Chapter 1
Sitting on a bench, huffing and puffing after completing a long chain of deliveries, Alex suddenly received a message on his social media. Though he initially didn't want to take out his phone, but thinking it might be a message from his girlfriend, who brought brightness to his otherwise dull life. So, he took his phone out of his pocket.
Click.*
Tapping the power button, the screen turned on. However instead of displaying his girlfriend's message on the screen, it showed a notification from a friend.
Since he rarely conversed with this guy, he was slightly curious about what kind of message he had sent him. He immediately tapped on the notification, which redirected him to the app, revealing an image right in front of him.
"What the fuck?" was all that came out of his mouth the moment he saw the photo.
In the picture, his girlfriend—the seemingly innocent and cute woman—was sitting in the lap of a man, dressed in a one-piece outfit that revealed most of her body. "This must be fake, right? they must have used AI." he couldn't help but reassure himself, as he struggled to believe his eyes.
His girlfriend, who had never allowed him to touch her or even wore such revealing clothes in his presence, was now posing in such a provocative manner. How could he believe it?
This must be some kind of silly prank.
Ding.
Just as Alex's mind was in turmoil, another message dinged in. It was a message from the same guy.
"Bro, sorry, I didn't mean to send this photo to you." The message stung him deep in his heart; as reading it it felt like this guy just wanted to poke fun at him for his cheating girlfriend.
"Why? Why did she do that? I was making her every wish come true! And who the hell is that guy?" Alex had been working so hard at his delivery job that he barely had time to rest. With the money he earned, he was buying her gifts and saving up to propose to her at the right time.
But now, looking at the photo, along with the message that mocked him, he realized that there was probably no use for AI; he had truly been cheated on.
The joy he had felt from working hard and looking forward to seeing her beautiful face on video calls every day began to hit him hard. He felt as if his world had fallen apart all of a sudden.
Taking revenge? That thought didn't even cross his mind.
How was he going to take revenge? By flaunting his manhood and telling her she had missed the opportunity to experience heaven in bed? No, that was just a pipe dream. Who would want that when he was just a poor fellow?
The strange idea of revenge began to fade as quickly as it had arisen in his heart. He knew his limits well, and since she was now sitting in the lap of a probably rich man, there was no way he could do anything.
Ding.
Suddenly, another dinging sound came.
"Does he really have to be that petty?" Alex couldn't help but curse, thinking that the guy had sent another message to make fun of him. However, when he looked at the screen, there was no message whatsoever in the chat, except for the photo and a few previous messages.
"Am I hearing things now?" Alex thought, tapping the power button to shut off his mobile. His mind was now slightly clearer with the idea of blocking that cheater from his already miserable life and using his hard-earned money to spend on himself instead of on that gold digger.
Ding.
"Congratulations to the host for awakening the Tycoon Cashback system."
Alex poked a finger in his ear, shutting his eyes, hearing the same dinging voice. However, the moment he opened his eyes, a translucent screen was flashing in front of him, with a few words written on it.
"Tycoon Cashback system? What's this thing? Am I hallucinating now?" Alex couldn't help but spit on the ground before asking. He had heard that when people overwork or overthink, they tend to hear or see strange things. But looking at that translucent screen at the moment, it seemed quite real, prompting him to extend his hand toward it to touch it.
"Hah, I'm really hallucinating." As his hand passed right through the translucent screen, Alex couldn't help but sigh heavily while blinking quickly to make the thing go away.
Ding. "Congratulations, host, you've received a newbie reward..."
[Do you wish to open the newbie reward?]
YES | NO
Now, instead of the translucent screen disappearing, the words changed, and a question appeared in its stead. "Newbie reward? Why does it sound like it's asking me to play some kind of game?"
Alex fell into a dilemma. Though he had saved up about $2,000, if he sought professional help regarding this, that money would vanish after just two normal questions, and at the moment, he was in no position to afford that. So, instead of trying to dismiss this as some kind of hallucination, he decided to accept it and said, "Sure, open the newbie reward for me."
Just as he said that, another notification popped up on the translucent screen.
Ding.
[You have received an MFRB Bank premium card with $100,000 credited to it; please use it receive cash-backs.]
"Yeah, thank you for being generous," Alex said sarcastically, as there was no way he would receive that much money from something that made people believe they were hallucinating.
However, just as he was thinking that and cursing even his hallucinations for making fun of him for being poor, a notification chimed on his phone.
Initially in no mood to take his phone out of his pocket, Alex did so anyway. As soon as the screen turned on, he read the message. The phone he was holding slipped from his hand as he saw the content of the message.