The clock on Adrian's phone read 11:55 p.m. when he pushed open the door to his apartment.
"Finally..."
He dropped his backpack by the entrance without even taking off his shoes. After ten hours at work, all he wanted was a hot shower and twelve uninterrupted hours of sleep.
There was just one problem.
He turned his head toward the computer.
"Five minutes."
The daily login reward.
If he didn't log in before midnight, he would lose a 364-day login streak.
An entire year.
"No way."
He pulled his keys from his pocket, tossed them onto the table, and headed straight for his desk while loosening his tie.
"Just log in, claim the reward, and log out."
He wasn't even planning to play.
He turned on the monitor.
The screen took forever to come to life.
"Come on..."
The company logo appeared.
Loading screen.
Another loading screen.
"Don't do this to me today..."
11:58 p.m.
The computer's fan roared to life.
At last, the game launcher appeared.
Adrian let out a sigh of relief.
"That's it..."
He entered his password.
Incorrect password.
He blinked.
"What?"
He typed it again, more carefully this time.
Password accepted.
"Good..."
11:59 p.m.
The loading bar crawled forward.
Thirty percent.
Fifty.
Seventy.
Ninety...
Then, without warning, the entire apartment went dark.
The monitor shut off.
The fan stopped spinning.
The router's lights vanished.
For several seconds, Adrian stood perfectly still.
"..."
"No."
He turned toward the window.
The entire street had gone dark as well.
"Are you serious?!"
The clock on his phone kept ticking.
11:59:41 p.m.
"No, no, no..."
The computer would take far too long to reboot.
But he still had one option.
His phone.
He could use mobile data.
He pulled it from his pocket as he hurried through the apartment.
The only light in the room came from the glowing screen.
11:59:52 p.m.
He opened the game.
Waiting for connection...
"Come on!"
11:59:56 p.m.
He rushed toward the window, searching for a stronger signal.
Then his foot struck the backpack he'd left by the entrance.
"Huh?"
He lost his balance.
He reached for the wall.
Missed.
The edge of the table slammed into his ribs.
A split second later, the back of his head struck the floor with a dull crack.
The phone flew from his hand, spinning across the tile.
For one final moment, the screen displayed:
11:59:59 p.m.
Then...
Silence.
And darkness.
No.
Not complete darkness.
There were voices.
At first they were distant, as though they had to pass through layers of water before reaching him.
Little by little, they became clearer.
"...He's here."
"He always arrives around this time."
"Look, look..."
Who was talking?
Adrian tried to open his eyes.
He couldn't.
His eyelids felt impossibly heavy, as though something were pressing down on them.
Was he still in his apartment?
The last thing he remembered was...
The blackout.
His phone.
Falling.
The impact.
He reached toward the back of his head.
There was no pain.
And he wasn't lying down.
He frowned.
Then...?
He took a deep breath.
The air smelled of freshly cut grass and gasoline.
Nothing like the stale mix of dust and reheated food that filled his apartment.
At last, he managed to open his eyes.
The first thing he noticed was leather.
Soft.
Cool.
Far more comfortable than the cheap mattress he slept on every night.
He blinked several times.
There was no white ceiling.
No light fixtures.
No familiar clutter from his apartment.
In front of him was a black leather seatback stitched with perfectly aligned silver seams, along with a small display embedded between the seats.
"What...?"
He slowly sat up.
The interior of the vehicle looked like something straight out of a luxury car magazine.
Polished wood.
Metal trim.
A subtle fragrance he couldn't identify.
Nothing looked familiar.
"Did someone take me to a private hospital?"
No.
That didn't make any sense either.
He looked out the window.
A massive building towered before him.
Dozens of people walked through the entrance, laughing and chatting.
The car slowed to a gentle stop.
Before he could react, the driver's door opened.
A man in a tailored suit stepped out with practiced ease.
He walked around the vehicle.
Then opened the rear door.
"We've arrived, Young Master."
...
Adrian's heart skipped a beat.
"Young Master Adrian."
The man stood motionless, holding the door open as though this were the most ordinary scene in the world.
The name froze him in place.
Adrian?
He looked at the driver.
"Wh-what... did you call me?"
The man seemed surprised.
"Adrian Valmont, Young Master."
The world seemed to stop.
"Valmont..."
He had never heard that surname before.
Then...
Several girls walking past the academy slowed down and glanced at him discreetly.
Some smiled.
Others began whispering among themselves.
The driver cleared his throat politely.
"Is something wrong, Young Master?"
Almost on instinct, Adrian stepped out of the car.
The moment his feet touched the ground, he turned to look at the vehicle.
A Porsche Panamera Turbo S.
He recognized it instantly.
