You Were Never Meant For Greatness

In the dimly lit corridor of Sacred Heights High School, Atrixus Timothy's footsteps echoed with a hollow sound, a prelude to the ordeal he was about to endure.

As he rounded the corner towards his locker, he could already feel the heavy weight of eyes upon him, the air thick with anticipation for the spectacle that was to unfold.

There, leaning with calculated nonchalance against the row of lockers, stood Liora Hastings and Julian Caspar, the architects of his daily torment. Liora, with her cascading blonde hair that shimmered like spun gold under the fluorescent lights, had a beauty that very much contrasted her venomous nature.

Her eyes, a piercing blue, seemed to cut through him with disdainful amusement. She had utmost disgust for anyone of low backgrounds.

Julian, tall and athletically built, with jet-black hair that contrasted starkly with his piercing green eyes, exuded an aura of unassailable confidence. They were the scions of two of the city's most influential families, their lineage, a shield that rendered them untouchable.

"Look, the slum rat decided to grace us with his presence," Liora sneered, her voice dripping with mockery.

Julian's laugh was a low rumble, a sound that seemed to draw others in, eager to partake in the cruelty.

"Did you find your way here, or did the stench of the slums guide you, Timothy?"

The words were like barbs, each one embedding itself deeper into Atrixus' psyche. He tried to move past them, to ignore the humiliation that washed over him like a tide, but they blocked his path, a wall of malice and privilege.

"Where do you think you're going? We're not done with you yet," Julian said, his hand shooting out to push Atrixus back. The force of the push sent him staggering, the laughter of the onlookers overshadowing his thoughts.

Before Atrixus could regain his balance, he felt himself being propelled forward, his arms grabbed and twisted behind his back. He was half-dragged, half-marched to the boys' bathroom, the jeers of his classmates echoing in his ears.

Inside, the air was thick with the smell of antiseptic and something else, something darker. Liora and Julian, with the help of their cohorts, forced Atrixus' head under the faucet, the cold water a shock to his system.

"Let's see if we can wash the slum out of you," Liora hissed, her words a venomous whisper in his ear.

Atrixus struggled, his lungs burning for air, but their grip was unyielding. Just as he felt the edges of his vision begin to darken, he woke up, gasping for breath, his body slick with sweat.

It was a dream, a cruel playback synonymous with the realities of his high school days.

Lying in the small room he shared with his mother in the slums of Paricus City, Atrixus felt the old, familiar anger boiling in his veins. But beneath the anger, there was something else—a determination that had been forged in the crucible of his suffering.

Today was the day of the evaluation, the day he had been waiting for, the day that could change everything. As he sat up, the memories of his dream still vivid in his mind, Atrixus allowed himself a moment to reflect.

"They call me a slum rat, an outcast, unworthy of becoming a System Bearer," he thought, his voice a silent monologue in the quiet of the morning.

"But they don't see what I see. They don't feel what I feel. They've never known hunger, never felt the sting of cold rain through a leaking roof, never understood what it means to fight for every breath."

Rising from his bed, Atrixus moved to the small mirror that hung on the wall. The face that looked back at him was marked by hardship, but in his eyes, there burned a fierce resolve.

"Let them underestimate me. Let them mock and scorn. For today, I will show them what a 'slum rat' can do. Today, I will prove that worth is not determined by birthright or lineage and background, but by strength of will and the courage to face one's demons."

As he dressed, pulling on the simple clothes that had seen better days, Atrixus felt a clarity of purpose that he had never known before. The trials he had endured, the pain and the humiliation, had all led to that moment.

Stepping out into the breaking dawn, Atrixus Timothy looked into the distance where Sacred Heights High School was located.

He could spot its towers silhouetted against the lightening sky, and he felt an unshakable conviction settle within him. Today, he would not walk as a victim of his circumstances but as a challenger of his fate.

With each step, his resolve deepened, a silent promise to himself and the memory of his father. He would emerge from the evaluation not just as a System Bearer but as a testament to the indomitable spirit of those who had been cast aside and forgotten.

Today, Atrixus Timothy would rise.

■■■

"You have failed the evaluation!"

In the vast expanse of the testing ground, a silence hung heavy in the air, broken only by the ominous hum of the large screen that loomed ahead. Atrixus Timothy stood alone, his gaze fixed on the words that sealed his fate.

