THE BLUE BOTTLE CONTRACT

Run or die.

That was the only choice left in Arga's head as his gaping shoe soles pounded the scorching asphalt of a narrow alley on the outskirts of Jakarta. His lungs felt like they were on fire; every breath felt like inhaling shards of glass. Behind him, the heavy thud of combat boots and harsh shouts drew closer.

"Hey! Stop right there, you little punk! Your mom’s debt isn't going to be settled just by running!"

That voice belonged to one of Mr. Bakri's thugs. Arga didn't look back. He knew exactly who they were—soulless meatheads who enjoyed breaking people's fingers for a few hundred thousand rupiah. Unfortunately, his mother's debt wasn't just a few hundred thousand. The compound interest from that bastard moneylender had ballooned into a figure they couldn't possibly pay back, even if they sold their kidneys.

Arga took a sharp turn, nearly slipping on a puddle of sewage that smelled putrid. Ahead of him, an old, rusted corrugated tin gate stood askew. Without a second thought, he lunged over it, ignoring the sting as the sharp edge of the metal sliced into his palm.

CRASH!

He landed on a pile of wet cardboard. Arga immediately scrambled, slipping into the shadows of a massive warehouse that looked like a graveyard for junk. This was a government-seized warehouse that had been abandoned for years. Dark, damp, and thick with dust.

"Where’s the kid? He just came through here!"

"Find him! If we don't, Mr. Bakri's gonna circumcise us both with a dull machete!"

Arga held his breath. He pressed his back against the cold concrete wall. His heart was hammering so hard it felt like it was echoing through the empty room. He could see the beams of flashlights piercing through the holes in the tin door.

God, just this once... please, he pleaded silently in despair.

But Arga knew God seemed busy looking after rich kids like Raka. Raka, that prick from school who had just humiliated him in front of the class this morning, spilling meatball soup all over Arga's only bag just because Arga had accidentally bumped into his expensive shoes. The world wasn't fair, and Arga was sick of swallowing that bitter reality every single day.

The sound of footsteps slowly faded, but Arga didn't dare move yet. He waited for a full five minutes, accompanied only by the sound of water dripping from the leaky roof.

Once he felt safe, Arga tried to stand up. However, his trembling leg knocked over a stack of wooden crates beside him.

CRACK!

The crate was rotten. Its contents spilled onto the filthy cement floor. Arga cursed under his breath, bracing himself to run again if those men returned. But it was silent. No shouting followed.

Arga looked down to see what he had just dropped. Amidst a pile of decaying documents and rags, something reflected a sliver of moonlight coming from the vent above.

It was a bottle.

It wasn't an ordinary glass bottle. It was shaped like an antique soda bottle from the 50s, but the material felt heavier—like ceramic, yet translucent with a deep sea-blue tint. Its surface was covered in a centimeter-thick layer of dust and cobwebs.

"What's this? An antique?" Arga muttered.

His mind immediately drifted toward money. If this bottle had historical value, maybe he could sell it to a collector at the flea market. Maybe it would be enough to pay off this month’s interest so Mr. Bakri would stop coming to his small rented room and screaming at his sickly mother.

Arga picked up the bottle. It felt cold. So cold that his palm went numb.

"So filthy," he said, wiping the bottle's surface with the hem of his grimy shirt.

As his fingers brushed the center of the bottle, Arga felt something strange. There were delicate engravings that hadn't been visible before. The pattern was intricate, resembling intertwining vines surrounding a symbol in the center that looked like a closed eye.

The moment the dust was completely cleared, the bottle suddenly vibrated.

Arga flinched. He almost dropped it. "Huh? What the hell..."

The vibration didn't come from his hand; it came from inside the bottle. A faint hissing sound began to emerge, like the sound of gas trying to escape a soda can that had just been shaken hard. Its rusted metal stopper began to turn slowly on its own.

Sssssssttttt....

The air pressure around Arga suddenly shifted. The warehouse air, which had been humid and hot, plummeted in temperature. Arga's breath began to mist in the air. He wanted to throw the bottle and run, but his hands felt locked in place. There was a powerful magnetic pull keeping his fingers there.

"Hey! I hear something inside!"

The shout from outside the warehouse startled Arga. Flashlights began dancing behind the door again. Mr. Bakri’s thugs were back.

"Crap!" Arga panicked. He tried to twist the stopper harder, thinking there might be something valuable inside he could use as a weapon or something that might explode. He didn't know what he was thinking; he just wanted to do something other than get caught and beaten.

POP!

The stopper blew off. Not with a quiet sound, but with a deafening bang.

An immense surge of air pressure exploded from the mouth of the bottle. Arga was thrown backward, his back slamming into an old iron rack until it buckled. His vision swam with stars.

From the mouth of the bottle lying on the floor, thick bluish-purple smoke billowed out. The smoke didn't dissipate; instead, it clumped together, solidified, and formed a small whirlwind that sucked in the surrounding dust.

Then, a voice emerged. Not a scream or a blast, but a long sigh that sounded incredibly... bored.

"Ah... finally. It turns out the air outside still smells the same. It still reeks of poverty and despair."

Arga's eyes widened. In the middle of the thinning smoke, he saw a human shadow sitting cross-legged in mid-air. The figure wore strange clothes that looked like a fusion between ancient robes and ragged, modern streetwear.

The figure turned toward Arga. His eyes glowed with a faint bluish light, and his face wore an expression as if he had just been woken from a very peaceful nap by the person he liked least in the world.

"So," the figure spoke again, his voice deep but dripping with mockery. "You're the scruffy brat who accidentally broke my seal? Seriously? I waited five hundred years inside a rusted soda bottle just to be saved by a kid whose body odor could knock out a cockroach?"

Arga gaped, his mouth locked tight. "You... what are you?"

"Me?" The figure stood up in the air, stretching his back until it let out a loud crack. "My name is Zat. And you, Snot-nosed, just got yourself into a mess far bigger than just being chased by debt collectors."

Right then, the warehouse door was kicked open.

"Found you, you little bastard!" one of Mr. Bakri's men yelled while brandishing an iron pipe.

Zat glanced toward the door, then looked back at Arga with a sarcastic smirk. "Wow, perfect timing. Looks like they want to help me warm up. You want to see something fun, or do you want to die hugging that empty bottle?"

Arga could only swallow hard. The world he knew had just shattered into pieces in a matter of seconds.

"Don't just stand there gaping, idiot!" Zat snapped. "Pick one! Do you want my help, or do you want to be their punching bag?"