By 7:30 a.m., Shin was back in his apartment.
The city was waking. Trams hummed along the rails, scattering pigeons from the lines. A coffee shop downstairs flicked on its neon sign, steam rising in uneven bursts from its back vent. Somewhere nearby, a student cursed at their printer, banging the side until the jam spat loose with a squeal.
Shin sat in silence, barefoot, hair still damp from a quick rinse. His long strands of brown hair were tied back loosely with a simple cord. He hadn't bothered with breakfast.
The apartment was small and minimal. A mattress was on the floor, a desk without a chair, a cracked kettle, and two cups. A pile of boxed relics, disguised as generic moving crates, sat in one corner. He had no books or posters, so nothing was hung on the walls besides shadows.
On the table, his university certificate.
Bachelor of Engineering. Final GPA: 7.1
He stared at it for a moment, not out of sentimentality—just curiosity.
He remembered the old days—the constant 6.5s—the floating, forgettable score he used to joke about.
"Guess I broke the curse," he murmured.
It wasn't pride. It wasn't anything.
The truth was, he'd stopped caring halfway through his final year—right after the Wind Tower changed everything. Since then, the idea of lectures, assignments, and deadlines had felt like echoes from a different world.
And yet, his grades had soared.
Not because he studied more—but because he didn't need to study at all. A single skim through a textbook was enough, thanks to Lightning's gift of absolute focus. Concepts that once required weeks of revision now slotted into place after minutes. He barely attended classes after the Wind Tower. Sometimes he even forgot what course he was registered for. But when he did allow his mind to engage, it sliced through material with surgical ease.
Ultimately, he stayed in the program for one reason: insurance. If the towers disappeared—or changed—or something else broke the strange new laws of the world, he'd still have something. A degree. A placeholder life. Something that means something in a world that is no longer relevant.
And now, that life was over.
He folded the certificate once, neatly, and slid it into a drawer. Then closed it for good.
Shin walked over to the kitchen cabinet and pulled out a small metal tin. Inside were three things: a cracked phone, a cheap prepaid SIM card, and a sealed plastic bag filled with raw gemstones—uncut sapphires, rubies, and antique diamonds—all looted from the Wind Tower's internal cache.
He held one of the stones up to the light. It glimmered faintly in the gray morning hue. Beautiful, yes—but inert—a dead shine compared to the living power of authentic artifacts. It made him sigh. He possessed priceless treasures, enough to make any king or emperor of the past die of envy, yet he had not a single coin to his name.
He exhaled through his nose, amused—a rich man with no money.
Selling them wasn't simple. Artifacts were too risky—not that he ever planned to part with them. But raw stones? With the proper channels, they were currency. The problem was finding those channels.
He'd already begun to feel out possibilities: quiet inquiries through encrypted boards, off-market jewelers, whispered connections to people who still knew people—a black-market merchant who owed a favor to someone who owed a favor to someone else. The wheels were turning—slowly.
He set the stones back and closed the tin. He wasn't worried. The time would come.
But for now, he was unemployed, and his savings were starting to run out. He turned to the far corner of the room, where an old notebook lay open.
Inside—maps, compatibility charts, faction diagrams, distribution patterns. Every known dajin tower was marked, cataloged, and color-coded by known location and priority. Shin had mapped more of the emerging network than most guild analysts—and he'd done it alone.
He flipped through the notes, letting the pages whisper. There were blank entries left on purpose.
Not for lack of data, but because they weren't ready to be filled.
Yet.
He flipped through the pages, letting them whisper. His handwriting was compact and orderly. Lines threaded from the equator up to the poles, clustering in ways most analysts still dismissed as a coincidence. Shin knew better. He'd compared weather data, seismic charts, and even migratory anomalies. Patterns bled through the noise.
One page showed Europe in red ink, clusters forming around mountain ranges and coastal seams. Another listed faction symbols—guilds, private armies, even loose mercenary networks that had already begun carving territory.
He stopped at a particular page. A list of names ranked by power and category. Some crossed out. Some circled. Beside each were brief notes: 'Cleared the tower in Cairo.', 'Unstable, avoid direct contact.' 'Useful pawn, unaware of own value.' Two names carried a bold question mark beside them: Spider and Stag? Relation unknown.
On another page, he saw a familiar name, Thommo. Shin hadn't spoken to him recently. Not directly. But the man had cleared a tower and lived, making him a rare resource. Not quite a threat, but not quite an ally either.
Just a useful card.
One he hadn't decided how to play yet.
In another section, four circles marked the confirmed dajins. Wind. Earth. Fire. Water. Lightning. Each underlined, each tagged with fragments of data he'd managed to gather from his encounters. He gathered everything he could, be it reports or scrubbed news leaks. At the bottom margin, a single note in smaller handwriting: 'Water and Fire: Location unknown'
The notebook closed with a soft thud, and the room fell still again. No phone rang, no notifications, no emails. And yet, the world felt loud.
Because Shin wasn't waiting anymore.
He stepped out onto the small balcony. The wind brushed against his hair—soft, respectful.
Down below, the streets were starting to swell. People moved with urgency, unaware of how much their world had already changed. How much he had already changed it.
His eyes scanned the skyline.
"This body… this power…"
A pause.
"It's only the beginning."