Stella moved first. No hesitation. No glance over her shoulder.

  She walked straight to the show glass where the food trays sat behind polished transparency. Steam pressed faintly against the inner surface. Rice. Meat. Bread. So close it almost felt like a joke.

  Two service robots rolled forward in smooth, synchronized motion. White frames. Black visors. No expression.

  “Stretch your wrist to purchase food.”

  The mechanical politeness scraped at something raw inside her. Stella exhaled slowly through her nose.

  “I am not here for your games,” she said, voice low, dangerous. “If I cannot get food, then I will destroy you.”

  The robots did not blink. Did not tilt. Did not retreat. “Stretch your wrist to purchase food.”

  Behind her, footsteps gathered. Chairs scraped. Metal legs shrieked against tile. The students drifted closer, drawn by hunger and the smell of cooked meat thickening the air. Some carried broken chair legs. Others clutched metal trays like shields. Eyes hollow. Cheeks sharper than they had been four days ago.

  “Attack!” Stella shouted.

  The word cracked through the hall. Wooden splinters rose. Metal lifted. A dozen bodies surged forward.

  And then, everything froze.

  A translucent blue screen burst into existence above them. Letters forming in cold, glowing precision.

  SYSTEM NOTIFICATION.

  The air seemed to thin.

  TASK: BEAT UP YOUR NEIGHBOR

  TIME ALLOWED: ONE HOUR

  REWARD: 50 NINJA COINS.

  The words hung there.

  Fifty.

  A number heavy enough to taste.

  Nobody moved.

  Weapons hovered midair. Breaths stalled halfway in their lungs. Eyes shifted, slowly, from the floating screen, to the person standing closest to them.

  Neighbor.

  It sounded harmless. Domestic. Almost friendly. But here, it meant target.

  Andy barked a laugh that broke too sharply. “Are these people crazy? Now they want us to kill ourselves?”

  No one answered him.

  They were measuring distances now. Shoulder width. Arm reach. Who looked weaker. Who looked desperate. Who looked hungry enough to cross the line.

  “Fifty Ninja Coin is life,” Brian said quietly. And then he swung.

  The wooden chair leg smashed into Brandom’s face with a wet crack.

  Brandom collapsed before he could even shout. Blood sprayed across the tile in a thin arc. The sight of it snapped something invisible inside the hall.

  The eruption was instant. Bodies collided. Fists drove forward. Someone screamed. Someone laughed. Someone sobbed.

  The robots rolled backward, clearing space.

  Theo chose quickly, he needed a soft landing and there was only one face that came to his mind:

  Andy.

  He was thinner now. Slower. An easier win.

  Theo lunged and drove his fist into Andy’s cheek. Once. Twice. The third blow snapped Andy’s head sideways and sent him crashing to the ground.

  Theo didn’t hesitate. He dropped to his knees, raising his arm to hammer down again.

  Andy’s hand shot up. His teeth sank into Theo’s fingers.

  A raw, animal scream tore from Theo’s throat.

  “Aaaahhhsss!”

  The sound barely traveled before it was swallowed by a dozen other screams.

  Andy didn’t let go. He twisted.

  Theo thrashed wildly, punching downward with his free hand, but Andy had already rolled, climbing on top of him like something feral. Teeth found skin again. Shoulder. Neck. Anywhere flesh showed.

  Theo’s screams cracked into pleas. “Please! Please! Please! You are killing me!”

  Andy’s jaw worked harder. Blood smeared across both of them.

  Across the hall, another student swung a tray like a blade. It bent on impact but kept moving. A girl clawed at someone’s eyes. Someone slipped in blood and was trampled before they could stand.

  Newton stood in the middle of it.

  Frozen.

  The world had turned into noise. Bone against bone. Breath against breath. Desperation given fists.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Oh my God,” he whispered. “They are all becoming monsters.”

  Before he could finish those words, a body slammed into him from the side, nearly knocking him over.

  Inside his skull, a whisper rose. You have to fight.

  He squeezed his eyes shut. “No!” He screamed

  “Else you will have no coin to eat,” the voice added.

  “No way,” he muttered. “I would rather starve than commit violence.”

  Then, he felt an impact:

  A fist crashed into his left eye. White exploded behind his vision. He staggered backward and hit the floor hard.

  “Aaahhhsssshhh!”

  Phil stood over him. No apology. No speech. Just hunger.

  Phil’s foot drove into Newton’s stomach. Air fled his lungs in a violent rush. Newton curled instinctively, arms wrapping around his ribs.

  Another kick. And another.

  Each one deeper than the last. Newton tried to crawl, but a hand grabbed his shirt and yanked him flat. A fist slammed into his mouth. Something split. Warm liquid filled his tongue.

  He coughed. Red splattered across the tile.

  “Fight back.” The voice inside him grew louder.

  He pushed it away. His mother’s voice came instead.

