A relentless cacophony assaulted his senses—car horns blaring in the distance, the distant rumble of engines, and the muffled chatter of a crowded street. A foul stench hung in the air: rotting garbage mixed with the metallic tang of blood and rain-soaked asphalt. Everything was dark, suffocatingly so.
He lay buried in a heap of trash, tucked between towering buildings in a narrow alleyway, right beside a row of rusted metal dumpsters. The pile shifted slightly as something stirred beneath it.
Then, a figure rose unsteadily from the filth. He wasn't tall—average height, maybe a little under. His black hair was disheveled, matted with dirt and sticking out in wild clumps. His face was smeared with grime, streaked with faint traces of dried blood that crusted around his cheek and jaw. He wore a once-white T-shirt, now torn and stained, layered under a long-sleeved checkered shirt that hung loosely on his frame—both riddled with rips and splattered with dark crimson patches. One foot was barely covered by a battered white sneaker, hanging on by threads, while the left foot was completely bare.
He lifted his head with effort, blinking against the haze in his mind. Nothing. No memories, no name—just emptiness. Spotting a sliver of light at the end of the alley, he dragged his feet forward, limping toward it like a shadow drawn to flame.
Emerging from the narrow passage, he stumbled onto the wide sidewalk of a bustling main street. The harsh glow of streetlights and passing headlights forced him to squint, raising one trembling hand to shield his eyes and cast a meager shadow over his face. He swayed dangerously, barely staying upright.
Pedestrians froze mid-step as they noticed him. Conversations hushed. Eyes widened. Some backed away instinctively; others stared in open concern or curiosity.
The young man stared back, his gaze unfocused and confused, as if seeing the world for the first time.
"Is he... high or something?" a voice muttered from the growing crowd.
"No way. Look at all that blood," another replied, voice low but sharp.
"Maybe he's one of them," someone whispered. "You know... an Awakened."
"Yeah, could be. We should call the police," a fourth voice said firmly.
"Poor kid," a woman sighed softly.
He stood there, swaying, understanding none of it. The words blurred together like distant noise. His legs threatened to give out at any moment.
Minutes later—though it felt like an eternity—a police cruiser pulled up with a sharp squeal of tires, its lights flashing red and blue across the gathered faces.
The officers loaded the young man into the back of the cruiser without a word, the flashing lights painting the crowd in alternating red and blue. He sat slumped against the seat, the world outside blurring into streaks of neon and shadow as they drove through the city streets.
They brought him to the local police precinct—a squat, gray building that smelled of stale coffee and disinfectant. After a quick medical check (just enough to confirm he wasn't dying), they led him to a small interrogation room. The space was dimly lit by a single overhead lamp that buzzed faintly, casting harsh shadows across the walls. In the center sat a metal table bolted to the floor, flanked by two chairs.
He was seated on one side, still dazed, his body aching in ways he couldn't quite place. Across from him sat the officer: a tall, broad-shouldered black man with a neatly trimmed mustache, wearing the standard dark blue uniform and cap. His badge glinted under the light, and his expression was a mix of fatigue and practiced authority.
The young man was only just starting to come around, his eyes slowly scanning the bare walls, the one-way mirror, the locked door.
"Alright, kid," the officer said, his voice deep and gravelly, leaning forward with his elbows on the table. "What's your name?"
The young man looked at him blankly, as if the question was in a foreign language.
"I'm asking for your name," the officer repeated, a touch slower this time. "Where you're from. How old you are."
The young man stared for a long moment, then gave a faint shake of his head.
"I don't know."
The officer raised an eyebrow. "You don't know? Hmm." He leaned back slightly. "What were you doing out there, then?"
"Where?" the young man asked, his voice hoarse and quiet.
"In that alley. On the sidewalk. People said you just stumbled out of nowhere, covered in blood."
"I don't know," he replied again, softer this time.
"You don't know." The officer's tone flattened. "You don't remember anything at all?"
The young man met his gaze, his expression almost pleading—as if he were desperately searching his own mind for something, anything, and coming up empty.
"Fine," the officer sighed, standing up and pacing a short step behind his chair. "So let me get this straight. You have no idea how you ended up there, who you are, or where you're from. That about right?"
"I don't know," the young man said once more, his voice flat, almost indifferent from sheer exhaustion.
The officer's patience snapped. He stepped forward quickly, grabbing the front of the young man's tattered checkered shirt and yanking him halfway across the table.
