Chapter 49: Three hundred and thirty-eight Partners.

Other people might not care, but Lorcan’s fans loved teasing him, and silly nicknames like "When will you bottom?" flew across the screen. Lorcan was speechless and helpless, so he just let his fans have their way.

After reading out the list of people who had sent gifts, he started the game.

Today’s mission was to go deep into the bug nest. Lorcan picked a small-calibre pistol and crept through the dark, deep underground, nerves on edge. The deeper he went, the darker it got, and countless raspy rustling sounds echoed all around. But Lorcan was a seasoned player and stayed calm, and he quickly found the mission target.

He hid behind a big rock, attached a scope, and was about to aim and fire when a sudden sharp pain shot through his chest. His heart started racing for no reason, and he felt so dizzy that he could hardly see the screen.

His vision slowly blurred, and the computer screen shrank to a tiny blue dot. Then everything went black, and he knew nothing more.

In a daze, a voice seemed to whisper in his ears.

"Welcome, host Lorcan Hayes, to the binding with this system. This system is an NPC role-playing system for tragic lead stories. You will play the part of the flirtatious, aloof Third Prince Fionn from the novel Lost Stars. Please study the character’s personality carefully and fulfil the novel’s plot. When your role-playing score reaches 60%, you will be rewarded with a chance at rebirth..."

Amid the eerie mechanical voice, Lorcan’s head throbbed with pain. He groggily opened his eyes and caught sight of silky silver hair, shining with a bright gloss. Lorcan reached out, and the long hair slipped through his fingers, cool to the touch.

"Uh..."

A sound came, and then his fingertips touched warm skin.

Lorcan was suddenly startled.

He was holding someone in his arms, a strikingly handsome man.

Beneath them was an overly soft bed, bigger than any Lorcan had ever seen, large enough for seven or eight people to lie on, like the bed of a CEO or young master in a classic romance novel. White curtains hung around the bed, and the room was far too big, with a ceiling ten metres high, a size no modern builder would ever use.

...A dream?

Lorcan reached out and brushed the silver hair back from the man’s forehead, then took a light breath. The face under the silver hair seemed to have grown to match his tastes, with azure eyes like the sky and sea. The forehead was covered in fine beads of sweat, and even the lifted neck was incredibly beautiful. The body was also exactly in Lorcan’s ideal range, with well-defined chest and stomach muscles and smooth, beautiful calves, like a carefully crafted doll.

Lorcan thought, Did the saints find my wish too hard to grant, and just pick a dream lover for me in my dream?

With this face, this body, this beautiful waist and these calf muscles, and he was still a zero?

He still wasn’t fully awake, but the silver-haired beauty smiled softly. He leaned close to Lorcan and said in a hoarse voice, "Your Highness, are you satisfied with what I have done?"

Lorcan: "...?"

Your Highness?

Role-playing? Did this dream come with a script?

Seeing his silence, Oisín’s expression cooled slightly. But thinking of his family and his career, he pushed down his discomfort and rolled off the bed onto the floor.

"Your Highness," he said, placing one hand on his chest and kneeling on one knee in a proper knight’s salute, dignified and elegant. "Please allow me to offer the wealth of the Collins Family in exchange for the chance to stay by your side."

Where Lorcan couldn’t see, his smile faded completely, his face went blank, and a bitter smile touched his lips.

Everyone knew that men were fickle and unfaithful, and there was no such thing as staying by someone’s side forever. Once he was deeply marked and their pheromones were tangled together, Oisín knew exactly what his fate would be, and he was ready to face it.

At this point, he had no other choice.

Dream or not, it was strange to see a silver-haired beauty kneeling in front of him like a knight.

Lorcan had no odd tastes, so he reached out to pull him up. "Please, stand up first."

But Oisín said, "Please let me stay by your side."

He spoke in a stiff, fancy way. Before Lorcan could reply, his vision blurred and a blue screen appeared before his eyes.

