The basement was silent except for the hum of the laptop.
Avery Rivers—no, A.R. King—sat cross-legged, fingers drumming idly on her knees. Her mind was still buzzing from the explosion of the Aurelian Vault. Her viral song, the web-novel, the unstoppable chatter—everything was spiraling in her favor.
And yet… the System chimed.
A soft crystalline note.
One she had learned to listen to like a heartbeat.
[New Main Quest Detected: The Masked Legend][Requirement: Join national singing competition under a hidden identity][Reward: Platinum Treasure Chest – Contains: Earth's Movie 'Titanic' (Full Composition Rights + Knowledge)]
Avery raised an eyebrow.
The Masked Legend.
She had been expecting something… large. But this?
A national singing competition. Broadcasted live. Millions of viewers. Prime-time chaos. And she would be hidden.
A grin flickered across her pale face.
Exactly as she had planned.
This was the ultimate stage. The one platform she could not only showcase her voice but also expose Titan Management's failures while staying untouchable.
The System pulsed again.
[Context: This show is owned by Clara Wu's Channel 9. High viewership, low regulation. Your contract allows full creative control under anonymity.][Optional Strategy: Song Selection can include any banned works or unreleased compositions.]
Avery leaned forward, her eyes glinting in the dim glow.
"The perfect storm," she murmured.
Across the city, Clara Wu sat in her office at Channel 9. The lights were dim, the room stacked with scripts, production notes, and half-empty coffee cups. She tapped at her tablet, reviewing the final lineup for The Masked Legend.
"Who is this new competitor?" one producer asked, eyeing the schedule nervously.
Clara smiled faintly, but her tone carried authority. "Does it matter? Whoever they are, they'll be the highlight of the season. We're giving them full anonymity. No interference. Just… let them sing."
The producer raised an eyebrow. "It's risky. What if it's a celebrity? What if it blows up and Titan Management—"
Clara held up a hand. "If Titan notices, so be it. That's the whole point."
She tapped the screen again.
[Competitor #1: Masked Diva – Identity Unknown]
Back in the basement, Avery opened a small, black box the System had provided. Inside lay a sleek, full-face mask. Metallic, reflective, with a voice modulator embedded in its lining.
The mask wasn't just a disguise. It was a tool.
A weapon.
[Passive Skill Activated: Identity Cloak – Prevents recognition in any public broadcast.][Optional Enhancement: Vocal Modulator – Can adjust pitch, timbre, and resonance while maintaining original tone.]
Avery held the mask to her face. It was cold against her skin. Sleek. Perfect. She could feel the System's energy hum faintly through it.
"This isn't about hiding," she said to herself. "It's about controlling the narrative."
Her fingers moved over the keyboard, arranging her song list. Every banned composition, every track that Marcus Thorne had tried to erase, every melody she had poured into during sleepless nights—she would perform them all.
Her first move on this stage would be a surgical strike.
And the audience wouldn't know who was behind the mask.
The System chimed again.
[Audience Analysis Ready][Estimated Viewership: 15 million live, 120 million cumulative][Impact Potential: Maximum – Talent Display + Story Integration + Emotional Manipulation]
Avery smiled.
"Phase 3 begins," she said softly. "The stage is mine."
She began rehearsing in the basement. The walls were bare, the sound crude, but the System compensated. The moment she sang, the virtual acoustics transformed the small room into a concert hall.
Every note. Every breath. Every subtle inflection was perfect.
[System Notification: Vocal Cord Reconstruction Complete. Full 5-Octave Range Accessible.]
Avery closed her eyes.
The mask would amplify her power. She would sing, Titan Management would cringe, and the public—unaware of her identity—would fall in love all over again.
At Titan Management, Marcus Thorne sat in a penthouse office, overlooking the city. The gala earlier still gnawed at him. The viral song. The A.R. King phenomenon. And now… the whispers about The Masked Legend.
"Masked Diva," one of his assistants muttered, handing him a tablet. "It's trending across every forum. Predictions say she'll break records. And… nobody knows who it is."
Marcus slammed the tablet down. "Nobody. Knows. That's the problem."
He leaned back in his chair, calculating. All his moves. All his contracts. All his blacklists. Every tool he had used to destroy Avery Rivers… none of it mattered.
"She's a ghost," Marcus muttered under his breath. "And ghosts… haunt everything."
Meanwhile, Seraphina Rose watched the same feed from her penthouse. Her nails were red, sharply polished. Her champagne untouched.
"Masked Diva?" she repeated. "Who does she think she is?"
Her assistant, Lily, who had been nervously arranging files about Avery's warehouse performance, leaned in.
"Miss Rose… this could be… dangerous. Public attention is shifting. A.R. King, The Masked Diva… it's all connected somehow. And people are speculating—it's…"
Seraphina cut her off sharply.
"Impossible," she hissed. "Avery Rivers? No. She's dead. She's blacklisted. She's nothing."
But her mind betrayed her.
She replayed the warehouse clip in her head. The raw, cold intensity. The way Avery could hold a room—even when the room was empty. The song. The novel. The basement performance that made every critic gasp.
Fear began to creep in.
"She's coming back," Seraphina whispered. "And… she's playing a game we can't even see."
Avery, in her basement, placed the mask over her face.
It was a perfect fit. The voice modulator hummed softly, adjusting her natural timbre to a slightly unrecognizable—but still hauntingly beautiful—tone.
She looked at the camera she had set up. Channel 9's production team was ready to capture every angle. But no one, not a single soul, would know who she was.
[System Notification: Identity Cloak Engaged. Public Recognition Impossible.]
Avery exhaled slowly.
"Let's begin," she whispered.
She struck a single key on her laptop. The cue music began to play, faint at first, then building. The melody she had chosen was one Titan had tried to erase from existence. Every note, every pause, every whisper had been engineered to pierce through suppression.
Her first song would be the first public strike in a war Marcus Thorne had not even realized had begun.
The camera rolled. Lights brightened. Live broadcast on Channel 9. Millions would see. Millions would not know.
And Avery smiled beneath the mask.
Because this wasn't just a performance.
This was a declaration.
A silent, gleaming, unstoppable declaration.
The Masked Diva had arrived.
And the world would never forget the name she hadn't yet revealed.
End of Chapter 19