The stairs of the narrow row house in Den Haag creaked with the agonizing groan of cheap wood that had endured too many brutal Dutch winters.
Elias descended slowly, his hand trailing along the peeling wallpaper. His mind, carrying the dense, heavy weight of fifty years of corporate warfare, was still calibrating to the light, almost hollow physical frame of a sixteen-year-old boy. His joints didn’t ache. His lungs didn’t wheeze. But the hollow, gnawing sensation in his gut was a stark reminder of his current reality: he was starving.
The scent hitting his nose wasn’t the rich, dark roast of the $100-a-cup espresso he used to drink in his Milan penthouse. It was the harsh, acidic tang of cheap, instant coffee mixed with the smell of damp brick and old cooking oil.
He stepped into the cramped kitchen. The linoleum floor was scuffed, the corners curling upward. In the center of the room sat a wobbly wooden table, and standing by the stove was a woman whose presence made Elias’s breath catch in his throat.
Rina Suryadi.
His mother looked exactly as she had in his faded memories of the early nineties. Her dark hair was pulled back into a hasty, practical bun. She wore a faded apron over a generic woolen sweater, her face lined with the premature exhaustion of an immigrant mother trying to stretch a single Guilder into three meals. In his previous life, she had died in 2014, a quiet, tragic casualty of the stress brought on by his chaotic, debt-ridden early career.
Elias paused in the doorway. For a fraction of a second, the cold, sociopathic capitalist armor he had spent three decades forging cracked. He wanted to cross the room, drop to his knees, and apologize for every tear she had shed over his failures.
But Elias van Kempen was a man who understood that apologies were the currency of the weak. Action was the only legal tender. In this life, he vowed silently, his dark eyes hardening into obsidian, you will never look at a price tag again. You will own the banks that refused to give you a loan.
Rina turned, a wooden spatula in her hand, and immediately frowned at him.
"Elias! Ayo makan! Why are you just standing there like a statue?" she scolded, her voice a rapid, melodic mix of Dutch and Indonesian. She pointed the spatula toward a chipped porcelain plate on the table. "Eat quickly. The bread is getting harder by the minute, and I am not buying more until Friday. Jangan macam-macam today, do you hear me? Look at you, you are too thin. Like a bamboo pole."
"Good morning to you too, Ma," Elias said, his voice surprisingly steady, though it lacked the deep, hypnotic baritone it would develop in his twenties. He pulled out a creaky plastic chair and sat down.
Across the table sat his older brother, Ruben.
At twenty years old, Ruben was already practically middle-aged in his soul. He wore a crisp, remarkably clean shirt that he had clearly ironed himself, his glasses perched perfectly on the bridge of his nose. Ruben was reviewing a stack of university textbooks and a small notebook filled with meticulous, handwritten accounting. Ruben was a creature of logic, order, and deep cynicism. Decades later, Elias would drag him kicking and screaming into the role of Chief Financial Officer for Sovereign Media, giving him billions of dollars and chronic high blood pressure.
Ruben didn’t even look up from his notebook. "You’re late. Again. If you spent half as much time looking for a real job as you do staring in the mirror, maybe Mom wouldn’t have to water down the milk."
Elias looked at the plate. On it were two slices of bread that looked like they could be used as construction materials, smeared with a translucent layer of off-brand margarine.
"I have a job, Ruben," Elias said casually, leaning back in his chair with an air of relaxed arrogance that looked entirely out of place in the slum-like kitchen. "I am going to Los Angeles. I am going to be the face of the decade. And you, my dear brother, are going to count my money."
Ruben finally looked up, his expression twisting into a mask of pure, unadulterated disdain. He pushed his glasses up his nose. "Los Angeles. Right. You think Calvin Klein or Armani is waiting for a half-Indonesian kid from the Hague with no portfolio and zero connections? Get real, Elias. The port of Rotterdam is hiring dockworkers. They don’t care about your cheekbones. They care if you can lift fifty kilos. Stop dreaming. You’re sixteen. Start lifting boxes."
Elias didn’t get angry. In his past life, Ruben’s pragmatic cruelty had stung, driving a wedge between them. Now, Elias just found it hilarious. Ruben was a brilliant accountant, but he had zero vision.
With a smooth, almost predatory grace, Elias reached across the table. Before Ruben could react, Elias snatched the remaining, slightly softer piece of bread right off his older brother’s plate.
"Hey!" Ruben snapped, his eyes widening in outrage. "That’s my breakfast!"
"Consider it an early management fee," Elias said shamelessly, taking a massive bite of the bread. He chewed loudly, flashing Ruben a million-dollar smirk that was currently worth exactly zero dollars. "When I buy you a Porsche in ten years, you can keep the bread."
