Masteria Online: Shattering the Dark God's Grand Scheme-Chapter 120 - Worry Bait

Dr. Tenor gave Renan one last concerned look before he stepped out of the room. It was beyond obvious that the doctor thought he was making a rash, uninformed decision. He’d likely tell his mom about it, and try to get her to talk him out of it. Renan sat on the edge of the hospital bed, his mind racing through the conversation he was about to have.

There was no way around it. Unless he wanted to cause catastrophic issues, then to sign an AMA and be released, he would need to let his family know that Masteria was another world.

The thought sat in his stomach, weighing him down. It was the exact circumstance he had been avoiding. He never wanted to make this choice, he’d have preferred to delay the issue. Unfortunately, circumstances had forced his hand. There was no way that Renatta would ever agree to him leaving the hospital and going back to the same game pod that made him go unresponsive. That was, unless she understood the real issue, what really made him unresponsive,and the reality of Masteria.

She needed to know that what harmed him wasn’t the pod itself, but from what existed beyond it. A world where magic existed, souls could be damaged, and a Dark God existed. A world that was as real as the hospital room he sat in now. A world that he HAD to go into every day, or else.

Slam!

The door suddenly burst open, and Renatta Stone rushed in. Her face was a mixture of relief and barely contained panic. She looked exhausted, clearly from the lack of sleep he had caused her, and her eyes were red from the crying she had done. The moment she saw him sitting up, conscious and alert, she nearly collapsed.

"Renan!" She rushed to his side, her hands immediately heading to his face, checking him all over. She inspected his eyes, arms, chest, then looked back into his eyes. "Oh my god, Renan, you scared me so much! So much! I came to check on you and you were just lying there on the floor, completely unresponsive, I thought-"

"Ma, I’m okay." Renan tried to interject, but she wasn’t finished.

"-I thought you were dead! I kept shaking you and shaking you and you wouldn’t wake up, and your eyes were open but you weren’t seeing anything, and I called 911 immediately but it felt like hours before they arrived, and then they brought you here and they couldn’t tell me what was wrong, they said they needed to run tests but nothing was showing up and-"

"Ma." Renan said more firmly, taking her hands in his. "I’m okay. I promise. We do need to talk about something, though."

Renatta’s expression shifted from relief to confusion, her brow furrowing. "Talk? Renan, honey, you just fainted out of nowhere. Nobody knows whats wrong with you. The doctor said they want to keep you for observation, run some scans. They’re worried about your brain having a tumor, or perhaps a clot!"

"Ma, please." Renan stood up from the bed, and despite the lingering lag in his body, he managed to stay steady. "I need to show you something. But not here. Let’s head somewhere with a bit more privacy."

He glanced meaningfully at the corner of the room where he knew a camera was mounted. Hospital security cameras were standard and constantly recorded. What he needed to demonstrate couldn’t be captured on any surveillance footage.

Renatta followed his gaze, confusion deepening on her face. "Why... why do we need privacy from the cameras? Renan, you’re scaring me. What’s going on?"

Her mind was racing through possibilities. What could possibly be the case! Her son was a stable young man, he never did drugs, never got himself involved in drama, nothing!!

Then, what could be the case? Could it really be drugs? Had he gotten into something illegal and didn’t want to be exposed? Did he have some kind of illness whose symptoms he’d been hiding? The worry in her eyes was extremely obvious. Looking into those eyes, Renan felt a pang of guilt for what he was about to put her through.

"Just trust me," Renan replied softly. "Please. There’s a bathroom right here. Just give me a few moments to show you something, and everything will make sense."

Renatta hesitated, considering her options. Yet, she didn’t have any. If that was the only way her son was willing to talk, then she had to take it. Finally, she nodded. "Okay. Okay, five minutes."

They moved to the small private bathroom. It was made for one person, making two people entering awkwardly, but the key point was that it had no cameras.

Renatta stood there, clearly fearful of what she was about to hear. "Alright, Renan. What is this about?"

Renan reached into his pocket, pulling out a quarter. He held it up between them. "Watch closely." Yet when he had intentions of continuing, for a moment, just a brief moment, his mind stuttered.

Micheal-

He froze. His hand trembled slightly as he held the coin.

Why did I just think of himself as Micheal?

Micheal.

The name came to mind when he was thinking about his own actions. Instead of ’I’, it was ’Micheal’. 𝒻𝘳𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝘯𝘰𝑣ℯ𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝘮

Was it just a coincidence, since he had just been forced to hear that name a thousand times earlier? He hoped so, because the alternative was that the white-faced entity had left an imprint upon his very soul.

He forced the thoughts down. Right now, he could do nothing about it. The mystery of Micheal would have to wait. He had a more immediate problem to solve, and that was convincing his mother that magic was real. He just had to move onwards.

"Renan?" Renatta’s voice pulled him back. "Are you okay? You look pale."

"I’m fine," he said. "Just thinking things though." He held up the coin again. "Mom, I need you to take this."