Chapter 51: OTHERWORDLY

"Is he gone?" Star asked.

"Yeah... I think so." I leaned back against the door, still holding my stomach. "She should stay the hell away from him from now on."

Abigail’s quiet crying filled the small room.

Star looked at me for a long moment, then exhaled. "Thanks."

I gave a weak shrug, then managed a crooked smirk despite the pain. "Does that mean I get to keep the extra fifty?"

She stared at me, expression serious... then a small, reluctant smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. She shook her head.

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TARGET DETECTED

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NAME: Latonia Allison

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[ RELATIONSHIP ]

> Partner: [Jamal]

> Loyalty: 74% [Stable]

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[SYSTEM SYNC]

> Favor: 14%

> Threat: None

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> [ ! ] GRIEVANCE LOG

UNKNOWN

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Ten percent Favor just for getting punched in the gut. Not exactly the method I would’ve chosen, but the system didn’t care how the points came.

All that was left now was to move forward, and hope I didn’t run into Cole again until I had the stats to actually do something about him... hopefully. Shit, that bastard was really getting on my nerves, now. I had to do something about him.

"Let me," I exhaled, pushing off the door. "Wait here."

I went into the bedroom, opened the small wardrobe, and pulled out one of my oversized t-shirts. When I came back I held it out to Abigail.

"Here. Put this on."

She took it without a word. Even though she was used to being naked around men for work, I still turned my back to give her a second of privacy. Fabric rustled behind me.

"Thanks," she said quietly. "You didn’t have to turn around, you know. I do this for a living."

I turned back. The shirt was big on her, dark fabric hanging loose, the hem stopping just above her knees. It somehow made her look smaller than she had a minute ago.

I shrugged. "After what just happened, I figured better safe."

She nodded, then looked at Star. "I... didn’t know you had a customer here, Latonia."

"He’s new." Star rubbed her own shoulder and sat back down. "Forget that for now. Are you okay?"

"He bit me. A lot."

"Let me see. Your left one looked bad."

Star reached over and gently pulled the neckline of the t-shirt down, exposing Abigail’s full breast. Dark skin, clear bite marks clustered around the nipple. I looked away after a second, but not before the image stuck.

"Fucking animal," Star muttered. "Why the hell did he bite you?"

Abigail pulled the shirt back up, wincing. "I told him from the start anal was off-limits. The second I got there he started pushing it. When I said no he threatened to tase me."

Fresh tears welled up, but she wiped them away hard and the sadness twisted into anger. She shook her head and looked at me for a moment like she still couldn’t quite believe any of this was real.

"Got a smoke?" she asked.

"Yeah."

I grabbed my pack from the bedroom, handed her one, and lit it for her. Then I slid the ashtray from the table closer so she only had to lean a little from the couch.

Abigail took a long drag and stared at the floor. "I can’t believe I fucking cried. Me. Latonia. Me."

"You nearly got raped, you idiot," Star shot back. "Of course you cried."

"Fucking asshole. And that Cole..." Another drag, harder this time. "I knew that bastard would take Karim’s side."

"He’s his best customer," Star said flatly. "What did you expect?"

They sat in silence for a while after that, the only sound the occasional crackle of the cigarette. Abigail smoked it down to the filter, then stubbed it out.

"I have to go," she said eventually, standing up. The oversized shirt shifted around her thighs. "I’ll get this back to you."

"Don’t worry about it," I told her.

She looked at me for a second longer, then nodded once.

Star stood as well. "Thanks again. Seriously."

"Yeah."

I opened the door for them. The hallway was empty now. Abigail stepped out first, still barefoot, still wearing my shirt. Star followed, pausing just long enough to give me one last look before they both disappeared down the corridor.

I closed the door, locked it, and leaned my forehead against the wood for a moment.

My stomach still ached where Cole had hit me.

The apartment felt too quiet.

????????????

Another Endurance daily quest done.

The system had promised better rewards the longer I kept the streak going, and it wasn’t lying. Two kilometers of running plus fifty push-ups netted me 150 EXP and 50 Sin Points. Some regular quests only gave that much EXP. This was just a daily. Lucky me.

And with it, I leveled up.

I didn’t feel like waiting until I got home to spend the points. As soon as the run was finished I dropped onto the same bench Sarah and I had sat on yesterday and opened the system interface.

"Five points to spend..."

IBE needed the investment. That night with Star had been embarrassing. Without overthinking it, I dumped all five points straight into In Bed Experience and confirmed.

Hitting 10 triggered a milestone.

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MILESTONE REACHED

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Attribute: IBE [10]

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Choose your Evolution:

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[A] THE LIMIT BREAKER

> Once per encounter,

you can surpass your

physical limits, temporarily

increasing pleasure output

by 50%. Consumes all LUST.

