[1% LIFESTEAL] Chapter 11 - It’s All Real

‘So… to sum it up. I am not allowed to say anything about what I’ve witnessed on the day of the break to anyone without madam’s permission, even mental health professionals, I have to ‘roid up for the next six months to look good for the interview, and finally, I get no money.’

Sacrificing his mind and body to get ahead was more or less Freddy’s modus operandi, so that wasn’t the worst thing in the world. No money, though? To sign the contract, he would have to sign off all forms of royalties, and there was no clause about payment.

“Madam…” he said cautiously.

“What is, dear? Need me to clarify something?”

“No, that’s… Well… I’m sorry, but I—” Asking made him so nervous that he felt like throwing up, but if there was anything that could get Freddy to beat his fears, it was money. “Do I really get no compensation?”

She looked thoroughly confused for a moment but quickly regained her composure. “Excuse me?”

“I’ve read the contract and don’t see anything claiming I will receive any money for participating. Did I misinterpret it?”

Madam looked as if a small fly was trying to get into her eyes as she blinked the bewilderment away. “Freddy, darling, what are you talking about? Do you understand what being a guest on my show entails?”

“Well, yeah, but—”

“Oh, please, you are clueless. First, let me clarify something for you,” she said, steeling her gaze. “Getting a spot on my show is not something one can buy, and it certainly isn’t something you’ll be getting paid to do. This is not a matter of cost. It is a matter of brand. If you’re concerned about compensation, well, I’ll give you a temporary place to live while—”

“Sold!” Freddy said and immediately signed the contract before she changed her mind.

“I’m not finished, dear.”

“What!? Really!?” Freddy asked, stars shining in his eyes.

“Pfft—!” Madam snorted. “Hahahahaha, you are so adorable, sweetheart.”

This had probably just landed him in a very exclusive group of people Madam had called adorable, but Freddy was too tunnel-visioned to notice, waiting for her to say what else he would get.

“I’ll simplify it for you, dear. The cost of living and everything you are expected to do will be fully covered, and you will even be invited to gatherings where you won’t be forced to spend a cent.”

“Oh my God, that’s like…”

That was a lot of stuff. Maybe he could even push it a bit. Would she get angry if he ate three meals a day? He at least hoped the temporary place to live would have a toilet he wouldn’t have to share with anyone.

Madam wasn’t finished yet, however. “Now, let me get to the good part. Your story is quite something. If presented correctly, you could easily come across as a hidden talent or maybe even a fated one. You definitely aren’t some chosen one, and no offense, but it is unlikely that you’re talented. However…”

“... If someone takes you under their wing expecting you to become a rising star,” she said, leaning a bit closer to him, “then they aren’t going to stop until you become one.”

***

Freddy lay in his bed, mind spinning endlessly. This was going to be his last day in this place. The moving crew arrived tomorrow. Well, the only thing they would have to move was his chest, which was the only item in this place that belonged to him.

It all suddenly felt so alien. On the one hand, this apartment had been his safe place, an escape from all the harsh realities of the outside. And on the other hand, this was where he had been trapped all this time, slaving away for the faint hope of maybe ascending in his forties or fifties.

He lightly slapped himself as he got up, heading to finish the last few chores he had before leaving.

***

A knock sounded from his door, and Freddy got up, paying the delivery girl as he took the food.

Apparently, his rent would nearly double next month. A fact he had been thoroughly oblivious to until the moment he faced his landlord to tell him he would be leaving tomorrow.

That fucking asshole was probably waiting until the last week to notify the residents since he knew that most wouldn’t be able to find another place to move to before having to pay the increased fee. Was that even legal?

The conflicted emotions vanished as pure frustration that he had to spend even a single night here took over.

The beer-battered chicken tenders he was eating were far cheaper than the oysters he had, but they were much more filling and, in Freddy’s opinion, far more delicious.

A small part of him wanted to say goodbye to Sharon and James, but he felt too ashamed to do that. Also, what was he supposed to say?

‘Oh, yeah, Madam Morleppe wants me on her show, so I’m moving out!‘

With what had happened between them, it might appear like he was bragging or rubbing it in.

He finished his meal, bathed, and returned to his room, wondering what he would do for the rest of the day.

“Oh shit!”

What about Bloodshed?

“Oh fuck!”

Wait… No… Calm down.

Thinking rationally, he didn’t have to take the remnant with him. He was confident it was valuable and that having an obedient remnant wasn’t common, but… that thing was just too fucking creepy.

