I never liked hospitals.
Too white. Too clean. Too quiet for how much pain they hold. Like they're pretending to be a church, but all they worship here is grief.
I remember the first time I saw my mother in this bed — tubes in her arms, skin too pale, eyes that looked past me like they already knew the ending. I was twelve then. I'm fourteen now. The same chair. The same chair. The same fucking chair.
But this time, I'm not alone. This time, my baby sister's curled up against my chest, tiny fists wrapped in my shirt. Emmy Creed. Three years old. A heartbeat I have to protect with my own.
Mom's breath rattles like paper. It's nothing like it was when she used to sing — she had this voice that made burnt toast taste good. Emmy never got to hear it properly. She'll never remember it.
Her hand twitches. I catch it. I press my forehead to her knuckles. I want to scream — I don't. Emmy's asleep. Emmy can't know. Emmy can't see. Emmy can't hear how much I want to tear the world in half for stealing her mother.
"I'm sorry, Ma," I whisper, voice cracked and raw. "I'm so sorry. I couldn't fix it. I couldn't fix anything."
She tries to speak. No words come. Just that sound — that last, soft sound. Her eyes find Emmy's hair against my chin. They soften. They tell me what her mouth can't.
Take care of her.
I nod, a tear slipping down my nose onto her wrist. "I will. I swear to you. I'll take care of her. I'll never let her go hungry. I'll never let her be alone. I'll never — I swear."
The machine sighs a long, flat line. I don't cry out. I don't move. I just hold her hand until it's cold.
I don't remember leaving the hospital. I remember rain. I remember Emmy's small body pressed to mine under a cheap hoodie that used to be Mom's. I remember the front door of our tiny house creaking open like it was embarrassed to let us back in without her.
Two years of paid bills. Mom worked herself into the grave for that. No debts. A roof. Heat for winters. Two years for me to figure out how the hell to be a parent when I'm just a kid who never really got to be one.
I put Emmy in our mom's bed that first night. It still smells like her. I sit on the floor. I watch Emmy breathe. I don't blink.
I was twenty-one when I died the first time.
A nobody. Just a broke college kid with an internet addiction and a soft spot for stories where the underdog wins. I don't know who I pissed off — maybe fate just hates guys like me. One car crash later, and boom — next thing I know, I'm a screaming newborn in a rotting apartment.
I waited for the cheat codes. The golden finger. The system. The magical mentor.Nothing came.
Instead, I got Mom — not rich, not smart, not lucky, but the kindest hands you'd ever find in this trash heap of a neighborhood. And Emmy — born screaming, tiny lungs telling the world she'd survive no matter what.
It wasn't a childhood. It was a countdown. Dad left. Mom coughed blood. The rent notices came. The food stamps came. The eviction threats came. I got tough, fast. Learned how to lie with a smile. Learned how to make stale bread taste good. Learned how to swing a bat if anyone looked at Mom funny.
I guess this is the part where I'm supposed to feel sorry for myself. But Emmy's warm against my side, thumb stuck in her mouth, trusting me with her whole tiny heart.
There's no room for pity when you're all someone's got left.
I was staring at the ceiling that night. Emmy drooled on my shoulder, all warm baby weight and tiny fists clenching my old T-shirt. The house creaked in the wind. The fridge buzzed like it was laughing at me for feeding it more hope than food.
And then — click.Buzz.
A screen flickered behind my eyelids. White text on black. A voice — not a voice, really — like a thought someone else whispered through my skull.
[SYSTEM INITIALIZING...]
I nearly jolted up, but Emmy whimpered, so I forced myself still.
[HELLO, ZANE CREED.]
I hissed under my breath. "Who the hell—"
[I AM YOUR SUPPORT TEMPLATE SYSTEM. I APOLOGIZE FOR THE FOURTEEN-YEAR DELAY.]
"Fourteen years?" I bite out. "Where the fuck were you when she got sick? Where were you when I had to steal stale bread for dinner?!"
[A CRITICAL ERROR OCCURRED DURING INSTALLATION. I REGRET THE INCONVENIENCE.]
I barked out a laugh. Hollow. Cold. Emmy snuggled closer. I touched her hair — soft, baby-fine. Everything that was left of Mom.
"You're late," I said. My throat burned. "You're so fucking late."
[COMPENSATION PROTOCOL ACTIVATED. YOU WILL RECEIVE TWO LEGENDARY TEMPLATES IMMEDIATELY. NEW TEMPLATES WILL FOLLOW EVERY SIX MONTHS.]
"What do I care about templates?" My voice broke, bitter. "You think I need fantasy trading cards right now? I need food. I need money. I need—"
[TEMPLATE ONE: YAMAZAKI GUN. FULL COMBAT TALENT, BODY UI, TUI, AND BLACK BONE.]
It hit me like ice down my spine. A flash behind my eyelids. Muscles that weren't mine screamed awake. My skin felt too tight. My vision shifted — lines, data, angles, muscle tension — everything mapped in real time. Gun's UI, flickering cold in the corner of my eye. Black veins of the Yamazaki bloodline stitching under my skin like liquid wire.
[TEMPLATE TWO: GORDON RAMSAY. MASTER CHEF. COMPLETE MEMORY TRANSFER. FULL CUISINE TECHNIQUE TREE.]