"You little parasite!" Ruben lunged across the table, but Elias smoothly slid his chair back, laughing.
"Elias! Ruben! Stop it!" Rina shouted, slamming a tin cup of coffee onto the counter. "Astaga, you two will give me a heart attack before I turn forty! Elias, give it back!"
"Already digested, Ma," Elias said, washing it down with a gulp of the bitter coffee. He stood up, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Despite the cheap clothes—a faded thrift-store jacket and oversized trousers—his posture was impeccable. It was the stance of a man who owned the building, even if he was currently squatting in it.
"I am going out," Elias announced. "I have a train to catch. I need to get to Amsterdam."
Ruben scoffed, crossing his arms. "With what money? A train ticket costs ten Guilders. You don’t have ten cents. Are you going to smile at the conductor until he lets you on?"
Elias patted his empty pockets. Ruben was right. His net worth was currently a catastrophic mathematical zero.
"Capital," Elias said smoothly, walking toward the front door, "is everywhere, Ruben. You just have to know whose pocket to pull it from."
He stepped out of the front door before his brother could hurl a textbook at his head.
The crisp, biting wind of the Dutch spring hit his face. The streets of Den Haag in 1991 were a symphony of gray brick, rattling bicycles, and the distant, mechanical hum of trams. It was a world entirely disconnected from the digital, hyper-fast reality he had left behind in 2025. There were no smartphones, no instantaneous wire transfers, no social media algorithms to manipulate.
Just as he took his first step toward the main street, a sound erupted in his brain. It was loud, abrasive, and entirely unignorable.
[CHA-CHING!]
Elias stopped in his tracks as the green, phosphor-like text of the Shameless Capitalist System projected across his vision.
[SYSTEM WARNING: DAILY MAINTENANCE FEE DEDUCTION INITIATED.][CURRENT LIQUID CASH: $0.00][INSUFFICIENT FUNDS DETECTED.]
Elias frowned. Maintenance fee? I just woke up in this timeline. I haven’t even used a skill yet.
[THE SYSTEM OPERATES ON A SUBSCRIPTION MODEL. EXISTENCE IN THIS TIMELINE REQUIRES CAPITAL. DAILY MAINTENANCE FEE OF $5.00 USD (APPROX. 10 GUILDERS) IS DUE BY NOON.][FAILURE TO PAY PENALTY: EXTREME, PARALYZING STOMACH CRAMPS IN PUBLIC FOR 24 HOURS, RESULTING IN SEVERE LOSS OF DIGNITY.]
Elias stared at the floating text, his left eyebrow twitching.
A magical system in novels was supposed to give the protagonist a starter pack—a hidden pill, a secret martial arts manual, or a billion-dollar lottery ticket. His system, however, was threatening to give him public diarrhea if he didn’t pay it five dollars by lunch.
"A literal loan shark," Elias muttered to himself, a genuine, terrifying smile spreading across his face. "Fine. You want a hustle? Let’s hustle."
He checked his mental clock. It was 9:00 AM. He had three hours to materialize ten Guilders out of thin air, not just to survive the system’s ridiculous penalty, but to buy his train ticket to Amsterdam. Amsterdam was where the local, bottom-feeder modeling agencies operated. It was the muddy trench he had to crawl through before he could launch his assault on Hollywood and Paris.
Elias adjusted the collar of his faded jacket, squared his shoulders, and walked toward Den Haag Centraal Station.
The train station was a chaotic hub of commuters, tourists, and the inevitable predators that fed on them. Elias moved through the crowd with the fluid, silent grace of a ghost. He wasn’t looking for a job sweeping floors. He was looking for an anomaly. He was looking for someone who was holding his money.
Near the southern exit, away from the watchful eyes of the transit police, he spotted it.
A small crowd had gathered around a makeshift cardboard table setup over a trash can. A burly man with a thick, scruffy beard and a heavy wool coat was rapidly shuffling three walnut shells across the cardboard surface. A small, crumpled ball of foam darted beneath them.
It was the oldest street scam in the history of urban civilization: The Shell Game.
"Watch the ball, keep your eye on the ball!" the scammer chanted in rough Dutch, his hands moving with practiced, dizzying speed. "Fifty Guilders if you can find the little mouse! Ten to play!"
A naive-looking tourist, clearly British from his terrible windbreaker, slapped a ten-Guilder note on the table and pointed confidently at the middle shell. The scammer lifted it. Empty. The crowd groaned.
Elias stood at the back of the crowd, his arms crossed. He didn’t blink. He didn’t just watch the shells; he engaged his Photographic Memory.
To a normal person, the scammer’s hands were a blur. But to Elias’s hyper-calibrated brain, the movement broke down into clinical, frame-by-frame data. He saw the exact millisecond the scammer used his pinky finger to pin the foam ball against the cardboard, lifting the shell while keeping the ball hidden in the palm of his hand. It wasn’t magic; it was basic sleight of hand. The ball was never under any of the shells when the mark was guessing.
