Chapter 5

"Are you cold?" Raul asked, looking down at me.

"No," I replied.

"Liar," he said with a smile, taking off his jacket and draping it over my shoulders. "Your hands are freezing."

His jacket carried his scent, a mix of fresh laundry and a touch of woody cologne. I had to admit, if this wasn't an instance and he wasn't a monster in human form, I might actually fall for him.

But I couldn't.

The panel showed: [Affection: 91→92

[Hunger: 79%→80%]

I did some quick math in my head. 92 affection points meant 80% hunger. At that rate, when affection hit 100, hunger would be 88%. That left 12% to reach 100%, but affection could only go up by 8 more points.

It didn't look like berserk hunger mode would trigger.

But the system never said the affection cap was 100.

A note popped up on the panel. [Tip: Affection cap is 200.]

Got it.

If the affection cap was 200, then what was the maximum hunger? If affection reached 200, based on the ratio, each point of affection raised hunger by about 0.89%.

So from 85 to 200—that was 115 points—hunger would increase by roughly 102%.

72% plus 102% comes out to 174%, way past 100%.

In other words, if I really pushed his affection all the way to 200, he'd be so ravenous he'd devour me completely.

The designer of this instance was a total madman.

I took a deep breath and started rethinking my strategy. I couldn't let Raul's affection rise too quickly, but I couldn't let it stagnate either. If it didn't increase, I'd never unlock all the rules. And without knowing every rule, survival was impossible.

I needed to find the sweet spot: raise his affection just enough to unlock the rules, but not so much that it triggered his berserk hunger mode.

At the same time, I still had to find the key and open the white door at the end of the hallway. Whatever was behind that door had to be crucial. Maybe it was more rules, maybe it was the truth, or maybe it was the exit.

The afternoon flew by. I watched a movie with Raul. He picked La La Land, and I had a feeling he did it on purpose, since the film was full of swoon-worthy romantic moments.

When the leads danced together at the observatory, he suddenly took my hand, lacing our fingers together.

"If one day I had to leave you," Raul said suddenly, his voice low, "what would you do?"

That question put me on edge.

"Why would you leave me?" I asked.

He was silent for a few seconds, his thumb slowly stroking the back of my hand. "It's not that I want to leave you. It's just… Some things might happen. Things I can't control."

Lines appeared on the panel. [Critical dialogue detected.

[Raul's self-awareness is fluctuating.

[Do you want to spend 10% sanity to read his deep memories?]

I hesitated. My sanity was already at 90%, and spending 10% would drop it to 80%.

Would 80% sanity trigger any negative effects? The system didn't say, but in games like this, the lower the sanity, the more real things get, and the more dangerous, too.

I hit [Yes.]

The panel flickered, and then a scene unfolded right in front of my eyes.

Wait, this wasn't my memory. It was Raul's.

In the scene, a young woman was sitting at the dining table, wearing a light-colored dress, her hair pulled back in a ponytail. There was a glass of warm milk in front of her. She looked almost like me.

To be exact, she was the previous player, the previous lead girl trapped in this instance.

Raul sat across from her, smiling as he watched her drink the milk. The whole vibe was cozy, like a slice of everyday life for any normal couple.

Then the scene shifted.

The woman was at the end of the hallway, clutching a key as she unlocked the white door. Her face was tense, hands shaking. She pushed it open just a sliver and glanced inside.

I didn't get to see what was behind the door. The vision cut out right then.

The next scene showed the woman lying in a bathtub, the water stained red. Raul was crouched beside her, holding her hand, tears falling into the crimson water.

"I'm sorry," he sobbed. "I'm so sorry. I couldn't control myself."

Her lips moved as if she wanted to say something, but in the end, nothing came out. Her eyes slowly lost focus, and her hand slipped from Raul's grasp.

The scene ended.

When I returned to reality, I found my eyes teary. It wasn't fear. It was because the memory was so vivid, I could almost feel Raul's despair in that moment.

He was really suffering.

And he really had killed her.

The statistics on the panel read: [Sanity: 90%→80%

[Tip: Sanity has dropped below 85%. Status unlocked: Blurred Perception.

[Tip: You will begin to see things you aren't supposed to see.]