Chris sat in his gaming chair, the glow of his monitors painting his face in a pale, anxious blue. He was doomscrolling, an activity he had perfected long before he had access to the universe's Reality System. But now, he wasn't just scrolling to pass the time. He was scrolling with a purpose. He was monitoring a legend. His legend.
The "Pothole Phantom" thread on the Upshur County Community Forum was like a living entity, a digital hydra that sprouted two new comments for every one he read. The praise was a heady, addictive drug, a kind of validation he had only experienced once in his life. He saw his anonymous, accidental acts of civic improvement being lauded as heroic.
"Whoever this Phantom is, they're a true patriot. Doing the work the county won't."
"My daughter drew a picture of the Pothole Phantom. It's a superhero with a steamroller for a hand. I'm putting it on the fridge."
He felt a warm, unfamiliar glow in his chest, a feeling he could only describe as a buff. He instinctively used [INSPECT] on himself.
[USER: Christopher Day]
[ACTIVE BUFF: [Public Adoration (Anonymous)] - Grants +10 Ego (Temporary). Effect degrades over time.]
The praise was a quantifiable, temporary boost to his own self-esteem. Every post speculating about the Phantom's identity made his skin crawl with the fear of discovery.
"I bet it's someone who works for a paving company in another county, doing it on the sly."
"My theory is that it's an old, retired road crew worker who just got fed up. A real man of the people."
The attention was a debuff warring with the buff.
[ACTIVE DEBUFF: [Paranoia] - Grants -5 Stealth to all public actions. User feels like they are being watched at all times.]
He was torn. The praise felt good, but the risk left him uneasy. His eyes kept flicking to the corner of his HUD, to the persistent, nagging reality of his actual goal. The [Scavenger Hunt] quest log was a stark reminder of his primary motivation.
[Refined Metal (Steel): 8.5/15kg]
The progress bar was more than half full, but it wasn't complete. The praise was nice, but the quest reward—150 XP and a permanent +1 to his Crafting Skill—was tantalizing. His desire to complete the quest won out over the fleeting warmth of public adoration and fear of discovery. He had to continue the operation. He had to finish the grind.
He minimized the Pothole Phantom thread, a difficult act of self-discipline. He spent the rest of the afternoon methodically scrolling through months of archived posts on the community forum, his fingers flying across his second keyboard. He wasn't just browsing, he was data mining. He used the forum's clunky search function, typing in keywords: "pothole," "crater," "tire," "alignment," "useless road crew."
The results were a quagmire of civic frustration. He found dozens of angry posts, each one a potential resource node. He began to compile a "hit list," opening each promising post in a new tab, creating a map of the town's most neglected infrastructure.
A post from three months ago, from a mother furious that a pothole near the high school had splashed muddy water all over her daughter's prom dress, was a prime candidate. A more recent one, from a man who claimed to have lost a hubcap in a cluster of holes on Main Street, was even better. He found a third, a long, rambling complaint about a "tire-eater" near the town park that had apparently been there since the Carter administration.
He used his [INSPECT] ability on the photos attached to each post, his new Tier 2 skill allowing him to pull detailed data from the low-resolution images.
The high school pothole:
[Resource Present: Rebar (Steel) - Approx. 2.1kg]
The Main Street cluster:
[Resource Present: Rebar (Steel) - Approx. 3.0kg]
The tire-eater near the park:
[Resource Present: Rebar (Steel) - Approx. 1.8kg]
He did the math in his head. 2.1 + 3 + 1.8. That was 6.9 kilograms of steel. He currently had 8.5. That would put him at 15.4 kilograms, just over the 15 he needed. It was perfect.
He pulled up Google Maps on his third monitor and began to plot the most efficient route, a loop that would take him from the high school to Main Street to the park, minimizing his time on the road. He was planning a farming run, optimizing his path between resource nodes to maximize his yield per hour. He wasn't just a guy trying to craft a lawnmower. He was an urban prospector on a mission.
That night, the house was silent. Chris moved through the darkness with a new confidence. The fear of his first midnight excursion had been replaced by the focused determination. He was the Pothole Phantom, and he had work to do.
He slipped into the beige SUV, the engine turning over with a quiet rumble. He backed out of the driveway and set off toward the empty streets of Buckhannon, his pre-planned route glowing on his mental map.
The first stop was the high school. The long, low building complex was dark and silent. He found the pothole easily, a nasty crater in the asphalt right at the entrance to the student parking lot. He pulled over, killed the engine, and got to work. The process was smooth, efficient. He opened the [System Functions Library], selected the [Extract_Material_From_Substrate] function, and filled out the form with a few quick mental commands. He deliberately ignored the little checkbox next to the "Void Fill" protocol note.