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[B] THE LOVER

> When a Target has at least

60% Favor, intimate encounters

generate 25% more EXP.

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SELECT ONE TO CONFIRM

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Both looked strong. Limit Breaker would temporarily push my effective IBE hard, but burning all my Lust every time I used it felt wasteful. Lust regenerated, sure, but not instantly.

The Lover, though... more EXP from sexual encounters. I already had the x2 multiplier with Sarah, and there was a possibility I could make that x2 into x4... the bonus experience points would start stacking like crazy. Long-term, that was the better play.

"The Lover it is."

I selected it and confirmed. Then I pulled up the main menu to check everything.

Luck was still sitting there, completely neglected. I’d have to deal with it eventually. For now the order of priority stayed the same: IBE first, then Perception, then maybe Charisma.

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MAIN MENU

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NAME: Chance Brooks

LVL: 11 [108/614]

RANK: Homewrecker

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[ CORE STATS ]

> CHA: 25

> END: 11

> PER: 25 (-2)

> LCK: 4

> IBE: 10

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[ ENERGY ]

> LUST: 200/200

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[ACTIVE PERKS: Expand]

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SIN POINTS: 1420

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"Alright... time to go."

I was about to stand when another notification appeared, this one for Sarah. Her Dependence had just dropped another four points. She and Hubert must have gotten into it again.

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TARGET: Sarah Angi

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[ RELATIONSHIP ]

> Partner: [Hubert]

> Loyalty: 0%

> Dependence: 40%

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[ SYSTEM SYNC ]

> Favor: 0% [?]

> Threat: None

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x2 Sexual Encounter EXP

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> GRIEVANCE LOG

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Forty percent. She was probably upset or distressed right now. My Gentle Protector perk would normally double Favor gains in that state... except Favor was already locked until her Dependence hit zero. Annoying, but there was nothing I could do about it yet.

"Maybe I can still call her..."

I pulled out my phone, leaned back on the bench, and dialed her number. It rang. And rang. And rang.

No answer.

Guess I’d see her at the apartment.

I stood up and started walking toward the bus stop. The weather was surprisingly decent, still a little cold, but warm enough that I hadn’t bothered with a jacket. Not that the jacket ever did much against the wind anyway.

"Huh?"

A woman ran past me. Her perfume hit me a second later. I knew that scent, the perfume I mean.

Not Sarah’s. Not Abigail’s. And not the cheap one Star had been wearing the first time she came to my place. This one was different. Sharper. More expensive. Almost...

Otherworldly.

I remembered it clearly now. When Star first stepped into my apartment she’d smelled like something cheap and sharp. But later, when Sarah came over and mentioned perfume, it had been a richer scent. Completely different... just like this one.

So whose was it?

The system tried to answer.

??????━??━━━━━━━━━━l??l??l??━━━━━━╮

P??E??R??C??E??P??T??I??O??N?? C??H??E??C??K??: ???

[N??e??e??d??e??d??: ????] - [R??e??s??u??l??t??: ????]

━━━━??━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

T??h??e?? p??e??r??f??u??m??e??? S??t??a??r?? w??a??s?? w??e??a??r??i??n??g?? a??

d??i??f??f??e??r??e??n??t?? p??e??r??f??u??m??e??.

O????w??n??e??r??... ????

━━━━━━━━━━━━?━?━l??l??l??━━━━━━━━━

E??a??r??n??e??d??: ???? S??P??

╰━━━????━━l??l??l??━━━━━╯

"Agh, fuck, fuck!"

A sharp headache spiked behind my eyes. I gritted my teeth and stumbled forward a step, still tired from the run. Both hands went to my knees as I hunched over, dragging in deep breaths until the pain dulled.

"Yo, you good, bro?"

A man slowed beside me and touched my shoulder.

I forced a weak smile. "Yeah... just need a second."

He nodded and kept running.

What the hell was that?

I was right about the perfume, though. Star had worn something cheap the first time. The scent Sarah noticed later was completely different, expensive, lingering. Someone else had been in my apartment. Someone I never saw.

"Wait... the woman..."

I lifted my head and scanned the track, searching for the runner who’d just passed me. There was no one. No women at all. Just four older men jogging, a teenager walking a dog, and the guy who’d stopped to check on me disappearing around the curve.

The perfume still hung faintly in the cold air.

Then it was gone.

"That’s... messed up." I exhaled as the headache finally faded. "Damn... that hurt."

I looked up again and scanned the runners one by one. Nothing. No sign of the woman who’d just passed me. Either I was starting to see things, or this system was messing with my head in ways I didn’t understand yet. The perfume, the glitched check, the sudden pain, none of it sat right.

"Fuck it." I pushed myself upright and kept walking. "Home. Hot shower. Then I’ll think."

??????????