Chapter 91
Ray straight up froze. His body tensed up instantly, his heart feeling like it stopped beating for a second before it started hammering against his chest like crazy.
His feet stopped dead in the middle of the room. Ray’s eyes darted around his empty apartment like a maniac, checking the ceiling corners, behind the closet, even behind the window curtains. Nobody there. The small room was completely empty, only lit by the dim glow from his phone screen and the streetlights outside.
"Pfft... no need to keep looking around like that. I’m not there, okay," the woman’s voice echoed again, chuckling lightly like she was watching Ray’s dumb antics from right up close. Her voice sounded crystal clear, ringing straight inside his skull, not coming through his ears.
Cold sweat started dripping from Ray’s temples. His grip on the phone tightened so hard his knuckles turned white.
"Who the fuck are you?!" Ray whispered, his voice shaking with a mix of anger and panic.
The woman’s voice laughed again, this time a little higher and cheerful. "Who am I? Hmm... the one playing with that junk slot machine. Same as you."
Two seconds. It took Ray’s brain two seconds to process that. His eyes widened in total shock. Junk slot machine? The realization hit him like a million-volt electric shock. This chick... she wasn’t a normal human. Not a hacker, not some secret agent, not a ghost either.
She was a System user.
Before Ray could even think another word, the girl’s voice suddenly burst into louder laughter.
"Ahahaha! Exactly! Your thoughts are way too easy to read, huh, Ray?"
Ray freaked out even more. She can read my mind?! He backed up a few steps until his back slammed into the cold wall. His breathing got faster and faster.
"What the hell do you want?! Stop messing with me!!!" Ray half-yelled at the empty room, trying to cover up the fear starting to eat at his head.
"Aww, so aggressive," the woman’s voice softened into a fake sweet tone, even though her little laugh still sounded annoying as hell. "I just wanna mess with you a little bit. Besides... you’ve already messed up a whole world with your system, right?"
Ray swallowed hard. His throat felt super dry. Fuck. This chick really knows. She knows Ray’s been using the Common Sense Altering System to scramble people’s reality and memories all over the world.
But at the same time, Ray realized something fatal. His panicked reaction and his own thoughts just leaked some crucial info. And she caught it right away.
"Oh..." The woman’s voice suddenly shifted, full of interest, followed by a super amused chuckle. "So the core name of the system you got lets you alter people’s common sense, huh? Ahahahaha! Too bad... I thought it was similar to mine."
Shit. I fucked up bad!
A cold chill shot down Ray’s spine all the way to his toes. The hairs on the back of his neck stood straight up. A terror he’d never felt before gripped his chest so tight it was hard to breathe. Another system user... and she knows Ray’s trump card.
"Chill out, Ray. No need to get so tense," the girl said casually, like she was comforting a little kid.
"HOW THE FUCK CAN I CHILL WHEN THERE’S SOMEONE ELSE’S VOICE IN YOUR HEAD?!" Ray snapped, letting out all his anger mixed with insane panic. "HUH?! Answer me, who the hell are you?!"
The voice in his head went quiet for a second, then chuckled softly with a tone that suddenly felt very familiar.
"What, you forgot? We actually met before, you know. Right when those federal agents took you away back then."
Ray suddenly went silent. His brain immediately rewound the dark memories from a while ago — when the federal cars surrounded him, when his livestreaming camera caught that weird shit at the see-through glass restaurant. In the middle of the crowd and chaos that day, there was this one girl standing there staring straight at him. The girl whose lips moved to form a silent sentence while looking right at the camera:
I know.
A horrifying sensation stabbed through Ray’s head.
Before Ray could even process that memory, the woman’s voice in his head confirmed it with a lighthearted, carefree tone:
"Yeah... that was me."
Ray clenched his fists tight, veins popping on his arms. The feeling of someone invisible watching him from behind made his stomach turn.
"But you know what, Ray?" The girl’s voice chimed in again without a care, sounding like casual yapping on a lazy afternoon. "I’ve actually been trying to bait your bestie into spilling that secret. Turns out you didn’t tell him anything at all. He’s so innocent, poor guy doesn’t know shit."
Ray furrowed his brows as his memory suddenly clicked with a weird conversation from a while back. His eyes narrowed.
"So... you’re the girl who told Karl I could feel the power from that junk slot machine?" Ray asked, voice low and suspicious.
"Ahh! Right, his name’s Karl!" the girl laughed in a cutesy way, like she just remembered some old toy’s name. "That muscular dude... Didn’t expect him to actually know nothing. But if you peek inside his head, he really thinks you’re his best friend. Kinda sad how you just ghost him like that."
