They say the higher you climb, the harder you fall. Well, I didn't just fall. I cratered.
Yesterday, I was a King. I was the guy who could stop a charging varsity athlete with a look. Today? I was a stray transmission—fading, full of static, and smelling slightly like a wet dog. The 'Soft Reset' wasn't just a status effect; it was a physical weight. My spine felt like it was made of wet cardboard, my glasses kept sliding down a nose that suddenly felt too small, and my voice was a rusted hinge.
"Seraphina?" I hissed, ducking behind the sugar station at the Cosmic Cafe. I was trying to hide from my own reflection in the napkin dispenser. "Tell me the 'Zero Rizz' status is a system error. Please. My skin feels like it's crawling."
[SYSTEM STATUS: CRITICAL ERROR]
[PENALTY ACTIVE: ZERO RIZZ PROTOCOL]
[DURATION: 44 HOURS REMAINING]
[CURRENT AURA: PUDDLE-RANK]
"Negative, darling," Seraphina's voice crackled like a radio losing signal in a tunnel. She sounded far away, her usual silkiness replaced by digital grit. "Actions have consequences. You leaked too much biometric data in the dojo. The 'Aegis' signal is jamming my core. Currently, your charisma is lower than a basement floor. You're navigating... without a compass. Try not to... disappear... entirely..."
The static swallowed her. I was alone in my own head for the first time since the lightning hit. It was terrifying.
I looked toward the window. Tiffany Brooks was a vision of high-fashion coldness. She sat with her legs crossed, tapping a manicured nail against her gold watch. To her, I was already fifteen minutes late. To the System, I was a walking disaster.
I moved toward her, and my sneakers let out an agonizingly loud squeal on the linoleum. Squeak-crunch. I miscalculated the distance, my balance totally shot. I tripped over a mahogany chair leg and nearly tumbled headlong into her five-dollar designer latte.
"Whoa!" I flailed, windmilling my arms as I caught the edge of the table. The wood groaned under my weight. Tiffany flinched, pulling her expensive leather bag away as if I were a biohazard.
She surveyed my rain-damp hoodie, my messy hair, and my trembling hands with the clinical distaste of a biologist looking at a new species of fungus.
"Leo?" she asked, her voice flat and disappointed. "You look like you've been living under a bridge. Why are you twitching?"
"The rain... it's aggressive today," I managed to stutter. My voice was a thin, pathetic reed. I sounded like I hadn't gone through puberty yet. I wanted the floor to open up and swallow me.
Tiffany leaned back, her gaze sharpening into a blade. The 'Liking Meter' above her head—once a warm, sunset pink—was rapidly draining into a stony, industrial grey.
"Where is the man from the auditorium?" she demanded. "The one who told me to 'watch him'? The one who actually had a spine?"
"He's... on sabbatical," I muttered, finding my own muddy shoes fascinating. I looked like a loser. I felt like the old Leo—the guy people looked through instead of at. The invisibility was back, and it was suffocating.
"Sit," she commanded. It wasn't a request. It was an order given to a stray dog.
I collapsed into the chair. Tiffany slid a tablet across the table, displaying the bracket for the next stage of the King of Hearts.
"The next round is the Talent Showcase," she said, her voice like a winter breeze. "Chad is preparing a pyrotechnic display. He's already calling himself the winner. I staked my social capital on you, Leo. I told people you were the 'X-factor.' If you walk onto that stage tomorrow night looking like a drowned rodent, I will be the laughingstock of this university."
"I can do it," I said, trying to find a single spark of the System's fire.
"A glitch?" Tiffany's laugh was brittle. She leaned in, her perfume making me feel nauseous because of how unworthy I felt. "You look like the old Leo. The shadow in the library stacks. The guy I wouldn't even notice if he was on fire. Do you have any idea how much I hate being wrong about people?"
She stood up, snatching her bag. "Maybe Chad was right. You were just a lucky strike of lightning that's already burnt out."
She turned to leave, but my hand moved instinctively. I caught her wrist. There was no 'High-Voltage' spark. No magnetic pull. My fingers were visibly shaking against her skin.
