The world had changed. Not in the way history books recorded wars or pandemics—but in quiet, cruel ways that most people never noticed. Debts grew like weeds, opportunities vanished like smoke, and those at the bottom were left to claw through life just to survive another week.

Yinny Kwon was one of them.*

Once a successful mechanic with a small garage, Dante now wandered the city scraping coins to afford his mother’s medicine and keep loan sharks off his back. He wasn’t lazy. He wasn’t stupid. He was just… defeated. Until the invitation came.

A crimson envelope. No return address.

Inside, a sleek black card with a symbol of a circle within a triangle. On the back, a message:

“This is your second chance. Play fair. Win, and your debt is cleared. Lose… and you’re forgotten.”

Along with it, a time and a location: an abandoned ferry terminal at midnight.

Yinny thought it was a scam. A cruel prank. But he had nothing left to lose.

He wasn’t alone.

Hundreds arrived—teachers, street performers, gamblers, doctors, ex-cops, even teenagers. All desperate. All broke. All willing to risk it all for a shot at redemption.

Then the masked figures appeared—dressed in crimson cloaks and silver masks shaped like animals. They guided the players into sleek black buses. Phones were confiscated. Identities erased.

When Yinny woke up, he was in a massive underground facility where the walls moved, ceilings whispered, and the rules were simple: survive the Marble Protocols.

Each game would test more than strength. It would test loyalty, morality, betrayal, and the will to live. The games themselves were twisted versions of folk traditions from around the world—rituals reimagined as death traps.

And each night, the losers vanished. No ceremony. No goodbye.

Only the winners moved on, haunted by what they’d done.

But behind the games lurked something darker—something older than capitalism, and more dangerous than desperation.

The Marble Protocol were more than entertainment for the rich. They were a rite. And every soul who played was part of something far bigger than they understood.