Chapter 1 — The Nobody With A Billion Dollar Shadow
Ethan Reyes woke up to the loudest piece of garbage fan ever mass-produced struggling for its last breath. The thing buzzed and clicked like it wanted to file a complaint against its whole existence. Sunlight leaked through busted blinds, spotlighting the disaster area that was his bedroom. Dust particles floated around like they thought they were in a music video.
His alarm had already shut up, which meant he must've punched it into silence earlier without waking up enough to remember. Classic Ethan.
He pushed himself upright, sheets falling off like they were abandoning the mission. He glanced at his reflection in the cracked mirror leaning against the wall.
Same face as always.
Eyes that screamed "tired."
Hair that looked auto-generated by a lazy game dev.
Posture of someone who apologized when other people stepped on him.
He exhaled slowly.
"That's me: Ethan. Human background prop."
He stepped over scattered energy drink cans and half-eaten snack wrappers and grabbed his faded work uniform from where it hung, defeated, on the chair. He threw it on, brushing crumbs off without caring whether they came from yesterday or last week.
Time to go pretend he mattered.
Warehouse Reality
Clock in. Head down. Lift heavy things until your soul evaporates.
The warehouse smelled like cardboard and "dreams died here." Forklifts beeped and workers shouted, but Ethan may as well have been invisible.
A supervisor walked past, didn't look at him, just pointed at a stacked pile.
"Lane 3's behind. Move it."
"Yes sir," Ethan murmured, mostly to the air, because the guy was already gone.
Lunch meant sitting alone on a crate, chewing a sandwich that tasted like punishment. His phone buzzed. For the first time all day, something like hope twitched in his chest.
It vanished quick.
A text from his aunt:
"Marcus and Devon hit 5k viewers on their new stream! Isn't that amazing?"
Marcus and Devon. His cousins. His former co-op partners. The guys who once told him he was "too boring" to hang with.
He stared at the message until the letters blurred. Then he locked the screen and shoved the phone away.
He didn't cry.
He just chewed that sandwich like it personally ruined his life.
Eight more hours.
Then he could finally clock into the life that actually mattered.
Loading Escape
When Ethan finally got home, he didn't even turn the lights on. He tossed the uniform somewhere behind him and aimed straight for his desk.
His VR rig glowed on the table like a throne waiting for its king. Sleek black casing. Neon blue pulse. A promise.
SECOND CHANCE
Be who you were meant to be.
His chest tightened with excitement.
He slid the visor over his eyes.
3…2…1…
Goodbye Ethan.
Hello actual living.
Blueville Bay
The world rebooted into neon glory.
Enormous towers sliced into the sky.
Flying cars zoomed like angry glowsticks.
Bass from clubs made the sidewalks vibrate.
The ocean glittered around the city like jewelry.
A digital voice welcomed him back with sass:
"Welcome, SAINT. Global Rank #3. Net Worth: 14.7 billion credits."
He looked down at himself.
Gone was the shy delivery boy.
Now he wore a jet-black armored suit lined with silver accents, perfectly cut to his sharper jawline and stronger build. His reflection in a nearby car window looked like trouble in human form.
His smirk showed up uninvited.
"Saint back in the building."
Chat notifications exploded across his HUD:
"GHOST KING MATERIAL 🔥"
"Hide your funds fr 💸😂"
"Loot me daddy 😳"
In this world, people noticed him.
Respected him.
Feared him.
Here, he wasn't afraid to exist.
Tonight's Mission
A supercar materialized curbside. Black paint drank in the neon like it owned the night. Doors lifted up smooth and dramatic. The engine hummed with pure arrogance.
Saint hopped in and sped off, the city stretching around him like it rolled out a VIP carpet.
Target: Royal Star Casino.
Owned by AI crime lord Don Ricardo.
Rumor: he just acquired half a billion in BlueCred Bars.
Saint planned to lighten his load.
He hit the rooftop, fired a silent grappling spike, and slipped into the heart of the vault like a billionaire Batman.
Rows of glowing BlueCred Bars stacked high, humming like they already belonged to him.
He grinned.
"Let's make rich dudes cry."
He cracked a case open—
ALERT:
QUEEN COBRA ENTERED THE AREA
Rank 1. Apex predator.
A voice behind him purred,
"You really thought you'd rob Ricardo without me?"
She stepped out of the shadows in a slick green tactical suit, scales shimmering like she was sponsored by danger itself.
Saint tilted his head.
"Trying to give you a night off from stalking me."
"Tch. I carry the whole team anyway."
"In your loudest dreams."
Before their flirty feast of insults could continue—
BOOM.
Vault doors blew open.
Don Ricardo stomped in flanked by two cyber-tigers with glowing red eyes and too many teeth.
Ricardo yelled like a theater kid with anger issues,
"SAINT! I will turn your bones into drink coasters!"
Saint sighed.
"This why nobody invites you to rooftop parties."
The fight was chaos perfection.
Gunfire rained from ceiling turrets.
Saint rolled under bullets like gravity owed him a favor.
Roundhouse kicked a cyber-tiger into a vault wall so hard it reconsidered life.
Queen Cobra sliced the other beast clean in half mid-snarl.
Saint dodged Ricardo's swing and uppercut the man's face so aggressively his mustache detached and flew away like it had dreams.
Chat lost its collective mind:
"SAINT GOT HANDS!! 🥊🔥"
"TIGER SAID 'I HATE MY JOB' 😭"
"RICARDO'S MUSTACHE NOOO 💀"
SYSTEM:
HEIST SUCCESSFUL
+500,000,000 BlueCreds
+Infamy: Citywide
Queen Cobra dusted her suit.
"You're still annoying."
"Love you too."
She turned to leave, paused, glanced back with a smirk barely visible.
"If personality was ranked? You wouldn't crack Top 9000."
He winked.
"She likes me."
Then the world broke.
Lights seized.
Buildings pixel-stuttered.
Sky turned into shattered code.
Thunderous text ripped across the heavens:
TOP 1000 PLAYERS
REPORT TO CENTRAL TOWER
MANDATORY UPDATE — PROJECT REBIRTH
Cobra's swagger faltered.
Saint's smile grew.
He whispered,
"Finally… something real."
He didn't know how real it was about to get.
END OF CHAPTER ONE
Saint.
The Ghost King.
The #3 Legend.
About to be trapped in the only world he ever wanted to live in.