Common Sense Altering System

The comment box turned into a digital hell. Donations from unknown accounts poured in, stacking up with crazy numbers until they cut through the gold animation feed from @NIGHT_SOVEREIGN. The questions weren’t just asking for explanations anymore. They were accusations, wild speculation, mass conspiracy theories.

[DONATION FROM: @AnomaliChicken - $200]

RAY! YOU CAN MAKE A HIJACK TOO, RIGHT?! DON’T TELL ME YOU’VE BEEN THE ONE DOING IT THIS WHOLE TIME?!

[DONATION FROM: @Nirwana_Truth - $500]

ANGELO’S RIGHT! HIME NEEDS TO GET SUED! BUT WHO THE HELL ARE YOU, RAY?! YOU RIDING WITH PURE FIRE OR WHAT?!

[DONATION FROM: @NotTungTunhsahur - $1,000]

IF YOU CAN HOLD BACK THE DIMENSION FREQUENCY, THAT MEANS YOUR POWER’S THE SAME AS THE ONE WHO MADE THIS PLAGUE! ANSWER WHAT YOU REALLY ARE!

The donation sound alerts crashed into each other, a buzzing that made Ray’s head worse. His eyes caught a few lines already treating him like the mastermind behind Common Sense Hijack. At the same time, Angelo’s donations kept hitting, one after another, no pause.

[DONATION FROM: @ANGELO_OFFICIAL - $10,000]

I already founded the Primordial Fire Church to take in people who want to survive this madness, Ray. Side with me. You need protection, and the people need a real place to hide. Not a government that just grabs you at random.

"Shit, this is going off the rails..." Ray whispered, almost too quiet for the mic. Cold sweat slid down his temple. Two million viewers who were just curious a minute ago were splitting into Primordial Fire Church fanatics and people calling Ray a supernatural terrorist.

Then the main monitor showing Ray’s stream dashboard froze. Chat stopped moving. The viewer count that had touched three million suddenly dropped to 0. The screen went pitch black with one giant red line: 504 GATEWAY TIMEOUT / SERVER CRASH.

The whole livestream system collapsed. The traffic load was so insane it wrecked the platform’s servers in seconds.

The webcam light died. The room sank back into dim dark, lit only by the leftover glow of a dead monitor.

Ray slammed back into the folding chair, breathing like he’d just outrun a mob. He dragged both hands down his face. "Fuck... my heart’s about to jump out."

"Shut the PC and the webcam off now, Ray. Don’t let it auto-reconnect," Milady said from the dark, sounding way too calm.

Ray hit the power button on the case until it beeped long and the fans died. Silence jumped on the room. All that was left was Ray’s breathing, still uneven.

"Get back on the sofa. You look like a standing corpse," Milady added.

Ray stood up on shaky legs, crossed the tight room, and dropped onto the sofa next to her. Milady was leaned back easy, laptop on her lap, now just showing a server error graph from the streaming site.

"So now what?" Ray asked, voice high, staring at how calm she looked. "There’s nothing good about this! You see that just now?! It’s getting worse, not better! People are starting to think I made that weird phenomenon! Then Angelo uses the mess to promote his stupid church! This is way off the original plan, Milady!"

Milady didn’t answer right away. She just laughed quiet. That little laugh that pissed Ray off instantly.

"Why the hell are you laughing?" Ray scoffed, grabbing his messy hair.

"I’m laughing because your reaction is exactly what I expected," Milady said, closing the laptop smooth. "This is already really good, Ray. Really good. This chaos is in our hands now."

"Good how, huh?! The server went down! People started accusing me of making the phenomenon!"

Milady turned and looked at him, eyes sharp in the dark room. "Yeah, fair if you don’t get it. Your brain’s dumb."

"Hey!" Ray snapped, voice jumping. "I’m serious! I’m just a regular dude whose job is laying around and sleeping! I never dealt with global-scale shit like this! My stream just crashed a multinational company’s servers and you still got time to call me dumb?!"

Milady sat up and cut the space between them on the sofa. The game-playing aura dropped. What was left was a cold look full of ugly reality.

