The door opened completely, revealing Jackson Brooks' silhouette under the dim hallway light. Kein stepped aside with a restrained gesture, a silent invitation that the man in the suit accepted with the confidence of someone accustomed to having every door open for him.

  Jackson entered the microstudio and, for an instant, the air seemed to grow denser. His eyes, trained to break reality down into market potential, scanned the few square meters. He observed the old laptop on the desk, the backpack with worn textbooks, and the almost total absence of personal belongings. It was not misery he saw, but austere functionality; the life of someone who had prioritized intellect over comfort.

  "Sorry about the mess. I don't usually receive visits from Beverly Hills," Kein said, letting a hint of youthful irony filter into his voice.

  "I've been in places far worse than this, Kein. Places with golden walls and empty people," Jackson replied, returning a professional smile as he unbuttoned his jacket and sat in the only chair in the room.

  Kein walked toward the small kitchen. "I only have instant coffee. Is that fine?"

  "That's perfectly fine."

  As the water began to heat, Kael, the 117-year-old man, observed Jackson's back. He studied the way the fabric of his suit fell and the tension in his shoulders.

  Kein returned with two steaming cups and sat on the edge of the bed, facing the chair. Before Kein could speak, the middle-aged man took a card from a silver cardholder and slid it across the side table.

  Kein glanced at it briefly: "The Gerzh Agency. Jackson Brooks." He slipped it into the pocket of his hoodie without giving it more importance than necessary.

  "Alright, Mr. Brooks. We're seated. Now tell me: How did you find out where I live, and why did you take the trouble to come personally?" Kein asked. It was a direct look, perhaps too mature for his age, but Jackson interpreted it as the intensity of an ambitious young man.

  Jackson took a sip of coffee. "I'm a casting agent, Kein. My job is to find needles in haystacks. I saw you at the theater last night and took the liberty of doing a little research. Kein Adler, UCLA honors graduate, top of his psychology class, orphan... An impeccable academic record... No am..."

  The atmosphere in the room changed in a millisecond.

  Kein did not move, but his gaze turned cold. A shadow of annoyance crossed his features and his pupils subtly contracted. It was the logical reaction of a young man who felt his privacy violated by a stranger.

  Jackson immediately perceived the change in his eyes.

  'Oops!'

  He raised his hands in a gesture of surrender, though he kept his charisma intact.

  "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Jackson said with a brief laugh, apologizing with a touch of humor. "I crossed the line, I admit it. It's a professional flaw; when I see something that interests me, I can't help but dig. It's nothing personal, it's just that in this business, information is the only way not to waste time."

  Kein maintained the silence a second longer than necessary, letting Jackson feel the weight of his feigned discomfort before relaxing his shoulders. "So what is it that you want?"

  "I want to offer you a contract, Kein. It would be a conditional six-month representation agreement. A development contract," Jackson said, leaning forward. "I promise you visibility and access to the best. But I need to evaluate whether what happened last night was luck or consistent skill. I require a private audition, camera test, and improvisation. If there's no consistency, we end it right there."

  Jackson took a document out of his briefcase. "Here are the terms. The evaluation appointment would be in three days, at ten in the morning."

  Kein took the paper, but his eyes locked onto the date.

  'Three days.'

  Automatically, his gaze shifted to the wall clock.

  '1:50 p.m... I have 09:32:28 left.'

  Time was running. He had a little over nine hours before his life depended on luck. Three days was a death sentence.

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  "I can't wait three days," Kein said, placing the contract on the table.

  The agent frowned. "Excuse me? Kein, people would kill for this. Three days is the time I need to organize the team..."

  "If you want to see whether I'm consistent, see it today," Kein interrupted. His mind worked at full speed. "I'll accept your proposal, but with one condition: I need to act today. It doesn't matter the role, it doesn't matter if it's as an extra. I need to be in front of an audience today."

  Jackson fell silent, analyzing the young man. He saw the intensity in his eyes. He interpreted it as pride, the desperate hunger of an artist who needed the stage like a drug.

  "It's an unusual condition, Kein," Jackson said, softening his tone. "But I like that urgency. Most would sit and wait. You want to go after it. I appreciate that."

  Jackson thought for a moment. "Mmmh. Alright, consider it my apology for the discourtesy earlier."

  Jackson stood up and took out his phone. "Give me your number. I have a contact at a theater running a play tonight. If I get you a spot, do you promise to show up at the audition in three days?"