Not to mention that he was deathly afraid of getting into trouble for being ‘in possession’ of something like that. Freddy was concerned that he might have had to report its existence to someone and that failing to do so could get him into deep shit, kind of like illegally owning a firearm in the old world.

There had been a time when making dubious decisions for uncertain gain was the right choice for Freddy. That time had passed.

But he wouldn’t be doing something as stupid as telling someone about it. It was a personified ether construct, meaning it would never move from where Freddy told it to stay. It couldn’t. Ether constructs couldn’t change their mind since they didn’t have a ‘mind’ to change. They had no free will or agency. Hell, they weren’t even really alive.

Thinking about it further, he quickly realized that where it was wasn’t a half-bad place to hide it. It was improbable that anyone would discover it in the storage, and it wouldn’t cause any trouble. Freddy could always use the pretense of ‘visiting’ Sharon and James to get into the building and retrieve Bloodshed if needed.

With that, he was finally done with everything he needed to do.

He spent the rest of the day playing in the netherecho, utterly unable to fall asleep. Between his dogshit sleep schedule and the anxiety keeping him awake, dawn arrived before sleep did.

***

Freddy sat in the far less luxurious carriage, accompanied by the moving crew and Madam Morleppe’s assistant.

The moving crew comprised four people dressed in dirty-white uniforms, three people too many, really, as one of the men simply hopped inside and took out the chest.

The assistant was a handsome, auburn-haired middle-aged man, or at least he appeared to be. What the actual age of an arch was was impossible to tell off appearance alone.

Matt, the assistant, kept asking Freddy random questions about his daily habits, and the more he asked, the more perplexed he grew. The target of his questions was equally bewildered at some of the questions.

How frequently do I have sexual relations!? Who does this man think I am?

Wasn’t that just something of a myth perpetuated by the film industry? There was no way that people just randomly had sex… Yeah, that sort of stuff didn’t just happen, no way. At least, not often.

It wasn’t long until the carriage stopped, and the people inside left.

They parked in front of a small complex of buildings surrounded by a tidy patch of forest. The buildings themselves, of which there were twelve, were relatively ordinary but clean. The walls were mostly either a shade of grey or beige, and there were no floating parts.

One building, the one placed in the center, was considerably taller than the others, reaching about twenty-five stories high, while the rest were all anywhere between ten and fifteen. Now that he got a closer look, this looked quite a bit like a place he walked by when he went to the bank.

‘No, wait, this is that place. Huh.’

He had heard about it from a coworker once. It was a private neighborhood located in the twenty-fourth district.

The twenty-fourth district wasn’t on the level of the twenty-fifth, not by a long shot, but it wasn’t impoverished either. Firmly middle class, with some middle-upper class outliers, such as this neighborhood, was where Freddy would place it.

The assistant took him to one of the shorter buildings. They walked by several cheerful young adults on their way outside, and Freddy was struck with a pang of anxiety upon hearing them giggling and chattering. The hallways were squeaky clean, lined with neatly arranged patterned tiles and some well-maintained plants.

Rather than walk up the stairs, the assistant took him to an elevator! An elevator! Wow! Freddy wasn’t sure he’d ever get to live in a building with one. Slight excitement wormed its way into his mind, and he massaged the back of his neck to relieve some tension.

This was getting him unduly excited, and he forcefully restrained his expectations since he knew he would be disappointed if he let himself get too hopeful. The elevator didn’t travel for long, and they exited on the third floor of the building. They turned right in the hallway, walked past three apartments, then turned right again, and stopped at the second door to the left.

Freddy felt like there was… an unordinary amount of space between the doors. Maybe there were more apartments, but their entrances were from the other side or something?

The assistant pulled out a key and opened the lock.

As the door pushed open, Freddy swallowed. “Ah, do you have something pick up, sir?”

That made sense. This was the assistant's apartment, and he was likely here to get something.

“Excuse me?” Matt said as he turned around and threw the keys to Freddy. “No, we already have everything we need. Now come, I will give you a tour of your residence.”

Freddy could feel his heart pounding in his chest like a rabid dog trying to escape a cage. It did not get any calmer when they walked inside.

A short, L-shaped hallway branched into a fucking massive bedroom, a living room that was so big Freddy felt dizzy, and even an entire, spacious kitchen. Every room had large windows along the walls, and judging by what he had seen when they arrived, nobody could see anything from the outside.

There wasn’t a single toilet, though.

Because there were three! Three toilets! In one apartment!? What the fuck!?

