5 parts Ongoing In a world reshaped by rapid technological advancement, humanity found yet another way to optimize connection: the Soulmate System.
Backed by global policy and powered by an intricate algorithm, the system pairs individuals based on compatibility-shared history, emotional resonance, biological markers. It promises balance. Stability. A better chance at lasting love.But even its creators admit its limits.
The system identifies a bond-it does not enforce one. Love, after all, is still a choice. And not everyone trusts an algorithm to make it for them. Some claim it's flawed, manipulated by the wealthy for their heirs. Others believe it's a near-perfect intelligence, capable of guiding people toward happiness-if they let it.
For most, the system reveals itself during the teenage years: a name appearing on the wrist, faint as ink beneath the skin. Permanent. Unavoidable.
Kirsten Park wakes up one morning with a name she already knows.
Kailer Rivers.
Her childhood best friend.
And now-her soon-to-be stepsister's boyfriend.
Kirsten never believed in fate, even after the mark burned itself into her skin. She hides it, afraid of what the truth could shatter-families, friendships, the fragile balance holding her life together.
But the longer she denies it, the worse it becomes. The chip malfunctions. The mark glows when he's near. It stings. Burns. Reminds her that secrets have consequences.
With her mother's wedding approaching and Kai moving closer into her orbit, hiding the truth grows harder by the day.
They say love is complicated.
Destiny is worse.Yet it isn't love that terrifies her-it's the system itself. The chip inside her. The anomaly rewriting her life.
And according to the rules, there's only one way to fix it.
Tell the truth.
Expose the mark.
Stop pretending.
In a world where soulmates are written into flesh by pulsing blood and coded fate, Kirsten Park is about to discover what happens when destiny chooses wrong-and demands to be believed anyway.