The ground beneath him might as well have been a chasm opening to swallow him whole. His heart, once full of hope and determination, plummeted into an abyss of despair. The shock rendered him momentarily speechless, disbelief coursing through his veins.

"But I passed phases one and two with high scores!" Atrixus found his voice, a mix of confusion and defiance, as he turned to face the evaluators. Their expressions were impassive, their stances unyielding—a stark contrast to the turmoil that raged within him.

One of the evaluators, a man with sharp features that seemed carved from stone, shook his bald head. "Phase one and two are foundational, but meaningless without phase three. It's the compatibility with the System Bearer microchip that determines your future. Without it, you can not proceed."

Atrixus' pleas fell on deaf ears, his arguments dissipating into the charged atmosphere of the testing grounds. The finality in the evaluator's tone was a hammer driving nails into the coffin of his dreams.

As he was instructed to leave, a shadow of defeat draped over his shoulders while Liora Hastings stepped onto the grounds. Her smirk was like a dagger twisting in his already wounded spirit. The murmurs and snickers of the onlookers, hidden in the shadows of the arena, felt like a chorus of ridicule aimed solely at him.

Liora's evaluation commenced, and with a flourish of triumph that Atrixus could barely stomach, she passed. The crowd erupted into cheers as she was whisked away, a future System Bearer, while Atrixus was left to navigate the aftermath of his collapse.

Away from the spectacle, hidden from the view of the masses, stood Liora's father, Leonard Hastings. A tall and slender man with glasses and his blonde hair braided backward. He looked like he could pass off as a college student because of his young and intense look.

However, he seemed to be engaged in a hushed conversation with one of the evaluators. The man's nod was almost imperceptible, a silent acquiescence to the dark deed done.

"I trust everything went as planned," Leonard's voice was smooth, a whisper laced with toxin.

"Without a hitch," the evaluator responded a glint of complicity in his eye.

"The device showed him as incompatible, just as you wanted."

Leonard's laugh was a low rumble of satisfaction.

"Good. We can't have a slum rat sharing the stage with my daughter. It would be a disgrace."

Money exchanged hands, a silent contract that spoke volumes of the corruption that lay beneath the surface of the hallowed process.

Meanwhile, Atrixus' journey home was a march through a fog of despair. Each step was heavier than the last, his back slouched under the weight of a thousand unspoken dreams. The city, with its towering structures and gleaming surfaces, mocked him with its indifference.

His mind was a tempest, thoughts crashing against each other with the force of a storm.

"How could I have failed? Was it all for nothing? My efforts, my dreams... were they just illusions?" The questions spun in a relentless cycle, each one a strike against the fragile walls of his resolve.

Atrixus' walk was a reflection of his internal defeat, a visual metaphor for the crumbling of his aspirations. The slums welcomed him, not with open arms but with a grim acknowledgment of his return.

There, in the shadows of the city's prosperity, he was just another soul adrift, caught in the undertow of societal neglect.

As he entered the cramped space he called home, the reality of his situation settled around him like a cloak woven from threads of failure. The dim light flickered, casting long shadows that seemed to dance in mockery of his plight.

Sitting alone, Atrixus allowed the full weight of his defeat to envelop him. The silence was oppressive, a void where once there had been the vibrant energy of hope. In that moment of utter desolation, he found himself at a crossroads, the path ahead shrouded in uncertainty.

■■■

In the echoing halls of the school, Atrixus Timothy moved like a ghost, his presence barely acknowledged by the throngs of students bustling around him.

The days since his failed evaluation had melded into a blur, each indistinguishable from the last, marked only by the deepening chasm of his despair.

Among his peers, over thirty now bore the title of System Bearers, their shoulders backed with pride and their conversations buzzing with excitement about the factions vying for their allegiance.

Liora, Julian, and their cohort were the center of gravity, around which the school's social universe orbited. Their tales of potential adventures in Shunri Paradise, of powers, honed and battles to be fought, were the stuff of daily discourse, elevating their status to near-mythical proportions.

Atrixus, on the other hand, existed in the periphery, his dreams of joining their ranks dashed against the unforgiving reality of his incompatibility.

Liora, ever the predator scenting weakness, relished in twisting the knife of his failure.

"A slum rat will always be a slum rat," she taunted, her voice a venomous caress that found its mark with unerring precision.

"You were never meant for greatness."