Heat chased the ice. Knives. Saucepans. Recipes. Exact temperatures. Finer than any textbook I'd ever skimmed. The chaos of fire and metal and oil, all under control. My mouth watered — and twisted in a grin. Emmy would never eat stale bread again. Not if I had to fry it in butter and call it brioche.
I laughed. Quiet at first — then sharp enough to hurt my chest. Emmy shifted, mumbled in her sleep. I bent over her, kissed her forehead. "Don't worry, bug," I whispered into her hair. "We'll be okay now. Even if I have to break the world open with my fists and cook dinner on its burning bones."
The UI flickered again — red lines tracking the cracks in my knuckles. The TUI humming low under my heartbeat, telling me exactly how to break a grown man's ribcage with two knuckles and a twist.
A child with a god's fighting instincts. A brother with the temper of a chef who takes no shit.
Mom's house creaked in the dark. I swear I heard her voice — or maybe just the wind — telling me to be good. To protect. To fight. To feed.
I would. I swear it. I swear it on the last of her warmth still clinging to this broken roof.
The next morning, I pulled Emmy out of bed, set her tiny feet on the floor. Made her scrambled eggs so perfect they'd shame any greasy diner. She giggled. Giggled when I sprinkled pepper on her nose. Giggled when I flicked butter at her forehead.
Her laugh was the first thing that didn't sound dead in this house since Mom left.
Nobody hires a fourteen-year-old with blood in his eyes and calluses on his knuckles. Nobody pays him enough to cover rent once the clock runs out on Mom's final mercy. Nobody but the basements. The cages. The circles of fists and cash and grown men who'd rather watch a child bleed than lose their paycheck.
I gave them a show. I made them believe I was just another stray cub looking for scraps.
The first man they sent was twice my size. Tattooed skulls on his fists. Teeth like broken tombstones. He spat at my feet.
"Go home, kid."
I smiled — Gun's smile now. Yamazaki blood humming. The UI outlined his throat, his elbows, the weakness in his stance.
"Can't." I cracked my neck. Emmy's tiny giggle still warm in my ear. "Got dinner to buy."
When he fell, they didn't clap. They stared.
A child standing over a grown man with his nose bent sideways. My knuckles split. Blood running clean and bright. The UI fed me muscle data I didn't understand, but my body obeyed like it was born for this.
They whispered it first — the name they'd spit in fear a month later.
"The White Ghost."
A ghost of a boy who never should've survived. A ghost who'd haunt the ring until his baby sister's belly was full.
I spat , smiled at the next man they sent.
Mom, I promised. I promised I'd take care of her.
And now I had the fists. The hunger. The ghost in my bones.
So help me God — I'd keep that promise. Even if it broke me a thousand times over.
The basement fights blur into months now. Friday. Sunday. Sometimes midweek, when the pits get hungry for blood. Four men in one night, then six the next. They throw chains, bats, broken bottles — all useless against Yamazaki Gun's ghost in my bones.
One fight bleeds into the next. My fists split skin, break jaws. I duck, pivot, my UI painting every angle white-hot in my skull. The TUI rattles its cage when I push too far — wants me to end them permanently. I won't. Not yet.
Between fights, I patch my wraps in a locker room that stinks of old sweat. The mirror's cracked. My reflection stares back — white irises, black sclera. A boy who doesn't bruise, who never bleeds. The White Ghost. Emmy's big brother. Both.
I sit with my back to the cold wall. Fingers raw from someone's teeth. Cash folded tight in my pocket. Rent for another month. Food for Emmy's tiny hands to smear syrup across the table with.
Sometimes, another fighter tries to talk. Calls me kid. "Kid, why you do this?" they ask. I don't answer. My fists speak for me. My silence scares them more than the hits.
One night, they pit me against two men at once. One swings a chain, the other a bat. They think numbers mean something. They don't. I weave — slip the chain. Step in — knee breaks a rib. Bat comes down — I catch it mid-arc, twist. Elbow to the temple. One man drops. The other sees what I am and runs. He never fights again.
They call that night "Ghost's Sermon." A lesson for anyone stupid enough to stand across from me.
After, I drag myself home. Emmy's awake when I push open the door. She sits at the table with a mug of cocoa she can't finish.
"Zane?"
Her voice breaks me more than fists ever could.
"Yeah, Bug." I kneel. She touches my cheek — the only thing in this world that can hit me and I let it.
"You hungry?"
I smile, though my knuckles drip someone else's blood in the sink. "Always." She giggles and climbs my shoulders. No man ever climbed me in the pit — only Emmy does.
I rinse blood out of my hair while she hums in the bathroom. The UI flickers off when she's near. The monster can't stand her warmth. The TUI sulks in the dark.
One day, I tell myself. One day I won't have to break bones for rent. I'll cook. Gordon's fire in my veins — perfect eggs, perfect bread. Emmy's laugh at the table.
But tonight? I fight. Again and again. The Ghost doesn't sleep. The brother does — when she sings herself to dreamland beside me.
One day. Just not tonight.
Zane Creed. The White Ghost. Untouched. Unbeaten. Unbroken. And never alone.