The Final Bet

Chapter 1: The Shattered Bet 1.1 The Final Dice Roll “Win… Please, just win…” I muttered hoarsely. My throat burned like I’d swallowed live coal. Every word scraped out like it was carved by shards of glass. My eyes, bloodshot, were locked onto the phone screen — the only place left that still held something close to “hope.” Low… Please be Low… My hand trembled. My fingertip slid over the sweat-slicked screen and stopped at the bet button: High. 1.25 million. I clenched my fist, nails digging into my palm. A faint sting. A trickle of blood. A way to remind myself I was still alive. “Everything’s going to be fine. It has to be…” I whispered like a prayer. Like I always did. The room reeked of damp mold and half-burnt cigarettes. The air felt thick, like it hadn’t been touched by time or wind in years. My shirt was wrinkled, stained, and soaked with sweat. The backrest of the chair was marked with years of dust and decay. Empty beer cans lay strewn on the floor. A bowl of moldy noodles sat forgotten on the table, flies buzzing lazily around it — the remnants of a world no one cared to live in anymore. I lived like garbage. But I gambled like I was God. The dice rolled. The rattling sound echoed like stones tossed into a coffin. I held my breath. My heart pounded like war drums. “High.” I screamed and slammed the table. A plastic cup flew off the edge, shattering on the dirty floor — like my last thread of belief. “f**k!” I hurled the phone across the room. The screen cracked open, black as a pit suddenly yawning beneath me. The dry thud it made on impact was as cold and final as a mercy kill. My fists clenched tighter. The nails sank deeper. Blood seeped out in droplets. But nothing stung like the number that vanished: 1.25 million — my final bet. Like the last bullet, fired at myself. A message came in. Hùng Mập: “Time’s up. Cầu Giấy alley. Now.” I dropped my head onto the desk. My sweat-drenched hair stuck to my hollow, sunken face. My chin scraped the dusty wood, catching on old splinters and caked dirt. Every breath felt like choking. 150 million — turned to dust. My dreams. My pride. That dream of being a “useful” man”—now just a faint scratch on the shattered mirror of my life. Linh Nhi had texted me last month: “Dương, I can’t save you.” My mom called, voice breaking: “Dương… I believe in you… Please, stop gambling…” Even Minh — my childhood best friend — cold as ice: “Pay me back.” I stared at the broken screen. Each message is like a dull knife — not sharp enough to kill, just enough to torture. “Just one more round. I’ll win it back. I’ll make it right — with Linh Nhi, with mom, with everyone…” But the phone lay still. The screen is black. Silent like death. I screamed: “You stupid bastard, Dương!” I flung the phone into the corner. A beer can tipped, spraying pale liquid against the wall. The golden stain ran over the cracks, soaked into the damp plaster, trickling down like blood. I collapsed, hands gripping my hair. My fingers slid across a bruise on my temple — an old mark from the last debt collection. My head was ice. My skin pale as a drowned corpse. “Why didn’t you stop? Why the hell couldn’t you stop until you were ruined?” The flickering fluorescent light above cast a warped, shivering shadow on the wall — my own silhouette, blurry and broken, like a ghost haunting itself. This filthy rented room — once the place where I dreamed of starting a new life — now felt more like a living coffin. “Dương is our only hope…” My mom used to say that — the day she sold our last piece of land to “invest” in my education. She stood at the university gate with a frayed scarf around her head, smiling — a smile that made me feel like I could be someone. Like I could change our future. I lied to her. I borrowed from loan sharks. Pawned my laptop. My motorbike. Even borrowed from my girlfriend. I gambled away my entire future… on a game I knew from the start… I would lose.