. Phone–wallet–keys vanish into his pockets. He nudges Max into the hallway, shoulders sliding past pajama legs and blanket capes and one guy balancing a goldfish like a sacred relic.
The stairwell swallows them—concrete throat, metal steps, a river of feet. The alarm ricochets off the cinderblock so hard you can taste copper. Jace plants his hand on the rail; it's sticky with cold. Someone two flights up stumbles; the stream compresses, shudders; he gives ground, absorbs it, keeps momentum.
"You okay?" Max yells near his ear.
"Ask me in a minute," Jace yells back, counting landings under his breath: fourth—third—second—lobby.
The double doors cough them into fluorescent light and scuffed tile. The RA at the front desk windmills people toward the exit. Jace peels left instead, a small refusal.
"Bro, now?" Max says, trotting to keep up.
"Science," Jace says, planting in front of the vending machine. It hums in its little cove, glass clean as an aquarium. He digs coins: 50¢, 50¢, $1, $1, $1. The digits climb to $3.00. B-2. The coil coughs. A bottle thuds into the tray.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Spend detected: $3.00.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Evaluating Talent…[SYSTEM PROMPT] Cashback: ×3.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Disbursement today: +$9.00 to host wallet.
His phone buzzes; +$9 lands with a tidy tap. Jace passes Max the bottle like it's proof of gravity. The RA barks "Outside!" again, and they spill through the doors into the cold.
The muster lot is all breath clouds and flip-flops and a barefoot kid swearing vengeance on asphalt. The alarm keeps chewing at the building's concrete lungs. A girl in a comforter burrito films the moment like it's an animal sighting.
Max cracks the cap with his teeth, gulps, blinks. "Did you just make money on water?"
"On a test," Jace says. The panel floats at the edge of his vision like a polite ghost. "We ladder."
"Ladder?"
"Small, separate spends," Jace says, voice even. "Each one rolls. Daily cap is $100,000. No loans. No system cash. We stack reps and outpace zeroes."
Max stares like he's seeing the outline of a hidden staircase. "So vending. Then what?"
"Campus store: toothpaste, razors, phone card, transit load. Separate receipts." Jace's breath leaves his mouth in measured steam. "Then dinner. We pay upfront to force variance."
"And if it rolls a zero?"
"Then I spent exactly what I planned to spend," Jace says. "Odds don't care about feelings."
A campus cop raises a bullhorn. "All clear. Alarm reset. Please re-enter in an orderly manner."
They fold back toward the doors with the crowd. Heat hits as soon as the lobby swallows them again. Jace slides left—two steps off the mat—through the little gate into the campus store that glows like a fish tank of caffeine and regret. The bell tinks without enthusiasm.
The cashier—ponytail, paperback, posture of someone who has seen finals week from both sides of the counter—looks up. "Evening."
"Evening," Jace says, hooking a basket. "Ring items separately? Receipts, please."
"That's fine," she says, thumb keeping her place on the page.
He works the list fast because speed is a kind of control.
Toothpaste ($7). Tap. Beep. The thermal printer chatters and spits.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Spend detected: $7.00.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Evaluating Talent…[SYSTEM PROMPT] Cashback: ×2.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Disbursement today: +$14.00.
Wallet total climbs. Receipt #1 slides toward him like a little flag.
Razor blades ($8). Tap. Beep. Printer again.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Spend detected: $8.00.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Evaluating Talent…[SYSTEM PROMPT] Cashback: ×3.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Disbursement today: +$24.00.
Receipt #2 lands. Max watches like blinking will scare the numbers away.
Phone card ($20). Tap. The cashier scratches a code, scans it into the ether.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Spend detected: $20.00.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Evaluating Talent…[SYSTEM PROMPT] Cashback: ×2.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Disbursement today: +$40.00.
Receipt #3 spears onto the tiny metal spike by the till.
Transit card load ($50). Tap. The reader blinks green; the transit card drinks its fill.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Spend detected: $50.00.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Evaluating Talent…[SYSTEM PROMPT] Cashback: ×3.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Disbursement today: +$150.00.
The panel obliges a glance with neat arithmetic:
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Total cashback disbursed today: +$237.00.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Daily cap remaining (Cashback): $99,763.00.[WELFARE] Money L1 · Cashback L1
The cashier eyes the small, proud stack of receipts. "You building a budget or a shrine?"
"A ladder," Jace says.
"To where?"
"Up."
