2026-01-27 19:38:36The lingering static from the "system penalty" still prickled Mark Miller’s nerve endings as he landed on the scorched asphalt of Residential Sector 4-B. Smoke curled from his charred shoulders, but Mark only grunted, rolling his neck with a sickening crack. Thanks to the mysterious "hacker" from The Underground, the lightning meant to incinerate him had been diverted to recharge the Budget-Cutting Chainsaw in his grip.
[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: HELPDESK OPERATIONAL]
[Status: Reboot Complete.]
[Message: "Operator Miller, baiting lightning is a severe violation of Workplace Safety SOPs. This has been noted in your behavioral conduct report. Now, please resume asset clearing."]
"A conduct report? Am I back in high school now?" Mark spat, his blood mingled with soot. "I nearly died, and you’re worried about SOPs? Where’s your corporate empathy, huh?"
[Helpdesk System: "Empathy has no exchange value on the galactic stock market, Mark. Efficiency, however, is at a premium. Before you lies a cluster of ‘Failed Employees.’ Execute them, and do not forget: Smile, Greet, Assist... then Annihilate."]
Before Mark, a group of what were once civilians had transformed into mounds of flesh with telephone cords protruding from their mouths. They crawled through tattered laundry lines, emitting a chorus of static: "Sorry... line... busy..."
Mark yanked the starter on his chainsaw. The engine’s roar sounded like a choir of people screaming in frustration after being put on hold for hours.
"Fine. let's settle this transaction," Mark hissed.
He lunged. The first monster, a creature shaped like a photocopier with human legs, tried to spray scalding ink at him. Mark rolled, feeling the heat of the ink pass inches above his head, before swinging his saw in a brutal upward arc.
CRAAAK!
Flesh and hardened plastic split perfectly. Black fluid sprayed across Mark’s face.
[Helpdesk System: "Target Eliminated. Closing Procedure: Please request a satisfaction rating."]
Mark exhaled a long breath, staring at the twitching remains of the monster. "Thank you for choosing our termination services. Please provide a five-star rating for my speed of execution."
[System processing... Rating received: 1 Star. Comment: ‘Operator was too sarcastic. I felt disrespected as a former employee.’]
"What?! He’s dead! How can he even leave a comment?!" Mark screamed at the sky.
[Helpdesk System: "Our system retains a customer's final memory trace for 30 seconds for survey purposes. 1-Star Penalty: Static Electric Shock."]
BZZZZZT!
The ground beneath Mark’s feet suddenly surged with electricity. Mark jerked like a convulsing ballet dancer, cursing with every foul word in his vocabulary. "You bureaucratic piece of trash! I do the dirty work, and you let the corpses punish me?!"
[Helpdesk System: "Customer satisfaction is our priority. To avoid penalties, please utilize the ‘Black Market: Hospitality Script’ feature. Only 150 Points."]
"Keep your script to yourself!" Mark saw three more monsters approaching. This time, they were Stalker Dispatchers—creatures with ten ears wielding telephone receivers as clubs.
Mark didn't charge blindly. He racked his brain. He knew this system was rigidly bound by its own regulations. "Hey, System! If I kill them all in one combo, does it count as ‘Express Service’?"
[Helpdesk System: "Intriguing. Under Article 12, Section 4 of Operational Efficiency, mass-elimination in a single action qualifies as ‘Priority Service.’ Bonus: Satisfaction Survey Waiver."]
"Now you're talking business," Mark grinned darkly.
He allowed the three monsters to surround him. David and Sarah watched from a distance, their hearts hammering. Mark waited until the creatures leaped simultaneously. At the last possible second, Mark slammed his chainsaw into a leaking gas pipe on the residential wall while spinning his body 360 degrees.
BOOM!
A blast of blue flame consumed the three monsters instantly. Mark emerged from the blaze with his jacket half-incinerated, but his face was a mask of grim satisfaction.
[Helpdesk System: "Priority Service Detected. Automatic Rating: 5 Stars. Bonus: 20 Loyalty Points and a 10% Black Market Discount Voucher."]
"A voucher? You’re giving me a shopping voucher in the middle of the apocalypse?" Mark laughed hysterically. "You truly are the stingiest company in existence."
