Growing up in Halcyon was a real struggle.
In the eyes of the wealthy, my community was at the bottom of the social ladder, those who thrived on the suffering of others during the war.
When my father and brother were still alive, both were men who lived with honor, who never committed any crime, a rarity in the Eighth District, where even those better off stole, cheated, or dealt under the table to get by.
Before the war, my father was an ironworker in the Fourth District, working alongside my brother. They'd helped build countless skyscrapers, yet they were never valued, simply because of where they came from.
Their identity cards bore the black letters marking them as from the Eighth District, a stamp of disdain and distrust.
I remember how my father would talk about the humiliation. After every shift, their bags were inspected for stolen goods, as though they were thieves. They were banned from elegant restaurants and cafes, and everyone looked at them like criminals just because they came from the poorer side of the capital.
Twenty-one years of labor, and my father earned only 340 gallants, while my brother, just starting, barely made 180.
It was enough to keep us fed and warm for a month, but nothing more. Nothing for school, for new clothes, or for the doctor when we needed one.
So, no, I never went to school. My mother taught me to read and count, until the war came.
A war that made the poor poorer and the rich even richer.
The Eighth District became a den of crime, the government had abandoned us.
Electricity was scarce, sewage flooded the streets, and the only reason the Republic finally paid any attention to the district was the old rusty boot factory and ironically that was the largest in the country.
When my father and brother first got leave from the front and returned home, they found themselves drawn to the allure of crime, especially my brother, who was a truck driver transporting supplies to the front lines.
He was perfect for smuggling weapons.
They were only home for a few days, yet every minute was filled with arguments. My brother craved the taste of easy money.
"Fifteen thousand gallants for a single run, Dad! We could finally leave this slum behind!" He'd said, standing with a faint smile, hope gleaming in his eyes as he looked my father straight in the face.
But my father saw it differently.
Slowly, he rose from his seat, his face tight with anger, fists clenched as he slammed the table with a force I'd never seen from him before.
"No amount of money will change where you were born, Erik!" He shouted, fixing my brother with a fierce, unyielding gaze. "Don't think that money will suddenly make people love and respect you."
"But Don Leica was born and raised here, and now he dines with the elites in the First District!"
"Do they respect him, Erik? They fear him because he kills to be respected! Money won't change anything. No matter how much you have, you'll still be from the Eighth District."
My father's voice was like steel, his anger barely contained. "Money, Erik, is the cheapest thing a man can have. It's here today, gone tomorrow, and all it leaves you with is the emptiness of what you gave up to get it."
I remember well Erik's face was twisted in defiance. "But it's not just money, Dad. It's a way out. A way for all of us to live somewhere decent. A way to finally be someone."
"A way to be someone?" My father's voice was quiet now, a dangerous calm settling over him. He looked Erik in the eye and said, "And who will you be, Erik, when you're done? When you've sold every piece of who you are, who's left?"
"Maybe someone who can look after his family! Someone who doesn't have to be ashamed of where he's from."
A bitter smile touched my father's lips. "Ashamed?" he repeated, shaking his head. "No, son. You're ashamed of us. Of the family that raised you, loved you, sacrificed for you."
The room was silent. Erik's shoulders slumped, and he looked down, clenching his fists as if struggling to hold onto his anger.
"Do you think you can buy back the years you'll lose chasing this money?" My father pressed on. "Do you think you'll buy back a little brother's loyalty? A father's pride? Do you think you'll ever have a place you can call home, or are you just chasing the money that will tear us all apart?"
Erik was trembling now, his voice barely above a whisper. "What good is family, Dad, if we're trapped here? If we're always just... scraping by?"
My father's expression softened, and he stepped forward, laying a rough, calloused hand on Erik's shoulder.
"Family is everything, Erik. It's what keeps you grounded when the world falls apart. Money... it's hollow. It fades. But family, son, that's the one thing that can fill even the deepest emptiness."
Erik's breath caught, and his eyes glistened, conflicted, caught between the yearning for a life free from poverty and the love that tied him to his father, to me, to a home that, no matter how broken, was ours. He looked away, his jaw tight, but I could see the battle raging inside him.
My father's words, like an anchor, held Erik in place, forcing him to confront a choice that went beyond money, beyond status. It was a choice between the fleeting shine of wealth and the lasting strength of those who would stand by him, no matter what.
"Think carefully, Erik," my father said, his voice now a murmur, heavy with the weight of all he'd endured. "Once you choose, there's no going back. But whatever path you take, remember that family isn't something you can buy back."
Erik stood there, breathing heavily, his fists clenched at his sides as he wrestled with himself, torn between anger and anguish. He looked at my father, eyes full of resentment mixed with something deeper, something he tried hard to bury, but it was there, peeking out through the cracks.
"Maybe I don't want to come back, Dad." He said, his voice trembling. "Maybe I don't want to live like this. I want more."
My father's gaze didn't waver. I remember that look on his face. There was sadness in his eyes.
"More, huh? I wanted more too, Erik. I wanted to give you more. But not at the cost of everything we are."
