Ethan sat in his BMW, the engine still off, talking quietly to the System. He needed clarity on the enormous new rewards he was collecting.
"Tell ," Ethan asked the System, his eyes on the rearview mirror. "Will I get points for anyone I piss off and turn into a mortal enemy, or how exactly do the Chaos Missions work? I still don’t have them clear."
[The Chaos Missions target the negative desire of people towards you, Champion. For example, if you wanted to do sothing extre, you could plant a bomb in a college, detonate it, and then claim you did it. The world would hate you, and you would gain thousands or hundreds of thousands of points. Of course, you would have to survive what cos next.]
Ethan sighed, rubbing his temples. "I am not a terrorist. There is no way I’m doing anything that stupid."
[The other way is exactly the sa but focused on actions that affect soone’s feelings. Just as you get more money for fucking a Dean than a student, you can harvest hatred from soone else. For example, that congressman you screwed over last ti—Vance. If you make him hate you to the death, my calculations show—let evaluate... about 3,500 Lux Points, due to his elevated position. However, ssing with him ans ssing with the entire United States Army.]
Ethan laughed, finding the risk appealing. "Screw him. I was going to ss with him anyway. That’s a great option."
Ethan picked up his phone and called Jason.
The mont the cell phone rang, Jason answered. Gunshots, screams, and muffled explosions were clearly audible in the background.
"I see you’re having fun," Ethan said, unperturbed. "Where are you?"
"We’re near the North End, in the farthest part of the 15% we need," Jason’s voice was sharp over the noise. "The gangs are putting up a fight, but before nightfall, we will have conquered the entire area. Davies has gone with the residents of the places we have conquered, and they have signed the assignnt of rights. Everything is going according to plan."
Ethan knew Jason was lying and wouldn’t tell him the exact level of difficulty they were having, nor could he force him.
"Understood. Be careful. I was just calling to see if you knew anything about Vance."
"We haven’t had ti to investigate him, Boss. I’ll try to get sothing during these days," Jason replied. "The only thing I found out is that he doesn’t live in Celestial Garden; that’s just his sumr house where he goes only on weekends. He usually stays in a building near the City Hall, or there’s also a rumor that he travels a lot to a cabin outside the city where he supposedly has a mistress, but nothing is certain. I’ll hand over the information as soon as I have it."
Ethan sighed. "Okay. Just watch your backs."
After hanging up, Ethan finally started his BMW.
He drove toward the exit, oblivious to the fact that he was being watched from afar. A young, furious voice spoke into a cell phone.
"Dad, I’ve got the guy. He just left the university. Can you help ?"
A gravelly, nacing voice replied, "Of course, son. No one sses with you and survives. Leave him to . I’ll send so friends after him."
With a smirk of sick satisfaction, Ryan Mitchell—the newly forged mortal enemy—hung up the phone before heading back to the dormitories to avoid drawing any attention.
Ethan was driving through the city when he spotted an electronics store. He decided he needed a high-capacity laptop to play League of Legends. Sam and Ming were still very active in the ga, and he figured it would be a good way to spend ti with them as friends.
He parked his BMW, got out, and walked toward the counter. He saw an older man behind it who looked up, reminding him vaguely of his forr boss, the old man Ray Carter, who used to run a similar repair shop.
Checking his watch, Ethan decided he still had plenty of ti. Instead of giving his money to a stranger, it would be better to visit an old friend.
Despite the distance, he drove to the area where he used to work. When he reached the familiar shop, he saw it looked exactly the sa—slightly neglected, with its bright, neon sign reading FixLT Hub.
As he pushed the door open, the entrance bell chid. The voice of his old boss rang out, welcoming him.
"Welco to FixLT. How can we help you? We have high-end equipnt, and we can repair anything you need."
The older man, Ray, looked up and saw Ethan, but he didn’t recognize him. He simply saw a handso young man and a black BMW parked conspicuously in front of his humble shop. Ray, assuming a rich kid had arrived with so damaged, expensive gadget, quickly put on his best custor-service smile.
Ethan smiled and decided to play a joke, asking for a major piece of super high-end equipnt he knew the old man wouldn’t have.
"I need sothing serious," Ethan stated, leaning on the counter. "A portable workstation that can run 8K rendering while streaming. Sothing with a top-of-the-line Nvidia RTX 4090 mobile GPU, at least 64GB of DDR5 RAM, and a 14th Gen Intel i9 HX processor. Can you fix or find sothing like that?"
Old Ray smiled widely, excited by the potential profit. "Of course! I actually have sothing similar right now. Just a second!"
The old man hurried into the back room and returned with a fully loaded, black laptop covered in flashing RGB lights.
Ray explained the specifications, which were indeed comparable, perhaps even slightly better than what Ethan requested. "This has the latest RTX 4090, a 1TB Gen 5 NV SSD, and an undervolted i9. This will handle anything you throw at it!"
Ethan chuckled and lowered his voice. "Old man, I didn’t think you’d have anything like that. Knowing how cheap you are, you never have such high-end equipnt in the shop, hahaha. You’ve really stepped up your ga this ti."
This comnt made old Ray jump back in surprise. The voice sounded familiar, like the skinny, malnourished young man who had abruptly abandoned him a few weeks ago and whom he hadn’t seen since. But the person standing in front of him bore no resemblance to that scrawny youth. The young man before him was muscular, exuding an aura of luxury and elegance that clearly signaled he was more than a re millionaire.
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