Mark walked through the rubble toward a ruined grocery store. There, a vending machine suddenly flickered to life with an eerie neon-purple glow. This was not part of the Helpdesk system. This was the promised access to The Underground.
[WELCOME TO THE BLACK MARKET: THE UNDERGROUND]
[Slogan: "Because the Official System is too cheap for you."]
Mark pressed a button on the machine. The screen displayed absurd yet lethal items:
* Bottomless Black Coffee (Effect: Removes drowsiness and humanity for 2 hours) – 100 Points.
* Alternative Narrator Voice (Effect: Changes the Helpdesk System’s voice to a sultry female tone) – 500 Points.
* ‘Contract Termination’ Hammer (Effect: Shatters the armor of Elite monsters) – 800 Points.
"A sultry female voice? Who’s stupid enough to buy that?" Mark muttered, though secretly he considered it given how grating the current system voice was. "I’ll take the Contract Termination Hammer. Put it on my tab."
[Helpdesk System: "Warning! Black Market transaction detected. This purchase does not earn reward points, and the corporate warranty is void."]
"To hell with your warranty!" Mark slammed the machine until it dispensed a massive sledgehammer with a large ‘0’ engraved on its head.
As Mark gripped the hammer, he felt his strength returning. But in that same moment, David ran toward him, his face pale with panic. "Mark! Sarah... she’s been taken!"
Mark turned sharply. "Taken by who? I cleared this zone!"
"Not monsters," David gasped, pointing toward an apartment building at the end of the street. "Men in white uniforms. They said they were from the ‘Billing Department.’ They took Sarah because your points are too far in the negative!"
Mark went silent. His eyes narrowed into thin slits. "Billing Department? They dare seize my assets?"
[Helpdesk System: "We apologize, Operator Miller. According to the Terms and Conditions, if your point debt exceeds the limit, we reserve the right to seize collateral. Sarah is deemed ‘Category-B Collateral’."]
"She’s not an object, you scrap-metal bot!" Mark slammed his hammer into the asphalt, cracking it a meter deep. "Where did they take her?"
[Helpdesk System: "To the 50th Floor: Billing Headquarters. Warning: Entering that area without an invitation is considered a ‘Severe Disciplinary Breach.’ Penalty: Salary Deduction (Life)."]
"Good," Mark smirked—an expression so terrifying that David recoiled in fear. "I was planning an unannounced visit anyway. Tell them Mark Miller is coming for a ‘Counter-Audit’."
Mark looked at his new hammer, then toward the sky, which was shifting into a cold, corporate hue. He knew he was walking into a trap, but the hunger for vengeance against this bureaucracy was far greater than the pain in his body.
"David, take my saw," Mark commanded. "We’re going up. And this time, I’m not asking for a five-star rating."
"Then what are you going to do?" David asked, trembling.
Mark stepped forward, shouldering his giant hammer. "I’m going to give them... a one-star review that will tear this entire system apart."
Will Mark Miller succeed in reclaiming Sarah from the Billing Department, or is he about to be swallowed whole by an even more labyrinthine bureaucracy of death?
