Chapter 40: Chloe the Dog Abuser

The voice was coming from within the changing room, and Chloe was standing at the entrance, so she was clearly within earshot.

"Oh, no wonder she resents her mother so much. The other students at her school have found out that she's an internet stripper. I can't think of too many things more embarrassing than that." A sympathetic look appeared on Hook's face as he spoke. "Back in the day, I was also always picked on because my parents were running a pub."

"What happened after that?"

"I developed skin as thick as a wall," Hook said as he pointed at his own face. "After that, nothing they said affected me anymore, but it seems like what they're saying is very hurtful for Chloe."

Sure enough, as soon as Chloe heard what was being said, the lights above the basketball court began to flicker, indicating her emotional turmoil.

She was still hoping that her boyfriend/crush would say something to stand up for her, even though there was already a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach.

"Ha! She's nowhere near as hot as her mum! I haven't fucked her, and I don't plan to. I'm not interested in flat ironing boards like her, but I wouldn't mind getting her mum in bed for some fun..."

Boom!

A loud thunderclap rang out overhead, and all of the lights above the basketball court were instantly snuffed out while Chloe rushed out of the stadium.

……

Karen could see what was happening in the real world, and she sighed, "No wonder she hates me so much..."

"Do you regret entering this... occupation?"

"No. This is not the most respectable job, for sure, but 10 years ago, I had nothing. This job helped me pay the bills and escape from the area that I previously lived in, which was filled with gangs and gunfights. It allowed me to purchase this high-end apartment and bring up my child. I have no regrets," Karen replied with a shake of her head. "For someone like me, who's crawled out the depths of hell, this amount of sacrifice is nothing, but she's unable to bear the kind of things that I can bear. She's still too young..."

"You can change your identity. Doesn't the Metaverse offer an identity reassignment service?"

"Twerking Karen is a piece of intellectual property. It's a name that I've been using since 10 years ago, and there's a fanbase attached to that name. Nowadays, there are countless unknown internet streamers and strippers, and the rise of virtual idols is only making this occupation more difficult. I can't afford to abandon my moniker."

"That does make sense."

As a businessman himself, Kim Hee-cho knew that it was not easy to earn money in any occupation.

Unfortunately, she couldn't just strip down and expect money to be thrown at her.

If she were to abandon her existing fanbase and restart anew, perhaps she wouldn't even be hired by any of the major Metaverse strip clubs. Those establishments didn't just hire anyone. The stage was only so large, and only the highest-earning strippers would be allowed to take the stage.

"I have no choice. Back when I first started, I didn't think about the future. If I had known this would happen, I wouldn't have used my original monicker," Karen said with a resigned shrug. "If I had known this would have such an impact on my daughter, I would've called myself Twerking Cherry. That's a much more alluring name anyway."

……

Karen held her daughter in very high regard, but just like Deranged Pig, she had underestimated her daughter's emotional and psychological tolerance. They had both thought that all it would take for their child to break would be some bullying from the other students at their schools, but in reality, they weren't that fragile.

Having said that, this incident had dealt Chloe a severe blow.

After hearing the conversation in the changing room, Chloe rushed out of the corridor with tears streaming down her face, but she was quickly stopped in her tracks by Adam and Hook.

After stopping Chloe, Adam clasped his left fist in his right hand and cracked his knuckles in preparation for the beating that he was about to dish out.

"Don't cry over trash like him. We'll teach him a lesson for you."

Through the experience that he had accrued from his last mission, he knew that establishing a positive connection with the mission target would be very beneficial for the progress of the mission, and for that purpose, he wanted to play the hero in this scenario.

"Who are you?"

In the psychic world, Chloe had no recollection of Adam. They had only just met in the real world, so she obviously didn't remember Adam at this point in her memory.

"We are enforcers of justice. What those people did to you is unforgivable. Wait for us here. We'll beat the crap out of those bastards for you!"

After making that declaration, Adam passed through the corridor and arrived at the changing room, then kicked the door open with full force.

"Who was the one badmouthing Chloe behind her back just now? It was you, right?"

Adam made his way over to the tallest boy in the changing room as he spoke, then gave him a vicious punch in the stomach, sending him flying back two to three meters.

"What the fuck?!"

It had to be said that his teammates were quite loyal, and they immediately rushed toward Adam to retaliate, only to be dispatched with ease by Hook.

"Oh, I might get addicted to this!"

Hook was howling in joyful catharsis as he pummeled the team on his own.

His combat prowess was very lackluster, and as a summoner, the same applied to Adam's psychic body, but that was a relative concept.

When pitted against aberrations, anomalies, and adapter hitmen, both of their psychic bodies were considerably weaker, but they were certainly more than capable of beating up the average person. After all, Adam's psychic body had been enhanced on multiple occasions, and he and Hook were like a pair of wolves that had charged into a sheep's pen, giving everyone in sight a thorough beating.

"So this is what it feels like to dominate a battle!" After sending the final player flying with his huge mechanical fist, Hook sighed with a slightly forlorn expression, "It's lonely at the top."

"Let's go."

The point of instigating this fight was to gain the favor of the mission target, and after beating up the entire basketball team, Adam arrived outside to find that there were still tears swimming in Chloe's eyes.

"Don't cry, we've already taught everyone who was badmouthing you in there a lesson in respect!"

"You shouldn't be physically assaulting people like this," Chloe sniffled. "But thank you for doing that for me."

"No problem. If you want to thank someone, thank your mother. She was the one who hired us."

"My mother?"

A complex look appeared on Chloe's face at the thought of her mother, and all of the people in the surrounding area began to slowly vanish on the spot.

"What's going on?"

"It's alright, this is just a sign that this scene in her memory has already concluded."

Hook was more experienced than Adam when it came to how psychic worlds functioned. He had been attending the academy longer than Adam had, and aside from the foundational theoretical knowledge, the academy also placed a heavy emphasis on teaching the finer details.

"I intentionally mentioned her mother just now so I could evoke some other memories," Hook explained as he pulled out his telescope. "Let's keep going."

"There's definitely more to this. That memory would've definitely dealt her a heavy blow, but it's not that serious." Adam knew that young people her age weren't that fragile.

Kim had also suffered from bullying in the past, but the true cause of her PTSD was witnessing that human factory.

Even an adult would've been extremely disturbed and suffered from frequent nightmares after witnessing such a gruesome scene, let alone a child like her.

When it came to tracking someone down in the psychic world, Hook was an expert.

Adam followed him out of the basketball stadium and the school, and they arrived at the next memory setting.

Just a moment ago, it had still been daytime, but in this scenario, it was already nighttime. Chloe was chasing a stray dog in the night, and after catching up to the poor dog, she tied it up before beating it viciously with a wooden stick.

"What is she doing?"