"From now on, you will be handling everything, from the advertisements and inventory management to replying to customer service. We're family, you can at least do that, right?"
A healthy man with a round belly, wearing an office suit, spoke with a smile, not the kind of smile that gave a good impression to people. Not that. Instead, it was a sly smile, a devil-incarnate smile.
Just looking at that smile, Norman felt an unspeakable urge to violently beat the shit out of this healthy man.
However, somehow, anyhow, he was able to control himself. Dark circles lay beneath his eyes, and he even struggled to properly open them, his brows twitching in a frown.
"What do you think?"
Norman somehow managed to calm his urge, reminding himself that violence against pigs would be against animal rights, as he barely managed to speak out:
"What about my pay increase?"
"Pay increase?" His boss's facial expression changed, turning from bright to dark as he shed an unseen tear.
"The company is facing losses right now, and we can't have more than five employees. If there's a pay increase, then the company will really go bankrupt."
At that moment, Norman couldn't contain his violent urges any longer. He stood up and was about to leave.
"Where are you going?" The boss stood up, cold sweat pouring down his head, scared shitless.
Norman paused. His body mechanically turned toward his boss as he slowly walked up to him.
"Did you not think about the company going bankrupt when you bought your fucking second house?"
Pa!
A slap echoed in the room.
Blood splattered on the table.
And then, Norman ran out the window of the office quickly, just as a roar came from inside the office room:
"Security!"
Big, bulky dudes entered the office:
"What happened, boss?"
"Go find Norman. I'm filing charges against him, let's see how he lives after I sue his ass!"
Norman burst through the rusted iron gates, his breath ragged, feet pounding against the cracked pavement, frantically. He darted past startled pedestrians, weaving between them like a shadow.
"Shit, I'm dead." He cursed his heart for acting on impulse, but still, he felt like it was worth it.
"I have so little. How much could he even take?"
Even though Norman told himself that, as the blood rush began to calm, his steps turned shaky and his legs felt wobbly.
Traveling down the road, he finally reached one of the ragtag apartments at the corner of the city and hurriedly entered it. Amidst his panic, he found himself becoming calm again.
His room was simple, a bed, a study table with a laptop atop it, and a VR headset resting in the corner.
Norman skipped everything and went straight to his VR headset. Sliding his hand over its smooth surface, he cursed more in his heart:
"I couldn't even play the expensive game I bought, Yokai Slayer, just because of this."
He took out a cigar from his pocket, cut the tip of it with a blade, then lit it and took a long drag.
"Since I'm going to go broke anyway, I might as well spend everything I have." He blew out a puff of smoke and felt his mind calm down.
With his nerves settling, he picked up the VR headset and his laptop and was about to leave, when his phone rang.
Norman took out his phone and looked at the message.
It was his sweetheart. However, the message immediately crushed his soul with two sentences:
"Let's break up. I have a better man, so move on, loser."
His legs grew shaky. His eyelids feel heavy for some reason.
"Am I a loser?" he murmured, staring at his trembling hands. The cigar fell to the ground.
He became silent for a while.
The memories began flooding back, countless hours working at the office, staying late for overtime with barely any extra pay, sacrificing weekends, and more.
In the end, Norman became expressionless.
His face turned cold, cold like an iceberg:
"You're right. There's nobody who will stand up for me or care for me. Didn't I work hard to get rich? But why did I work hard if, in the end, everyone just abandons me?"
He stood up, took the VR headset and laptop into his arms, and was about to leave.
Just then, a terrifying pain radiated from his chest.
"Eh?"
He collapsed to the ground, his head hitting the floor with a sickening thud, blood instantly seeping from the wound. He writhed in agony like a fish out of water, his eyes wide as they had already lost their vitality.
Overworked, betrayed, Norman died an average man's death.
However, as the pool of blood gradually spread, it seeped into the VR headset... and then, lightning crackled from it.