The stillness within the apartment was absolute.
Velvety darkness clung to every corner, the thick black curtains draped over the windows like veils of silence. No morning rays pierced the serenity. Everything inside breathed calm, like a pause between heartbeats.
This apartment—stark and minimal—belonged to none other than Kaidren.
Sprawled across the center of the wide bed, Kaidren lay entangled in the thick folds of a white comforter. It half-covered his body, but not entirely. One arm had slipped free, hanging limply off the side. The other rested across his chest. His right leg jutted out from under the covers, angled lazily as if it had drifted there in a half-turn during the night.
His face, usually unreadable and composed, wore a rare mask of stillness. Not the cold stillness he gave the world, but one of genuine peace. No tension. No thought. Just sleep.
But then—
Beep. Beep. Beep.
The piercing tone of the alarm shattered the still air like a stone through glass.
Kaidren's brow twitched. His eyelids fluttered open, slowly—unwillingly—revealing a dull violet gaze that reflected the room's pale ceiling above him. For a moment, he just lay there, unmoving. Staring. Letting the beeping continue. It didn't seem to irritate him. Nor did he rush.
Eventually, he shifted. With slow, deliberate movement, he turned to the left, reaching across the nightstand for the source of the sound.
His fingers brushed against smooth metal—the familiar texture of the blue phone.
Beep. Beep. Click. Silence.
Kaidren lay still again for several moments. Then, without a word or sound, he sat up and began his day.
He stretched with a slow arch of his back, arms extending high, joints cracking softly in the quiet. The white blanket slipped from his shoulders. His full-toned black clothes from last night still clung to his frame—wrinkled now, but dry. He hadn't bothered changing before collapsing into sleep.
With a silent yawn, he moved to the window, pushing the curtains aside.
Sunlight streamed in instantly—warm, golden, and far too loud for his eyes. But he endured it. The light cast long, gentle shadows across the minimalist room. White walls. Clean lines. Sparse furniture. It was plain, efficient, and emotionless—just like him.
Kaidren made his bed with mechanical precision, then walked to the kitchen and boiled water. He reached for some random branded instant noodles, pouring the contents into a bowl before filling it with hot water. A few minutes later, he was slurping quietly, the steam rising into his face.
After finishing, he poured himself a glass of water. Then milk. He downed both in quick succession, wiped his mouth, and rinsed the dishes in the sink. His routine was efficient. Methodical. It didn't require thinking—it was etched into his body like muscle memory.
Next was the bathroom. He brushed his teeth, his movements slow but practiced. The mirror above the sink reflected his neutral expression, eyes still dulled from sleep. Without pause, he stripped off his black hoodie—now finally dropping it into the laundry basket like he should've done the night before.
Kaidren stepped into the shower.
He emerged minutes later, his pale skin damp, droplets clinging to his collarbone. He dried off using the same white shirt from the night before, patting himself dry without care. The black pants remained within reach, but he didn't wear them.
Instead, he pulled on a simple white T-shirt and a pair of shorts patterned with black and blue palm trees—light and casual. The kind of clothing that clashed entirely with the giantlike strength he had displayed just hours ago.
Still barefoot, Kaidren walked across the room with the white t-shirt draped around his neck. He collected the last remaining clothes from yesterday—his aqua-colored pajama pants and underwear, the ones he had worn when he first arrived in this world. He folded them with unexpected care and tucked them into the closet near his bed, letting the door click shut behind him.
Next: laundry.
He gathered every used item from the laundry basket and loaded them into the washing machine tucked inside the bathroom corner. His face didn't change as he pressed the buttons. His mind drifted.
After finishing, he limped softly toward the living room and collapsed onto the white couch with a deep exhale.
On the glass coffee table, the remote and blue phone sat side by side. He reached for the remote, clicked on the television, and stared as light filled the room once more.
A melodramatic scene unfolded—a poorly acted soap opera, filled with fake crying and over-exaggerated gasps. Kaidren blinked. Once. Then changed the channel.
Flick. Flick. Flick.
Too loud. Too fake. Too chaotic.
Then—
A familiar tone. Neutral voice. Static backdrop.
The morning news.
Kaidren's finger hovered over the remote before he finally set it down on the glass table along with the blue phone. He leaned back into the couch, settling in like a spectator to the world outside.
The news anchor spoke in an even tone:
"...temperatures today will remain steady in most regions. Expect rain in Sector Delta. In other reports, local PSERD officers apprehended a Tier 1 esper thief in District 3. No injuries were reported..."
Kaidren watched. His eyes didn't blink much. Occasionally, his fingers tapped the armrest in a faint, unconscious rhythm. Then—
"...City Z's safety unit has raised caution levels following an unidentified Tier 4 esper reportedly spotted late last night near Industrial Block E. According to the patrolling officer, the presence was brief but unmistakable. The Esper has yet to be identified…"
Kaidren raised a brow slightly.
"...Tier 4?" he muttered to himself, his voice quiet and dry.
He blinked slowly, watching the footage of the district flash on the screen. That... looked familiar.
His thoughts rewound to the night before. The countless jumps. The energy trailing off his arms. The sound of his punch dispersing a cloud midair. The violet glow.
A faint twitch at the corner of his mouth. It was barely a smile. Barely.
"Guess I got lucky on not encountering that hoodlum…" he mumbled, still under the assumption that the reported Tier 4 was someone else.
He reached down and scratched the back of his head lazily, his hair still slightly damp.
Oblivious to the truth.