  Kein stood up as well, hiding his relief behind his neutral mask. "You have my word."

  "Good." Jackson wrote down the number and headed toward the door. "I'll send you the address later. Don't make me look bad, Kein."

  "It won't happen," Kein replied with unsettling calm.

  *Click*

  The door closed.

  Kein remained alone. He looked at the wall clock.

  '2:06 p.m.'

  *Bzzz!*

  The phone vibrated. A message from Jackson: "19:00 hrs. 'The Silver Theater.' Ask for Marcus. Don't be late."

  Kein set the phone down. He had only a few hours to prepare his next identity. He was not going to be an extra; he was going to be the center of gravity of that play. The countdown continued, but now he had the opportunity to take control.

  'It's been years since I've had a situation like this in my hands. When was it?... Ah, yes. That assignment where I had a bomb strapped to my wrist.'

  Kein smiled faintly, remembering the past. A situation like that was not something to smile about, but he had always enjoyed the challenge.

  "I need to move."

  Leaving aside fleeting thoughts, Kein moved toward the laptop on his study desk. As they say: know your enemy and you will not lose any battle. He always had to prepare. He took the business card from the pocket of his hoodie and placed it next to the keyboard. The golden embossing of "The Gerzh Agency" gleamed under the lamp's light.

  "Alright. Let's research Jackson Brooks first."

  His fingers flew over the keys with rhythmic cadence. In NEXARA, hacking was a war of quantum algorithms; here, the security protocols of civil databases seemed like toy locks to him. He did not need to be the best to bypass basic privacy walls.

  He analyzed Jackson's profile. He was not just an agent; he was a tracker. Brooks had an 85% success rate in turning unknown talents into marquee names. His social media was meticulously clean: photos at galas, handshakes with renowned directors, and an absolute absence of scandals.

  'Too clean. Either he's a saint, or he's a professional of appearances,' Kein thought, narrowing his eyes. 'His body language in photos always yields the spotlight to the client. He knows when to be the shadow. That works for me.'

  Then he moved on to the agency. The Gerzh Agency was not just any talent office; it was one of the "Big Four." An ecosystem that controlled multimillion-dollar contracts and had tentacles in every relevant streaming platform. If Jackson was the hook, this agency was the net.

  He closed Brooks' tabs and typed his next target: "Silver Theater."

  The information loaded. It was a mid-tier theater with a respectable history but now surviving thanks to independent productions and external rentals. It was not glory, but neither was it the mud of the lower district. Location: twenty minutes by public transport. Reputation: a common place where critics sometimes went looking for "rough gems."

  "7:00 p.m. performance... Hamlet."

  Kein leaned back in the chair, letting William Shakespeare's story flow through his mind. A tragedy about doubt, betrayal, and revenge. He dissected it with the coldness of someone analyzing a mission report.

  'A prince who doesn't know whether to kill his uncle or not. A ghost demanding blood. A mother who forgets too quickly.'

  Even though he did not know which role he would be assigned, Kein began analyzing the psychological profiles of the male characters to be ready for any substitution.

  For Hamlet, he needed little imagination. The prince struggled with indecision after his father's death. Kael remembered a mission in the chrome suburbs of NEXARA, where he had to monitor a corporate heir for weeks before eliminating him. The melancholy of the character was a suit he had already seen up close: that hollow gaze of someone with too much power and no will.

  For Claudius, the usurping and manipulative king, Kein searched his own experience as an assassin. He had known hundreds of Claudiuses: men who smiled while ordering an execution. He only had to project that calm, predatory ambition his last employer—the CEO—displayed before betraying him.

  Even the Ghost felt familiar. A being that exists only to remind someone of a blood debt.

  'I myself have been the ghost in many lives,' he reflected with icy calm. 'That presence that appears in the dark to claim a life.'

  He researched Horatio, the loyal friend, and Polonius, the meddling counselor. Each one was an archetype Kein could emulate using fragments of his long life. He was not going to act; he was going to "recycle" real behaviors he had observed over a century.

  He shut the laptop abruptly. The clock was nearing 3:00 p.m.

  He stood up, feeling that forgotten pressure beginning to manifest as a slight tension behind his eyes. He could not fail. In Hamlet, the tragedy ended with the stage full of corpses. In his own play, the only corpse he could not afford was his own.

  "Marcus," he murmured, memorizing the contact's name.

  He went to the closet and chose the most versatile clothes Kein Adler had. He had to look like a blank canvas, ready to be painted by any character thrown at him.