The rain in Oakhaven didn't just fall; it eroded. It washed the silver off the spires and dumped the grime into the Warrens, where it pooled in stinking, black lagoons. I sat in a pile of wet refuse, my stomach a void of gnawing hunger, staring at the rusted iron ring on my finger.It didn't pulse with the divine light of the Sovereign. It didn't hum with the system’s prompts. It just sat there—heavy, cold, and stubbornly physical.**[Item Found: The Debt-Collector's Omen.]****[Status: Rusted.]****[Current Balance: 0.]**"Faceslap of a homecoming," I whispered. My voice was a dry rasp. I was a Level 0 nobody in a world where children could snap their fingers and cook me from the inside out."Eli! Get up!" A small, frantic hand grabbed my tattered sleeve. It was Miri, the girl from the alley. Her face was smeared with soot, her eyes wide with terror. "The Iron-Order is at the Southern Gate. They’re doing a 'Siphon'! If they find you here without a Spark, they’ll toss you in the mana-

The "cellar" was a damp stone cavity that smelled of wet slate and the slow decay of centuries. I didn't mind. I had slept in the Trash Folder of the universe; a cold floor in Oakhaven was a luxury suite by comparison. I woke before the first bell, my mortal muscles screaming, but my mind sharp as a razor.The iron ring was now a dull, brushed silver.**[Current Ownership of Academy Infrastructure: 5.2%]****[Status: The Sage of the Lowly is active.]**I didn't start my day with a broom. I started it with a ledger I’d "borrowed" from Haman’s desk. By the time the apprentices were dragging their hungover bodies to the Great Hall for breakfast, I was already in the kitchens."Get out, Mundane!" the Head Cook, a massive man named Bruiser with forearms like hams, barked at me. "The Mages want their sun-fruit crepes, and the fire-elementals are acting up! We’re behind schedule!""The elementals aren't acting up, Bruiser. They’re starving," I said, walking toward the massive iron stove wher

The cellar was no longer a refuge; it was a bunker at the end of the world. Above us, the Academy groaned like a dying beast, the "Permanent Sleep" protocol sending ripples of violet lethargy through the stone walls. My "Lowly" army was shivering, their breaths coming in shallow puffs of frost as the Arch-Mage began to drain the thermal energy from the entire district."Sixty minutes, Eli," Leo whispered, his hands shaking as he held a magnifying glass over a pile of raw mana-crystals. "The 'Sleep' is already hitting the Warrens. My mother... she messaged me through the stone. People are just lying down in the streets and not getting up.""Faceslap of a forced retirement," I gritted out, my fingers blurring as I stripped the insulation from a salvaged copper cable. My mortal body was screaming for rest, but the silver ring on my finger was a cold, sharp needle of adrenaline. "The Arch-Mage isn't killing them. He’s liquidating their consciousness to power his own ascension. He thinks h

Oakhaven was dissolving. The marble towers didn’t fall; they un-existed, turning into a fine grey mist that smelled of static and forgotten dreams. Above us, the ultraviolet eye of the Outer God filled the sky, its gaze a trillion-ton weight pressing the city into the dirt."Faceslap of a final notice, Elias!" Aethel’s voice echoed—not from the room, but from the Void-Shard ring on my finger. The merge had unlocked the echoes of my old life. "The God isn't here to play. It’s here to delete the save file!""I know!" I roared, sprinting toward the epicenter of the High Tower’s ruins. Every step felt like running through wet concrete. The ground was no longer stone; it was the raw, unrendered data of a dying world."Eli, wait!" Selene screamed from the cellar entrance. She was clutching Miri and Leo, their faces pale in the sickly purple light. "The city is gone! There’s nothing left to save!""There’s the ledger!" I shouted back, not stopping. "Faceslap of a desperate gamble: I’m not sa

The ruins of Aethelgard were a graveyard of broken glass and grey ash. The golden sun had been replaced by a flat, sterile white light that cast no shadows. Standing in the center of the wreckage, Sarah—or the entity wearing her face—brushed a speck of golden dust from her grey blazer. She looked terrifyingly corporate."Faceslap of a psychological haunting," I whispered, my hand tightening around the obsidian ring. My heart was a drum in my ears, beating against the cold logic of the Auditor. "What are you, Marcus's latest prank? Or is the Void just running out of original ideas?""Performance review, Elias," she said, her voice a perfect replica of the woman who had shared a cubicle with me in 2084. She opened her briefcase, pulling out a tablet made of polished obsidian. "You’ve liquidated two sectors in record time. Aethelgard was a high-value asset. The Board is... concerned about your aggressive amortization of their portfolio.""Aggressive?" I stepped forward, my boots crunchin