  “Never involve yourself in violence. Violence leads to murder. And the Bible commands: Thou shall not kill.”

  Another punch landed on his stomach. He gasped and spit blood.

  Phil’s knuckles smashed into Newton’s nose. A crunch. Stars burst behind his eyelids.

  Phil mounted him fully now, knees pinning Newton’s arms. His shadow swallowed Newton’s vision as his fists kept falling.

  Newton’s chest tightened. Breath would not come properly anymore. The hall blurred at the edges.

  Then a voice echoed in his mind:

  “Jesus does not exist here.”

  The memory of Stella’s voice cut through the haze.

  “The only God that exists here is the system.”

  A fist cracked against his cheekbone.

  “In this world, violence is survival. It is either you are the one doing it..”

  Another blow landed.

  Phil’s hand drew back again.

  “..or the one it is being done to.”

  The next punch hovered for half a second longer than the others. Maybe Phil was tiring. Maybe Newton’s mind was slowing. Or maybe something inside Newton finally snapped.

  “Fine,” Newton whispered. “You speak violence, I will respond with violence.”

  He did not think. He moved.

  Whatever strength remained in him, whatever breath had not yet been beaten out of his lungs, he gathered it like a final offering. His knees dug into the slippery floor. His vision swam red and white.

  Newton rose. Not steady. Not graceful.

  But fast.

  His fist cut through the air and crashed into Phil’s face with everything he had left.

  The sound was thick. A blunt crack. Phil’s head snapped backward. His body followed. He fell hard, hands flying to his face.

  “My nose! My nose! My nose!”

  The scream tore out of him, high and panicked. Blood poured between his fingers, bright and sudden, dripping down his wrist, splashing onto the tiles.

  Newton stood over him, chest jerking, lungs dragging air like broken machinery.

  He could have stepped back. But he didn’t.

  Something inside him had shifted. Not cleanly. Not nobly. It felt jagged. Feverish.

  He lunged.

  His knees hit the ground on either side of Phil’s ribs. The impact sent a jolt up his spine, but he barely felt it. His hands grabbed at Phil’s shirt, bunching fabric, pulling him up just enough.

  And then the blows came. One. Two. Three.

  His knuckles smashed into Phil’s cheek. His own skin split on impact. Pain shot up his arm, but it blurred into the larger storm roaring inside him.

  Phil screamed.

  Newton kept hitting. The world narrowed to a single point. To the memory of a fist slamming into his eye. To the taste of blood flooding his mouth minutes ago. To the suffocating weight of Phil’s body pinning him down.

  His fist rose and fell. Over and over again.

  Phil’s head snapped sideways with each strike. Blood smeared across his lips. Across his chin. Across Newton’s fingers.

  “Stop! Stop!”

  Newton did not hear him. His own breath was too loud. Too harsh. A broken rhythm sawing in and out of his chest.

  He struck again.

  Even when his knuckles began to burn. Even when the skin over them peeled back and the sting sharpened.

  Even when his wrist trembled from impact. He didn’t stop. Phil’s voice cracked into something smaller. “Please! Please!”

  Newton’s fist came down again. The hall around them was a chorus of agony. Bodies rolling. Furniture splintering. Someone was coughing up something thick and wet. Someone was laughing hysterically.

  Newton’s world held only one shape beneath him.

  Phil’s voice shifted. “I beg you in the name of God,” he choked. “Please don’t kill me.”

  Newton’s fist halted midair.

  The words cut through everything.

  IN THE NAME OF GOD!.

  They did not sound like the system’s voice. They did not glow blue and cold.

  They sounded human, and fragile. His arm hovered, trembling above Phil’s bloodied face.

  The name. God.

  It struck deeper than any punch. For a second, the hall disappeared. The screams faded. The metallic smell dissolved into something else entirely.

  He saw a small kitchen. Sunlight through thin curtains. His mother standing over a pot, wooden spoon in hand, turning to look at him with that firm, steady gaze.

  Never involve yourself in violence..Her voice was not loud. It never needed to be. Violence leads to murder.

  His fist began to shake.

  Remember the commandment:

  THOU SHALL NOT KILL.

  “Oh my God,” Newton whispered. The rage that had carried him drained all at once, leaving behind a hollow ache. His hand dropped uselessly to his side.

  He slid off Phil’s body and fell backward onto the floor, palms scraping against sticky tile.

  “What have I done?”

  His chest rose and fell violently. Air scraped into him like sand.

  Phil curled onto his side, coughing, blood dripping from his ruined nose. He did not try to stand. He just lay there, shuddering.

  Newton dragged his hands over his face. They came away red. He stared at them. His hands.

  His mother used to hold these hands when they crossed the street. Used to rub them when he scraped his knees as a child.

  Now they were coated in someone else’s blood. “Oh my God,” he said again, voice breaking.

