2026-02-09 20:25:43The mirror above the motel sink was crusted with grime and split by cracks, reflecting a man Eduardo barely recognized as himself. He pulled off his shirt, which now looked more like a blood-soaked rag than clothing. Under the flickering neon light, his body was a horrifying sight. His skin was pale as porcelain, yet his muscles appeared denser, more pronounced, as if forcibly carved from within.
On his left side was a stab wound from Jojo’s knife that had slipped between his ribs. It was no longer bleeding heavily. Instead, a clear fluid mixed with black flecks pulsed from it.
“Damn it,” Eduardo hissed.
He grabbed the rough motel hand towel, clenched it between his teeth, then poured cheap alcohol he had found in the stolen car’s first aid kit directly onto the wound.
“ARGHH!!!”
The scream was muffled by the towel. The pain was not just a surface sting, but like electrical current burning through his nerves. Strangely, in the middle of that agony, a system notification appeared at the edge of his vision.
[NEURAL REGENERATION PROCESS INITIATED.]
[STATUS: GHOST CELLS ACTIVE.]
[NOTE: YOUR BODY IS BEGINNING TO REJECT NORMAL HUMAN PAIN. YOU ARE BECOMING MORE EFFICIENT AS A KILLING MACHINE.]
“Killing machine, huh?” Eduardo gave a bitter grin, staring into his reflection, his eyes now carrying a faint reddish glint. “I just wanted to be a good father, not some damn robot like this.”
Suddenly, the bathroom door was pounded violently.
“Eduardo! Open up!” Emily’s voice sounded hysterical from outside. “Open it now or I’ll break it down!”
Eduardo exhaled, pulled his filthy shirt back on to cover the wounds, then opened the door. The moment it swung open, Emily stormed inside, grabbing his collar with trembling hands. In her other hand, she held her phone, displaying the breaking news that kept looping on the television.
“What is this, Edu?! Look!” Emily shoved the phone in front of his face. “The news says they found body parts at the docks and they confirmed they’re yours! You’re declared dead! Status, DECEASED!”
Eduardo looked at the screen without emotion. “Good, right? I told you. That’s an advantage for us.”
“AN ADVANTAGE, YOU ASSHOLE?!” Emily screamed, tears streaming down her dirty cheeks. “Chloe asked why Daddy’s picture is on TV with condolence flowers! What am I supposed to say? That Daddy is playing ghost? We lost everything, Edu. Our identity, our future, everything!”
“Listen to me, Emily!” Eduardo grabbed her shoulders, harder than he intended, making her wince. “If the world knows I’m alive, Claude will send his entire army to this motel within hours. The police will slap cuffs on me for killing Rico and Slim. Is that what you want?!”
“But we can report it. We can seek protection!”
“There is no protection for poor people with no name!” Eduardo roared, his voice shaking the cramped room. “Now I have freedom. I can move under the radar. I can walk up to Claude while he’s sleeping and rip his heart out without the police looking for me. I’m a ghost now, Em. A ghost that breathes.”
Emily stared at him with a look more painful than any bullet. It was the look of trauma. She saw the man who used to kiss her every morning now speaking about tearing out hearts with ice-cold calm.
“You… you really enjoy this, don’t you?” Emily whispered. “This power. You like being a monster.”
Eduardo froze. Her words struck the deepest part of his eroding conscience. He wanted to deny it, but somewhere in his mind, a strange sense of satisfaction did surface whenever he imagined Claude begging for mercy.
“I’m doing this for you,” Eduardo muttered, though even to himself, his voice sounded uncertain.
“Don’t use our names as an excuse for your madness, Edu,” Emily stepped back, releasing his shoulders. “Look at Chloe. She’s terrified every time you enter the room. You’re not her hero anymore. You’re… the thing that gives her nightmares.”
Emily turned away and retreated under the thin motel blanket with Chloe, who curled up in fear.
Eduardo stood alone in the dim, musty motel room. An overwhelming loneliness settled in, the kind known only to those who no longer have a place among the living.
The night grew deeper. Eduardo sat on the rickety wooden chair, staring into the darkness beyond the window. Exhaustion finally overtook him. His eyes slowly closed, and his consciousness was pulled into a familiar void.
ZING.
