Zhao Chen walked aimlessly through the rain.
He didn't know how much time had passed since he left the old building. He only felt a strange emptiness, as if something invisible had been ripped out of his life.
He couldn't explain it.
He only knew that something must have happened there.
Something important.
First Effect: Luck Vanishes
A car drove by too close.
"Hey!" Zhao Chen shouted, stepping back.
He slipped.
He fell onto his back into a puddle.
Pain in his elbow. His backpack fell open. His phone hit the ground.
Screen cracked.
He lay there, staring at the gray sky.
"Great..." he muttered.
Before, these things didn't happen to him.
Before, there was always someone there to help him.
A coincidence.
A stroke of luck.
Now, nothing.
Second Effect: The Lost Opportunity
Drenched, he arrived late to his part-time job.
The manager looked at him with annoyance.
"Late again, Zhao Chen."
"I'm sorry, boss, it's just—"
"It doesn't matter," he cut him off. "Someone with better references came by today."
He handed him an envelope.
"Don't come back tomorrow."
Zhao Chen held it without opening it.
"Fired...?"
The manager had already turned his back.
Third Effect: Isolation
He tried to call a classmate.
No answer.
He sent messages.
Read.
No response.
In the class group chat, no one reacted when he wrote.
It wasn't hate.
It was indifference.
As if his presence... no longer mattered.
Somewhere Else
The system displayed cold data in front of Lin Mo.
Detected Consequences — Son of Luck #1:
Base Luck: -40%
Internal Confidence: Unstable
Social Support Network: Early dissolution
Recovery Probability: Low
Su Qingyue bit her lip.
"All of that... because of a single stolen opportunity."
Lin Mo replied without emotion.
"It wasn't just one."
He thought: It was the first.
"And without the first, the others never arrive."
Qingyue closed her eyes for a second.
"What if he breaks?"
"Then the world will look for another protagonist."
Immediate thought: Or I will take his place.
Back to Zhao Chen
That night, Zhao Chen sat in his rented room.
The broken phone lay on the table.
The unopened dismissal envelope beside it.
He looked at his hands.
"What did I do wrong...?"
There was no answer.
No sudden enlightenment.
No mysterious old man or savior system.
Only silence.
And a lingering sensation:
Someone had gotten there before him.
Final Confirmation
The system notified:
Son of Luck #1:
Status: Main route collapsed
Transition: Forced secondary character
Additional Destiny Points obtained: +60
Current Total: 500
Lin Mo looked out at the city from high above.
"This is how you steal destiny," he thought.
Without blood.
Without glory.
Just by letting the world stop helping.
Su Qingyue looked at him.
And, although she didn't entirely approve...
She understood there was no turning back now.