"Listen to me, kid," he growled, eyes narrowing. "Do I look like someone who's in the mood for games? I've got a pile of real cases on my desk. Problems up to here." He gestured sharply to his neck. "I couldn't even buy my little girl a proper birthday gift today because of shifts like this—"
The young man suddenly gripped the officer's wrist with surprising strength, his eyes wide and wild.
"I don't know!" he shouted, his voice cracking with raw frustration. "I don't know what you're talking about! I don't know where I am, who I am—I don't remember anything!"
The room fell silent except for the buzzing lamp. The officer froze for a second, then slowly released his grip, staring at the kid with a new wariness. Genuine amnesia cases tied to Awakenings weren't unheard of... but they were always trouble.
He sat back down, rubbing his temple.
"Alright," he muttered. "Alright. Let's start over."
The officer exhaled slowly, pinching the bridge of his nose as he settled back into his chair.
"Alright. I get it. So you really don't remember anything—not how you got there, not where you came from. Looking at the state you were in, it looks like somebody worked you over pretty good and dumped you. But the medic says you're completely fine now. No broken bones, no internal bleeding… nothing. Which makes this whole thing even more suspicious."
He paused, studying the young man's blank face.
"Come on, kid. Anything at all? A place? A name? Doesn't matter how small—just something. Right now, every little detail counts."
The young man looked at him with a simple, almost childlike expression, then clutched his head with both hands, wincing.
"I can't remember," he muttered. "My head feels like it's splitting open."
"Fine," the officer grunted, standing up. He walked to the door, opened it, and glanced back. "Sit tight for a minute."
The door clicked shut behind him. The young man sat alone, eyes drifting aimlessly over the bare corners of the room—the cracked paint, the flickering light, the faint hum of the ventilation.
After a few minutes, the door opened again. The same officer stepped in, unlocked the cuffs from the young man's wrists, and gestured.
"Come with me."
"Where are we going?" the young man
asked quietly as he stood.
"Someone who can actually help you just arrived," the officer replied.
They walked down a brightly lit corridor and entered a larger, cleaner room. A few chairs lined the walls, and a simple examination bed sat in the center. Natural light filtered through a high window.
A woman was already waiting. She had smooth, shoulder-length auburn hair, striking features, and eyes the same warm brown as her hair. She wore a sharp navy suit and held a small black cloth-like device in her hand.
The officer guided the young man to the bed opposite her and took a seat beside the woman.
"Hello," she said with a calm, professional smile, extending her hand. "My name is Misfilia."
The young man stared at her hand for a moment, hesitant.
"Sorry about that," the officer cut in. "He doesn't remember anything. Total blank."
"That's quite all right," Misfilia replied gently. "Allow me to introduce myself properly. I'm Misfilia, 97th generation Denz Detector, Third Division of the Second Awakened Affairs Unit."
The young man just looked at her, confusion plain on his face.
"We're going to check whether you've Awakened as a Denz," she explained. "If you've recently turned eighteen, the mark should be active." She lifted the black cloth—about the size of a hand. "Please extend your right arm."
He obeyed slowly. She placed the device against the inside of his wrist, just below the palm, and activated it with a soft glow.
"What is that?" he asked.
"It's a detection pad," she answered, eyes fixed on the unfolding holographic display only she could fully see. "It confirms the presence of a Denz mark. It's also my personal Core item."
Her brows lifted slightly in surprise. Whatever she was seeing was rare—unusual enough to make even a seasoned detector pause.
Then, in the air between them, a translucent blue panel materialized, visible to everyone in the room:
═══════════════════════════
[Awakening Confirmed]
═══════════════════════════
[Name: Stray]
[Title: Stray – The One Who Lost Their Way]
[Denz Class: Regenerator]
[Class Description:
A soul that refuses to surrender to death.
Each rebirth carves deeper wounds upon the flesh and mind, yet grants the power to rise again and again.
Specialization: Self-only regeneration....
Misfilia's eyes widened just a fraction as she read the details, then flicked to the young man—no, to Stray—with renewed interest.
Stray's eyes widened as the glowing blue panel hung in the air, the words sinking in like cold water. His heart pounded harder. The officer beside him fell silent, his earlier frustration replaced by a tense stillness as he read the display.
The young man—no, Stray—stared at it, then at Misfilia.
"What… what is this?" he asked, voice barely above a whisper.
"This is your Awakened status," Misfilia replied calmly, though her eyes betrayed a flicker of genuine intrigue. "Your Denz class is Regenerator. But that's not the part that surprises me. What's truly unusual—rare, even—is this."
She gestured toward the panel.
Stray swallowed. "What is it?"