The typical morning report continued rolling—minor city crimes, and local events flickering past like a mundane tide. But as Kaidren leaned against the armrest of the white couch, his half-lidded gaze slightly dulled from routine, a particular headline snagged his attention like a fishhook in his mind.
"Next Monday, February 22 at 8 a.m., the Esper Studies and Training Institute under Psi Guardians International will begin conducting the annual Psyche Profiling Assessment across all major cities."
The words struck like static in his ears. His back straightened subtly.
"…The Psyche Profiling Assessment?" he murmured aloud.
A flicker of something stirred in the back of his mind—memory, or perhaps distant familiarity. February 15th. That's what the blue phone said when he glanced at it earlier. February 15. And the test was in a week.
"That's right…" his thoughts surfaced clearly now, a glimmer of sharp recollection emerging from the haze. "February 15. This is when the story began. The official start of the game… when the player first enters the world of 'Espers of the World.'"
His eyes lingered on the blue glow of the TV, but his thoughts had already drifted far away. He stared through the screen more than at it now. The corners of his mind spun like quiet gears, calculating.
He had been granted 25 esper abilities by the system—an absurd number, objectively broken even in the context of the game. Six of them were already unlocked, all related to bodily enhancement, and even that much felt like overkill considering the rarity of fully-mastered Tier 1 body powers. But now, Kaidren's mind reeled toward something deeper.
"The main cast," he muttered to himself, eyes narrowing faintly, "they should be preparing too."
Even if he didn't know all of them by heart, he remembered one key detail from the game's community. The nine "Children of Fate"—the chosen protagonists hailed from some of the world's most powerful esper families. Each one of them was a walking anomaly.
"Unlike normal espers," Kaidren recalled softly, "they didn't awaken during puberty. They were born already linked to their Nexarion…"
That unnatural awakening granted them instant access to ten… eleven esper abilities—right out of the womb. No teenager in the world could compete with that. Most aspiring espers were still trying to get a proper scan of their abilities by age fifteen. Meanwhile, the main cast had already been training theirs under private instructors for over a decade.
And as if that wasn't enough, each of them… each… had a Law-related esper ability.
Kaidren leaned forward, elbows on knees, staring blankly at the blue light of the screen. The term echoed in his mind like an incantation:
Law-related abilities.
Abilities that didn't follow traditional logic, nor obey common esper constraints. They bent the rules of space, time, and physics—not through brute force, but by rewriting how the world functioned in their presence.
Even now, the thought gave him chills.
"The weakest one," Kaidren whispered, rubbing the bridge of his nose with a long exhale, "was the guy with Law of Attraction and Repulsion…"
He scoffed quietly. "Weakest," yet that ability, when matured, allowed the user to hurl enemies straight into orbit. Or worse, draw satellite-sized meteors like they were toys magnetized by his will. The fan forums once joked that he was practically a human gravitational anomaly.
And that was just one of them.
Kaidren's gaze lowered to the blue phone sitting silently on the glass coffee table. Its matte glow had dimmed, but to him, it was a symbol. A link between what he was now… and what he could be.
"They were called the Children of Fate." His fingers tapped silently against his knee. "Born to rule. Born to change the world. Nine of them… each with bloodlines that shouted destiny from birth."
He didn't have a bloodline. He didn't even have a past.
His only family… gone.
His only clue… this phone.
His only gift… twenty-five esper abilities granted by a system too silent for comfort.
He could hear his own breath now. The silence between words weighed heavier than the news itself.
Kaidren leaned back again, resting his head against the edge of the couch cushion, eyes half-closed. Sunlight from the open curtain dappled across the floor in warm patches, crawling slowly toward the rug. His gaze shifted toward the ceiling.
"Is this really how things work in this world?" he wondered. "That power is predetermined? That strength is inherited like wealth or fame?"
But even in that cynical thought, he knew better. Strength wasn't just about how many powers you had. He remembered that clearly now from the game forums, debates, and even the lore built into the narrative itself.
"It's not about your esper rank," he muttered, "it's about the kind of ability you have."
Because even a Tier 2 with the right ability could annihilate a Tier 5 who relied solely on brute force and weak ability. The classification system meant nothing in the face of conceptual domination.
So Kaidren's next thoughts weren't about the upcoming Psyche Profiling Assessment, nor the names of the nine fated characters.
They were about his own abilities.
Nineteen remained locked.
Nineteen undiscovered pieces of himself, hidden behind an invisible wall. What lay in wait? Would one of them—could one of them—be a Law-related ability?
"I need one."
His internal voice came like iron, quiet but immovable.
"I need just one Law-type. Just one. That's all it would take to catch up."
After all, while the Children of Fate were born to shine, he wasn't here to play by the script. He wasn't born into destiny—he was dropped into it.
He didn't owe this world anything. But perhaps, this world owed him.
The fanboy he once was when his parents were still alive would have been giddy, just standing in the same room with his favorite character.
But the Kaidren of today?
He planned to compete silently.
To stand above them for the peace he wish to obtain.
His eyes drifted once more to the TV screen as the news returned to casual reports—market changes, local cafe reviews, weather outlooks for the coming week. The drama of the moment passed, fading into the ordinary.
But inside Kaidren, something had shifted.
He sat silently, letting the news fill the air like white noise while his mind continued to churn.
"If I want to survive here... I have to start unlocking the rest."
His fingers reached toward the phone again, his expression unreadable. The faint blue light reflected in his eyes like stars in deep water.
He didn't smile. He didn't frown.
But something behind his gaze had changed—an ember of clarity burning into flame.
Let the Children of Fate have their bloodlines.
He had something better:
Desperation.
And that… was sometimes the greatest power of all.