Late at night, New York City, Midtown High School.
As the sky grew darker, this once bustling school inevitably became quiet.
At this time, an activity room was brightly lit, and four students, two boys and two girls, were playing poker inside.
"Hey, everyone, you haven't forgotten what we are going to do here, have you? It's almost twelve o'clock."
"Oh, come on, of course I remember. When the hour hand hits twelve, um, what do we do?"
"Mike, you are such an idiot. We need to light a candle and stand in front of the mirror. At midnight, we need to recite the spell and then blow out the candle. According to rumors, we will see something interesting. If you can't even remember something so simple, how can you say that you are a fan of the occult?"
"Hehehe, maybe Mike is here to find true love."
"No !"
Mike's dark face turned red, but fortunately, no one noticed.
To hide his embarrassment, he stood up and volunteered.
"I like this kind of mysterious stuff. I'll be the first to try it. You guys just watch from the side!"
The other three shrugged their shoulders, unconcerned.
They let him try to see if the "Man in the Mirror", a strange story that had recently become popular on the Internetwas real.
Seeing that it was almost time, Mike picked up a candle he had prepared earlier, lit it with a lighter, and stood in front of a full-length mirror.
Looking at himself in the mirror while holding the candle, he felt nothing at all and even wanted to laugh.
He wasn't interested in supernatural things.
He had joined the mysterious club just to impress girls and didn't believe for a second that he would see a distorted reflection of himself staring back from the mirror.
Mike made a face and turned to his friend.
"Help me check the time. Don't blame me if I miss it."
"Watching you, Mike. Hope you don't pee your pants."
Mike raised his middle finger in response.
At exactly twelve o'clock, the three onlookers shouted in unison.
Mike immediately blew out the candle in front of him.
He glanced at his ordinary reflection in the mirror, shrugged, and slowly turned around.
"Looks like we've been tricked again. Hey, what's with you guys ? Why those faces ?"
The three students stood frozen, their expressions twisted in terror, as if they had seen something unspeakable. One by one, they began to back away in fear.
In the mirror, Mike's reflection hadn't turned around. Instead, it remained facing them wearing a strange, unsettling smile.
"Ahhh!"
A piercing scream finally shattered the silence of the night.
"Haha, so it's true. Americans really do love flirting with death " a voice sneered.
A few hundred meters away, in the quiet of a security booth, Li Wei casually crossed his legs and took a slow sip of coffee, completely at ease.
Yes, the infamous "Man in the Mirror" legend had been entirely fabricated by him. A trick, designed simply to help him navigate this strange world with more confidence.
Two and a half months ago, Levi had arrived in this reality.
From the countless images plastered around of a man with a signature mustache, he realized he'd landed in none other than the chaotic world of Marvel.
Fortunately, he has a plug in.
Name: Li Wei
Talent:
1. Evil Belief : The more people know of your existence, the stronger you'll become.
2. Strange Body: Can transform into a strange body and can only be harmed by supernatural forces.
3. (Unlocked when reputation reaches 10,000)
Reputation: 6,078
Levi called this plug-in a reputation system. As long as he continued to improve his reputation, he could unlock new talents and become stronger.
Reputation was linked to the impression he left on people. The more people knew him, the stronger that impression would become, and the more his reputation would grow.
In the beginning, he was just an ordinary man trying to live cautiously. As more and more people came to know him, his strength began to surpass that of ordinary people, and he could now easily defeat ten adults on his own.
After discovering his second talent, he became bolder and discovered how to create strange and terrifying stories to increase his reputation.
After several experiments, he discovered that if he created these strange stories himself, the people who heard about them could bring him reputation points.
And so, "Man in the Mirror" was born.
It just so happened that Levi was a security guard at Midtown High School. He had heard that several students from the occult club were preparing for a mysticism session, and he had no choice but to help them.
As he listened to the screams that seemed to echo in his ears, Levi smiled faintly, stood up, and patted the shoulder of the old man sitting next to him.
"Old Martin, our shift is over."
"Is it that late already? Well then, let's go home and get to bed early."
"It's still too early. The nightlife is just beginning."
"It's great to be young. I miss those days."
Levi shook his head, took off his uniform, gave a farewell wave to the old man, who looked remarkably like Mr. Stan Lee, and left the school.
He returned to his rented apartment, took a relaxing shower, turned on the TV to create the illusion that someone was home, then transformed into a [ Strange Body ] and floated out of the apartment as usual.
In addition to being immune to ordinary attacks, the [Strange Body] also possesses a variety of abilities such as flight, invisibility, and possession.
It closely resembles a kind of ghost king that has no fear of the sun.
It also possesses a psychic corruption ability, anyone who looks directly at his [Strange Body] becomes mentally unstable, their sanity gradually decreases.
Levi flew through the night sky for a long time before landing at the shopping mall. When he came out, he was "fully armed," squeezed into a tight-fitting outfit and wearing a motorcycle helmet with dark tinted visor.
If someone tried to peer through the dark visor of the helmet, they would realize there was nothing behind it. No face. Just emptiness.
What followed was much simpler : He spotted a group of thugs who were in the wrong place at the wrong time, beat them senseless, told them to run back to their mothers, and seized their motorcycle.
Thus began the roleplay : [Headless Rider].
That night, countless hooligans out enjoying the shadows of the city were violently beaten. What truly terrified them wasn't the pain, it was the fact that their attacker had no head.
After dealing with yet another group harassing the weak, Levi politely returned the borrowed clothes and helmet, phased through a wall into a private house, and found a couple sleeping deeply in their bedroom.
A mischievous smile curled on his lips as he slowly drifted into the man's body.
The next second, the man sat up and stepped out of bed.
His wife, lying beside him, seemed to catch a faint noise, but didn't open her eyes. She simply turned over and slipped back into sleep.
Levi sighed with mild regret. He made the man leave the bedroom, walk into the office, boot up the computer, and post cryptic messages across several forums.
"Shocking! The Headless Rider appeared right outside my house! The photos don't lie!"
"Guys! I swear I saw the Man in the Mirror tonight. I'm terrified… what should I do??"
"Help!! My back hurts every morning. I think… I think my body moved on its own last night…"
Levi's ten fingers danced across the keyboard, leaving faint afterimages in the air as the keys clacked under a furious rhythm. He wrote with the zeal of a prophet, feeding the three urban legends he himself had given birth to.
Thanks to his previous groundwork, many users believed him. But naturally, the trolls weren't far behind.
Holding the keyboard like a righteous blade, Levi struck down mockery after mockery, scattering them like a lone hero facing an army.
Apparently, noticing her husband hadn't returned to bed, the wife finally got up.
She opened the office door, baffled, and found him furiously surfing forums in the dead of night.
"Why aren't you sleeping?" she snapped. "What the hell are you doing glued to that PC? You look full of energy… Come to bed. I'll drain you dry so hard, you won't be able to stand up again."
"…"
Levi slowly turned around. Standing there was a woman with a full, voluptuous figure and an air of dominance. He curled his lips into a sympathetic smile.
He could only apologize for the man who was possessed by him and was about to taste his wife. After all, she was the one who made the first move, wasn't she ?