"Ray," she said quiet, but it pressed. "Get this through your head. You stepped into this mud too deep from the first day you passed out in the street. You’re not getting a peaceful life again. You’re not living normal like regular people again. That ship has sailed. You got two options. Control the game, or get crushed by people like Angelo and Hime."

Ray went quiet. That hit him in the chest like a clean punch. Can’t live normal sounded like a death sentence. He stared at the girl next to him for a long second, then let out a long breath that was half surrender, half frustration.

"Huh?" Ray rolled his eyes, trying to bleed the tightness out of his chest. "You talking like that... you saying you’re gonna take care of me for life?"

Milady laughed again. Freer this time. Bright. Still packed with mockery.

"Take care of you for life?" She tilted her head, thin smile all provocation. "If I have to, I’ll marry you too. How’s that? So you’re safe forever under my arm."

The words came out of her mouth like a cheap joke. Inside Ray’s head, it wasn’t funny at all. A cold slide ran down his spine. Chills. That smile. That tone. That total dominance. It made him clock how dangerous the girl in front of him was. Weird part was, the fear made him feel more tied to her. More invested. More hooked on the crazy scenario she’d built.

Ray stared at her without blinking. His eyes had a seriousness that wasn’t usually there.

Milady caught the shift and killed the laugh immediately. The mocking smile vanished, swapped for a look of open disgust. She shivered a little and scooted away from him on the sofa.

"Ew. You actually thought that?" Milady looked at him like wet trash on the side of the road. "That’s disgusting. Don’t make me nauseous, Ray. Your fantasy is so country."

"Who the hell was fantasizing?!" Ray shot back, face going red from embarrassment and irritation. "You’re the one who brought up marriage first!"

"That’s called sarcasm, idiot," Milady cut in fast. "Don’t make a habit of taking my sentences literal if your brain can’t process a metaphor."

Ray rubbed the back of his stiff neck. He tried to change the subject before his pride got stepped on any harder.

"Whatever," Ray muttered. He tipped his head against the sofa and stared at the dark ceiling. "Anyway... instead of running this crazy stream scenario, why don’t you just focus on your dual personality? You realize that thing can take your body anytime and wreck everything, right?"

Milady didn’t get mad. She crossed her legs and picked up her cold coffee again just to spin the leftover ice.

"I’m handling it," she said easy.

Ray looked over. "Meaning?"

"Every time your Common Sense Altering System gets used," Milady said, watching her reflection in the dark coffee, "my other personality gets weaker. She gets more influenced and distorted by the system you have."

Ray’s eyes widened slow. "How? My system only changes people’s logic. How’s that touching your other personality? What’s that got to do with your brain?"

Milady moved her eyes from the cup straight to Ray. Deep again. Full authority.

"Because I’m the original," Milady said, flat and certain. "I hold the highest authority over my system and this body. That bitch can only touch or use the system if she grabs full control of my brain."

She set the cup back on the table with a small clink. "Every time you activate a Hijack, reality around us shifts. In that shift, the line between consciousness and the subconscious gets blurry. Because my position is the owner of this soul’s authority, your system indirectly presses down the ’fake’ personality trying to steal control. Short version, the more you act, the more that bitch stays locked in the dark part of my head."

Ray listened close. The crazy puzzle pieces were starting to show a bigger picture. Milady wasn’t just using him against Hime and Angelo. She was using Ray’s system like a sedative. Or more accurately, a prison. For her own secondary personality.

"So..." Ray let the sentence hang. "Every time we make this mess, you get safer from your dual personality?"

"Exactly," Milady said short. "That’s why I said this chaos is in our hands. Angelo can have his Primordial Fire Church. Hime can have government muscle. But as long as the public believes you’re the medium of this phenomenon, and as long as your system keeps working... I’m the one holding the leash on you, and you’re the one holding the key to my head."

Milady stood up from the sofa, fixed her skirt, then looked down at Ray.

"Rest, Ray," she said cold. "The server crashed, but the effect of that livestream just started. Get ready. You need to take a daily mission."

She put on a thin smile. The kind that made Ray realize, under all the cruelty and manipulation, Milady was the most dangerous protection he had.

"Tch. You control too much," Ray exhaled.

"Hmmm...." Milady nodded.