Prince Of Mind Hallucinations

Chapter 4: New Face, New Problems, and Blue Underwear

Raditya took a deep breath outside the door of his AP Pre-Calculus class. He tugged at the collar of his shirt, which now felt suffocatingly tight across his newly broadened chest and shoulders. The sensation of having clear skin and a jawline sharp enough to cast a shadow still felt incredibly alien, like he was walking around in a hyper-realistic Halloween costume. As soon as his hand touched the doorknob, a wave of audio—not physical sound, but psychic echoes—began seeping through the cheap wood.

Holy crap, Raditya is gorgeous now, I just want to jump him. What happened to him out there? Did the lightning burn the ugly off? Whatever, he's still a nerd, just with a better casing now.

Raditya scoffed under his breath. He pushed the door open. Instantly, the chaotic chatter inside the classroom died. An awkward, heavy silence fell over the room, as if someone had just hit the mute button on the universe's remote control. Dozens of eyes locked onto him. Kids who were normally busy throwing paper footballs or gossiping were frozen like deer in headlights.

He walked down the aisle toward his desk in the back row. Every step he took echoed firmly against the linoleum floor. Raditya could physically feel the stares of the girls trailing him like hot hands tracing his spine. He tried to sit down as casually as possible, though the plastic chair felt entirely too small for his new shoulder width.

"Rad... is that really you? You're not some demon that possessed his body out on the field?" Ben whispered, his voice shaking. His eyes scanned Raditya's face as if looking for the zipper on a human skin-suit.

Raditya just shrugged. "I just washed my face, Ben. Turns out lightning is a top-tier exfoliator."

Jonny, sitting on the other side, was practically vibrating with envy. Inside his head, Raditya heard a bitter, toxic complaint: Dammit, now I'm the ugliest guy in this group. Am I supposed to just stand next to a Calvin Klein model every day? He's gonna steal every single girl I even look at.

Suddenly, the classroom door swung open, hitting the wall with a loud bang. Mr. Miller walked in carrying a long wooden yardstick and a massive calculus textbook. His round face and thin mustache were set in a permanent scowl. He marched straight to the front of the room without a word, though his eyes darted toward Raditya with a confused frown.

Wait, who is that? A transfer student? Why does he look like that actor my wife cries over in those stupid Hallmark movies? Whatever, doesn't matter, as long as that A****n Prime deal on laundry detergent hasn't expired yet, Mr. Miller thought. His internal voice was nasally and consumed by discount calculations.

"Open your books to page forty-two! Logarithms!" Mr. Miller barked, his voice booming. "I want absolute silence! Anyone who hasn't done the homework can go stand facing the wall until the bell rings!"

Raditya tried to focus on the textbook in front of him, but the sensory overload hit him again. This time, it came from the middle row, where Tanya—the cheerleader from his earlier bathroom vision—was sitting. She wasn't paying attention to the whiteboard. Her eyes were glued to Raditya's neck, and instantly, Raditya's "thought-radio" was hijacked by a wildly explicit, sweltering fantasy projection.

In Raditya's mind's eye, the classroom faded out, replaced by the shadowy, dimly lit equipment room behind the gym. In this mental projection, Tanya had already unbuttoned the top of her cheer uniform, letting her maroon lace bra peek out aggressively. She imagined Raditya backing her up against a stack of tumbling mats, his mouth trailing roughly down her neck while his large, veiny hands gripped her chest without mercy.

The vision was terrifyingly detailed—he could feel Tanya's ragged breath against his ear, the sensation of skin slick with sweat, and the echoed moans filling the cramped space. Tanya imagined herself wrapping her bare legs around his waist, begging him to just take her right there. In the fantasy, Raditya yanked her skirt down with one swift motion, letting their bodies collide without a single barrier. Raditya felt a phantom heat flare up from the hallucination, transferring straight to his actual groin under his desk. The visual shifted to them moving together in a brutal, frantic rhythm on top of a musty mat, sweat dripping from Raditya's jaw onto Tanya's heaving chest.

"Hhh..." Raditya nearly let out a physical groan, biting the inside of his cheek hard enough to draw blood just to snap himself out of it. He looked away, desperately trying to find some fresh air, even though all he could smell was dry erase markers and the overpowering Axe body spray of the kid sitting next to him.

Meanwhile, Mr. Miller was explaining logarithmic properties at the speed of a freight train, but his mind wasn't on the numbers at all.

