Spin-Off: Old Six's Daily Life (5)

Facing Loli's streaming demands, Mothman broke down and cried. She lowered her head, choking with sobs, as a black oily substance seeped from her insect-like compound eyes.

Her trembling voice was filled with grievance: "Why do you have to force me to stream? I don't want to stream. I really don't want to stream anymore..."

The cybernetic monster, standing at three and a half meters tall, now seemed like a helpless child. Her cries echoed in the reservoir, unbearably tragic, even causing a pang of hesitation in Loli's heart.

She was already like this, pushed to madness by streaming. Maybe she should be spared?

But as Loli noticed the streaming effect improving with her sobbing, the heat and engagement skyrocketing, and the gifts pouring in—amounting to more than she herself could earn in months—she hardened her resolve.

Anxiously, Loli grabbed Mothman's insect-like forelimbs, pleading, "Streaming makes money, girl. If you stream, you can pay off all your prosthetic loans! You can reclaim your mortgaged body!"

"I don't want it, I don't want it!!" Mothman's voice grew unstable, her vocal cords buzzing with sizzling currents, while her fuzzy, data-cable-covered body started convulsing.

Suddenly, she extended her arm and violently plunged her insect forelimb into Loli's body. Her voice, once filled with despair, now burned with hatred: "Because of you! It's all because of you!"

Faced with her threat, the tearful Loli, ignoring her injuries, shouted back: "Because of me? Because I brought you into this business?! What else can you do if you don't stream? You need to eat! You need to drink water!"

"Hurry! Hurry! Save your sex slave already!" Old Six shouted, urging Black Ghost from the sidelines.

Black Ghost deactivated all his combat prosthetics, casually glancing at Loli, who was still forcing Mothman to stream. "I didn't expect his appearance to be so beautiful, yet his heart so filthy. I don't feel even a shred of desire for him now. He's unworthy of being my sex slave."

Despite his words, Old Six's next remark spurred him back into action. "Cut that sentimental crap! The stream's heat is starting to drop!"

"Fuck! Seal the revenue share deal with my system AI!" With the roar of a chainsaw, Black Ghost charged forward once more, slamming Mothman down onto the ground.

Seeing the two finally start fighting, Old Six shouted excitedly. "Yo yo, get the live room hyped up! Spam those gifts! Charge up Black Ghost! Send car gifts! Ramp up Mothman's turbo boost!"

As Old Six rapped to amp up the streaming heat, Loli dragged her injured body over to him and snarled viciously, "Give me my streaming share right now! Or I'll make her stop this instant!"

"Fine, fine, no need to rush. As long as we're making money, we all get a piece!" Faced with Loli's threat, Old Six begrudgingly relented and handed out separate revenue agreements to Black Ghost and Loli.

Loli curled up behind a cracked concrete pipe, her trembling fingers swiping across her account balance. Staring at the rising virtual coin total, her expression swung between greed and heartbreak.

In the end, she steeled herself during a fleeting moment of softness and split the earnings fifty-fifty with her deranged partner.

By now, Mothman's appearance had completely transformed. Her head bent backward at a grotesque angle, her compound eyes cracked with web-like fissures. The faux fur on her body, masked by data cables, now extruded molecular-grade chainsaws at the ends. These bloodthirsty metallic tendrils lashed wildly through the air.

"Bang!" A mangled Black Ghost was brutally thrown into the wall with such force that the concrete shattered completely.

Seconds later, the subcutaneous armor on his back exploded open, revealing clusters of micro-missile launchers. "Taste my overloaded special package!" Twelve missiles, illuminated by purple arcs of electricity, spiraled out in rapid succession.

"yoyoyo~! Mothman mutation! (Danger~!) Deploy pop-up knife ads! Black Ghost tears open his skin! (wow~!) Revealing the recharge bar!!"

"Supreme cannon fire unloads my Decepticon flow! Every piece of support cranks my rhythm higher! Electronic gladiator cricket flows turn you into tech pro!!"

At some point, walls surrounding the circular reservoir filled with other people emerging from the pipes. They shouted in excitement, accompanied by floating miniature live rooms in front of their faces—they were all streamers too.

Old Six glared at them maliciously. "Damn it! These parasites stealing my viewers!"

Mothman scanned her surroundings and realized the reservoir had become a Roman-style Beast Fighting Arena. People crowded around her on all sides, wild with excitement, craving blood, watching her with predatory grins—just like the audience of the live streams.

"I don't want to stream anymore. I really don't want to stream anymore..." she cried out, collapsing emotionally, but no one heard her words.

She wanted to hide but found no escape, wanted someone to rely on but realized her last source of support had sold her out to this arena.

Finally, pushed to the brink, she raised her sharp insect forelimbs, stabbing them directly through her own compound eyes and piercing her brain completely.

In that instant, the sound stopped abruptly, and all eyes watched as Mothman's body, limp as a torn sack, fell into the water with a splash. The stream's heat rapidly cooled down.

Like the receding tide, the freeloading streamers vanished from the pipes, the gifts stopped coming, and the revenue shares ceased completely.

Old Six, Loli, and Black Ghost stood waist-deep in the water. None of them spoke; the atmosphere was suffocatingly silent.

Finally, Black Ghost broke the silence. Looking at the corpse floating in the water, he remarked regretfully, "People shouldn't die. Without people, how do we keep making money?"

Seeking reassurance, Loli looked to the others. "What we did... didn't feel right, did it?" She started sobbing as she spoke.

Old Six counted his account balance, not even glancing up. "You're such a fake bitch. Selling out your friend and crying about it? Cut the theatrics. Here in the Metropolis, money is everything. Money is worth more than anything else; everything else is trash."

"I didn't want her to die! I just wanted her to repay her debts! I just wanted her to earn enough money to cure her cyberpsychosis! I really just wanted her to stream one last time!"

"Spit." Black Ghost spat at her in disgust, pointing at Old Six as a warning. "You better pay me back when you cash out, or I'll fucking end you." With that, he turned and left.

"Pay you back? Pay my ass. I'm hitting the clubs first. This time, I'm going to Central District—never been there before." Old Six said as he turned to leave.

As Old Six departed with the illuminated drone, the entire reservoir sank into pitch-black darkness.

Days later, Mothman's body in the reservoir vanished. It was retrofitted with AI, puppeting her likeness, mimicking every move, every smile of the streamers that followed. As a puppet, she remained trapped forever in the very streams she loathed and feared...

Until the day Sun Jack burned it all to the ground.

"Fuck off! You're telling me this thing isn't a robot but a goddamn corpse?! Old Six, you piece of shit, bury her! I don't care what happened before! From now on, in the Metropolis, I—Sun Jack—make the rules!!"