
AustrianMogger
LTN from Austria 𝕯𝖝𝕯 𝖈𝖗𝖊𝖜, #1 MGTOL
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Chapter 2.5 – Gray Days
The days in Kilicia had a way of dissolving into each other, like pages in a book that had been soaked in water. Each looked the same, each felt the same, each ended with the same dull ache in Sikuti’s chest.
He woke to the buzzing of the dormitory alarm, the thin mattress pressing into his spine. Six a.m., every morning, without fail. The corridors outside filled with the shuffle of feet, the hum of tired voices, the occasional cough. The crimson bracelets of his dorm-mates pulsed faintly in the dark, as if mocking them with reminders of their place.
Work began an hour later.
The recycling plant was a cavern of grinding belts and steaming vats. The air smelled like melted plastic and burnt oil, clinging to his skin long after he returned to his quarters. Rows of crimson-banded workers lined the conveyor belts, sorting scraps with gloved hands. It was the kind of work machines could do better—had done better, years ago. But when AI made human labor redundant, the government decreed that the lowest tiers must still work, if only to remind them of their worthlessness.
The labor wasn’t for efficiency. It was for humiliation.
Sikuti spent hours hunched over a conveyor, plucking out mis-sorted shards of metal from heaps of shredded polymer. The gloves chafed his fingers raw. His supervisor, a thick-necked man with a permanent scowl, stalked the aisles with a tablet that monitored each worker’s pace. Whenever someone slowed, he barked their Index score like an insult.
“Thirty-seven! Keep up!”
“Forty-two! Don’t drag your tier down!”
“Thirty-nine—Vale! Eyes on the belt!”
The words burned hotter than the ache in his shoulders. Thirty-nine. Not a name. Not even a person. Just a number.
The Lunch Break
Lunch at the plant was worse than the work itself. The cafeteria was a cavern of long benches, each one marked by invisible borders of hierarchy. The crimson-banded sat together, not out of choice but out of necessity. The others—the Normies assigned to oversee them, the HighTiers who passed through for managerial training—clustered at their own tables.
The difference was stark. The higher tiers laughed freely, their voices carrying like bright bells. The crimson-banded ate in silence, spoons scraping against plastic trays of tasteless slop.
Sikuti tried, once, to start a conversation.
It was his second week at the plant. He sat beside a boy around his age, narrow-faced with deep-set eyes. His bracelet glowed 38.
“First time here?” Sikuti asked quietly.
The boy didn’t look up from his stew. “Don’t talk to me.”
Sikuti blinked. “Sorry, I just—”
The boy’s eyes flicked to his bracelet, then away. “I don’t make friends with numbers below mine.”
That was the end of it.
Sikuti ate in silence from then on.
The Girls
It wasn’t just the boys.
Girls in the crimson district were no different—sometimes crueler.
On his third week, he passed a group of them on the way back from work. They stood beneath a broken neon sign, bracelets glowing faint red, their laughter sharp in the evening air.
One of them caught sight of him. She was plain-faced, hair tied back in a messy bun, her Index barely scraping into 40 if he had to guess. She smiled—not warmly, but slyly.
“Hey, Thirty-Nine,” she called. “Lose your hair already, or is it just retreating in shame?”
The others burst into laughter.
Heat surged in Sikuti’s face. He wanted to fire back, to tell her she wasn’t so flawless herself, that her crooked teeth and pockmarked skin weren’t worth mocking anyone over. But the words stuck in his throat.
In Kilicia, insults always flowed downward. Never upward. Never sideways. Only down.
He walked past without a word, the sound of their laughter following him like a curse.
Nights in the Dormitory
At night, the dormitory became a mausoleum of muted misery.
Sikuti’s five roommates rarely spoke to him. They were older, hardened by years of crimson life. One was thirty-two, his hair completely gone, his belly sagging over his belt. Another was twenty-six, his face scarred from an accident years before. None had wives. None had girlfriends. None had hope.
They spoke sometimes, in gruff voices over cigarettes by the window. Their conversations were always the same: how many years they’d been stuck, how little the stipend stretched, how much they hated the smell of plastic clinging to their skin.
Not once did they speak of love.