Elias waited. He watched the scammer fleece two more tourists, accumulating a healthy wad of colorful Guilder notes in his deep coat pocket.
When the train horn blared, signaling a major departure, the crowd dispersed, leaving the scammer momentarily alone to pack up his cardboard table.
Elias stepped out of the shadows and approached the man.
"Excuse me," Elias said, his voice dropping into a smooth, cold register that was entirely unnerving coming from a sixteen-year-old boy.
The scammer, a man easily twice Elias’s weight, looked up and sneered. "Games over, kid. Go ask your mommy for ice cream money."
Elias didn’t flinch. He didn’t posture or puff out his chest. He simply stepped completely into the man’s personal space, his tall frame looming slightly.
"I’m not here to play," Elias said softly, his Dutch flawless, stripped of any street slang. He spoke with the measured, terrifying cadence of a corporate auditor. "I am here to collect the tax."
The scammer blinked, genuinely confused. "Tax? What the hell are you talking about, boy? Back off before I break your jaw."
Elias smiled. It was the Million-Dollar Smirk, currently unbuffed by the system, but backed by decades of destroying billionaires in boardrooms. It radiated pure, unadulterated danger.
"Paragraph four of the local transit authority bylaws clearly prohibits unlicensed gambling on railway property," Elias stated, his tone conversational, as if he were discussing the weather. "But we both know you don’t care about that. What you do care about is the fact that you’re using a classic palming technique. You pinch the foam ball between your pinky and ring finger on your right hand, resting it against your palm while you lift the shell with your thumb and index."
The scammer’s face went rigid. His hands instinctively twitched toward his pockets.
"Now," Elias continued, leaning in slightly, his eyes locking onto the man’s pupils. "There are two transit police officers standing exactly forty meters behind me near the ticket kiosks. And, more importantly, the local syndicate boys who actually control this turf usually take a forty percent cut of street hustles. I know for a fact you aren’t paying them, because if you were, you wouldn’t be flinching right now."
It was a bluff. Elias had no idea if the local syndicate cared about a petty shell game. It was a Lifestyle Deduction. A man running a cardboard table solo near an exit was an independent operator avoiding turf taxes.
"You..." the scammer stammered, his bravado entirely evaporating. The kid in front of him didn’t look like a teenager anymore; he looked like a demon wearing a teenager’s skin. "Who the hell are you?"
"I am the auditor," Elias lied flawlessly, extending his open palm. "And my silence regarding your little right-handed parlor trick costs fifty Guilders. A flat fee. Consider it a cheap operating license."
The scammer looked over Elias’s shoulder, confirming the distant presence of the transit cops. He looked back at Elias’s dead, uncompromising eyes. The man swallowed hard, sweating in the cool morning air.
With a trembling hand, the scammer reached into his coat pocket, pulled out a crisp, yellow fifty-Guilder note, and slapped it into Elias’s open palm.
"Take it," the man hissed, grabbing his cardboard table. "Freak."
Elias folded the bill neatly, slipping it into his worn pocket. "A pleasure doing business with you. Have a highly profitable day."
As the scammer practically ran out of the station, a sharp, incredibly satisfying sound echoed in Elias’s mind.
[CHA-CHING!]
[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: SUCCESSFUL EXTORTION RECORDED.][EVALUATION: PURE CAPITALIST RUTHLESSNESS. NO MAGIC USED. PURE LEVERAGE.][REWARD: +5 SHAMELESS POINTS (CP)]
Elias let out a long breath, feeling the crisp paper in his pocket. Fifty Guilders. It was nothing compared to the millions he was used to moving, but right now, it was the most beautiful piece of paper in the world.
He walked directly to the automated ticket machines. He didn’t hesitate. He fed a ten-Guilder coin—procured by breaking the fifty at a nearby newsstand—into the slot. The machine whirred, spitting out a small, rectangular ticket.
Destination: Amsterdam Centraal.
He pocketed the remaining forty Guilders—roughly twenty US dollars. It was enough to cover the system’s extortionate maintenance fee and buy him a cheap meal.
Elias walked out onto the elevated platform. The wind whipped his hair as the sleek, yellow-and-blue Dutch train glided into the station, its brakes hissing loudly. He stepped up to the edge of the platform, his reflection caught in the glass of the train doors.
He was penniless, dressed in rags, and beholden to a parasitic system that would torture his bowels if he didn’t pay rent.
But he was alive. He had his memory. And he had a ticket to Babylon.
Elias van Kempen stepped onto the train, the doors sliding shut behind him. The hunt had officially begun.