You get one life. That’s it. One shot. So why waste it living for someone else’s approval? Why cling to rules written by people too afraid to live? Do what makes you feel alive. Even if it’s wrong. Even if it’s ugly. Because in the end, there’s no prize for behaving. There’s only what you did—and what you didn’t dare to do.
Rex didn’t respond. Even though there was a dark, tempting truth hidden in the man’s words—something that tugged at the lonely corners of his soul—he held firm. After all, he had lived a whole previous life chasing approval, grinding through days without ever truly living, never even holding the hand of someone who loved him. It was a life wasted on survival, not experience.
And yet, he didn’t let the man’s sugar-coated nihilism seduce him. Not here. Not now. Because no matter how philosophical he made it sound, Rex knew exactly where he was—inside an exclusive mansion filled with elites, the very people who drained the life out of the world to fuel their endless appetite for power, pleasure, and domination. The rules they wanted to escape were the ones they themselves had bent and twisted to suit their games.
Yes, Rex was romantic. Yes, like any young man, he dreamt of love and passion and maybe even many beautiful women. But this? This was not love. Not even lust. This was a hollow parade of people chasing sensation because they had nothing left inside worth feeling. Women passed around like trinkets. Men trying to out-degenerate one another in a contest of apathy.
Just thinking about the scene disgusted him. Sharing bodies like borrowed clothes. Making out with women who looked as if their eyes had long forgotten how to focus. How many men had been there before him? How many after? He wasn’t a saint, but even his flaws had limits. Whatever he wanted from life, it was not this. Not this theater of rot dressed in silk. Official source is novel·fiɾe·net
His silence was his answer. And his revulsion, a quiet rebellion.
Not hearing his reply, the masked man chuckled softly—though it was less amusement and more an empty echo, like wind passing through a hollow shell. His eyes, hazy and unfocused, glinted with something unreadable. He didn’t seem to care that Rex had offered no response. Maybe he didn’t even register it. He turned to the man beside him—another masked figure, lounging like a statue—and without hesitation, leaned in to kiss him.
It wasn’t gentle. It wasn’t passionate. It was mechanical. Perfunctory. The kind of kiss that carried no soul, only habit. Flesh seeking flesh, not out of love or even lust, but sheer boredom. was just the next thing on a long, tedious list of indulgences.
The sight, so jarring and sudden, made his stomach turn. There was no beauty in it, no intimacy—only an absence. It was the human body used like a toy, discarded and passed along. Watching it made him feel like an intruder in a place where humanity had been stripped away and replaced with hollow pleasure.
He fought the urge to gag.
This wasn’t freedom. This wasn’t rebellion. This was what happened when people with too much power and too few boundaries confused decay for liberation.
This was rot masquerading as freedom.
And he wanted no part of it.
He slowly backed away, the thick fog parting for him like a shroud, as if the room itself was letting him go. His breath quickened, every nerve on edge. He didn’t dare look back—not out of politeness, but out of primal fear. Because deep down, he knew that if he stayed even a second longer, he might witness something even more degenerate, something that would burrow its way into his brain and never leave. Some part of him feared he’d stumble into a circle of masked figures chanting, or see a body not moving among the cushions.
Heart thudding in his chest, he slowly turned and began walking—then jogging—then damn near running back the way he came, desperate to find the clean lights, the distant music, the laughter that—while artificial—at least felt human.
He stumbled backward into the hallway, lungs dragging in clean air like he’d just broken through the surface of a polluted sea. His breath was ragged. He wiped his hands on his pants like he could scrub off the scent.
He hurried back down the corridor, feet echoing louder than before.
His brain screamed for a reset button, to erase all those disgusting images from his mind.
Every step away from that room felt like a step back into reality. But even as he put distance between himself and the lounge of excess, he couldn’t shake the mental images—glittering flesh, drugs on display, the glint of baby oil under golden light.
And then the worst thought crossed his mind.
What if he’d gone further?
He remembered the whispers. The conspiracy theories. The darker rumors—the ones about underground circles, rituals, sacrifices. The tales too twisted even for Hollywood’s eccentric standards.
He had always thought those stories were exaggerated. The rumors. The whispers of Hollywood’s darkest corners. He thought people just liked sensationalism. That it was all tabloid junk.
And the worst part? The party had only just started. Who knew what happened deeper into the mansion?
"What if," he whispered to himself, "that was just the welcome room?"
"I just came for a Hollywood party," he muttered. "How did I end up in a deleted scene from the devil’s afterparty?"
He wasn’t sure what rattled him more—the fact that this level of depravity existed, or the idea that for some people, this was just another Friday night.
Or maybe all of their parties are !?
The thought chilled him to his core. Who knew what else went on behind closed doors in this mansion—or in mansions like it around the world? He’d heard rumors. Whispers on forums, in conspiracy corners of the internet. Child sacrifices. Animal blood spilled on marble altars. Masked rituals under the guise of "performance art." People disappearing without a trace, their names quietly scrubbed from headlines, their last seen locations traced back to events just . It all sounded ludicrous then—just urban myths or deranged rants.
But now, he wasn’t so sure.
Because what he’d just seen? That wasn’t fiction.
And he had a feeling it was only the surface.
There were more doors. More rooms. More secrets.