[My Love Stan ❤️: The one about being handso]
Upon seeing the ssage, Sophie pressed her face into the pillow and made a sound that was sowhere between a laugh and a squeal. Well he’s right, stan was indeed a very handso guy..
[Sophie: You’re impossible]
[My Love Stan ❤️: And yet here you are. Still texting at 11pm]
[Sophie: Because you just gave two hundred million dollars and I’m trying to process it!!]
[My Love Stan ❤️: Take your ti]
[Sophie: How am I supposed to take my ti when my heart is beating this fast]
She stared at the ssage after she’d sent it. It was more honest than she’d intended, the kind of confession that slips out at one in the morning when defenses are low and feelings are high.
The typing indicator appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again.
[My Love Stan ❤️: Get so rest Sophie]
It was gentle. Warm. And completely, maddeningly noncommittal.
Sophie sighed, the sigh of a woman who had fallen for a man who treated emotional vulnerability the way a cat treats a closed door: with acknowledgnt, mild interest, and absolutely no intention of opening up in return.
But she wasn’t deterred. If anything, the challenge made the warmth in her chest burn brighter.
[Sophie: I have sothing to ask. Please don’t be angry...]
[My Love Stan ❤️: Ask away]
[Sophie: I always thought rich guys were stingy. But you spend money like it’s water. Why?]
A pause. Then:
[My Love Stan ❤️: Boredom]
One word. Five letters. And yet it communicated more about Stan Harrison’s relationship with wealth than a thousand-word essay could have.
Sophie stared at the ssage and slowly shook her head.
’A rich, bored guy who spends two hundred million dollars on a livestream because he has nothing better to do on a Tuesday night.’
’And I’m in love with him.’
’God help .’
[Sophie: How about this, I’m planning to go to karaoke tomorrow to have so fun. Want to co with ?]
[My Love Stan ❤️: Sure]
One word again. But this ti, it sent butterflies erupting through Sophie’s entire body, not a flutter, not a gentle stirring, but a full-blown swarm that left her breathless and grinning and pulling her blanket up to her chin like a teenager.
[Sophie: It’s a date then 💕]
[My Love Stan ❤️: 👍]
Sophie stared at the thumbs-up emoji for a long mont.
Then she laughed, a quiet, helpless, completely smitten laugh, set her phone face-down on the nightstand, and pressed both hands over her racing heart.
’He gave a thumbs-up. A thumbs-up. To a date invitation.’
’I am hopelessly in love with the most emotionally unavailable billionaire on the planet.’
She closed her eyes, still smiling, and let the warmth carry her toward sleep.
Across the city, Stan watched the favorability counter in quiet fascination.
He hadn’t done anything. He was lying in bed, one arm around a sleeping woman, the other holding a phone. He’d sent a few ssages. Made a few jokes. Agreed to karaoke. Given her a thumbs-up.
And yet:
[Sophie Youngs: Favorability 80]
The number ticked upward on its own, not from spending, not from gifts, not from any deliberate action on his part. It was climbing purely on emotion. Sophie was lying in her apartnt, thinking about him, replaying their conversations, and the favorability counter was responding to the intensity of her feelings in real ti.
[Sophie Youngs: Favorability 85]
[Sophie Youngs: Favorability 87]
He set the phone down and watched the numbers rise with the detached fascination of a man observing a stock he’d invested in early.
[Sophie Youngs: Favorability 95]
’Ninety-five. She’s thinking about right now. She’s lying in bed, alone, thinking about , and her feelings are strong enough to move the counter without any external stimulus.’
[Sophie Youngs: Favorability 100]
Stan’s breath caught.
’One hundred.’
Maximum favorability. The absolute ceiling. No woman he’d ever bound had reached this number, not Sarah, not Maya, not Xenia, not anyone. Sophie Youngs had just beco the first person in the system’s history to hit perfect affection.
And she’d done it alone. In her room. At one in the morning. Thinking about a man who’d replied to her date invitation with a thumbs-up.
Stan stared at the number for a long ti.
’A hundred,’ he thought. ’She’s at a hundred.’
The implications were significant. At maximum favorability, the consumption multiplier would unlock the system’s highest tier, a ten-tis rebate on every dollar spent on Sophie Youngs. Ten tis. The kind of multiplier that turned millions into tens of millions and tens of millions into hundreds of millions.
But alongside the financial calculation, a quieter, more uncomfortable thought surfaced.
A favorability of one hundred didn’t just an likes him a lot. It ant total, unconditional emotional investnt.
The kind of attachnt that didn’t bend or flex or adjust with new information. The kind that held on regardless of consequences.
Sophie Youngs was, by the system’s asurent, completely and irrevocably in love with him.
Not infatuated. Not chard. Not impressed. In love. The kind of love that doesn’t negotiate with reality.
The kind that makes a person rearrange their entire life around another person without being asked. The kind that, if mishandled, could turn possessive, obsessive, consuming.
’If this keeps going,’ Stan thought, ’she might cross a line. The kind of love that sits at a hundred doesn’t always stay healthy.’
Stan knew he was slowly becoming a playboy, so having a girl love him at such level was going to be troubleso.
He let out a slow, quiet sigh.
’I didn’t ask for this. I just wanted the rebate.’
But the system didn’t care about his intentions. The system asured feelings, not motives. And Sophie’s feelings had reached a level that made the financial returns extraordinary and the emotional consequences potentially dangerous.
’Handle this carefully,’ he told himself. ’Very, very carefully.’
He set the phone on the nightstand, adjusted Sarah’s sleeping weight against his shoulder, and closed his eyes.
[Sophie Youngs: Favorability 100. Next consumption event will trigger 10× rebate.]
’Ten tis huh?’
The number glowed behind his eyelids like a promise and a warning, tangled together in the dark.
’Not bad for a week’s work,’ he thought, and for the first ti, the familiar refrain carried a weight it hadn’t carried before.
Elon Musk can hold the number one richest for a while, it’s only a matter of ti before Stan Harrison overtakes them all and beco the no 1 richest on Earth...
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