He was no longer in the motel. He was back in the white room filled with absurd antique objects. Behind the counter stood Grandpa Antonio, cheerfully polishing a crystal skull with a silk cloth.
“Well, well… look who dropped by,” Grandpa Antonio grinned, revealing his yellowed teeth. “How does it feel to be a ghost, you unlucky brat? Nice, right? No taxes, no fear of the cops.”
“Cut the crap, old man,” Eduardo snapped, stepping closer. “I need a way out of this. Emily is starting to hate me.”
“Hahaha! Poor thing. But listen, in this world, hatred is more useful than love if you want to survive,” Grandpa Antonio set the skull down and looked at Eduardo seriously. “You think Claude is just going to sit still? He knows you’re not dead. He told the public you’re dead to cover his embarrassment, but he’ll send hitmen to sweep the entire city.”
“I need weapons. I need money,” Eduardo said.
“Now that’s my grandson, straight to the point,” Grandpa Antonio snapped his fingers.
A transparent panel suddenly appeared in front of Eduardo.
[FIRST QUEST ACTIVATED: THE GHOST’S REVENGE.]
[OBJECTIVE: Retrieve the soccer gambling money from Claude’s small safe at the shop on Mawar Street.]
[TARGET: $250,000]
[REWARD: Basic Firearms Knowledge & 100 System Points.]
[FAILURE: YOUR WIFE AND CHILD WILL GO HUNGRY TOMORROW MORNING AND YOUR LOCATION WILL BE EXPOSED.]
“Mawar Street?” Eduardo frowned. “That’s the place Marco mentioned.”
“Exactly. Claude keeps his pocket money there before sending it to headquarters every Monday morning. Tomorrow is Monday, Eduardo. If you don’t move before dawn, that money is gone. And you know this, the motel isn’t free, and your wife and child’s stomachs aren’t made of stone,” Grandpa Antonio laughed mockingly.
“What’s the price this time, old man?” Eduardo asked warily.
Grandpa Antonio smiled slyly. “Oh, for the first quest, I’ll give you a discount. The payment is simple. A bit of your remaining fear. I’ll erase your fear instinct so you can walk in there like an angel of death.”
“Take it,” Eduardo hissed. “I don’t need fear anymore.”
“Excellent choice. Now wake up, little devil. The sun is almost up, and your prey is waiting.”
Eduardo jolted awake, gasping for breath. Cold sweat soaked his forehead. He glanced at the motel clock. 4:30 a.m.
He looked at Emily and Chloe, still asleep. He reached into his pocket and found only a few last coins. His grandfather was right. By tomorrow, they would be thrown out if he brought nothing back.
Eduardo stood, picked up Rico’s Glock 17, which had only two bullets left. He checked the magazine with mechanical precision.
“Two bullets… enough for two heads,” he murmured.
He walked toward the door, then paused. He looked at Emily. A powerful urge rose to kiss her forehead, to apologize for everything. But as he stepped closer, the system in his head chimed.
[Active Skill Effect: Cold Heart. Empathy suppressed for mission efficiency.]
Eduardo pulled his hand back. His face went flat, devoid of emotion.
“I will come back. I’ll make sure you don’t starve.”
