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《System Error: Too Much Pain Detected》

Lina Vale has survived more than most. Abandoned. Betrayed. Forgotten. When life finally shatters her completely, something impossible awakens.

A System.

One that doesn't just track progress—it feels pain. And responds to it.

Now, every wound, every scar, every moment of silence is recorded… and turned into tasks, skills, and power.

But growth comes with a cost.

As she navigates a world of fame, hidden scars, and glittering deception, Lina must rise from nothing—with a System that rewards her pain and a past that refuses to stay buried.

He watches her from the shadows.

Kael Marlowe. Cold. Untouchable. A man whispered about but never understood. Every woman wants him. Every man fears him. But only Lina sees the cracks in his ice.

With variety shows, rival stars, and a growing fortune she can’t explain, Lina is no longer invisible.

But in a world where one mistake can destroy everything…
How much of herself is she willing to lose to become seen?

System Error: Too Much Pain Detected

Ashlight wasn't just performance training. It was exposure therapy disguised as art.

The trainees were paired up and instructed to provoke raw, emotional reactions in one another. No scripts. No guidance. Just triggers.

He stood across from her on the bare stage, arms crossed, eyes gleaming like he already knew where to cut.

He smiled, but there was no humor in it.

"Difference is—I know I'm pretending. You still think pain makes you special."

The words slammed into her chest harder than expected.

"Careful," she said coldly. "You don't know me."

"I know enough," Adrian replied. "You're beautiful. That buys attention. You're tragic. That buys sympathy. But that won't hold in the long run."

He stepped closer, his voice a low hum. "Blood. Fire. Vulnerability so raw the audience doesn't know whether to love you or fear you."

"I'm obsessed with truth," he said. "And you're the most interesting lie I've seen in years."

She hated how her heart stuttered—not with attraction, but with the fear of being seen too well.

That night, in her dark room lit only by streetlight glow through sheer curtains, Lina whispered to the air.

"Because he reflects the part of you still unsure if you deserve your light."

On the third day, they introduced the emotion switch drill.

Each trainee would be mic'd and filmed for five minutes. No retakes. A producer would call out one emotion every thirty seconds—rage, grief, laughter, regret—and the subject had to embody it.

The orphanage's dark hallways. The way Mira cried when she lied. The silence that followed being expelled. The time she walked home in the rain with nothing but a cracked phone and a broken promise.

When they called out "grief," she didn't blink.

When they said "hope," she let the smallest smile bloom—fragile, but true.

When the session ended, the trainer stood in stunned silence.

Then wrote a single word on her file:

Later, Adrian caught up to her in the garden outside the dorms.

She sat on the low stone bench, watching moonlight settle over the hedges.

He looked at her with something unspoken in his eyes. Then, softly:

"You know… they say people like us don't fall in love. Just into obsession."

She turned to him. "And do you believe that?"

Adrian's voice dropped. "Not until I saw you cry."

The silence that followed was thick.

The next morning, Lina's assistant Sora snuck onto campus with a burner phone and a voice full of chaos.

"You're trending again," she whispered. "They leaked a 12-second clip from your emotion test. You went viral on a Russian fan account and now some fancy Korean label wants your image rights. Also, Kael hasn't said a word."

Lina blinked. "Why would Kael say anything?"

Sora grinned. "Because you're glowing, babe. And I think it scares him."

Pressure Points