[Live Viewers: 245,671,092]
A quarter of the human population was currently glued to their phones, tablets, and TVs, watching the same thing.
For the past three months, this masked figure had turned the world upside down. He turned fear into a reality TV show, and the entire planet was his captive audience.
Simon leaned forward, grabbing a handful of popcorn.
"The lighting is terrible," Simon muttered to himself, squinting at the grainy footage. "If you're going to threaten the Mayor, at least use a backlight to separate yourself from the background. Amateur."
Simon wasn't afraid. Well, not in the way normal people were.
Simon was an actor or at least, he tried to be. He was eighteen, fresh out of high school, and obsessed with the art of fear. He spent his weekends studying classic slasher films, analyzing how the villains moved, how they breathed, and how they built tension. To him, the Nightmare Artist wasn't a monster.
On the screen, the masked figure paced back and forth in what looked like an abandoned warehouse. The camera shook violently. The audio crackled.
"They think they can find me!" the Nightmare Artist screamed, his voice distorted by a voice changer. He held up a trembling hand to the camera lens. "They think they can stop the harvest! But I need more! I need the numbers to go up!"
The chat room on the side of the screen was scrolling so fast it looked like a waterfall of text.
Omg is he crying?
Run dude the cops are outside!
Where is this??
#TeamNightmare trending #1 worldwide lol
This guy is insane.
Simon shook his head. "He's panicking. You lose the audience when you panic."
Simon's room was plastered with posters of iconic horror villains. Freddy, Jason, Ghostface. They were his idols. They controlled the fear. The guy on the screen was just a desperate man in a mask.
Suddenly, a loud boom echoed through the speakers.
The camera on the stream fell over, landing sideways. The view was now of the dirty concrete floor and the Nightmare Artist's boots.
"POLICE! FREEZE!"
"HANDS IN THE AIR! NOW!"
The audio peaked, turning into a screeching mess of shouting and sirens. Simon finally popped the popcorn into his mouth, chewing thoughtfully.
On screen, the Nightmare Artist scrambled backward, his mask slipping slightly to reveal a sweaty, terrified chin. He crawled toward the camera, grabbing it with shaking hands. He brought his face right up to the lens.
"It's not me!" the killer shrieked, spit flying onto the lens. "I had to do it! The numbers! If I don't get the fear points, it punishes me!"
"GET ON THE GROUND!" a voice roared from the background.
Gunshots rang out.
The Nightmare Artist jerked back, clutching his chest. He slumped against a rusted metal pillar, sliding down until he was sitting in a pool of his own expanding blood. The camera, miraculously, was still focused right on him. The chat went berserk.
DID THEY JUST KILL HIM LIVE???
OMG.
RIP.
He deserved it.
What was he talking about?
Simon leaned in closer, his nose almost touching his own monitor. The dying killer looked straight into the camera, his breathing ragged and wet.
"The System..." the killer gasped, blood bubbling past his lips. "The System is the reason!! It... it abandoned me..."
His head slumped forward.
The stream didn't cut off immediately. For ten grueling seconds, the world watched the lifeless body of the most wanted man on Earth. Then, a SWAT officer stepped into the frame, saw the camera, and kicked it.
[Signal Lost.]
The screen went black.
Simon sat back in his gaming chair, exhaling a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding. The silence in his room was deafening compared to the chaos that had just played out.
"The System is the reason?" Simon repeated, furrowing his brows. "What a weird ad-lib for a death scene. Was he trying to blame society? Or maybe a video game?"
He reached for his mouse to close the window. The internet was probably already exploding with theories. Conspiracy theorists would be eating that last line up for years.
Simon tried to close the browser. Nothing happened.
"Come on," Simon grumbled. "Don't tell me the site crashed my PC. This thing is brand new."
He moved the mouse, but the cursor was frozen. The black screen where the video player had been began to shift.
Suddenly, a sound echoed inside Simon's head.
[Ding!]
Simon jumped, spinning his chair around, looking for the source of the sound. "Hello? Mom?"
No one answered.
He turned back to the screen. The black static had vanished, replaced by a crisp, glowing blue interface. It looked exactly like the status screens from the RPG games he played when he wasn't studying acting.
[Scanning for New Host...]
[Candidate Found: Simon Vance.]
