"A name is not who you are.It is who you are allowed to be."
In the twilight of New Vale, where streetlamps flickered like dying eyes and fog bled from the mouths of alleys, there existed a law no one dared inscribe.
Names were not chosen. They were carved. Into the soul. Into reality.
A name, once Spoken with full Intent, did not merely define you. It contained you.It shaped your breath, molded your will, rewrote the narrative of your existence. And if you understood your name… if you could hold it in your mind without going mad…You could control it.
Few dared to try. Fewer still survived.
Those who did were called Literalists.
Among them was a man seated in the far booth of a nameless tavern, where even the walls seemed hesitant to recall their own construction.
The patrons gave him space, not out of fear—but deference. As though their very thoughts bent away from him, like iron fillings fleeing a reversed magnet.
He was not tall. Nor broad. His eyes were not cold, but unreadable—like a closed book written in an extinct tongue.
A single card spun idly between his fingers.Not a full deck.Just one.
Ten of Hearts.
Faint glimmers of scarlet flickered across its surface, not ink, but something older.
The woman behind the bar—her name badge reading Ms. Caffeine, stitched in brown—cast a glance his way.
She cleared her throat.
"You'll ruin your nerves with silence, Mr. Card."
The man didn't look up immediately. His attention remained on the card, as if divining an answer from its endless spin. Then, without breaking the rhythm:
"I'm not here to drink," he said.
"Then what are you here for?"
"A draw."
Outside, something howled.
The door creaked.
And in walked a man whose very presence seemed to offend geometry—like he didn't quite fit within the frame of the door, though his body was ordinary enough. Slender. Worn leathers. Grease-smudged goggles.
His smile was wrong. Too wide. Teeth too even.
Around his throat was a chain—linked with nametags, real and broken. Some faded. Some blood-smeared.
His voice was lazy, but not without edge.
"Mr. Card," he said. "A pleasure."
Mr. Card did not rise.
"And you are?"
"Call me Mr. Squeeze."
The room grew colder. Not physically—but symbolically. As if something sacred had been violated.
Even Ms. Caffeine paled. Everyone had heard of Mr. Squeeze—the man who crushed names into silence, one syllable at a time. Who turned titles into weapons, identities into pulp.
He'd earned his name.Or stolen it.
Did it matter?
"I want your name," Squeeze said casually, stepping forward.
"That's unfortunate," Card murmured, the card still spinning. "I'm rather fond of it."
Squeeze flexed his fingers. One gloved. One raw.
"I don't need the whole thing. Just a vowel. An essence. The core of your card."
"You think it's something you can hold?"
"I know it is."
The world cracked.
No one saw him move. One moment, Squeeze stood still; the next, his arm was reaching, not at Card—but into the space around him. As if attempting to seize something intangible.
A name.
Reality bent. A chair snapped in half. The air thickened.
But before his hand could close—
Card flicked the card.
It moved without friction. Without hesitation. Without mercy.
The Ten of Hearts landed face-up on the wooden floor.
At once, Squeeze convulsed.
He fell to his knees, hands clawing at his chest, mouth open in a silent scream.
His bones began to fold. Not like paper. Like guilt. Like regret. Like he was being reconfigured into the last thing he loved.
Tears streamed down his face.
"What—what did you—"
"You reached for my name," Card whispered. "And my name reached back."
In this world, to master your Name was to encode laws into yourself—like divine programming. Every part of your name could be sharpened. Turned. Bound to a symbol.
Mr. Card had long since ceased being a man.He was now a deck of meanings.
The Ten of Hearts was not a trick.
It was an edict:
"Let love destroy you. Let memory be your end."
As Mr. Squeeze curled into a quiet death, Card stepped forward and bent down.
From the twitching corpse, he unclipped one of the stolen tags.
Mr. Chalk.
He remembered that name. A schoolteacher, perhaps. A man who taught hope before hope became contraband.
Card snapped the tag in two.
A ripple passed through the floorboards. Somewhere, in a dusty classroom, a chalkboard erased itself. A memory disappeared.
One less tether.
He turned to Ms. Caffeine.
"Dispose of him."
She said nothing. Only nodded.
Even her silence was respectful.
Outside, the night had changed. The fog had thickened.
Card walked into it, the air tasting faintly of ozone and rusted names.
Above him, street signs twisted into spirals. Advertisements forgot their slogans. Even reflections began to lag behind their owners.
On a concrete wall, written in blood-dark paint, were the words:
"MR. SPHERE IS COMING."
He stared.
The name was a paradox.
A sphere—by design—had no angles. No beginning. No end. It could not be parsed. Could not be bound.
To take such a name…
It required perfect self-erasure.
A body without axis.
A soul without corners.
Something shifted behind him.
A shadow peeled itself from the wall, forming into a man with slick gloves and a crooked smile.
The tag on his chest read: Mr. Fold.
"Still playing with cards, Card?" Fold asked. "Careful. You might draw something you can't put back."
"You're in the wrong district."
"I was invited."
"By whom?"
Mr. Fold's grin widened. "By your name."
Card didn't answer.
Fold stepped forward, his coat twitching as if afraid of him.
"You stretch it too thin, you know," he continued. "Ten of Hearts? Jack of Spades? Next you'll be laying down Queens and calling yourself salvation."
"I don't worship my name."
"No. But you wear it like a coffin. Eventually, you'll have to lie in it."
Before Card could answer, a low hum filled the air.
Not heard.
Felt.
Buildings began to bend—not collapse, but curve, as if pulled by invisible thread toward a single point.
In the heart of the street, where asphalt cracked and puddles rippled inward, a perfect white orb began to descend.
Smooth. Soundless. Sinless.
The words formed around it, not spoken but implied:
MR. SPHERE.
Mr. Fold stopped smiling.
Card reached into his coat.
Another card emerged.
Jack of Spades.
It bled.
Somewhere far above, the clouds formed a circle.Below, geometry wept.
And the first true game of Names was about to begin.