A shimmer of natural light seeped into a dimly lit room. The room looked uninviting and rather empty for a young man’s room.
A young man was lying on the bed, completely oblivious to the world around him. He was wearing a white t-shirt and blue jeans, and his hair was messy and filthy.
Crack… A sudden sound of breaking glass reverberated from the downstairs.
The young man flinched and woke up. He rubbed his eyes and looked around the room in confusion. However, he soon realized where he was and caught a glimpse of the VR headset on the bedside table.
He reached his hand towards it, but at that moment, his stomach rumbled. He groaned in pain as he felt like he hadn’t eaten in a very long time.
“Ugh…” Jesse sat up and rolled the wheelchair closer. He sat down, rolled out of his room, and saw the downstairs. There were sounds coming from the kitchen, one from an angry-sounding woman.
Jesse sighed, as he didn’t really want to go there. However, he was feeling very hungry.
‘Maybe I can use my legs…’ He looked down at his legs and rubbed them.
He grabbed the wheelchair from the armrests and pushed himself up.
After standing with both legs, he felt sharp pain on his soles, but it wasn’t unbearable.
Jesse wobbled and almost fell down the stairs, but managed to stabilize his body beforehand.
He gently pushed the wheelchair towards his room’s door and then walked down the stairs towards the downstairs.
After reaching the downstairs, he saw his father sitting on a sofa, watching a TV show. Then, when Jesse turned around a corner, he saw a slim woman sweeping broken glass pieces.
He was Jesse’s mother, Maria Kraham. She was rather attractive, with wrinkles at the corner of her eyes and long black hair, which she had tied in a ponytail. She had similar blue eyes to Jesse’s but looked way more serious.
Maria looked away from the floor and saw her son standing below the stairs. She opened her mouth before closing it and turning away from him. She continued sweeping the broken glass pieces in silence.
Jesse ignored her and walked to the refrigerator. There was more food than last night, meaning his parents visited a store. He took out ready-made food and went to the sink to fill a cup with water.
He then returned to the table, sat down in silence, and started eating without interacting with anyone.
Maria poured the broken glass pieces into a plastic garbage bag and then closed the lid of the garbage can. She washed her hands with cold water in silence and then dried them with a towel before returning to her food preparation.
The atmosphere was very awkward.
Jesse soon finished his food and went to wash the bowl and cup before putting them back in the cupboard. He then walked towards the stairs with the intention of returning to his room.
Maria glanced at her departing son from the corner of her eye. She then turned back to food preparation without the intention of talking to him.
After reaching the second floor, Jesse came to a stop after seeing that his wheelchair had been rolled further away and his door was wide open. He looked inside the door with a frown. 𝒩𝗈𝐕𝐿xt.𝗇t
‘Did Holly come here? To steal my money probably, but I don’t have any.’ He thought nonchalantly, but then he noticed something missing on his bedside table. His VR headset was nowhere to be seen.
His eyes iced over, and he slammed his door shut before rushing to the nearby room.
Without knocking, he slammed the door open and saw his little sister lying on her bed with a VR headset in hand. She was also talking as if she were having a phone call.
“Huh, what the hell?” Holly sat up in a hurry, and after seeing it was her brother, she turned angry. “Jesse, what the fuck? Get out of my room!”
“Give it back.” Jesse spoke coldly.
“Huh, give what back?” Holly innocently tilted her head as if she didn’t know what he was talking about.
“My VR headset.” Jesse pointed at the white VR headset with a golden visor. It was right beside Holly on the bed.
“Oh, that.” Holly took the VR headset into her hands and looked at the golden visor. “No, I will go play with Allison.”
“Give it back.” Jesse stepped forward with his hands clenched tightly.
“I will give it back after I am done.” Holly said with a cold smile. “Now, leave my room, or I will tell mom.”
“Give it back!” Jesse shouted, his eyes having a tint of red.
“Or what?” Holly raised an eyebrow and stood up from the bed. She crossed her arms and mockingly looked at him. “What would you do? Attack me? Hah, if you hit me, you would injure yourself.”
Jesse stopped in front of her and looked coldly at her mocking-looking face.
“You are crossing a line, brother.” Holly said coldly. “One more step, and I will also accuse you of sexual harassment.”
Jesse looked at Holly with an even colder expression. His nails dug into his palm, and small droplets of blood dropped to the floor.
Holly saw that and paled slightly. She then scoffed, returned to the bed, and tossed the VR headset towards him.
“Fine, take it.”
Jesse’s expression widened in shock, and he caught the VR headset mid-air. His heart was beating fast because it could have landed on the floor and been broken.
“Get out of my room!” Holly shouted and sat back on her bed. She looked frustrated and looked at her phone before closing the call.
Jesse looked at his little sister before leaving the room and returning to his room after fetching the wheelchair from the hallway.
He put the VR headset gently on his bed and looked at his bleeding palm. He felt light-headed, as it felt like he’d been stabbed.
He rushed to his desk, took out a white bandage, and wrapped it tightly around his palm.
His legs then again started hurting, and he hurriedly sat back on his bed.
“God damn it.” Jesse covered his face and cursed with frustration. ‘They are also now trying to take away the only thing that brings me happiness? They just don’t understand.
‘Here, I am an abomination. I can’t live a normal life. But in Martial Online, I am normal. I can do the same things as everyone else. They don’t understand how much it means to me. It is something I have dreamed of for longer than I can remember.
‘I won’t let anyone take that away from me.’
Jesse looked at the VR headset and sighed. He then remembered something and pulled out his phone. He went to check out Martial Online’s forums.
To his surprise, he had over thirty messages!
‘Oh, I wonder how many of those are planning to actually purchase the information…’ He thought curiously and opened the first message.
[WorkHard: Can we trade information? I will tell you where a secret cave is, and you tell me where Crow Cave is. Deal?]
“Scam.” Jesse blocked the user and moved onto another message.