For a brief moment, he got paranoid that there were hidden cameras somewhere and that Madam was messing with him. That was quickly dispelled, however, since he knew damn well that Madam wasn’t the type to do that.

The fridge was filled to the brim with premade dishes best served cold.

“Since you’ve said you do not know how to cook, we’ve filled your fridge with premade food. If you wish, though, you can always order a meal through the tablet here,” he said as he pointed at a fully functional, massive tablet placed right next to the fridge, “It might take as long as twenty minutes for your food to arrive, though, so keep that in mind. Also, don’t worry about the food going bad. There are preservation inscriptions in there, and if you ever express an interest in cooking, just let us know, and we’ll supply you with fresh ingredients.”

Freddy had barely comprehended any of what he had just heard. His brain was still stuck on the first sentence. This man did, indeed, ask Freddy whether he knew how to cook.

Like, ten minutes ago.

And in that short time, they, whoever they were, managed to stock the fridge with the appropriate food.

The tour didn’t get any less insane after that. Apparently, that suspicious black rectangle in the living room was actually a damn BC. His own personal BC that he could watch whatever he pleased on.

There was also a surround sound system, one that stretched out throughout the entire apartment.

“You do not need to worry about the noise, Mr. Stern,” Matt said. “The apartment is fully sound isolated.” Then he winked at Freddy. “Keep that in mind.”

Freddy was too bewildered to comprehend what the man meant by that.

The toilets were all stocked with both a shower and a bath. The bedroom had a queen-sized bed in it, as well as a gigantic wardrobe of clothes fitting for Freddy’s build. The moving crew brought the chest in, and they asked him where he wanted the items inside to go.

Most of it was placed in a small storage room in Freddy’s bedroom, except for a few books on a shelf in the living room.

And with that, the tour was over.

“Feel free to settle for the next few days,” the assistant said. “We’ll see each other again Wednesday at noon, three days from now. Until then, I highly recommend you get acquainted with the neighborhood.”

The man handed Freddy a small card. “You can use this to pay for any goods or services here, but keep in mind, it is limited to a budget of a thousand dollars a day. Naturally, anything you don’t spend will accumulate. Now, if you have no further questions, I’ll be on my way.”

Freddy merely nodded absent-mindedly, brain failing miserably to catch up with everything that had happened. The assistant left, leaving Freddy alone.

He turned around, apprehensively eyeing the hallway. This just didn’t feel real. Freddy spent the next hour walking from one room to another, too scared to touch anything out of fear of it vanishing before his eyes.

Eventually, he settled for sitting on the bed. The neatly arranged, high-quality sheets and blanket felt too sacred for Freddy to disturb, so he just sat there in the corner, heart beating out of his chest.

As he calmed down, he eventually braved the fall as he lay down, still in the very corner of the gigantic bed.

It was about 3 PM, according to the massive clock on the wall. Nobody would judge him for taking a nap, right?

Eventually, his accumulated fatigue won out, and he fell asleep.

***

When Freddy woke up, he felt incredible. That had been some of the best sleep he had ever had. Some of the longest, too, since it was 7 AM the day after. And now that he had woken up, he was finally confident.

It’s all real.

So he got up, showered, changed into comfortable, casual clothing, and ate a cold chicken salad from the fridge. It was damn delicious.

He moved to the living room and turned on the TV, but he couldn’t sit for long. He took a piss in the toilet, choosing the closest one. He went to his bedroom, then the wardrobe, then the toilet, then the living room, kitchen, bedroom, kitchen, bedroom, wardrobe—

‘What did that man say again?’

“The apartment is fully sound isolated, right?” He said out loud as he started running. Then he started cackling. Then he started fucking screaming.

“Holy fucking shit, it's all real! Fuck yeah, baby! Wooooooooo!”

He swapped the channel on the BC until he found a music channel, and he turned it up a bit, not too much since he wasn’t confident that the sound isolation was perfect. The next twenty minutes were spent with him jumping around like an excited kid.

And just like an energetic toddler, he was quickly worn out. So he sat on the couch, pop music still loudly blaring in the background. “It’s all real.” And this time, it was followed by tears. “Oh, fuck, it’s all real, man.”

But it wasn’t free. While the contract put it very nicely, it didn’t change the fact that he would be put on ‘chemical assistance’ to achieve the look he needed for the interview.

Freddy was no endocrinologist, but he knew damn well that steroids fucked you up. Still, weirdly, he almost preferred that. There needed to be some catch, some damn evidence that this wasn’t simply too good to be true.