"You already have a Title," she said. "Most people fight for years inside the Tower before earning even one. Yet here you are, freshly Awakened, and you already carry 'Stray – The One Who Lost Their Way.' And then… your name." She paused, leaning forward slightly. "It's in red. I've never seen that before. Not once. And it's clearly not your real name."
"What do you mean, not my real name?" Stray asked, his voice rising.
"Normally, a person's name appears in blue text. Simple, ordinary. But in extremely rare cases—maybe a handful in the last century—a new Awakened's name shows up in crimson. And in every one of those cases, the name wasn't theirs. It was given. We used to call those people 'Chosen by the Tower.'"
"Chosen? Tower? Denz? I don't understand any of this," Stray said, frustration bleeding into his words. "Someone please explain what you're talking about."
Misfilia exchanged a quick glance with the officer, who gave a small nod.
"You really don't know," she said softly, almost to herself. Then she straightened, folding her hands in her lap.
"Alright. I'll keep it short."
She took a breath.
"One hundred and twenty years ago, the Towers appeared. No warning, no explanation. Massive structures, hundreds of them across the world, tearing open the sky like wounds. The day they arrived, monsters poured out—things we'd never imagined. Cities burned. Millions died in the first weeks. Humanity was on the edge of extinction.
"Then people started changing. Newborn children began carrying invisible marks. When those children turned eighteen, something inside them awakened. We call them Denz—those who carry the mark. They gain abilities, classes, power drawn directly from the Towers themselves. But every ability comes with a cost. A personal, painful price only they must pay.
"The only way to grow stronger, to protect what's left of the world, is to enter the Towers and climb. Floor by floor. We call those who do it Climbers. Some do it for glory, some for survival, some because the system forces them. The higher you climb, the more resources you bring back—technology, materials, magic that keeps society running. But most never make it past the early floors. And very, very few ever reach the top.
"That's the world we live in now. The Towers didn't just bring monsters. They changed everything."
She looked at him steadily.
"And today, you became part of it."
Stray stared at her, the words sinking in slowly, like stones dropped into dark water.
"What does that mean… 'became one of them'?" he asked, his voice laced with disbelief.
Misfilia met his gaze steadily.
"Exactly what I said. You're one of the extremely rare Denz chosen directly by the Tower itself. And now, like every Awakened, you're expected to enter the Tower, climb it, and help protect humanity from what's inside."
Stray kept looking at her for a long moment, then shook his head.
"No. I don't want this."
Both Misfilia and the officer froze, genuinely stunned.
"What do you mean you don't want this?" the officer said, his voice rising with irritation. "It's a Denz's duty."
"You're supposed to climb," Misfilia added, her tone still calm but firm. "To keep ordinary people safe. To keep humanity safe."
"Protect humanity?" Stray let out a short, bitter laugh. "Hell no. I'm not doing it."
The officer leaned forward, jaw tightening.
"Kid, every single Denz does this. If people like you don't protect the civilian population, then who the hell will?"
Stray turned to him, eyes narrowing.
"Then what are you police doing? What do you even get paid for? Isn't protecting people your job?"
The officer opened his mouth, but Misfilia raised a hand gently, stopping him.
"Police can't protect civilians from every threat," she said. "There are dangers out there—monsters that spill from the lower floors, raids that break through barriers—things regular forces can't handle. That's why Climbers exist. That's why Denz exist."
Stray's voice grew sharper.
"So you want to send me into some deadly place? I just woke up in a pile of garbage. I don't know how I got there. Now I'm sitting in a police station, I don't even know my own name, and you're asking me to save humanity?" He shook his head again, harder this time. "You said there are thousands of Denz out there already. Let them do it. I'm passing on this one."
The room went quiet. The officer looked like he was about to explode, but Misfilia simply studied Stray, her expression unreadable—part curiosity, part concern.
Finally, she spoke, voice low.
"You don't have a choice, Stray. Not really. The Tower doesn't ask. It takes."
Misfilia leaned forward slightly, her calm demeanor unbroken, but her voice carried a heavier weight now.
"The Tower doesn't give you a real choice, Stray. Not in the way you think."
She glanced at the officer, who nodded grimly, then continued.
"Every Denz—without exception—must enter the Tower within thirty days of Awakening. It's not a law written by governments or guilds. It's built into the system itself. We call it the Compulsion.
"If you refuse… or try to run… the mark reacts. At first, it's subtle: headaches, nightmares, a pull you feel in your chest whenever you're near a Tower entrance. But the longer you ignore it, the worse it gets.
