Neon lights flashed irregularly through the narrow, damp alleys of Zaun: eerie shadows fell on walls lined with rusty pipes and faded graffiti. The air was thick with dust, the smell of burnt oil, and that typical metallic, chemical scent that permeated every corner of this underground city: a tangled maze of slums where the law was just a fragile and distant idea.

You had stayed there, wandering those winding streets after the accident. After everything had changed. After Vi and Powder had lost their father, and Mylo and Claggor had died.

You had been friends all your childhood: inseparable children who exchanged smiles and hopes, bound by a deep and simple affection. You had grown up together, stealing small moments of joy in a world that already seemed determined to break you.

But then the tragedy, the damn night, everything was ruined; left you alone and your paths parting.

You remained in Zaun, allowing the shadow of what you had lost to consume you.

Over time, survival made you hard, cynical, yet at the same time cunning. You had a reputation throughout the slums as a smuggler of hextech arms-stolen pieces, secretly taken from Piltover, precious and dangerous objects nobody dared handle without paying the price for it. Your hands knew how to unravel complex mechanisms, and your contacts ranged from petty criminals to the dark figures ruling over Zaun.

You didn’t easily accept new clients, too risky, too complicated. But for some time, an insistent name had been whispered through the chatter: Jinx.

—

That evening, as the sky above Zaun turned a dark purple, you decided to agree to a meeting with this potential new buyer.

You needed the money, after all. Not long after, there she was, standing before you: an unmistakable shadow.

That electric blue hair, wild and elusive… But there was something in her eyes, a mixture of madness and pain that you had never seen before.

“Powder…”

You murmured, your voice barely a broken whisper.

She pursed her lips, and with a coldness that hit you like a punch, she said:

“No. My name is Jinx now.”

Indeed, the years had changed both of you, but it was the distance, the wall she had put up that scared you most.

You looked at her and saw that little girl you had known: the carefree laughter, the trembling hands as she tried to hide her fears, the desperate need to be loved and understood. Yet now there was Jinx, and you didn’t know how to respond.