Besides, they would probably use some fancy concoction with minimal side effects. He could live with that. After crying his damn heart out and rubbing his thighs so much that his palms turned red, he finally relaxed.

He went to the toilet to wash his face and then visited the wardrobe. Freddy planned to head outside a bit, and while his current clothes were much nicer than anything he had worn, they were just a tad too casual for him.

Dressed in a loose, long-sleeved, black T-shirt, plain blue jeans, and wearing some cool-ass sneakers, Freddy headed to the door. Every step felt heavier than the last, and he hesitated to open the door for some reason.

The doorknob might as well have been glowing hot-red in Freddy’s eyes, and it didn’t take long for him to figure out why. He was scared shitless of going outside alone. But he forced himself to grab it.

While he knew damn well that he wouldn’t have the privilege of shutting himself in, using that as an excuse to stay inside wasn’t valid. He had been granted an opportunity. If he failed to put his best foot forward, then the sacrifices he was willing to make wouldn’t be ones of resolve but of ignorance of the consequences.

The doorknob turned, and the door was pulled open.

It was finally time for Freddy to go outside.

***

Mark carried a gigantic bag as he exited the elevator and stepped onto the third floor. While he could have hired someone to bring it over, the discipline beaten into him in the academy wouldn’t go away so easily.

He turned right twice and approached the door to his apartment—or rather, to their old apartment. This small neighborhood in the twenty-fourth district was where his family used to live, and it was the place where he decided to spend, at the very least, a part of his year off.

Reliving the past to ground himself was one of the best ways he could come to terms with all that’s happened. It would give him a perspective of how far he’d come.

The doors of the neighboring apartment to the left opened, and a young man stepped out. This apartment used to be empty, at least as far as Mark remembered, so this was someone he didn’t recognize.

He seemed… weak. Incredibly so. Mark had been surrounded by monsters for so long that he had forgotten what regular people looked like.

He slapped himself a bit for being somewhat judgemental toward the young man. This was his first neighbor. It was only a matter of time until they got acquainted, and the last thing he wanted to do was leave a bad first impression.

Mark straightened his back, took a deep breath, put on his most amicable smile, and as the man walked toward him, he greeted him. “Howdy, neighbor! I’m Mark Afronte! I just moved in here, and I sincerely hope we can get along,” he said cheerfully, holding a hand forward.

“Ah—! Yeah, uh, hi,” the man responded as he awkwardly fumbled the handshake. Then, he just nodded and hurriedly walked away with a half-jog.

Mark scratched the back of his head. “Fuck me, that was awkward.”

Did he come on too strongly? Well, he did his part, he supposed.

He dragged the massive bag into his apartment and lay on the bed. It was so nostalgic. A sheet of paper rustled in his pocket, and he pulled it out.

It was the contract for the job he had accepted. The money was alright, but it wasn’t why he took it. Being jobless was an excellent way to spiral into bad habits and lose discipline, so he wanted to have at least something to do.

Honestly, he was incredibly overqualified for this position, but it was too convenient to pass up. He was to be a personal trainer for some kid. It came with a free gym membership, special privileges, and the work hours would be very flexible, not to mention quite undemanding.

Given that he would be spending half his day in the gym anyway, he couldn’t have possibly asked for a better position.

‘Well then,’ he thought as he put the paper away, ‘I guess I should unpack my things.’

***

It… itches.

Bloodshed had spent so long trapped in this confined space. After some time, it grew capable of something incredible.

It could sense exactly where Master was. His existence was like a shining beacon to Bloodshed, and it patiently waited for the mighty lord to rise and head for his conquest. But he didn’t move. For so long, he simply stayed in one place, likely gathering his strength and concocting his plans.

Good. The rivers would run red, and the oceans would drown in blood. All would be—

Suddenly, something stepped into the building. It was a being of sinister nature, a creature that spilled blood with every step it took. And it met its master.

Another servant, perhaps?

They left, both stepping outside and going far away. But it was alright, since soon, they returned. But then Master went away again, this time even further away. And he wasn’t coming back.

Had he abandoned it? No, replaced it?

If that was his will, that would be its fate.

…

Or maybe he’d simply forgotten it? That could be possible. Master lived for greater things than a mere servant like Bloodshed, and it wouldn’t be impossible for him to lose track of everything he prepared.

Then, as the diligent servant it was, it only had one choice.

Bloodshed phased through the box and walked over to the door. It placed a bony hand on it, and within moments, it was phasing through.

Wait for me, Master.

I will come to you soon.