He had never seen one in person.
Only in magazines and online videos.
"This thing costs more than my entire apartment building."
He stood there in silence for several seconds.
None of this made any sense.
Who owned this car?
Where was he?
And why was everyone acting as though he belonged here?
His eyes drifted to the Porsche's gleaming black paint.
The polished surface reflected his image with crystal clarity.
The air left his lungs.
The young man staring back at him couldn't have been older than eighteen.
Dark hair.
Perfectly balanced features.
Tall.
Elegant.
Handsome in an almost unreal way.
Slowly, Adrian raised a hand.
The reflection did the same.
He took a step back.
So did the reflection.
...
"That's not me."
The words slipped from his lips before he even realized he had spoken them.
He didn't have time to think any further.
"Boss!"
A voice called out from the staircase.
Three students jogged toward him with a familiarity that left him completely bewildered.
"We thought you weren't coming today."
"Are you feeling better?"
"After what happened yesterday, everyone's talking about it."
Adrian looked at them one by one.
He didn't recognize a single face.
Yet judging by the way they looked at him...
They clearly knew him.
He didn't answer immediately.
The three students stopped in front of him, waiting for a response.
They watched him with a mixture of respect and nervousness, as though a single word from him could determine their fate.
"What are they expecting me to say?"
He searched his memory for their faces.
Nothing.
He had never seen them before.
And yet...
Something felt strange.
As he looked at them more closely, names began surfacing in his mind without any effort.
Leo Torres.
Marco Ruiz.
Bruno Sáez.
A chill ran down Adrian's spine.
"What...?"
They weren't his memories.
They were simply...
There.
As if they belonged to someone else.
"Boss... are you okay?"
He looked up.
The boy wearing a baseball cap seemed genuinely worried.
A fresh bruise was still visible on his cheek.
Before Adrian could ask what was going on, another student spoke.
"After what happened yesterday, we figured you'd skip today."
Yesterday.
Another word.
And then—
A sharp pain shot through his head.
Fragments of images flashed before his eyes.
A school hallway.
A school uniform.
Three students surrounding someone.
A punch.
Shouting.
Then...
Nothing.
Adrian pressed a hand against his temple.
It wasn't a complete memory.
Only fragments.
Like scattered photographs mixed with the memories of a complete stranger.
"What the hell is happening?"
"Boss..."
Leo took a cautious step forward.
"Do you want us to call the whole thing off?"
It took Adrian several seconds to answer.
He had absolutely no idea what Leo was talking about.
But admitting that wasn't an option.
If he really was inside someone else's body, revealing his confusion would only attract unwanted attention.
He took a slow breath.
Stay calm.
Gather information first.
Act later.
It was a simple rule.
And the only one he could follow right now.
He studied the three of them in silence.
"Before I decide anything..."
He paused.
"Tell me exactly what happened yesterday."
The three exchanged uneasy glances.
Leo was the first to speak.
"We thought it'd be easy..."
"There were three of us against one."
"But that guy..."
"He doesn't fight like a normal person."
"This is starting to sound way too much like one of those badly written stories," Adrian thought.
The classic nobody who's not supposed to stand out... yet somehow ends up beating the bullies anyway.
He analyzed the situation as calmly as he could.
A powerful family.
A ridiculous amount of money.
Subordinates.
A suit that probably cost more than several months of his salary.
And a car worth more than his entire apartment building.
He sighed.
"Please..."
"Don't let this be what I think it is."
A humorless laugh escaped him.
"It has to be a dream. Yeah... that makes a lot more sense."
He had never believed in destiny.
Or miracles.
But he did believe in bad luck.
And if there was one thing he had learned during his twenty-five years of life, it was that somehow, things always found a way to turn out worse than expected.
"Boss..."
"Forget it."
"Don't do anything else."
Leo looked up in surprise.
"But, Boss...?"
Adrian studied him for a moment.
"Tell me something."
Leo swallowed.
"Does my family have influence?"
"Of course."
"And my grades?"
Leo scratched his cheek awkwardly.
"Well... you don't usually put much effort into studying."
"But if you actually tried, you'd probably be the top student in the entire class."
A rich kid... who's also lazy.
Adrian held back a sigh.
"This is looking worse by the second."
A shiver ran down Leo's spine as he watched his unusually calm expression.
"From now on," Adrian said evenly, "stop acting like an impulsive thug."
"Observe."
"Listen."
"Learn."
Leo straightened immediately and nodded.
"Understood, Boss."
Adrian lifted his gaze toward the academy's main building.
Hundreds of students came and went as though everything were perfectly normal.
Only he felt as if his entire world had just been turned upside down.
"Just what kind of mess have I gotten myself into?"