  He folded forward, elbows on his knees, and covered his face.

  A sound rose out of him before he could stop it. A sob. It tore from his chest, raw and uncontrolled.

  He imagined her finding out. He imagined her standing at the door of this place, somehow stepping into this nightmare and seeing him kneeling over another boy, fists raised.

  The disappointment in her eyes. Not anger. But it would be worse. She would be hurt.

  His shoulders shook. “I just committed violence,” he whispered into his palms, as if saying it softly would make it smaller.

  “Please forgive me God. The devil made me do it.”

  Around him, the hall was no better. Students lay scattered across the floor like discarded dolls. Some curled into themselves, clutching ribs. Some stared blankly at the ceiling. A few crawled weakly toward the walls, leaving faint streaks behind them.

  Someone whimpered continuously, the sound thin and animal.

  A boy near the overturned tables tried to stand and collapsed again, hands slipping in a dark pool beneath him.

  The air was thick. Breathing felt like swallowing rust. Newton lowered his hands slowly.

  Phil was still alive. He could see the faint rise and fall of his back.

  Relief and shame collided inside him.

  Then, a familiar blue glow washed over the room.

  SYSTEM NOTIFICATION:

  The letters materialized above them, crisp and indifferent.

  YOU HAVE BEEN CREDITED FIFTY NINJA COINS.

  No applause. No triumphant music. Just text.

  Newton stared at his wrist. The number flickered:

  Fifty.

  The same reward which was offered at the beginning. The same number that had turned neighbors into predators.

  A few students lifted their arms weakly, checking their own displays. Some let out hoarse, exhausted laughs. Not joyful. Just relieved.

  Fifty Ninja coins meant food. Fifty Ninja coins meant another day.

  One girl tried to cheer, but the sound came out as a cough.

  Brian pushed himself upright against a wall, face swollen, lip split. He glanced at his wrist and nodded once, like confirming a transaction.

  Theo lay on his back, fingers wrapped in torn fabric, eyes half closed. Andy sat slumped nearby, chest heaving, dried blood dark around his mouth.

  No one celebrated. They were too drained for that.

  Slowly, one by one, bodies began to move. Not toward each other. But toward the show glass.

  The robots rolled forward again, perfectly aligned, as if nothing had happened. As if the floor were not smeared with the cost of their task.

  “Stretch your wrist to purchase food.” Voices were too tired to argue this time.

  Students extended trembling arms. Coins deducted. Trays dispensed.

  Hands shook as they carried plates away.

  Some sank to the floor immediately and began to eat with frantic, mechanical movements. Food disappeared into mouths that were split and swollen. Rice stuck to blood.

  No one waited. No one shared. Newton remained seated for a moment longer.

  His head throbbed. His eye had begun to swell shut. Each breath pulled at his bruised ribs.

  He looked once more at Phil. Phil had managed to roll onto his stomach. He was crawling away slowly, leaving faint red smears behind him.

  Alive.

  Newton swallowed hard. He forced himself to stand. His legs trembled but held. He walked to the show glass.

  The smell of food hit him again, warm and cruelly normal. He raised his wrist. The robot scanned it. Coins deducted. A tray slid forward.

  Newton took it and moved away from the others, finding a space against the wall. He lowered himself carefully, wincing as his back touched cold concrete.

  He stared at the food for a long second. Then he began to eat. Slow at first. Then faster.

  His hands shook. Rice fell from his fingers. He did not bother picking it up.

  Around him, some students who had finished eating dragged themselves toward another corridor.

  The clinic.

  A white sign glowed above its entrance.

  Treatment available.

  Coins required: five Ninja Coin.

  One boy limped inside, holding his arm at an unnatural angle. A girl with blood matted in her hair followed, pressing cloth against her scalp.

  Coins would vanish there too.

  Newton watched them go. He looked down at his wrist again. The number was higher now.

  Safer.

  For the moment. He imagined stepping into that clinic. Lying on a clean bed. Letting someone stitch the cut above his eyebrow. Letting someone wrap his ribs.

  But each treatment would subtract from the number.

  Subtract from food.

  Subtract from survival.

  He lifted another bite to his mouth instead. The pain pulsed steadily behind his eye. He chewed. Swallowed.

  The world had made its rule clear. Coins decided who ate.

  Coins decided who slept warm.

  Coins decided who received care. And he wasn't ready to spend it on minor things.

  He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and tasted iron again.

  Around him, the hall slowly quieted. Groans softened into low murmurs. The robots stood still, waiting for the next transaction. The blue glow of the system faded from the air.

  Newton leaned his head back against the wall. His body hurt everywhere. His hands throbbed. And beneath it all, something else hurt more quietly.

  But he kept eating.

  Unknown to him, pairs of eyes watch them from afar.

  “It is time to activate phase two,” the old voice said slowly.”

  The others nodded. “Yes, master.”