I was pulling on a clean pair of jeans when someone knocked on my door.

"Yeah, come in," I called out, still shirtless. Had to be Sloane. She’d already seen me completely naked. Shirtless was practically conservative at this point.

The door opened.

Not Sloane.

Diane Fitzgerald stepped into my room wearing a button-up white blouse that hugged every curve, a black pencil skirt that ended just above her knees, sheer stockings, and heels that made her legs look impossibly long. Her pink hair was styled professionally, swept to one side, and her blue eyes locked onto my bare chest before traveling slowly up to my face.

"Hello, sugar," she said in that warm Southern drawl that suddenly felt very different than it had nine years ago. "Can I come in?"

My brain short-circuited.

"Sure! Yeah. Sure." I grabbed the nearest shirt from my bed, fumbling with it like an idiot.

Smooth. Real smooth. Definitely didn’t sound like a nervous teenager at all.

Diane’s heels clicked against the hardwood floor as she walked further into my room, taking her time, her gaze moving across the space with deliberate slowness. She paused at my desk, ran one finger along the laptop, then turned back to face me.

I’d managed to get the shirt on but hadn’t buttoned it yet because my hands suddenly forgot how buttons worked.

The System notification flashed across my vision with all the subtlety of a fire alarm.

〘 EMERGENCY QUEST: Damage Control

Diane Fitzgerald has discovered evidence of your undisclosed ability. You have one conversation to convince her to keep this information confidential.

Time Limit: Duration of current conversation

Success Condition: Secure Diane’s agreement to maintain secrecy regarding Blitz

Failure Condition: Diane reports undisclosed ability to IHL authorities

Rewards:

→ 100 SP

→ 1x Bronze Gacha Pull

→ Diane Fitzgerald’s Trust: Established

Penalties for Failure:

→ IHL investigation into false registration

→ Potential criminal charges

→ Removal from Fitzgerald household

→ Diane Fitzgerald’s Temptation Gauge locked permanently

Quest cannot be declined. Timer starts now. 〙

Fuuuuuuck.

"So," Diane said, her voice light and conversational. "Tell me about your Aspect, sugar. The one you manifested this week. Phantom Touch, was it?"

I finished buttoning my shirt, buying myself three seconds to think. "Yeah. Telekinesis. Channeler-type. About fifteen feet of range, limited weight capacity. I can move objects with my mind." I kept my voice steady, casual. "You saw it yourself last night."

"Mm-hm." Diane tilted her head slightly, her expression unreadable. "Really."

That single word carried about seventeen layers of subtext, none of them good.

She walked over to my bed, her heels clicking with each step, and sat down on the edge. She crossed her legs, the movement drawing my attention to the way her stockings caught the morning light, then patted the space next to her.

"Come sit with me, Lukas."

It wasn’t a request.

I sat, leaving a respectful amount of space between us. My heart was hammering hard enough that I wondered if her Read the Room Aspect could detect it.

Diane pulled out her phone, tapped the screen a few times, then turned it toward me.

The video showed the training room. Time stamp from last night. And there I was, assuming the low stance, breathing in that specific pattern, then launching across the room so fast the footage blurred.

Blitz.

My second ability. The one I’d carefully avoided mentioning to anyone.

"Fuuuuuuck," I said out loud this time.

"That’s what I thought too," Diane said pleasantly. She let the video loop twice more before locking her phone and setting it on her lap. "So. Lukas, honey. You want to explain to me why you demonstrated a telekinetic ability last night but the security footage from three hours later shows you moving at speeds that would make most speedster-types jealous?"

My mouth went dry. "I can explain."

"I certainly hope so. Because right now it looks like you lied to me, to Sloane, and you’re about to lie to the IHL when we register you this afternoon." Her voice remained warm, almost friendly, but steel ran underneath it. "And lying to the IHL about your Aspect classification is a felony, sugar. They take that very seriously."

Think. I needed to think.

Option one: claim it was part of the same Aspect. Telekinesis with a speed component. Rare but not unheard of. The problem was that Blitz looked nothing like telekinetic movement. It was pure physical speed, a burst technique that had zero connection to moving objects with spectral constructs.

Option two: admit I had two abilities but claim I didn’t realize they were separate. Play dumb, lean into the late manifestation angle, suggest I was still figuring out what I could do. The problem was Diane wasn’t stupid and that excuse was paper-thin.

Option three: tell her the truth.

Yeah, that one was off the table entirely. Hi Diane, I’m actually a transmigrant with a gacha system that gives me abilities in exchange for seducing women and I groped your ass last night because a quest told me to. How’s your morning going?

Option four: make her want to keep the secret.

That one had potential.

"You’re right," I said. "I lied. Both abilities are real. I have telekinesis and I have the speed burst. Two separate things."

Diane’s eyebrows rose slightly. She hadn’t expected me to admit it so quickly.

"Go on."

"I didn’t tell you because I was scared." Not entirely a lie. "Late manifestation at seventeen is already weird enough. Late manifestation with two abilities? That’s the kind of thing that gets you dragged into a lab for testing. Or recruited by agencies before you’re even licensed. Or targeted by people who want to figure out how it happened."

"So you decided to hide one."

"I decided to register the one that wouldn’t make me a target." I looked at her directly. "The telekinesis is useful. The speed burst is the kind of thing that makes people ask questions I don’t have answers to."

Diane studied me for a long moment. Her Read the Room Aspect was probably feeding her all kinds of data about my emotional state right now. Elevated heart rate. Genuine fear. Desperation. All true, all detectable.

"Why should I keep this secret?" she asked. "You’re talking about committing registration fraud. That reflects on me, on my agency, on Sloane. If it comes out later that I knew and didn’t report it, my reputation takes the hit alongside yours."

"Because you care about me," I said. "You took me in when my parents died. You’ve spent nine years raising me. You’re not going to throw me to the IHL wolves over this."

"Don’t presume to know what I will or won’t do, sugar."