God, my wife told me to buy new underwear. Said she was sick of looking at my ratty boxers. But why did she have to pick neon blue nylon on A****n? It was so embarrassing when the mail carrier dropped them off, thank God the neighbors didn't see, Mr. Miller grumbled internally while scribbling random equations on the board.

Raditya, who was still trying to suppress his physical reaction to Tanya's wet dream, accidentally got caught in the crossfire of Mr. Miller's thoughts. He heard every excruciating detail about the blue briefs: the brand, the "breathable and sleek" fabric texture, and how he'd used a 15% off coupon to get them.

"Ahem! Raditya!" Mr. Miller's voice suddenly shattered the absurd daydream. "You've been zoning out since I started talking! Get up here! Solve the equation on the board!"

Raditya flinched. The entire class turned to look at him again. He stood up slowly, feeling the tension radiating from his classmates. He walked to the front of the room, taking the slightly damp whiteboard marker from Mr. Miller's hand.

His eyes stared at the logarithm on the board, but his ears were still being pumped full of Mr. Miller's panicked internal monologue.

Crap, did I even change into the new underwear this morning? I thought the blue ones were still in the dryer. Oh, wait, no, my wife told me to wear them today so they'd match this blue dress shirt. Ugh, if my belt slips and these kids see this obnoxious neon waistband, I'm never going to hear the end of it...

Raditya tried to concentrate on the numbers, but the mental image of Mr. Miller's bulging stomach stuffed into tight, bright blue nylon briefs suddenly flashed in his mind as a side effect of his power. It was an absolute violation of his newly acquired 4K vision.

"Why are you just standing there? Is it too hard?" Mr. Miller asked, his mustache twitching with smugness.

Without thinking, Raditya turned to look at Mr. Miller, his gaze dropping involuntarily to the teacher's lower stomach. Irritated by the disgusting visual he'd just been forced to endure, Raditya's mouth acted on its own.

"Relax, Mr. Miller. Even if those new neon blue briefs are riding up a little tight, this logarithm is actually pretty easy to solve," Raditya said casually. With a few swift, precise strokes, he wrote the correct answer on the board in seconds.

Dead silence fell over the classroom. It was even quieter than when Raditya had first walked in.

Mr. Miller froze as if he'd just been struck by the same lightning bolt. His face cycled from red, to yellow, to as pale as the whiteboard behind him. His hand automatically flew down to cover his crotch over his blue dress shirt, looking at Raditya as if the kid had X-ray vision.

"Y-you... What did you just say?" Mr. Miller squeaked, all his previous hostility vanishing into thin air.

"I said the answer is five, sir," Raditya replied, flashing his most perfect 'Prince Charming' smile, even though internally, he was screaming in panic over his own stupid, reckless mouth.

Mr. Miller's mind imploded in absolute chaos: SWEET MOTHER OF GOD, HOW DOES HE KNOW THE COLOR OF MY UNDERWEAR?! IS MY SHIRT TRANSPARENT?! DID MY WIFE POST ABOUT IT ON F******K?! I'M DEAD. I'M RESIGNING RIGHT NOW.

"G-good... c-correct. Your answer is correct. You can... go back to your seat. And... let's keep the irrelevant comments to ourselves!" Mr. Miller stuttered, beads of cold sweat the size of corn kernels rolling down his forehead.

Raditya walked back to his desk, passing Tanya, who was still staring at him with a mind full of explicit imaginations involving handcuffs and baby oil. As soon as he sat down, Ben elbowed him hard in the ribs.

"Rad! Are you insane?!" Ben whisper-yelled, loud enough for half the class to hear. "How the hell did you know Miller is wearing blue underwear? Did you peek at him at the urinals or something?!"

"Just a lucky guess, Ben," Raditya replied shortly, hiding his face behind his textbook.

Outside the classroom, the psychic noise from the adjacent rooms began trickling in. The gossip about "The Hot Nerd Who Knows the Teacher's Underwear Secrets" was already spreading through the school's collective neural network before the bell for next period even rang.

Raditya leaned back in his chair, staring out the window. The sky outside was perfectly clear, but inside his head, a massive storm had just made landfall. He realized one terrifying truth: A new face might bring you popularity, but the ability to hear the most ridiculous, filthy secrets of everyone around you was a curse he was going to have to navigate very, very carefully.

Because if he wasn't careful, the next victim wouldn't just be Mr. Miller's dignity and his blue briefs—it would be the sanity of the entire school that had been pretending to be normal this whole time.