The Spray of Desire

So the long-awaited Level 3 hypnosis item was...?

I let out a sigh of relief. Yeah. This is more like it. Unlike the Level 1 and Level 2 hypnosis items, this one actually looked promising. More than anything, it was a spray, and that alone put its practicality leagues ahead of any powder. Unlike powder, all I had to do was mist it from up close and the hypnosis would take. Wasn't that exactly what this was saying?

I was admiring the new item with a satisfied smile tugging at my mouth when a fresh plume of blue smoke curled up and another screen formed in front of my eyes.

This time there was enough new material to make the level-up feel worth it.

Enhancement and evolution. If any two mechanics were built to milk a wallet, these were them—second to none, and they'd be offended to hear otherwise. Even the names were comfortingly familiar.

I'd already read through Spray of Desire once, so I set it aside and tapped the option that had just unlocked.

A status window packed with a long block of text appeared, and beside it a second status window, completely empty.

By the time I'd read all of it, furrows had carved themselves into my brow. God, this is a headache...

I sorted it out in my head, one piece at a time. Enhancement, I understood well enough. Probability upgrades were an old companion, beaten into me by more games than I cared to count. Evolution was the problem. Read in context, it was a system built so you could use the hypnosis items your level was still too low to buy.

Right. I could see it had been made with good intentions. I understood that. And still—wasn't this stingy past the point of insult?

Even if I bought the Level 1 Powder of Goodwill and then ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠succeeded at every enhancement and the evolution in a row, I would have to spend 1,800 points. And that was the perfectly ideal case. What if an enhancement failed? What if the hypnosis item was destroyed even once, midway through an enhancement or an evolution?

The points required would double. Realistically, once I added the cost of buying the powder itself, I'd need to budget a comfortable 3,000 points or more before evolution was even possible. More than ten times the powder's price of 300 points.

The enhancement fee already cost more than the powder, and there was a destruction chance stacked on top of that. Let it break, and every point spent up to that moment simply vanished into thin air.

There was only one thing worth weighing. Was an evolved hypnosis item valuable enough—worth more than the points sunk into it—to justify swallowing risks like these?

I ran back through the description of Spray of Desire.

Spray of Desire. Easy to use, clearly, and a useful ability. But as for whether I could actually hypnotize someone with this power alone... honestly, I couldn't be sure.

No. It was impossible. Unlike the Powder of Fear, this thing had no ability to force its target.

I wavered for a moment, then made my decision. In truth, the conclusion had already been settled.

Isn't this exactly what I saved them for? You stockpile ammunition so you can spend it.

I tapped the empty status window floating beside the Enhancement / Evolution window. I'd vaguely expected some line like Enhance? to pop up, but there was no response at all.

Was it not working? Or was it an error?

Come on. I'd even braced myself to blow the whole stash, and now the mood was completely dead.

I tried shoving the blank screen. I even threw a punch at it. Then, all at once, I remembered buying the stimulant—more precisely, the moment I'd drawn it out of the blue screen. You stuck your hand into the dispenser illustrated on the display and pulled out, as a real object, a stimulant that existed only as a picture.

...Then the reverse ought to work, too.

I purchased Spray of Desire. The price was 300 points either way, so I'd simply chosen the highest-level hypnosis item.

Shhhk—

Buying a hypnosis item came without the fanfare of hauling something out of a screen. Blue smoke gathered over my hand and generated the object there.

The spray that formed on my palm was smaller than I'd expected. It was a single-serving empty bottle about as thick as my thumb—the kind you mist over junk snacks—with an uncolored flame sticker stuck to the side. I looked down at it for a moment, then held it sideways and slowly pushed it into the empty screen floating beside the enhancement window.

And just as I'd expected, the spray melted into the screen as an image, the same way the stimulant had when I bought it. A blue window bloomed open beside the picture.

450 points....

Still, the success rate was seventy-five percent. With a trembling hand, I pressed Yes.

The screen flickered for five seconds, flared bright and long once, then returned to what it had been. I opened the eyes I'd clenched shut against the glare, and a new description had appeared beside the image of the spray.

What is this?

Originally, the target only got worked up when they saw my face. Now, simply recalling it was enough to arouse them. And it wasn't only that—the intensity of the arousal itself had climbed. I'd expected it ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to get a little better and stop there. This was a complete upgrade, strictly better in every way.

"Huh..."

At this rate, it might actually be worth investing in. Wasn't this the kind of change that made one and a half times the points feel fair? If the law of equivalent exchange held, then it was worth putting points into.

I drew the enhanced spray back out of the screen, then fed it in again.

The enhancement text had said the first upgrade improved the effect, and the second improved the duration. I was planning to try for evolution anyway, so I pressed Yes without hesitating.

The odds had only been fifty percent, but the spray enhanced without a hitch. I checked the improved duration.

Four times.

The duration alone had stretched by a full fourfold. I'd taken the whole system for a rip-off, but this might actually be the best value I'd ever seen.

The corners of my mouth kept twitching upward. I stared blankly at the empty screen, then, as if something had taken hold of me, pushed the spray back in.

The line that had read enhancement changed to evolution, and the points consumed became 750.

The finger I'd been moving toward Yes out of sheer momentum stopped short. 750 points.... It did seem like a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠lot. And the success rate was only twenty-five percent....

But with a thing like this, once you were riding the feeling you had to keep your foot on the gas. Two successes in a row—so maybe the evolution, too?

I pressed down.

I watched the screen strobe through narrowed eyes, and the instant the light died I drew the spray out of it, a faint expectation rising with the motion.