While I was walking toward the lobby, I was reviewing a few things about the skills that I had learned. First of all, every skill had its strengths and weakness. For example, while telekinesis was powerful, but the user had to keep his focus on the object. Rose was very talented, but she couldn’t move much while controlling the objects. To move around, she would have to pay attention to what direction she would go and where she would put her feet. That was more than enough to make her unable to control her glaives at a high-speed.

Another problem the skills had was the user. A skill couldn’t do a single thing by itself, so, a skill could be useful or couldn’t do anything depending on the person who was using it. Any skill could be countered, as long as a human being was using it. I was betting on that possibility to make me escape from that situation. I couldn’t run, and I couldn’t fight, my best option was to find the weakness of that woman’s skill. I was already in deep waters, so, might as well bet everything on that idea.

My plan was far from perfect, but I couldn’t make that plan better just by waiting or thinking. So, I decided to use the woman’s words against her while offering her some advice. On the best-case scenario, she would let me go and forget us, and on the worst scenario, I would die. But, oh well, I might as well die fighting too.

I couldn’t use offensive skills inside the hotel, but I still could create a spiritual knife. So, I created it, and I stored it in my body. Maybe it would come in handy, maybe not. But, no one ever died for being too careful.

When I returned to the lobby, Ann showed a surprised expression. I could understand why Karl was so in love with her, even though she had a terrible personality.

“Look who has returned,” Ann said while showing a small smile. “Did you return here to surrender?”

“Nah, I’m good. I came here to talk a little.”

“Talk about what?” Ann asked, confused.

“About you and your actions, I’m not the best person to say this, but you should stop while you can.”

Ann’s carefree expression disappeared, and I could see the anger in her eyes. She looked at me like I was nothing more than an insect; she really had a superiority complex.

“I don’t know how much people died because of you, and I don’t care about either. I also don’t care how you intend to manage this place. But if you continue to do as you please, you will die without nothing.”

“What did you say?” Ann asked emitting hostility with her voice.

“You are living a life full of lies; you don’t have the right to change other people’s memories. Right now, you don’t love those guys, and they don’t truly love you either. For how long do you intend to lie to yourself? Don’t tell me that you also want to become a queen. Will you create a new country? Will you become the queen of a country full of monsters?”

Holy crap… did I really have to say those words? I was feeling very uncomfortable because of it; I didn’t have the right to say that because I was full of flaws. But at least my words had some effect on Ann. She looked very pissed, her bodyguards too. But even though she was unreasonable, she wasn’t stupid enough not to recognize that I was telling the truth.

“Right now we don’t know how the other cities are holding up we don’t even know if we will find other survivors in this country or in the others. Do you really think that we have the time and the people to waste fighting against each other? Stop wasting time with your petty actions, or you will condemn all humanity to extinction.”

For a few moments, Ann studied me with a grim expression. She was far smarter than me since she didn’t become furious because of my words. She knew that eventually, she would get bored of being worshiped by her bodyguards. If you eat your favorite food every day, soon you will get sick of it. In essence, it was the same.

“You have two options: let me go and forget about us. You can play with your skill in this place; we will ignore you. But, you should let the survivors who aren’t under your control go and create their own survivals’ camp or join ours. The second option is to kill me and start a war with the other survivors, they may die, but you will suffer a lot of damage. Perhaps you will lose all your bodyguards in that war. It’s your choice.”

She had three options; she could use her skill to put me under her control. But I couldn’t say it, the bait was too obvious, after all. Maybe it wasn’t a bait; perhaps I was just ridiculously giving her the chance to put me under her control. But it wasn’t like I could do much in that situation, the chances were small. But I still could counter her skill because I already knew how the skill worked. Well, more or less.

“I will choose the third option,” Ann said, smiling. “I will make you kill your friends, and after that, I will delete all your memories, and you will become a worm.”

My plan had succeeded, but her creativity scared me. If I fail, I will kill many innocent people, and in the end, I will become a worm.

‘Crazy bitch… you will die by my hands.’

Her bodyguards surrounded me, and without even touching me, they forced me to leave the hotel. Ann followed us while smiling, and because she looked so sure of herself, I began to change my mind about the plan of countering her skill. But when I thought about that, her bodyguards put their weapons near my neck. One slight wrong movement and I would lose my head.

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

When we all were outside the hotel, Ann began to sing, and I began to feel tired. She was using the skill sleep; she was far more prudent than Ken. Before I could notice, everything around me disappeared, and I was surrounded by darkness. I couldn’t move, nor could I feel anything, I couldn’t even hear my heart beating. After a few instants, I heard footsteps, and Ann appeared, before she or I could say anything, she created a throne identical to her actual throne, and she sat.

“Welcome, this is my world,” Ann said, showing a condescending smile. “The goddess of illusions’ world.”

“So you call yourself a goddess, huh. You are even more full of yourself than Ken.”

“Who is Ken?” Ann said, showing a surprised expression.

“The idiot who caused problems in the north, I killed him and his minions. Didn’t you send Karl to spy him and his group?”

