Title: The Debt of the Unborn
⭕In the city of Aethelgard, people don't die of old age; they die when their "Chronos-Account" hits zero. Every second of your life is taxed. If you are born into the "Lower Dials," you start your life with a debt of forty years. You must work to earn back the right to exist.
Silas was a "Time-Sweeper." His job was to harvest the remaining minutes from the recently deceased. It was a cold, clinical profession. He would stand over a body, press a silver vacuum to their temple, and watch the digital glow of their remaining seconds transfer into a glass vial.
One rainy Tuesday, Silas was called to a luxury penthouse in the "High Noon" district. The man on the floor was Julian Vane, the billionaire architect of the time-tax system. He was dead, but his clock showed something.
impossible: 999 years, 59 minutes, and 59 seconds.
As Silas reached for the harvest, the "dead" man's eyes snapped open.
"Don't take it," Julian whispered, his voice like grinding stones. "If you take this time, the world resets. And this time... we won't be the ones in power."