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Ch 13. The Lost Memory
The world in Eduardo’s eyes felt like an old television broadcast that had lost its signal. Everything appeared gray, flickering, and filled with a deafening hiss of static. He could feel violent jolts, his back slamming against the stiff car seat, and the sharp smell of gasoline mixed with sweat stinging his nose. “Boss! Hey, Boss Eduardo! Wake up, damn it! Don’t die in my car. I just cleaned the seats with my spit this morning!” Gord’s voice sounded very far away, as if it were coming from underwater. Eduardo blinked his eyes, which felt glued shut by thick fluid. He touched his own face. Wet. Cold. When he looked at his palm under the dim glow of the streetlight, the color was not red. It was black. Pitch black, like bitter squid ink that smelled of rotten copper. “Hah... hah...” Eduardo jolted upright, his body shooting up so fast that his head slammed into the roof of the battered sedan. THUD! “Whoa, easy, Boss! You just passed out for ten minu
Ch 12. Dawn Raid on the Gambling Shop
The shop house on Roses Street stood arrogantly among rows of shabby buildings that seemed to have long surrendered to poverty. Behind its steel doors, Claude's football gambling operation pulsed like a dark heart, pumping dirty money into the mafia boss's pockets while the surrounding residents struggled to survive. Eduardo shut off the engine of the stolen sedan two blocks from the target. Pale blue dawn light washed across the asphalt, casting long shadows that looked like the fingers of death. "I can't believe you actually brought me here, Boss," Gord whispered while struggling with the zipper of his jacket that had jammed again. His cursed luck at work as usual. "This place is the most heavily guarded spot in the district. These guys aren't the market thugs you shot earlier. These are Claude's elite crew. They carry real toys, not rusty pistols." Eduardo did not look at him. His red eyes, the result of exhaustion and the strain of the system, stared coldly at the
Ch 11. The Madman's Luck
Eduardo crouched in the shadows behind a pile of rotting wooden crates, his eyes narrowing as he watched the dark comedy unfolding before him. In the middle of a narrow alleyway that reeked of stale urine, a scrawny man with wild, unruly hair was being systematically beaten by three large thugs. The man was Gord. He looked more like a failed vagrant than a fighter. Yet, there was something about him that kept Eduardo from turning away. "Die, you dog!" one of the thugs roared, swinging a thick wooden plank directly at Gord’s head. Gord, who was busy trying to spit out a mouthful of bloody phlegm, suddenly slipped on a banana peel that had appeared out of nowhere. His body flopped to the side in a ridiculously clumsy motion. CRACK! The wooden plank smashed into the concrete wall exactly where Gord’s head had been a split second before. Even more absurdly, the plank snapped clean in two. "Damn it! This wood is rotted through with termites!" the thug cursed, st
Ch 10. The Predator's Preparation
Eduardo stood in front of the motel door, its paint peeling and flaking, staring at the loose change left in his palm. There were only a few coins and one crumpled ten dollar bill. Enough to buy two pieces of cheap bread, not enough to pay for his family’s shattered dignity. He placed the money on the small table beside the bed, right next to Emily’s limp hand as she slept. Eduardo did not leave a note. A ghost left no messages. “I’m going to get breakfast,” he whispered softly, more to himself than to Emily, who might have been trapped in another nightmare. Eduardo stepped out of the room, closing the door so gently that not even a click was heard, a new habit formed since the Shadow Step system had taken root in his body. He walked toward the stolen sedan parked beneath a dark, leafy tree. Once in the driver’s seat, Eduardo checked his weapon. Rico’s Glock 17. “Two bullets,” he muttered, staring at the nearly empty magazine. “One for the lock, one for the sur
Ch 09. The Breathing Ghost
The mirror above the motel sink was crusted with grime and split by cracks, reflecting a man Eduardo barely recognized as himself. He pulled off his shirt, which now looked more like a blood-soaked rag than clothing. Under the flickering neon light, his body was a horrifying sight. His skin was pale as porcelain, yet his muscles appeared denser, more pronounced, as if forcibly carved from within. On his left side was a stab wound from Jojo’s knife that had slipped between his ribs. It was no longer bleeding heavily. Instead, a clear fluid mixed with black flecks pulsed from it. “Damn it,” Eduardo hissed. He grabbed the rough motel hand towel, clenched it between his teeth, then poured cheap alcohol he had found in the stolen car’s first aid kit directly onto the wound. “ARGHH!!!” The scream was muffled by the towel. The pain was not just a surface sting, but like electrical current burning through his nerves. Strangely, in the middle of that agony, a system not
Ch 08. Flight Beneath the Rain
The SUV’s worn tires screamed as Eduardo wrenched the steering wheel, forcing the vehicle onto a muddy dirt path. Rain poured down relentlessly, as if the sky itself wanted to drown this city of sins. Inside the car, the atmosphere felt colder than the air outside. “Edu, slow down! You’re going to get us killed!” Emily shouted, clutching the handle above the door. Eduardo ignored her. His eyes were locked on the trembling rearview mirror. He had just seen the flash of police lights at a major intersection. They were looking for this car, a stolen vehicle already wrecked and soaked in blood. “We need to change vehicles,” Eduardo muttered. His voice was flat, emotionless, like a machine processing data. “How are we supposed to do that? We don’t have any money, Edu! We didn’t even pack enough clothes for Chloe!” Emily’s voice edged toward hysteria. She glanced back at their daughter, who was asleep from exhaustion, though her body jolted every time the car hit a potho
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