REX WANG AND STYX

Rex Wang inherited the northern slums, three million of his parents' debt and a grey stone egg that lay on the altar for half an hour without one sign of life. It cracked open while a debt collector was beating him to death in an alley, and what climbed out was the size of a fingernail. The whole academy laughs at a mosquito. They stop laughing when they learn she is a queen, and that after every kill her swarm is larger than before.