Chapter 223: 223 | A Call to the Matriarch [PS BONUS]
The silver Gacha token materialized in my inventory with a soft chime. I pulled up the interface, watching the familiar wheel spin into existence. Silver tier meant decent odds. Not great, but not terrible. The last few silver pulls had given me useful stuff. Lightning Cloak. False Data. Things that actually contributed to my survival.
The wheel spun.
The golden light built.
The symbols blurred past in their usual sequence.
And then it stopped.
〘 Silver Gacha Complete 〙
〘 Result: Convenient Amnesia 〙
〘 Rarity: Uncommon 〙
〘 Classification: Passive Trait (Social) 〙
〘 Effect: When the Host finds himself in a compromising situation with a registered heroine, there is a 15% chance that the heroine will conveniently forget the encounter occurred within 24 hours. Memory loss is selective and only applies to potentially relationship-damaging moments. The Host retains full memory of all events. 〙
〘 Note: This trait was clearly designed for a protagonist with significantly worse social skills than the current Host. The System acknowledges that forgetting romantic progress is counterproductive to stated objectives. Consider this a reminder that the Gacha does not care about your feelings. 〙
I stared at the description for a long moment.
Then I stared at it for another long moment.
"What the hell."
The words came out flat and empty. Not angry. Not even disappointed. Just the hollow acknowledgment of a universe that had decided to personally insult me.
A fifteen percent chance for women to forget our interactions. Not remember them fondly. Not develop deeper feelings. Just straight up forget that anything happened.
This was the opposite of useful. This was actively harmful to everything I was trying to accomplish. The entire point of the System was building relationships with heroines. Raising gauges. Creating connections that would translate into power and resources and all the other things I needed to survive in this world.
And the Gacha had given me a trait that made women forget I existed.
〘 The System notes that Convenient Amnesia has situational applications. In scenarios where the Host’s behavior crosses acceptable boundaries and generates negative gauge impact, selective memory loss could prevent relationship deterioration. 〙
"So it’s insurance for when I screw up."
〘 The System prefers to frame it as consequence mitigation for inevitable poor decisions. 〙
"That’s the same thing with extra words."
〘 The System is aware. 〙
I dismissed the notification and opened my inventory, the interface manifesting in my vision with its usual clinical precision. I scrolled past the actually useful items to the section I’d mentally labeled as the garbage pile. Dampen sat there already, a monument to mediocrity, its description promising the ability to make surfaces slightly moist while actively insulting me with its existence. Now Convenient Amnesia joined it, two completely useless traits taking up mental real estate for absolutely no reason whatsoever.
The System had given me the power to make women forget I existed and the power to stop feeling things strongly.
What a fantastic combination. Really inspiring stuff. The tools of a true protagonist. The arsenal of a man destined for greatness. I could make a doorknob clammy, erase romantic encounters from memory, and flatten my emotional responses into comfortable numbness. With these abilities combined, I could become the world’s most forgettable hero, remembered by no one, feeling nothing, leaving slightly damp surfaces in my wake.
Truly legendary.
I closed the inventory with more force than the gesture required and flopped backward onto the bed, letting the mattress absorb both my body weight and my disappointment in one unceremonious collapse. The ceiling stared back at me with the blank indifference of architectural design. White. Flat. Utterly unhelpful. It offered no wisdom, no guidance, no commentary on the absurdity of my situation. Just ceiling. Being a ceiling. Doing ceiling things.
My phone sat on the nightstand where I’d dropped it earlier, screen dark, waiting. I could feel it there, a small rectangle of obligation and potential complications. The thing was full of conversations I didn’t want to have yet, notifications I’d been ignoring, and the accumulated weight of a social life I was still figuring out how to manage without the Oracle Feed holding my hand through every interaction.
Sloane expected me at dinner in fifteen minutes. That was a fact. A concrete obligation in a day that had become increasingly abstract the longer it went on.
Felicity probably wanted to continue our friendship development.
Camille was somewhere on campus forming opinions about my wardrobe that would translate into competitive energy I’d have to manage.
And tomorrow was Monday. The real first day of classes. Steele’s conditioning drills at six in the morning followed by whatever academic torture Halloran had planned for Combat Operations students.
I needed advice.
Not System advice. Not strategic recommendations from an entity that thought making women forget me was a reasonable consolation prize. Real advice. Human advice. From someone who actually understood how this world worked and didn’t have an agenda that involved turning me into a harem protagonist against my will.
I picked up the phone and scrolled to Diane’s contact.
The line rang twice before she answered.
"Sugar, if you’re calling to tell me you’ve already gotten into trouble, I’m going to need you to start from the beginning and use small words because I’ve had exactly two glasses of wine and my patience is not what it could be."
Her voice washed over me like warm honey. That Charleston drawl that somehow made everything sound both comforting and slightly dangerous. The specific tone of a woman who had built an empire out of making people look good and wasn’t about to let a little thing like long distance stop her from managing everyone in her orbit.
"I haven’t gotten into trouble."
"That’s what people say right before they explain exactly how much trouble they’ve gotten into. Spill."
"I’m serious. No trouble. I just wanted to hear your voice."
The line went quiet for a moment. When Diane spoke again, her tone had shifted into something softer.
"Well now. That might be the sweetest thing you’ve said to me in months. You feeling alright? No head injuries? Nobody’s threatening you at knifepoint and making you say nice things?"
