The Market of Souls

In Neo-Manhattan, 2147, immortality isn't a gift—it's a commodity.  Beneath a perpetually twilight sky, the elite bask in the stolen glow of countless lives, eternally young while the masses barter their dwindling years, their bodies prematurely aged, their futures mortgaged to the insatiable Chronos Corporation.  Nineteen-year-old Niko Drazic, a street artist whose canvases are the grimy alleyways, witnesses this slow decay daily, his vibrant art a rebellion against the monochrome despair.  But when his sister, a Chronos coder who promised him escape, dies in a suspiciously sterile “accident,” Niko’s grief ignites a firestorm.  Her whispered fears of Chronos's dark experiments, once dismissed as paranoia, now echo with chilling truth.
Driven by a thirst for justice, Niko plunges into the city’s underbelly, joining the Free Souls, a clandestine resistance led by the enigmatic Rebekah Lam, a former Chronos scientist haunted by her past. Armed with his sister's cryptic data logs and a newfound digital fluency, Niko becomes more than an artist; he becomes a symbol, a hacker disrupting the flow of stolen souls.  His fight entangles him with Zachary McDowell, a disillusioned Chronos executive caught in a moral crossfire, and Tanya Mitchell, a hardened black market dealer whose pragmatism reflects the brutal cost of survival.
Within the opulent world of the immortals, Niko witnesses lavish galas where years are traded like stocks, their hollow laughter mocking the silent screams of the dying.  Elara’s coded messages become breadcrumbs, leading him deeper into a conspiracy that exposes not just corporate greed, but a fundamental flaw in the very concept of immortality — a monstrous hunger that transforms individuals into commodities and empathy into a forgotten relic.
As Rebekah’s past intertwines with Niko’s present, their crusade culminates in a daring raid on Chronos headquarters.  But the truth Niko uncovers is more complex than corporate evil. The villain isn't just Chronos; it's the insatiable human desire for eternal life, the very market of souls itself.  He faces a devastating choice: shatter the system and risk plunging the world into chaos, or dismantle it piece by piece, convincing humanity to embrace its own mortality. The fate of countless souls, including his own, hangs in the balance.  Will humanity choose to reclaim its soul before the market consumes the last vestiges of its humanity?