Sikuti lay on his bed and listened, the bracelet’s faint glow pulsing against his wrist. He thought of girls he had known in school—girls who used to laugh with him, sit beside him, share notes. Back then, before the Index, there had been hope. Everyone was equal until the numbers came.
Now, those same girls lived in other districts, their bracelets green or gold. They wouldn’t even see him if he stood in front of them. Their dating filters would block his face before their eyes could process it.
He closed his eyes.
The loneliness was worse than the labor, worse than the insults, worse than the endless gray. It was the certainty that no hand would ever reach for his, that no lips would ever meet his, that no one would ever look at him and see something worth wanting.
A Glimpse of the Upper World
One evening, after a fourteen-hour shift, the shuttle route glitched. Instead of descending directly into the crimson district, it passed through a Normie zone.
Sikuti pressed his forehead against the glass, staring in wonder.
The buildings were cleaner, the neon brighter. Families walked together in the streets—men and women holding hands, children skipping at their sides. A group of Normie boys laughed with Normie girls outside a café, their bracelets glowing green, their faces alive with the careless joy of being wanted.
Sikuti’s chest ached.
He imagined stepping off the shuttle, removing his crimson band, and walking into that café. He imagined ordering a drink, sitting at a table, smiling at one of the girls. He imagined her smiling back.
But the thought dissolved into bitterness. He knew what would happen instead. The bracelet would lock at the district boundary. Security would drag him back. The girl would look at his face, his number, and her smile would vanish.
The shuttle descended into crimson once more, the brief glimpse of another life fading into smog.
Chapter 2.5 – Gray Days (Part 2)
The thought began small, like an ember smoldering in the back of Sikuti’s mind.
Maybe, just maybe, he didn’t have to accept this.
Everywhere he went, he heard the same bitter refrain from crimson men older than him: “Don’t bother. Nothing changes. Your number is your life.” They spoke with the weary certainty of people who had surrendered long ago. But Sikuti wasn’t thirty or forty. He was eighteen. He still felt the ache of youth in his chest, the stubborn hope that something could be done.
He remembered his body in school—slight, forgettable. He had never been strong, but what if strength could bridge the gap? What if muscles could make up for the weak jaw, the soft face, the crooked nose?
The thought was intoxicating.
For weeks he lived on half his meals, scraping together every credit from his stipend. Finally, one gray morning, he tapped his bracelet to the entrance of a rundown Tier-Restricted Fitness Hall.
The door beeped, unlocked, and he stepped inside.
The Gym
The air was thick with the smell of sweat and rust. Rows of battered machines lined the floor, their paint peeling, their weights chipped. The screens above the treadmills flickered, half-dead, streaming endless advertisements of golden Chadlites in pristine gyms up in the higher districts.
Sikuti swallowed hard. This place was for crimson bands only—discarded equipment for discarded men. But to him, it felt like a sanctuary, a chance.
He started slow. Dumbbells first, then benches, then machines. His body screamed after the first week, every muscle aching like it had been torn apart. But the pain felt good. It felt purposeful.
He pushed harder.
Each morning he rose before the plant shift, dragging his tired body through an hour of lifting before the day’s labor. Each night he returned, arms trembling, lungs burning. He ate little but protein paste, rationing every credit for gym fees and supplements.
The weeks bled into months.
And slowly, changes came. His arms thickened, veins surfacing along his forearms. His chest broadened. His back grew stronger, his shoulders less sloped. For the first time in his life, he felt power in his body, a solidity he had never known before.
When he looked in the cracked gym mirror, he almost believed he was becoming someone else.
The Assessment
It was three months later when he found the courage to return to the Index Scanner.
It wasn’t required—the number was permanent, locked in the city’s archives. But every crimson district had public scanners, machines where desperate men tested themselves, hoping that effort could rewrite destiny.
Sikuti stepped into the booth, heart hammering. He stripped to his undershirt, letting the scanner sweep over his new physique. His muscles were undeniable now, his body harder and stronger than the boy who had entered three months earlier.
The machine hummed, data spilling across the glass.
- Muscle mass: increased 17%.
- Body fat percentage: decreased 9%.
- Bone structure: unchanged.
- Facial symmetry: unchanged.