[Compatibility: 98%.]
Simon blinked. He rubbed his eyes and looked again. The text was still there, floating on his monitor. No, wait it wasn't on the monitor. When he moved his head to the left, the blue text followed his vision, floating in the air.
"Okay," Simon said slowly, his heart rate picking up. "I've been watching too many movies. I'm hallucinating. I need sleep."
He stood up to go to the bathroom, to splash some cold water on his face.
[Ding!]
[Transfer Complete.]
A sudden wave of cold energy washed over him.
A new window popped up in his vision, bright and demanding.
[Congratulations! You have been selected as the new user of the Serial Killer System!]
[Current Rank: Nobody.]
[Fear Points: 0]
[Global Ranking: Unlisted]
Simon froze. He read the words again. Serial Killer System.
"Wait," Simon whispered, a nervous chuckle escaping his lips. "That guy... the Nightmare Artist. He wasn't crazy? He was... playing a game?"
A chill ran down Simon's spine, but strangely, it wasn't fear. It was the same feeling he got when he stepped onto the stage for a school play, right before the curtain went up.
[Main Quest Initiated: The Debut.]
[Description: The world is boring. The previous host was a clumsy butcher who lacked style. He relied on brute force and cheap jumpscares. The System demands art.]
[Objective: Generate 100 Fear Points within 24 hours.]
[Reward: Starter Skill Pack + "Actor's Mask".]
[Failure Penalty: Permanent deletion of existence.]
Simon stared at the penalty. Permanent deletion of existence. That sounded serious.
He sat back down on the edge of his bed, his mind racing. Most people, upon receiving a magical screen telling them to become a serial killer, would probably call the police or check themselves into a mental hospital.
He looked at the poster of Ghostface on his wall. He looked at the stack of acting scripts on his desk scripts for roles he never got because directors told him he had "too much intensity" or "an unsettling stare."
"The previous host lacked style," Simon read aloud, a smile slowly creeping across his face. "You can say that again. He had no pacing. No dialogue control."
He stood up and walked to the mirror hanging on his closet door. He looked at himself. Messy brown hair, pale skin, average build. He looked like a normal teenager.
"So," Simon said to his reflection, testing out his voice. He dropped his pitch slightly, adding a rasp, imitating the villain from a famous thriller. "You want fear? You want a performance?"
[System Note: Fear Points are generated by inducing genuine terror in targets. The more creative and widespread the fear, the higher the multiplier.]
Simon laughed.
"This is crazy," he admitted, turning away from the mirror. "I'm going to jail. Or I'm going to die."
But as he looked around his room, the mundane reality of his life seemed so dull compared to the glowing blue box hovering in his vision. He wanted to be a star. He wanted the world to watch him.
The Nightmare Artist had failed because he was a thug. He treated the System like a chore.
"But I..." Simon picked up a plastic skull from his desk, holding it like Hamlet holding Yorick. "I am an actor."
He looked at the objective again.
He didn't have to kill anyone to cause fear, did he? The System called it the "Serial Killer System," but the currency was Fear, not death.
"Hey, System," Simon asked the air. "Does it count if I just scare them really, really bad?"
[Ding!]
[Clarification: The System feeds on Fear. The method of extraction is up to the Host. However, death is usually the most efficient closer for a scene.]
"Usually," Simon noted. "But not always. A dead audience can't feel fear. A living audience... they can carry the fear with them forever."
An idea began to form in his mind. A script was writing itself in his head.
He checked the time. It was 11:00 PM.
"24 hours to get 100 points," Simon murmured. He grabbed his hoodie and pulled it over his head.
He walked over to his drawer and pulled out a mask he had made for a Halloween party two years ago. It wasn't anything fancy just a plain white theatrical mask, featureless and smooth, but he had painted a single, black tear falling from the left eye.
He held it up.
"Let's see if we can get better reviews than the last guy," Simon whispered.
He slipped the mask into his pocket and turned toward the window. The city lights of the quiet suburbs flickered outside. Somewhere out there, people were turning off their TVs, shaking their heads at the violence they had just watched, thinking it was all over.
Simon opened his window and climbed out onto the fire escape, the cool night air hitting his face. He felt light. He felt ready.
"Lights," Simon whispered. "Camera."