"And what are we, exactly? The ones who get spat on? The ones who get watched like criminals just because of the dirt we grew up in? I'm done with that! I want to walk down the street without feeling like everyone's eyes are on me, judging me."
"They'll always judge you, son. No amount of money can wash away where you come from, or who you are. You think leaving here will change that?"
"Maybe I won't know until I try. Maybe I don't want to be trapped here, pretending that being poor is some kind of honor. I want respect."
"And you think that respect will come from a pocket full of gallants?" My father asked, his voice laced with quiet sorrow. "Let me tell you something, Erik. I've seen men with everything and men with nothing. And the ones with nothing they're the ones who understand what true loyalty, true family means."
Erik looked away, but his breathing was heavy, his jaw clenched. I could feel his frustration, his desire to break free from the weight of everything he thought was holding him back.
My father's voice softened, carrying the roughness of a man who had endured his own battles.
"You think I'm blind to your pain? To the anger you feel when people look down on you? I feel it too. But I don't need their approval, son. I've got something they can never touch, no matter how much they look down on me."
Erik swallowed, looking back at my father with a mixture of anger and desperation. "And what's that?"
"Dignity." My father replied firmly, his voice steady. "The kind that doesn't come from money, but from knowing you stayed true to yourself. From knowing that, no matter what, you never became what they accused you of being."
Erik's hands unclenched, and he looked down, shoulders slumping. For a long moment, he was silent, caught between the lure of the world beyond and the weight of the life he already had. And then, as if all his energy had drained from him, he whispered, "I just don't want to be nothing, Dad."
My father stepped closer, placing a hand on Erik's shoulder. "You were never nothing, Erik. Not to me, not to your family. Money won't fill that hole. But being here, with the people who love you, that's what gives you worth."
Erik's face softened, and he seemed to crumble under the weight of his father's words. The rage, the longing—they melted away, leaving only a boy who'd felt too small in a world that expected him to be more.
In the stillness that followed, my father held him, his voice barely a whisper. "You're not alone, Erik. And you're not nothing. Not while you have us."
The silence hung heavy in the room, but it was a different silence—a silence that, for the first time in a long time, felt like home.
After that night, they went back to the battlefield. My father left at dawn, face set like iron, the weight of a thousand unspoken things hanging in his gaze as he looked back one last time. Erik went in the dead of night, slipping out as shadows gathered, leaving only a cold echo where he once stood, the door barely whispering shut behind him.
They never came back.
Erik, my wild, restless brother, died in an ambush, his life taken in the blackness of night, far from home, far from us.
And my father met his end in the madness of a bayonet charge, somewhere on the frozen eastern front.
It's strange how you try to hold onto words, how you try to remember the last thing they said, the sound of their voices. But time stretches, memory blurs, and what's left? Some twisted ghost of them, lingering in fragments. And yet, what my father told Erik that night, that relentless argument that echoed through the walls—I remember it like a scar, buried deep but forever there.
He believed in family. In honor, dignity, things he thought could stand unbroken against the cruelty of life. But maybe he was wrong. Maybe there's no difference between family and money after all. The world taught me that both are fragile, that both slip through your fingers when you need them most.
Because what is family if not a debt you can never repay, a burden you carry whether you want it or not?
Money promises security, but family demands sacrifice. And in this world, sacrifice often feels like a cruel joke, just another way to drain you dry until there's nothing left but ashes. My father gave his life for his ideals. Erik gave his for a dream of freedom, a dream that lay somewhere beyond these dead, bitter streets.
And in the end, both of them disappeared into the same cold darkness, leaving nothing behind but their ghosts.
So, what's the difference?
If family and money are both things you lose, both things that cost you in ways you never truly understand, how can one be worth more than the other?
Maybe my father was right, maybe Erik was right. Maybe neither of them was right.
All I know is that when you grow up in a place that strips you of everything dignity, respect, even hope you start to believe that everything has a price. Even love. Even family.
For me, there is no difference.
Money is family, and family is money.
Both are things that hold power over you, that can abandon you, that leave you hollow when they're gone. But maybe that's all I've ever known, a life where the things you cherish are just as fragile, just as easily lost, as a few pieces of silver slipping through your fingers.
And maybe that's why, in the end, I've learned not to hold on too tightly to anything.
So yes, I chose to chase money, power, the things that buy freedom in a world that's already sold its soul.
I chose to become the very thing my father feared. Because when everything else is stripped away, when all the noble words are hollow and empty, it's money that puts food on the table.
Money that buys you out of the slums, out of a life where people look at you like you're already defeated.
It's not about greed. It's about survival. It's about making sure I never end up like them dying with nothing, swallowed up by a world that's always taken more than it gives.
My father thought he was better than this, that he could hold on to his dignity and come out on the other side unbroken. But dignity didn't save him. Honor didn't stop a bayonet from finding his heart. And Erik's dreams of respect, of escaping the dirt he was born into , turned to dust the minute he set foot on the battlefield.
But I'm not like them. I don't believe in those fairy tales. I believe in what I can hold in my hands, what I can seize before it slips away.
And if that makes me a criminal, then so be it.
I'd rather be a criminal with something to show for it than a martyr with nothing but empty hands and faded memories.