- Jawline definition: marginal improvement due to fat loss, structural score still 36.
- Hairline: recession ongoing.
- Composite Attractiveness Index: 39 (unchanged).
Sikuti stared at the number.
“Unchanged,” the machine repeated, in its flat, indifferent tone.
His fists clenched. “But I—”
“Unchanged.”
The booth door opened with a soft hiss, signaling him to leave.
The Locker Room
He sat on a bench in the empty locker room, his body still slick with sweat. His reflection stared back from a cracked mirror—muscular now, yes, stronger, but the same crooked nose, the same soft jaw, the same thinning hair.
He wanted to smash the mirror, to shatter the face that mocked him, but even that felt useless. The shards would still reflect the same truth.
He buried his face in his hands.
What was the point? If effort couldn’t change the number, if strength couldn’t rewrite symmetry, then what chance did he have? The hierarchy wasn’t built on willpower. It was built on bone. On genetics. On the lottery he had lost before he was even born.
The Girl in Green
Later that week, as he walked back from the gym, he passed through the transit hub.
There she was: a Normie girl waiting by the platform, her bracelet glowing green. She was not spectacular—her hair a little frizzy, her teeth slightly crooked—but her skin was clear, her jaw softly defined, her nose balanced. She was a 52, maybe 53.
And she smiled.
For a heartbeat, Sikuti thought it was for him. His chest surged with a desperate, foolish hope.
Then she looked past him, waving to another boy—a tall Normie with a perfect green bracelet. They laughed together, their hands brushing as they moved toward the shuttle.
Sikuti stood frozen. His muscles, his sweat, his months of grinding effort—none of it mattered. He was crimson. They were green. Their worlds never touched.
The shuttle doors closed, and the girl was gone.
Nights of Fury
Back in his dormitory, he tore open his ration packet with shaking hands. The food was bland, tasteless, but he devoured it with a fury born of despair.
His roommates barely glanced at him. They had seen it before—the cycle of hope, effort, and crushing disappointment.
“Thought the gym would save you?” one muttered, not unkindly. “We all did.”
Sikuti said nothing.
He lay awake long into the night, staring at the ceiling. His body was stronger than ever, but he felt weaker, more powerless, than he had on the first day.
The truth gnawed at him: no matter how hard he worked, no matter how much he sweated, he could never escape the bones of his face.
And in Kilicia, bones were destiny.
Chapter 2.5 – Gray Days (Part 3)
The Decision
It was after another long shift, his skin still reeking faintly of melted plastic, when Sikuti gave in to the thought he had been avoiding.
The gym hadn’t saved him. The scanner had mocked him. His reflection still wore the same crooked bones. But maybe—just maybe—there was another way.
People met through apps. Even here, in crimson. Even the lowest had access to TierLink, the government’s sanctioned platform for “romantic compatibility.” The ads promised “Connection for every level.” The slogan echoed through every dorm wall, plastered across every shuttle.
He knew the truth: TierLink was nothing more than another mirror of the hierarchy. Still, he wanted to try. Wanted to see, just once, if anyone might swipe right, if anyone might look past the number.
That night, he downloaded it.
The Profile
The app scanned his bracelet automatically, pulling his information into a profile.
Name: Sukuti Vale
Age: 18
Height: 180 cm
Attractiveness Index: 39 (LowTierNormie)
The red glow of the “39” sat like a brand beside his name. He could not remove it. He could not hide it.
He uploaded a photo anyway—a mirror shot from the gym. His muscles looked solid, defined. He hoped, prayed, that maybe someone would notice the work he had put in.
He filled out the text box: “Just a guy who likes reading, lifting, and trying to make something of himself. Looking to meet someone genuine.”
His thumb hovered over the “Activate” button. His stomach churned.
Finally, he pressed it.
The profile went live.
The Swipes
At first, he swiped nervously, cautiously. The girls who appeared on his feed glowed with bracelets of green, sometimes even gold. Normies, HighTiers. Smooth skin, bright smiles, sharp bone structures. He swiped right on all of them.
No matches.
Hours passed. He lowered his standards. He swiped right on anyone—girls with uneven skin, girls with braces, girls whose numbers sat at 43, 42, 41.
Still no matches.
