Human-Face Sore
Have you ever heard of the human-face sore?
It parasitizes the human body, feeding on its host's desires to survive.
1
At first it was just a little itch, then a small bump appeared. I thought it was a pimple and didn't take it seriously. By the time I noticed something was wrong, it had already grown to the size of an egg...
I went to the hospital for a checkup. They said it was a fibroma and recommended surgical removal.
But I refused. I asked the doctor to prescribe some medication instead, so I could try treating it at home first.
Surgery would require hospitalization, and I couldn't afford that kind of time.
I was a livestreaming sales host—I earned money by the second. How could I waste time lying in a hospital bed?
A fibroma wasn't anything serious. I'd try medication first and see how it went. If it didn't work, I'd consider other options later.
2
Before becoming a livestreamer, I was a delivery driver, zipping around the city in my beat-up minivan every day.
One day, while crossing a bridge, I saw a girl about to jump into the river. Without thinking, I dove in and saved her. Someone filmed the whole thing and uploaded it online—within hours, I was famous, a viral sensation.
A friend suggested I capitalize on the attention and start selling products on stream. Just for fun, I opened an account.
On my very first stream, I made hundreds of thousands. The "hero who saved a life" label brought in a massive wave of traffic.
Looking at the numbers in my account, it felt like a dream. How many years would I have had to deliver packages to earn that much?
I took my family out for a feast at the most expensive seafood restaurant in town. I bought my wife designer clothes and imported toys for my son—things we'd never even dared to dream about before.
From then on, I was hooked on livestreaming. Every day, I studied how to drive traffic and boost sales...
Soon I had my own team, and I was thriving in the industry.
That was when that damned fibroma appeared. The doctor wanted me to have surgery, but how could I? Interrupting my streams meant losing who knows how much money...
So I tried medication first, hoping it might just disappear on its own after a while!
3
At first, I was too busy to go to the hospital. Later, I lost interest entirely...
Because my traffic dried up—and fast. In this era of relentless change, viral moments fleet by in a flash.
Without traffic, there was no money. The freefall sensation was like dropping from the clouds to the ground... Under those circumstances, who had the mental bandwidth for anything else?
That night, exhausted, I went to take a shower. When I took off my clothes and stood before the mirror, I froze in horror... The thing on my chest had grown even larger without my noticing, and it looked disturbingly like a human face.
I rubbed my eyes, thinking I was seeing things.
No mistake—that was definitely a face! On this "face," there was a nose, eyes, and a mouth!
I was terrified and tried to claw it off. Just then, it opened its eyes and spoke to me in a measured tone: "Don't be afraid, my friend! I won't hurt you—in fact, I can help you make lots of money!"
On my chest, a strange face had grown. Not only did it have human features, it could talk!
Good lord, even fairy tales wouldn't dare go this far! It was only later that I learned this thing was called a human-face sore—a parasite that attached to the human body and fed on its host's desires.
I stood before the mirror, stunned for a long time before I found my voice. "You—how can you help me?"
"You've lost your traffic, haven't you?" It smiled faintly. "Follow my instructions, and we'll bring the traffic flooding back!"