A cold voice said, "Hello, Host. Please say no."

Lorcan froze.

Say no?

He hadn’t spoken, but 016 seemed to hear his thoughts. "Say no to Oisín’s request and read these lines."

A short line of text appeared.

"Head of the Collins Family, Iris Major General of the Third Army, I understand what you want, and your offer interests me. But if you want to stay with me, you must show me more sincerity."

The line was so fancy that Lorcan wondered if he was stuck in some old-fashioned fantasy game.

66 seemed to notice his confusion. It quickly explained the binding and the mission. "You must play the Third Prince, Fionn, and follow his story. When you finish, you’ll get a chance to be reborn."

It added, "To keep this small world stable, try to score above 60 points."

Lorcan had played games like this. In some of them, if you acted too far out of character, you got thrown out.

Oisín had been kneeling for a long time. As the silence dragged on, his heart sank lower and lower. Then the Third Prince spoke slowly, his voice thick and sleepy. "...I understand what you want... but I need to see more sincerity."

So he had been turned down.

Oisín gave a silent, bitter smile.

He had already given himself to this man, and from now on he could not answer the pheromones of any other. If that wasn’t sincerity, what was?

Still, he had expected it. This man knew Oisín had nowhere to run, and he would keep pushing until he had taken everything from the Collins Family.

But Oisín showed none of this. He looked at Fionn with what seemed like deep devotion and bowed. "I will show you my sincerity."

Lorcan’s skin prickled with goosebumps.

It felt like a novel or a game. The beautiful man in front of him was like a puppet. He said his lines with full feeling, but his eyes stayed empty, as if he were performing for someone watching a screen.

Lorcan looked at the screen. A new line had appeared. "The scene is over. Tell Oisín to leave."

Lorcan breathed out. "I need to rest now. Please go."

Oisín picked up his clothes, bowed, and quietly left.

Only when he was fully gone did Lorcan relax and sink back into the soft bed.

The System appeared and cheered him on. "Your score is very high, Host."

Outside, 016 kept a cold, proud face for its new host. Inside, it was crying happy tears.

Look at him! A great host! He does what he’s told. Not like that Cian before, who asked too many questions and played both sides.

Lorcan was still dazed.

Anyone would be stunned after dying in the middle of a game and waking up with a System feeding him lines.

After the System explained, he understood the basics. Then it showed the novel on the screen. "This is the story you must follow. Please read it carefully."

The novel was over four hundred pages. Lorcan had barely finished the first lines of Chapter one when he suddenly patted his own face. His eyes darted around. He glanced down at his thighs, lay back, and pulled the blanket over his head.

What was going on?

Then Lorcan whispered, "So... were we doing that just now?" His voice sounded a little hopeful.

Had his twenty years as a wizard finally ended?

When he woke up, he’d been dizzy. His chest still hurt, and nearly dying had left his mind foggy. He remembered an unfamiliar touch that felt kind of nice, but the details were blurry. Only after reading the novel did he realise that they had only just begun.

After a pause, it said, "Yes?"

Lorcan’s face went bright red, and his neck too.

The System had a bad feeling.

"Why are you blushing?" it asked. "Haven’t you done it before?"

You have 338 partners. You’re a big player. Why act shy now?

He was a little annoyed. "Of course it’s my first time."

It felt trouble coming. Its processor was close to crashing. "But you have 338 lovers?"

Three hundred and thirty-eight lovers, and none of them ever...?

Lorcan was confused. "Three hundred and thirty-eight? Oh, you mean my fans? What does that have to do with my first time?"

"...Don’t they call you partner?"

Lorcan tried to explain it to the clueless System. "That’s how it works now. They call me partner, and they call other streamers partners too. Anyone can have a hundred partners and be called partner by a hundred people. It doesn’t mean anything.

It couldn’t understand modern relationships. It tried to calculate the chance that a very unfaithful person with countless lovers could still be a virgin. The answer was 0.003%. It began to doubt everything and crashed completely.