Ray’s jaw tightened. Discomfort crawled all over his body. This chick wasn’t just some regular system user — she could straight up read other people’s minds.
"What the hell do you actually want, huh?" Ray cut in coldly, trying to hold back the shaking in his chest. "Just here to mess with me? You’re real funny."
"Yee... so aggressive," the girl huffed, giggling. "I just wanna play around a bit. I’ve had this system forever, I’m bored as hell, you know? But speaking of which, Ray... you’re seriously such a pervert! Making the whole world think slapping a girl’s ass is a normal way to say hi at the gym? Hahaha! Your brain really reflects how much of a perv you are inside!"
"Not funny, asshole!" Ray snapped, his anger finally boiling over. "Show yourself if you’re so brave! Stop just talking shit inside my head!"
The girl’s laughter got louder, sounding mocking but still light.
"Ih, what’s wrong with you? You know I’m not there, right? You pervert... Don’t tell me you want me to appear just so you can fuck me? Ahahaha!"
Ray’s stomach twisted harder. A wave of disgust spread through his chest. This girl had zero boundaries, treating him like cheap joke material.
"Aww, Ray... don’t get so bothered," the voice continued, her tone suddenly switching to sweet, cute, and whiny like a little kid throwing a tantrum. "Remember... you almost caused World War 3 to break out, you know? And now you’re getting this mad over something this small?"
Ray squeezed his eyes shut tight, gritting his teeth until they ground together. Those words hit his pride right in the chest.
Back then, Ray felt like he was the Admin of the world. Just by typing a few lines into the Common Sense Altering System panel, the entire population of Earth would kneel and treat even the most absurd shit as totally normal. He felt like he had control over the fate of millions.
But now?
Faced with this voice with no body, Ray felt his position shatter into pieces. He wasn’t the Admin running the game anymore — he was just a small pawn being used as entertainment and toyed with, with no way to fight back.
Ray took a deep breath, trying to calm his wild heartbeat. He tried to gather whatever rationality he had left.
Wait... Ray started analyzing in his head. If this girl can only read minds and mess with sound frequency... that means she’s not that powerful, right? She doesn’t have direct physical power or system control that goes beyond basic logic.
Before Ray could finish his train of thought, that annoying bright laugh cut in sharply again.
"Aww, how cute, Ray... Ray..." the girl’s voice chuckled, like she’d just heard the funniest joke of her life. "You’re really such an ego-driven guy, huh? Looking down on others just to make yourself feel better."
Ray tensed up. His thoughts were being read with zero gaps.
"Oh yeah, Ray..." her tone suddenly shifted to a mischievous, probing one. "How many girls have you fucked using that system power of yours?"
"None of your business!" Ray shot back quickly, voice sharp.
But his reflexive thoughts couldn’t be lied to. The second that question dropped, memories and flashes in Ray’s brain automatically started spinning without him being able to stop them. And she caught every single bit instantly.
"HOLY SHIT...!" The girl’s voice exploded into hysterical, loud laughter. "You’ve been making girls suck you off?! God damn... what a nasty Ray!"
Ray’s face turned red between shame and rage. The feeling of being stripped naked down to his darkest thoughts made his stomach churn. That discomfort turned into burning paranoia.
"Get the fuck out of my head! Get out, asshole!" Ray hissed through gritted teeth, his voice shaking with held-back anger.
Instead of getting scared, the girl just laughed even harder, before finally letting out a casual sigh in Ray’s head.
"Yo, dummy..." the girl called out in a relaxed but piercing tone. "You want me to leave? When You’ve already been tapped by the federal agents, you know! Your apartment’s got CCTV planted everywhere!"
Ray’s body suddenly went stiff. His brain felt like it got hit with a sledgehammer.
"What...?" Ray hissed, eyes widening in disbelief.
"Hey, I’m being nice by telling you this, right? Heheheh..." the girl replied casually, like she just told him tomorrow’s weather forecast.
Ray held his breath. His eyes wildly scanned the ceiling corners, vent gaps, and behind the room lights. His head was pounding hard. In his mind, he screamed full of suspicion.
What the hell do you actually want, bitch?! No way you’re just here to play around!
The girl’s laughter faded, replaced by a mumbling tone like she was thinking hard.
"Hmm... at first I really was just here to mess around," she said in that fake cutesy tone. "But because you’ve been asking that questions a lot... whoa, I just got a really good idea!"