Finally, a profile appeared with a crimson band. Index: 38. A girl his age, plain-faced, with a sallow complexion and tired eyes. Her bio read: “Just looking for someone decent. Don’t waste my time.”
His heart leapt. Here was someone close. Someone like him.
He swiped right.
A second later, the screen flashed:
“No Match.”
He stared at the phone. The girl with the tired eyes, a single point below him, hadn’t wanted him either.
The Messages
Two days later, his phone buzzed.
1 New Match.
His breath caught. He opened the app with shaking hands.
The girl’s Index was 37. Her face was grainy, the photo poorly lit. She looked older than she was, hair thinning at the sides.
But still, it was a match. His first. His only.
He messaged immediately: “Hi, I’m Sikuti. It’s nice to meet you.”
No reply.
Hours passed. Days.
Finally, a single message appeared: “Not interested. I just swiped for fun.”
The match vanished.
The Stream
One night, in desperation, Sikuti tuned into a live stream.
A Normie girl was hosting it—nothing special, maybe a 52. She smiled into the camera, bracelet glowing green, as hundreds of viewers filled the chat. Most were green, some gold. A handful of crimson tried to join, their comments ignored or deleted instantly.
“Let’s see who’s watching,” she laughed, scrolling through the viewer list.
His heart froze when his name appeared.
“Sikuti Vale. Index thirty-nine.” She laughed again, not cruelly, but dismissively, like she was brushing dust from her sleeve. “Sorry, sweetheart, but this chat’s not for you.”
She blocked him live, her smile never faltering. The other viewers laughed, the chat flooding with jokes.
He sat in silence, the glow of the screen staining his face.
The Collapse
The next morning, he didn’t rise for the alarm. His roommates left without him, muttering about lateness and docked credits. He lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, his phone still clutched in his hand.
The emptiness in his chest was no longer sharp. It was heavy, like stone pressing down on him.
He thought of the girl at the transit hub, her hand brushing against the Normie boy’s. He thought of the laughter in the plant cafeteria, the jeers in the crimson streets, the flat voice of the scanner repeating “Unchanged.”
And he thought of his own reflection—the muscles, the sweat, the effort that meant nothing. The crooked nose, the weak jaw, the fading hair.
He pressed the phone to his forehead, eyes burning.
Why had he been born like this? Why had he been thrown into this lottery only to lose before it even began?
For the first time, he wished he could simply disappear.
The Ember
That night, he wandered the crimson streets alone. The neon lights above flickered, broken, their glow unable to pierce the smog. Men with crimson bands huddled in corners, smoking, staring blankly at the ground. The air was thick with the smell of hopelessness.
Sikuti walked until his legs ached, until his body begged him to stop. He ended up in front of the scanner booth again.
He stepped inside.
The machine hummed, scanning him with its cold beam of light.
Composite Attractiveness Index: 39. Unchanged.
He laughed, a dry, bitter sound.
But beneath the laughter, something stirred. Something small. Something dangerous.
If the number could not change… then maybe the system itself had to.
The thought was terrifying. Blasphemous. But it burned brighter the more he tried to smother it.
For the first time since his assessment, Sikuti did not feel only despair. He felt anger.
And anger, he realized, was harder to kill.
Closing
He left the booth and walked back toward the dormitory. The streets of crimson stretched before him, endless and gray. He hated them. He hated the city. He hated the hierarchy, the bracelets, the scanner, the very bones of his own face.
The hopelessness still weighed heavy, but buried within it now was something else.
A seed.
A seed that, in time, might grow.
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Got Order wrong. These take place before chapter 3
Previous Chapters

Blackpill Utopia Chapter 1
Chapter One – The Sorting The assessment hall was vast and silent, a cathedral of glass and steel. Rows of booths lined the chamber like confessionals, each glowing with the pale hum of biometric scanners. Dozens of eighteen-year-olds shuffled forward, their nervous whispers swallowed by the...

Blackpill Utopia Chapter 2
Chapter Two – Crimson Shadows The dormitory door groaned when Sikuti pushed it open. Inside was a narrow hall with six identical doors branching from it. The plaster on the walls was cracked in places, yellowing under strips of weak fluorescent light. A faint smell of damp fabric clung to the...