Back into the night. The campus breathes: trees tick like cooling engines, laughter ricochets off glass, a scooter's whine rakes past. A delivery guy cuts across their path too close; Jace pivots, weight low, lets him pass with inches to spare. Max's curse turns into a laugh mid-birth.
"Dinner?" Max asks—hopeful, wary.
"Dinner," Jace says, pace lengthening. Twelve strides to the path. Twenty to the bike rack. Sixty to the gate where the security guard watches the street like it owes him gossip.
The street answers with buses like sighs and neon like handwriting. The hotpot diner is a warm rectangle of fogged windows and heat. Inside: laminated menus, burners sunk into tables like steel planets, servers flowing with tray grace.
"Two?" the hostess asks, tablet raised.
"Two," Jace says, and then, "Carter," when she asks for a name. They wait on slick benches beneath a TV where a basketball game plays on mute; captions sprint as if chased.
"You're vibrating," Max says.
"Ambition," Jace says.
"Looks a lot like low blood sugar."
"That too."
They're waved to A17, a two-top with chili-pepper magnets stuck to the wall like warning signs. A burner, a pot, chopsticks, water. The table hums the way machines hum when they know their job.
"We eat like kings," Jace says, flipping the menu like a dealer. He taps his finger down the page with quiet authority. "Prime beef ($58), mushroom medley ($22), tofu ($12), greens ($10), two iced teas ($8 each), two sauce bars ($8 each)."
The server's pen keeps pace. "Pay now or after?"
"Now." Jace totals aloud so the math lives where the System listens: "Fifty-eight plus twenty-two plus twelve plus ten plus eight plus eight plus eight plus eight—$134."
He taps to pay.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Spend detected: $134.00.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Evaluating Talent…[SYSTEM PROMPT] Verifying exclusions…[SYSTEM PROMPT] Eligible. Roll variance: active.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Cashback roll pending…
The burner coughs and then whumps. Broth wakes and throws bright eyes to the surface. The tray arrives—beef marbled like geography, mushrooms in tiny helmets, tofu squared and neat, greens folded like flags.
"You're too calm," Max says, suspicious.
"I used to fall for a living," Jace says, laying two beef slices into the broth with the smooth precision of a man who respects seconds. "This is easier. This pot doesn't move."
"Your definition of 'easier' concerns me."
"One, two, three," Jace counts, and lifts the beef perfect, drops it into Max's bowl.
Max stares like God personally comped the meal. "If this hits, I'm naming my firstborn Jace."
"Don't curse the kid," Jace says. Steam curls into the panel, blurring the words to a dealer's unreadable eyes.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Cashback roll pending…
"Sauce," he says, and stands. At the bar, he builds with method: sesame paste, garlic, scallions, chili, one spoon of vinegar, a drift of cilantro. Max builds chaos and returns with a bowl that looks like it might sue.
Back at A17, the burner hums a low, satisfied engine. Mushrooms bob like tiny buoys. Tofu squares turn from ivory to satin. Jace centers his glass on its condensation ring. He aligns his chopsticks parallel on the rest—small rituals that make the odds feel less like weather.
"Let me pay you back that hundred," Jace says, eyes still on the pot.
"With what, your personality?" Max grins.
"With interest," Jace says, sending $120 with a couple of taps. Max's phone lights; the eyebrows try to flee his face.
"You robbed a bank."
"Legally adjacent," Jace says. The panel drops a quiet caution:
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Reminder: borrowed money exclusions apply.[SYSTEM PROMPT] Note: peer transfers are eligible for Money Welfare only when incoming to Host.
"Noted," Jace murmurs. The broth rolls harder, a steady muscle of heat. The panel holds its blankness like a coin balancing on spin.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Cashback roll pending…
Max tries not to stare at air only Jace can see. "If this works, dessert. If it doesn't, we still ate like kings."
"Both outcomes acceptable," Jace says. He swishes greens through the broth and watches the color shift from forest to jade. "But I like the first one better."
Steam deepens, thins, writes and erases the same sentence. The burner whispers. A server glides past with a tray of raw shrimp and apologies for the wait to another table. Somewhere, a laugh peals, quick and bright; somewhere else, a child knocks a spoon to the floor and makes it a victory.
Jace steadies his breathing. He has learned what steadiness buys. He aligns the chopsticks again, parallel, and waits to see if the house is a friend tonight.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Cashback roll pending…
He does not blink first.