“Oh! His name was Ken!” Ann said. “I totally forget about him. A guy who was so full of himself because he had an electric stick doesn’t deserve my attention.”

“Look who is talking… anyway, why don’t you start already? I don’t have all day to play with you. So, how will you change my memories?”

“It’s pretty simple,” Ann said after she raised her index finger. “I will just alter your most important memories and put myself in the center of them. After that, I will make you see those memories hundreds of times and presto! You will become my mindless servant.”

“Wow! What a disgusting skill! It’s more like brainwashing than you showing illusions. I guess this will take a long time to take effect.”

“Not really,” Ann explained. “The time in this place is different than in the real world. Years inside this place is less than a few minutes outside.”

That was a bit scary, instead of changing my memories, I would become crazy if she decided to torture me. But probably she couldn’t do that; she was the kind of person who would do that if she had the chance.

“Shall we start? Or I should I see some of your most embarrassing memories?” Ann said.

Now that worried me a little; I had a lot of embarrassing memories that I would take with me to the grave. The world wasn’t ready to know about those memories, and I wasn’t even a bit interested in sharing them with other people. Not even with my family.

A lot of TV screens appeared in a line in front of Ann, in those screens I could see many things that I saw with my eyes along with my entire life. But a few of those scenes didn’t look much familiar.

“If we are talking about embarrassing moments, there is a period of life we will find many of those. right?” Ann said, looking pretty excited. “Puberty!”

Ah, crap… what did I do to deserve that? Why the first person to discover my most embarrassing secret had to be the city’s number one bitch? No more plans and I won’t take any more stupid actions. I will become a robot and follow all of Sandra’s orders. If I do that, I won’t probably get in trouble anymore.

“Let’s see, let’s see,” Ann said while she examined many screens. “What is this? As a man, it seems that you didn’t spend much time in the bathroom. Don’t tell me…”

The crazy bitch was really having the time of her life, while she was examined many memories with excitement, I just wanted to bury my face on a hole. Unfortunately, I couldn’t move a muscle in that place. So my despair and shame rose to levels never before reached.

“I can’t believe it!” Ann said while she was laughing out loud. “You! You! You!”

“Don’t you dare say it!”

“You never had an erection in your entire life!” Ann said while laughing even more. “You are totally impotent!”

Slowly, I could see my HP decreasing; I suffered a fatal blow. Although I couldn’t see my status in that place, I was so depressed that I imagined my HP dropping. My life was over, from all things she could learn from my life; the first she learned was my most embarrassing secret. Now I could become her minion even without the brainwashing, as long as she keeps that secret, I was willing to become her most loyal subject.

I was pathetic beyond reason, I was dumb, impulsive, and selfish, I probably had some mental problems, and many other things. The other survivors already knew that, and I couldn’t care less about their opinion. However, when it comes to my most shameful secret, I was very, very sensitive. That was a bit controversial, but I couldn’t let anyone know about that. I would rather die than make that public, but that wasn’t an option anymore. If the crazy bitch decides to share this with others, I won't kill myself, but I would move to the South Pole. I would hunt the monsters there, and I will live a hermit life.

I didn’t know how much time had passed, but after what had seemed ten minutes, Ann stopped laughing. She laughed so much that she trembled on the floor.

“Oh boy,” Ann said after cleaning the tears on her eyes. “This has been the highest point in my entire week. Even my bodyguards didn’t make me feel that good.”

She really had to make that comparison, huh. She was really a slut, Karl was insane to love her. It was like loving a porn star. Or perhaps he was even more stupid than me, in any case, I couldn’t care less about that. I thought that I could counter the crazy bitch skill with my willpower, but she destroyed my willpower. Ann could spend her entire life analyzing my memories, but she wasn’t able to cause any more mental damage to me.

“What a pity, “Ann said after resuming her actions, “While you don’t suit my tastes, but your toy is a bit above average.”

What a dirty mouth, but that couldn’t be helped, after all, she played with her bodyguards day in and day out. She wasn’t the goddess of illusions; she was the slut goddess.

“No wonder you never had a girlfriend,” Ann said. “It seems that you showed interest in some girls, but you soon give up on them because…”

“Go to hell, crazy bitch.”

“It must be painful,” Ann said while analyzing my recent memories. “You have quite a few beautiful friends, but you can’t approach them. You aren’t handsome and even if you had the chance you couldn’t become closer to them, close like a man and a woman can become in bed. It’s so depressing; your heart doesn’t even beat faster when those girls are near you. You don’t care about women anymore? It seems that you aren’t interested in men either.”

“I don’t want to hear this coming from you! You are just an egocentric crazy bitch who wants to be in the center of the universe. Your life is emptier than my life had ever been. You refused the love of the person who loved you for years, for what? You traded the love of someone who loved you despite your innumerable flaws to be loved by empty dolls.”

“You recover quite fast, huh,” Ann said a bit surprised. “Those depressing years strengthen your mind instead of weakening. Anyway, let’s see what kind of your memories can make me laugh.”

The crazy bitch was also a sadistic bitch; it seemed that she wanted to make me feel even more miserable.