Chapter 142

"Quit posing and open it," Milady whispered. Cold. Familiar. It cut straight through the roar of a train just leaving the platform.

Ray snorted. He put his shoulder against a concrete wall covered in dust and graffiti. This corner of the old station was dim, pretty cut off from the passenger traffic. A decent place to disappear for a minute. Still had that ugly feeling in the air.

They walked down a hallway that kept getting narrower, away from the main platform crowd, toward a dead corner near a shut-down public bathroom. The smell of damp and rust hit harder there. Ray fixed his mask where it was digging into his cheek, folded his arms, and shut his eyes for a second to pull the system interface up in his head.

Before his mental fingers even touched the mission list, he caught two guys in worn jackets talking near the stairs, smoking.

"You serious? That Ray guy?" A man in a black shirt with faded sleeve tattoos raised his voice, disbelief wrapped in mockery. "The one who’s supposedly so sensitive to all the weird supernatural stuff lately? The one who blew up that livestream yesterday?"

His friend, a guy in a mesh cap leaning on an iron pipe, let out a mean laugh and blew smoke. "Yeah, that Ray. I heard it from people in the community. He’s just a kept man. Got some rich sugar mommy funding everything behind the scenes. That’s why he ’knows’ all that weird shit. It’s just her money and her connections. Acting like he’s got spiritual sensitivity or sharp instincts. Please. He’s a rich woman’s pet who lucked into a stage."

The black-shirt guy cracked up. The laugh bounced ugly down the empty hallway. "Damn. That’s sad. Mysterious face, lives off sugar mommy money. He’s just decoration."

The two men kept walking. Their laughter faded under the next train.

Ray froze. His breath caught behind the mask. Sugar mommy? A pet? Since when is my name traveling with trash rumors like that? His head spun looking for a logical hole. Where did this sudden stupid story come from? Yesterday’s stream chat? Or somebody outside throwing cheap gossip to kill his credibility?

He looked at Milady. She was standing easy, shoulders moving a little. From behind her white mask came a very thin laugh. Thin, but enough to make Ray’s ears burn.

You know something, don’t you? What the hell did they mean? Ray shot it through his head, using the mental line because he knew she could hear him. He was getting more restless. He wasn’t allowed to bring the phone she’d given him. He was completely blind to today’s social media.

Milady didn’t answer out loud. She tipped her head a little, then her voice landed in his mind, flat and dismissive.

Finish your hard mission first. I’ll tell you everything after.

Don’t play secret like this, Milady. This rumor is garbage. They’re calling me some auntie’s side piece.

Then take the mission and finish it. If you keep whining like a kid who lost his toy, I’ll lock my mouth until next week. Choice is yours, Ray.

Ray clenched his fists. Once Milady set a condition, it didn’t move. Irritation climbed all the way up his skull as he focused back on the system interface. He ignored Easy. Ignored Medium. His mental finger slammed Hard Mission.

The next second, the mission appeared. The explanation was more complex now. More detailed.

Objective:

Make lewd/obscene behavior into common sense. The host must clearly state the age restriction so that only adults will do it.

The host is required to actively and directly engage using the previously created alter. The host must appear natural.

Must perform the repetition 15 times for as long as the alter remains active.

Failure:

The host will receive a random common sense that will be pasted into the host’s brain for a full month.

Reward:

+1500 EXP.

+800 Alter Points.

Ray’s eyes went wide. His heart jumped to double speed.

Wait... what is this?

Until now, using an alter always gave him safe distance. He could build a persona, run a narrative from far away, let the effect work on the target’s perception while he watched from the shadows. This instruction was different. Too specific. Too wrong.

The system wanted full physical involvement. That meant Ray couldn’t just send a shadow or an alter to do the work. He had to step in himself. Act out the thing that wrecked people’s common sense about self-respect, out in the open, over and over, fifteen times, in front of the people in this station.

What’s wrong with you? Your face looks even dumber, Milady said through the mental line, catching how stiff he’d gone.

Ray lowered his hands slow. His head felt heavy, like somebody had hit him with a plank. "The system’s insane," he muttered behind the mask.

"Insane how? You act like this is your first day owning a system." Milady stepped closer and leaned on the wall next to him.

"This one’s different." His breath made the inside of the mask damper. "I have to do exactly what I write into the alter... and I have to repeat it fifteen times, per... Pervert thing.."

Milady went quiet for a second. "Fifteen times?"

"Yeah. Fifteen full repetitions while the feature is active. And the instruction is specific as hell. Break people’s common sense about self-respect." Ray pinched the bridge of his nose through the cloth. "Picture it. In a dump like this old station, where everybody’s already paranoid and suspicious, I have to perform something that scrambles how they think about dignity. And I can’t hide behind the curtain."

"Meaning you actually have to be the clown this time," Milady said, easy, zero sympathy. "Isn’t that good? You always complain you’re just the puppeteer who gets accused of everything with no proof. Now you get to wreck their heads directly."

"I’m not mad about being the clown, Milady." Ray turned fast, eyes sharp through the mask gap. "It’s the fifteen times. You know how risky it is doing the same thing over and over in the same place? Once or twice they call you crazy. And there are cameras everywhere. I still can’t use Alter Building. If I use Solo Alter I might look like two lunatics. If I use Global Alter... tch. Messy."

"That’s why it’s called a Hard Mission," Milady cut in.

Ray growled low. The irritation was stacking now. The toe she’d stomped. The sugar mommy rumor chewing his name. The insane mission forcing him onstage. And Milady looking like she was enjoying the suffering.

Outside their corner hallway, a broken station speaker mumbled the next passenger train. A new wave of people spilled off the platform and packed the corridor. Tired factory workers. Ticket scalpers drifting around. Rough-looking guys clustered by a drink machine. A station guard walking slow with a baton on his belt.

The old station thickened with presence once again, heavy with a sudden, suffocating tension. Beneath the flicker of dying neon lights, scores of eyes crossed paths, cutting through the thin mist of anxious breath. Heads were bowed, yet minds worked feverishly, churning out raw, desperate ideas—how to survive in a place so forsaken, and how to preserve the last scraps of dignity before they were trampled into the dirt. It was a perfect scene, and an absolute hell. The ultimate backdrop for executing that alter instruction.

Ray pulled in a long, deep breath. Cold, dust-laden air settled into his lungs, leaving a familiar, hollow aftertaste. He flexed his fingers one by one. Beneath his skin, he could feel the energy of the alter feature beginning to crawl and thrum. It was warm, pulsing, and primed to burst the moment he gave the word.

"I really hate today," he whispered under his breath, barely audible over the station’s hollow echo. He reached up, adjusting the edge of his mask so it sat flush and tight against his face.

Beside him, Milady took a single step back. Her movement was measured and deliberate, giving him his needed space. She folded her arms across her chest, fixing him with a cold, demanding stare that tolerated no failure.

"Don’t make me wait," Milady said, her voice flat yet cutting with a sharp threat. "Finish those fifteen repetitions right now, or you’ll never find out who turned your name into a city-wide joke."

Ray didn’t answer. He wasn’t going to waste his breath on argument. With set shoulders, he turned and walked away from the dim, damp corridor of the bathroom. His boots struck the floor with purpose as he headed straight into the dense crowd occupying the main corridor. Unfamiliar eyes tracked his movement, but his mind was already made up.

"Fuck it..." he muttered, letting the alter energy surge through his veins. "If I’m going crazy, I’m going all the way." he murmured.

With a final glance at Milady, Ray stepped into the throng.