In the future, time has become a currency called “Time Credits,” and every life has a price tag. The protagonist, Chen Xuan, is burdened with “neural debt,” and the patterns on his arm constantly remind him that he has just 27 years left in his account. When a giant holographic advertisement displays the formula “1 year of Time Credits = 10,000 credit points,” laying bare the chasm between social classes, he grips an old terminal and sets out from the ruins of the slums, guided by the faint glow of the “Tree of Consensus.” His journey is a fight against the commodification of life and an attempt to tear open the abyss of his age. In this struggle over time, capital, and human nature, he must reclaim control of their lives for ordinary people as warnings of overdraft ring out.
