Tuesday Evening, August 20th, 2022 - Demien's Apartment, Bergamo
Demien set the phone down and stared at the ceiling. The apartment felt too quiet; his mind kept cycling through Marco's text about Nike, Adidas, and Puma, three giants competing for a kid who'd been completely broken two months ago.
The irony sat heavy in his chest.
He sat up slowly. His body still hummed with post-training fatigue, muscles loose but not dead, the kind of tiredness that meant he'd worked but not overworked.
The Milan match is Saturday, he thought, and his eyes moved to where the system interface would appear when called. Four days. I need upgrades now, let them settle before the game.
"Hey, UG," he said quietly to the empty room.
The familiar blue panel materialized instantly, text appearing in clean lines.
「Hello, Demien. How are you doing?」
"I'm good," he replied, and he meant it, the word feeling strange because two months ago 'good' wasn't in his vocabulary. "I'm ready."