[EXECUTE]
The air shimmered. The low buzz filled his ears for a second. And then, silence. He checked the spot. A perfect patch of new asphalt. He smiled and got back in the vehicle. One down.
The second target was Main Street. The cluster of smaller holes was right in front of one of the town's hardware stores. The street was bathed in the orange glow of the streetlights, which made him feel a little more exposed, but the town was asleep. He repeated the process, the function executing flawlessly. Another perfect patch job. Two down.
The final stop was the town park. This was the darkest, most isolated location on his list. The park was a pool of blackness, the only light coming from his own headlights. He found the tire-eater, a massive, jagged chasm in the road that looked like it could have been caused by a small meteor. He felt a twinge of civic pride as he prepared to fix it. He was doing the town a service, even if his motives were entirely selfish.
He ran the function one last time.
As the familiar blue light shimmered over the massive pothole, a series of satisfying notifications chimed in his mind, a cascade of positive reinforcement.
[1.8kg Refined Metal (Steel) added to Inventory.]
[Total Acquired in Session: 6.9kg]
[Quest Objective Updated: Scavenger Hunt]
[Objective Met: Acquire 15kg Refined Metal (Iron/Steel)]
[Objective: Acquire 3kg Polymer (Plastic)]
[Objective: Acquire 1x Small Combustion Engine (Functional)]
[Objective: Acquire 2L Gasoline]
[Objective: Acquire 1x Spark Plug]
He felt a surge of triumph. He had done it. The most difficult part of the resource grind was over. The progress bar for the steel was full. His secret mission was a success. He had single-handedly acquired over fifteen kilograms of refined steel without spending a dime or leaving the county.
He turned the SUV around, the headlights sweeping across his final, perfect patch job. He felt a little guilty about using Pete's gas for his secret questing. On his way home, he saw the glowing, 24-hour beacon of a Sheetz convenience store. He pulled in, a lone vehicle in the empty parking lot. He swiped his own debit card and put ten dollars' worth of gas in the SUV's tank. It was the least he could do... and the most. He was pretty much broke.
The next morning, the Upshur County Community Forum was in a state of joyous hysteria. Chris woke up to his phone buzzing incessantly on his nightstand. He grabbed it, and his screen was a cascade of notifications. The forum had exploded.
The discovery of three more perfectly patched potholes on major town roads had confirmed it. The Pothole Phantom was real, the Phantom was on a mission, and the Phantom was incredibly, supernaturally efficient.
The praise was no longer just speculative. It was worshipful.
"I'm starting to think the Pothole Phantom is a wizard," one user wrote. "This is actual magic."
"The Pothole Phantom for President!" another post read. It already had over a hundred likes.
Another user, a tech-savvy college student, had created a shared Google Map, pinning the locations of the Phantom's four confirmed patches. Little pushpin icons dotted the map of Buckhannon. "I'm trying to find a pattern," the student wrote. "There seems to be no geographic logic. The Phantom strikes where the Phantom is needed most."
Chris stared at the map, at his own secret journey from the previous night plotted out for the whole town to see. The legend of the Pothole Phantom was now cemented in Buckhannon folklore. He was a myth. He was a local hero. He was also a guy who desperately needed to find three kilograms of scrap plastic.
Just as he was basking in the warm, anonymous glow of his newfound fame, he saw a new post appear at the top of his feed. It was a shared link from the official "Mayor of Buckhannon" Facebook page. It was a new, official statement. His blood ran cold.
He clicked the link. The statement was a masterpiece of impotent rage disguised as civic concern.
"It has come to the attention of my office," the Mayor's post began, "that an unknown individual or group has been performing un-permitted, unregulated, and potentially dangerous rogue paving on county roads. While we appreciate the civic spirit of any citizen concerned with our infrastructure, these actions are illegal. This 'Pothole Phantom,' as they are being called, is a vigilante, operating outside the law and undermining the authority of our dedicated and hard-working county road commission. We are using all available resources to identify this individual and will prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law."
The post was a declaration of war. A war on good deeds. A war on perfectly patched potholes. A war on him.
Chris immediately used his [INSPECT] ability on the Mayor's official statement on his phone screen. The data window was stark and unambiguous.
[Author: Mayor Bob Thompson]
[Current Mood: Furious, Publicly Humiliated]
[Active Goal: Identify and prosecute the "Pothole Phantom" by any means necessary.]
Chris stared at the screen, a wry, tired smile on his face. He had successfully completed the most difficult objective of his quest. And in doing so, he had just become the number one enemy of the most powerful man in town.
Again.