"Wait," I whispered.
Tiffany froze. "Release me, Leo. People are staring."
"I'm still the same person," I said, my voice cracking at the edges. "Even without the... the confidence. I'm the one who caught you on that stage. I'm the one who saved the Professor's skirt. That wasn't just code, Tiffany. That was me."
Tiffany went still. For a heartbeat, the 'Liking Meter' vibrated. It didn't rise, but the freefall stopped. She looked into my eyes, and for a second, the Queen was gone—replaced by someone genuinely curious about the wreck in front of her.
"You're a mess right now," she said softly. "But... at least you're a sincere mess. You have forty-eight hours to find that 'fluke' again, Leo. Because if you fail the next round, I'll make sure the entire campus knows exactly how small you really are."
An hour later, I was in the university gym. It was a cathedral of iron and rubber, and it was currently the site of my impending humiliation. Usually, I could move mountains with the 'Physical Buff', but today, the five-pound dumbbells felt like they were forged from collapsed stars.
"Seraphina," I wheezed, leaning against the squat rack. "The penalty... it's draining my vitals, isn't it? I can't even lift my bag."
"Strength follows spirit, Leo..." her voice was a ghost in my ear. "Zero confidence... zero power... Try not to get... folded..."
"Well, if it isn't the 'King' in his natural habitat," a booming voice mocked.
Chad Miller loomed over me, flanked by his usual sycophants. Beside him, Mika watched. Her flinty eyes lacked their usual competitive fire. She looked... disappointed. Pitying. Her 'Liking Meter' was a flat, unmoving grey.
"You look like you're about to dissolve, Vance," Mika said, her voice strangely flat.
"I'm fine," I gritted out, trying to stand. My knees gave a pathetic wobble.
Chad laughed, a sound like gravel in a blender. "Fine? You look like a bug waiting for a boot. Hey, since you're such a 'natural' athlete, why don't you show us some of that 'King' power on the heavy bag?"
He shoved a pair of boxing gloves into my chest. "Go on, Hero. Entertain us. Show Mika how you 'pinned' her wrists in the alley."
A crowd began to form, students pausing their workouts to watch the inevitable train wreck. I saw Tiffany watching from the treadmill in the distance, her face a mask of secondhand embarrassment.
I approached the heavy bag. It looked like a titan. I wound up and swung with everything I had left—every ounce of frustration and fear.
Thud.
The bag didn't even shudder. It was the sound of a wet towel hitting a floor. My wrist buckled, and a sharp spike of pain shot up my arm. I let out a sound that was far too close to a whimper.
The gym erupted. Chad nearly fell over, howling with laughter. "That's it?! That's the guy who talked big? You're a fraud, Vance! You're nothing but smoke and mirrors!"
He stepped into my space, his shadow swallowing me whole. He raised a hand, and I flinched. My eyes slammed shut. I actually flinched.
"That's enough, Chad!"
I opened my eyes to see Mika standing between us, her palm flat against Chad's chest. "He's clearly sick. Let it go. It's pathetic to kick a man when he's already down."
"He's a loser, Mika! Get out of the way."
"I said enough," Mika barked. She turned to me, her eyes filled with a stinging mix of pity and frustration. "Go home, Leo. This is just embarrassing for everyone."
I didn't argue. I grabbed my bag and walked through the gauntlet of snickers. Every step felt like a mile.
In the locker room, I splashed freezing water on my face. I looked pathetic. I looked like a glitch that had been patched out.
"I hate this," I whispered to the tiles. "I hate being this weak."
Vrrr—
A faint, golden resonance pulsed in the back of my skull.
"Good. Let that burn, Leo," Seraphina whispered. "The penalty expires in twelve hours. The Talent Round is tomorrow night. Are you going to show up as a shadow... or are you going to show them why the Rizz System chose you?"
I looked at my hands. They were still trembling, but a microscopic spark of blue light flickered at my fingertips.
"Tomorrow," I whispered. "Tomorrow, the game resets."