The night after the vending machine incident still weighed heavy on Ethan's nerves. He had replayed the footage three times before falling asleep, marveling at how the world saw him as fearless when he knew he was simply… lucky.
Morning came quiet, too quiet. Even the cicadas outside his cheap inn window seemed hesitant to sing. Ethan rubbed his eyes, checked the phone, and frowned—the algorithm had triggered another "priority content" notification.
> [System Prompt: Engagement Surge Detected. Next Content Type – BLOOD.]
His stomach dropped.
"Blood? What the hell does that mean?" he muttered.
The Witch, sipping tea across the table, arched an eyebrow.
"The algorithm is hungry. If it demands blood, then blood it will find. Your job, cameraman, is to survive long enough to capture it."
Her words weren't reassuring.
---
That evening, the stream began. The title auto-generated by the system:
"Sacrifice in the Alley – Live"
[Chat]
ghostHunter77 : Sacrifice?? holy hell this gonna be good
streamQueen : last night vending machine, tonight BLOOD?? algorithm on fire!
Lurker99 : cameraman better not die fr 💀
luckyCharm22 : nah he's invincible, bet he walks away again lol
Ethan's grip on the camera tightened. Invincible… if only they knew.
The Witch led him through crooked backstreets where stray dogs barked at shadows. The air thickened, metallic, like iron in his mouth. Then—footsteps. Not theirs. Something scraped along the wall.
Out of the dark came a figure cloaked in shadow, jagged limbs swaying unnaturally. It rushed at Ethan first, ignoring the Witch entirely.
"Shit!" Ethan yelped, stumbling backward. His heel caught on a discarded glass bottle, sending him crashing sideways—just as the shadow swiped. Its claws ripped through the air where his throat had been a heartbeat earlier.
Glass shattered. Shards flew. One particularly sharp piece embedded itself into the shadow's form, drawing a hiss like boiling oil.
The Witch smirked.
"Do you see? Even the shadows trip over your luck."
[Chat]
knifeEmoji : HOLY THAT THING WENT FOR HIS NECK
blood4clicks : algorithm WANTED BLOOD—IT GOT BLOOD!!!
cameramanStan : BRO DIDN'T EVEN FIGHT, HE JUST FELL AND WON
skepticX : nah staged 💀 nobody that lucky
---
The fight wasn't over. The shadow lunged again, this time from behind. Ethan spun blindly, trying to keep it in frame. His hand knocked over a rusty pipe from a trash heap. The pipe toppled—landing perfectly into an old breaker box with exposed wires.
Sparks screamed. The live feed flared white for a second as electricity burst out. The shadow shrieked, dissolving into smoke.
Ethan's breath came ragged, half in terror, half disbelief. He pointed the camera at himself, whispering:
"Holy… It almost had me. Twice! If I hadn't slipped—if that pipe didn't fall—I'd be dead. This is insane… I'm not even fighting back, I'm just… surviving by accident."
[Chat]
bloodCultist88 : ALGORITHM IS PLEASED 🔴
ironLung33 : 😂 dude just tripped and summoned Thor's lightning
luckyCharm22 : invincibleeee cameraman confirmed
streamQueen : HE'S THE FINAL GIRL TROPE BUT A GUY 📹💀
The Witch stepped closer, her eyes glimmering with quiet satisfaction.
"The algorithm asked for blood. It received shadow blood, not yours. For now… that keeps you alive."
She turned her back, already leading the way to safer streets.
Ethan stayed frozen for a long moment, camera still rolling, before muttering to himself:
"I can't keep dodging death like this… can I?"
But deep down, a sickening certainty told him—he could. And the stream would never let him stop.
The more 'impossible' footage he captured - the shadows, the blood that wasn't blood - the faster the battery drained. It was as if the camera had to work harder to record reality bending. The card never filled, but the energy cost of capturing the supernatural was real.