"After two weeks, most people can't sleep. They feel like their blood is burning. By day twenty-five, many collapse—constant pain, hallucinations, organs starting to fail. And on day thirty-one…"
She paused, letting the silence speak.
"The mark consumes you. Your body breaks down from the inside. No medicine, no magic, no mage intervention can stop it. You die. Slowly. Painfully. And there's no record of anyone ever surviving past day thirty-five.
"That's why even the ones who hate it—the ones who curse the day they Awakened—still climb. Because the alternative is worse."
The officer crossed his arms, his earlier anger replaced by something closer to sympathy.
"We've seen it, kid. Runaways. Rich kids who thought their families could hide them. Rebels who swore they'd rather die than serve the Tower. They all ended up the same way. Screaming in a hospital bed until there was nothing left."
Misfilia's eyes softened, but she didn't sugarcoat it.
"You can fight the idea. You can hate it—and plenty do. But you can't fight the mark. Not forever. The Tower always collects what it's due."
She let that settle, then added quietly:
"Some Climbers find ways to make it their own. They climb for revenge, for answers, for people they care about. A few even find something like freedom higher up. But no one escapes the first step.
"You have thirty days, Stray. After that… the choice stops being yours."
Misfilia nodded slowly, as if expecting the question. She turned her wrist over, revealing a faint, glowing tattoo-like pattern on her own skin—a subtle spiral that pulsed faintly with blue light.
"This," she said, holding it up for Stray to see, "is a Denz mark. Every Awakened carries one. It appears at birth, invisible to the naked eye until the eighteenth birthday—or, in rare cases like yours, until the moment the system forces an early activation.
"It's not just a tattoo. It's the direct link between you and the Tower. The source of your class, your abilities, your stats… and your Core Cost."
She lowered her hand.
"The mark usually manifests on the wrist, neck, or chest. It glows faintly when the system is active, and it can be scanned—like I just did with you. For most Denz, it's dormant until exactly age eighteen. Parents sometimes pay for early scans to confirm if their child is marked, but nothing happens until that day.
"Once awakened, the mark becomes permanent. It can't be removed, suppressed, or transferred. It records everything: your level, your fragments, your titles, even how many times you've paid your Cost. The Tower sees through it.
"And it's what enforces the Compulsion."
She met Stray's eyes.
"If you try to live a normal life and ignore the Tower, the mark begins to 'call' you. It starts as discomfort, then pain, then torment—as the system forces you to fulfill your role. Some say the mark is alive in its own way. That the Tower uses it to watch, to judge, and to punish.
"In your case…" She glanced at the still-fading status panel. "The red name and the immediate Title suggest your mark isn't ordinary. It activated without waiting for your birthday. It named you itself. That's why we called people like you 'Chosen by the Tower' in the old records. Whatever happened to you before you woke up in that alley—it triggered the mark prematurely. And the Tower rarely does that without a reason."
The officer shifted uncomfortably.
"Bottom line, kid," he said. "That mark on your skin? It's not going away. And it's not gonna let you walk away from this."
"Damn it all," Stray muttered, his voice rising with raw anger. "Let it all burn. I don't even have my own name or memories. The second I wake up, strangers show up and tell me I have to go save the world. What kind of screwed-up place is this?"
He slammed his palms on the bed rail, breathing hard, eyes burning with frustration.
Misfilia didn't flinch. She waited until the echo of his words faded, then spoke softly, trying to steady him.
"There are benefits too, Stray. Real ones."
"Benefits?" He laughed bitterly. "What—like dying for people I don't even know and getting a hero's title that lasts less than a month before everyone forgets?"
"No," she said calmly. "A lot of Denz climb for different reasons. Some need money—badly. And climbing pays. The Tower is full of monsters. You kill them, you get items, materials, essence crystals… things that don't exist outside. Sell them down here, and you can make more in a single good run than most people earn in years.
"Yes, the Tower will call you. It will pull at you. But that doesn't mean you're trapped inside forever. Once you've spent at least ten continuous days climbing—clearing floors, surviving—you earn a grace period. Two full weeks back on the surface with no pain, no compulsion, no mark burning under your skin. You can live normally during that time. Rest, spend your earnings, do whatever you want.
"Then, when the grace ends, the call starts again. You go back in for another ten days minimum, come out for two weeks… and the cycle continues. Plenty of Climbers live comfortable lives that way—good money, decent freedom, and they only risk the Tower in controlled bursts."
Stray fell silent, staring at the floor. The anger was still there, simmering, but now mixed with something else—calculation.
"How soon can I start?" he finally asked, voice low.