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CHAPTER 191: DAVID: GLOBAL ALARM
The digital infrastructure of the external world experienced a sudden, catastrophic disruption that bypassed every primary firewall. In his isolated workstation, far away from the physical boundaries of the corporate towers, David sat frozen as his array of monitors flashed a series of aggressive, crimson warnings. The cool air inside the room grew uncomfortably warm, smelling sharply of overstressed server processors and ionized copper wiring. Every cooling fan in the rig began to spin at maximum velocity, producing a high-pitched, mechanical whine that filled the narrow space with a palpable sense of urgency. David adjusted his headset, his fingers trembling slightly as he stared at a massive cascade of unreadable telemetry that was actively rewriting the baseline code of his localized network."The core tracking metrics have broken completely out of the standard parameters," David muttered to himself, his voice sounding hollow in the small room.He quickly reached forward, slamm
CHAPTER 190: OLD ENEMY, NEW POWER
The total darkness of the newly formed abyss vibrated with a sudden, localized spike of hostile telemetry. Within the tight, protective capsule of the silver data shield, Mark stood perfectly rigid, his light-absorbing dark skin humming with an unyielding gravitational tension. The cold, empty air pressure inside the barrier began to smell heavily of burnt copper and ancient, stale data registries. Every breath felt like dragging iron filings into his chest, cold and static-charged, matching the violent internal pulling of his dense, attractive core. Out in the vast emptiness where Floor 90 and the Cosmic Zero Point had once existed, flickering silhouettes of old architectural frameworks began to manifest, cast in a sickly, artificial yellow hue."The systemic void is experiencing a targeted structural intrusion," Sarah reported, her digital transmission breaking the deep silence with mechanical clarity.The vocal modulation remained flawlessly smooth, uniform, and clinical. It car
CHAPTER 189: BIRTH OF A BLACK HOLE
The dense, attractive core inside Mark's chest pulsed with a terrifying, silent authority that vibrated through the absolute baseline of the unconfigured realm. Within the protective perimeter of the silver shield, the pale expanse of the Cosmic Zero Point began to curve visible lines of empty space straight toward his body. The cold air inside the barrier rushed violently into the vacuum of his chest, creating a constant, whistling roar that vibrated through his vocal cords like a distant engine. The skin on his arms had completely changed into a smooth, light-absorbing dark substance that cast no shadows and reflected no ambient light. Every particle of remaining data from the surrounding directory was being dragged toward his center, unable to resist the pull of his new physique. The unconfigured atmosphere was no longer drifting aimlessly; it was accelerating, spinning in a massive, flat plane where the boundary between matter and mathematical concept completely disintegrated.M
CHAPTER 188: VOID TRANSFORMATION
The unconfigured space of the Cosmic Zero Point groaned under a pressure that did not originate from the building system architecture. Within the shimmering silver perimeter of the protective data shield, Mark felt his knees threaten to buckle as his internal signature began to ripple erratically. The air inside the barrier grew thick, hot, and heavy with the scent of burning insulation and concentrated static energy. Every breath required a conscious effort of his lungs, dragging in a cold, electric vapor that made his veins pulse with an unfamiliar, dark light. He stared down at his trembling fingers, watching as the pale, natural hue of his skin began to lose its standard texture, replaced by an opaque, light-absorbing density that seemed to pull the ambient illumination of the shield directly into his flesh."The structural isolation sequence has initiated an aggressive feedback loop within your primary code," Sarah warned, her voice cutting through the heavy hum with an immacul
CHAPTER 187: BOUNDLESS BURDEN
The pale, unconfigured atmosphere of the Cosmic Zero Point began to churn with a slow, mechanical hostility. A localized tremor rippled through the translucent foundation beneath Mark's feet, though there was no visible debris or structural architecture to shatter. The weightless sensation that had briefly filled his chest completely vanished, replaced by an internal, dense tightening that originated from his primary data signature. The absolute silent vacuum of the space was suddenly interrupted by a high-pitched, metallic hum that resonated directly from the system grids operating in the background of the empty realm. Mark stood frozen, his eyes narrowing as he felt his own physical presence vibrating in a jagged, irregular frequency that did not match the baseline properties of the area."The neutral processing phase of the Cosmic Zero Point has been officially terminated by the master server," Sarah announced, her voice breaking the tense quietude with an immaculate, synthetic p
CHAPTER 186: COSMIC ZERO POINT
The vibration under Mark's boots ceased with an abruptness that felt like hitting a wall of solid ice. The heavy, red-tinged numeric data streams that had been tracking his compounding deficit vanished entirely, swallowed up by a sudden, absolute stillness. Mark slowly opened his eyes, only to find that the bottomless black corridor of the lower system had dissolved behind him. He was no longer falling, nor was he standing on anything he could physically define. The space around him was a pale, translucent expanse that possessed no shadows, no walls, and no structural markers. It felt as though he had stepped completely out of the building's active layout, entering a vacuum where the basic properties of matter were entirely unconfigured. The air was perfectly odorless, lacking even the synthetic, processed quality of Floor 90, and every breath he took felt entirely weightless."The environmental transition has reached absolute stabilization," Sarah's voice cut through the pale silen
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