The first thing Aeron felt wasn't pain. It was the cold, clinical weight of a countdown timer pulsing against his retinas.
[LIFESPAN REMAINING: 00:59:59]
[CURRENT FOLLOWERS: 0]
[STATUS: UNVERIFIED GHOST]
Aeron lunged upward, his gasping breath hitching as his lungs burned with the scent of ozone and wet concrete. He wasn't in his office. He wasn't at the gala he'd been fixing for a tech billionaire. He was in a sprawling, dilapidated courtyard surrounded by high-rise slums that seemed to scrape a bruised, purple sky.
Hundreds of others were waking up around him. Some were screaming. Others were staring blankly at the air, their fingers twitching as they tried to swipe away the HUDs burned into their vision.
"Welcome to the Feed," a voice boomed—not from speakers, but from inside their skulls. It was melodic, synthetic, and utterly heartless.
"Tonight's theme: First Impressions. The Unboxing Royale is now LIVE!"
Above them, the sky rippled. A fleet of heavy-duty drones, each equipped with a high-definition lens and a red "Recording" light, descended like a swarm of locusts.
"What is this?" a woman nearby shrieked, clutching her throat. "I have a family! I have—"
Her timer hit zero.
There was no explosion. No cinematic flair. Her body simply… stopped. She slumped to the concrete like a puppet with its strings cut. A small notification popped up in the corner of Aeron's vision, floating over her corpse:
[USER DELETED: INSUFFICIENT ENGAGEMENT.]
Aeron's heart hammered against his ribs. As a PR fixer, he'd spent his life making people famous. He knew the math of attention. He looked at his own clock. 00:54:21.
If he didn't get followers in the next hour, he was a dead man.
THOOM.
A massive, rusted steel crate slammed into the center of the courtyard, crushing a fountain. Then another. And another. One hundred crates for five hundred people.
"The crates!" a man yelled, his eyes wide with desperate greed. "They have the boosters! Get to the crates!"
The courtyard turned into a slaughterhouse.
People who had been strangers seconds ago were now clawing at each other's eyes to reach the steel boxes. Aeron stood still, his eyes narrowing as he watched the drones. They weren't filming the crates. They were filming the blood.
He looked at his HUD. His view count was flickering: 2... 5... 12... The audience was starting to tune in. They wanted a show.
Aeron's gaze locked onto a small, dented crate tucked behind a pile of rubble, ignored by the mob. His "Fixer" instincts screamed that the loudest prize wasn't always the best one.
He sprinted. His boots skidded on the grit as he reached the crate. His HUD flared blue.
[PREMIUM CRATE DETECTED]
[UNLOCK COST: 100 LIKES]
[CURRENT BALANCE: 0 LIKES]
"Dammit," Aeron hissed. He looked back at the crowd. A massive man—Ulysses—had already claimed the central crate. He wasn't even looking at the loot. He had a smaller player pinned to the ground, his hand around the man's throat, playing directly to a hovering drone.
"Look at me!" Ulysses roared at the camera.
"Is this what you want? Give me the likes and I'll let him go! Downvote me and I'll snap his neck!"
The "Likes" on Ulysses' counter were skyrocketing. The crowd was loving the villainy.
Aeron looked at his own empty counter. He looked at the drone hovering three feet away from his face, its red eye judging him. He didn't have strength. He didn't have a weapon. He only had the truth.
He looked directly into the lens. He didn't plead. He didn't scream. He gave a cold, shark-like smile—the one he used before ruining a rival's life.
"You're bored, aren't you?" Aeron whispered to the millions watching. "Watching a big man bully a small one is easy. It's cheap. You want to see something that actually breaks the game?"
He pointed to the "Premium" crate.
"Give me 100 likes," Aeron challenged, his voice dripping with mock boredom. "And I'll show you why the Developers are already afraid of me."
[NOTIFICATION: LIKES UPDATING...]
[10... 45... 89... 112!]
[CRATE UNLOCKED. INITIALIZING 'GLITCH-TOOL'...]
The crate hissed open, emitting a pale blue light. But as Aeron reached inside, a shadow loomed over him. The sound of a heavy axe dragging against stone echoed behind him.
"Bold words for a Ghost," a gravelly voice growled.
Aeron turned. Ulysses was standing there, his axe dripping red, his follower count glowing a healthy, vibrant green. The drones swerved, sensing a 'Boss Fight.'
[WARNING: TRENDING LEVEL INCREASING!]
[CHAPTER 1 CLIFFHANGER: WILL YOU EQUIP THE ITEM OR RUN?]